Books outside my comfort zone

Top ten Tuesday, books I read outside my comfort zone. I found all enlightening. For others click here.

This one caught me by surprise. I liked it, but it was disturbing. It was the first book I read that mentioned a girl's reaction to learning about menstrual cycles.

This one I didn't enjoy. It took a bit to finish it and I decided that was all it wanted to read. Didn't go on to next ones.

This one caught my curiosity as it was heavily promoted. It gave me an insight into a woman's mind. I found it was mostly complaining about being a woman and how horrible it is. The idea of a zipless fuck was interesting, but when the moment arrived she turned it down.

I was teaching 7th and 8th grade Language Arts and literature. All the girls were reading this book and sniggering about it among themselves. APS had a number of parents insisting the book be removed from the libraries. Librarians automatically bought Ms. Blooms books because they were wonderful young adult stories. I naturally decided to read it to see what all the fuss was about. 
To me was a rehash of Fear of Flying. 

Irene Blea is a close friend. We met at Southwest Writer's Workshop and Writer's 2 writers. This book is based on the discovery of women's bodies buried on the West Mesa in Albuquerque. Seven women and one fetus were subsequently unearthed. No one has been charged with these crimes. She spent years meeting the families of the women. She wrote this story in honor of their mothers and the deceased. 
In Old Town Treasure House Books allows authors to have book signings. Whenever  Irene holds one it is wall to wall people. When signing this book a number of the mothers were there and it was very emotional.
This book is about a mother with a daughter she's not heard from in over a year and doesn't know how to contact her. Behind her back wall is where the women are discovered and the city starts excavating the mesa behind her house. 
The mother spends the rest of the book worrying that one of the bodies might be her daughter and then relives all the choices she made while raising her. It was difficult to read the continued angst, but the women who's daughters bones were discovered most likely understand every word of the story.

This was Irene's first novel. It's based on her aunt's life. Before this Irene wrote textbooks for women's studies.
Set in early 1900's in rural New Mexico Suzanna is a thirteen year old girl whose family sells her to a wealthy landowner to be his wife. It wasn't easy to read about a child having to marry a man old enough to be her grandfather. I rooted for her as after having as much abuse by him as she could she takes a leap of faith and leaves him not knowing what her future will hold.