The Fifteen Wonders of Daniel Green

I just finished this book.

I know.   Great accomplishment!

Well, for me, it was.

My reading trends have been stagnant lately.  I see books that I want to read, and I just can't sit and do it.  I can't focus long enough to read consistently for a long period of time.

And I mean for more than 10 minutes at a time.

It was that bad.

I was tired of checking out books on Overdrive and not finishing them.  

I thought maybe if I went to Barnes and Noble with Megan and bought some books at the 50% off sale, and if I could have the real book in my hands and turn the pages rather than reading on the Nook, that it would help.

But really what it took was coming to Myrtle Beach and losing all of the distractions from home.

I was reading a Karen Kingsbury book, Two Weeks, when we left, and I finished it the first night we were in MB.  I was disappointed in the book, mainly because I really enjoyed listening to Karen K at the Women of Joy weekend, and I really wanted to like her book.  

But I didn't.

It was too predictable, to pat, too pious, maybe?  I just didn't like it.  The characters, even though they had flaws, were too good.  Does that make sense?  
 The Fifteen Wonders of Daniel Green is one of the B & N books that caught my eye as I was browsing the 50% off tables.  Why?  The focus was on a farming family, a couple and their two children, and a young man who created crop circles, secretly, in fields while working as hired help on another farm.  

Farming.  Get it? 

As soon as I started the book, I was intrigued.  I liked the plot.  I enjoyed the character development.  I liked the style of the writer.  Each chapter was titled with the name of one of the main characters:  Nessa.  Daniel.  Molly.  Even though other characters drifted their lives, the focus was on these three.  Their individual chapters told the story through their eyes, from their perspectives, as the various facets of the plot affected them, and how they were reacting to the crises they encountered either individually or as a family.

This was the author's first book.  She is young.  Married.  A dog mom.  Has a Law Degree from Harvard.  But she is also an associate fiction editor at Pangyrus, which makes the connection to this work.

My first instinct when I finished the book on this Friday evening as I was stretched out on the couch in the condo at the resort was to toss it in the bag and pull out another book that I had brought along.  But I didn't.  I wanted to just sit and absorb what I had read.  Let it all sink in.  Enjoy the moments.

Maybe this book was just what I needed to put reading at the forefront of things i like to do for fun!  We shall see.