"White Bread" by Aaron Bobrow-Strain was a short but interesting social history of how white bread came to dominate in America by playing on people's fears about cleanliness and then how, 100 years later, it has now fallen out of vogue for more "rustic" bread.
I watched the movie "Cheaper By the Dozen" a few weeks ago (the original with Myrna Low and Clifton Webb, of course) and it put me in the mood to reread Frank Jr. and Ernestine Gilbreth's happy memoirs of their youth. I actually (much to my surprise) own "Cheaper By the Dozen", so I was able to pull it off the shelf and reread it. Alas, I don't own the sequel, so I'll have to get it from work. But if you've never read their books, they are good fun. Frank and Lillie Gilbreth married and had 12 children. Frank was a time management engineer, and Lillie was a psychologist. Together, they combined their amazing talents and ideas into making businesses and families more efficient. Some of their methods are still being used today. I weep like a baby every time I get to the point in the book (and the movie) when Frank Sr. dies.
"Time Out for Happiness" by Frank Gilbreth Jr. was a book I didn't know existed but my library had. Awesome :) He apparently wrote a few other books after "Belles on Their Toes" with his sister. This book was a loving tribute to his parents, detailing how they met and married and started their family. After their father's untimely death, he tells of how his amazing mother carried on their work single-handedly while finishing to raise their brood, how she amassed honors and degrees the world over for her tireless efforts, and how she was still going strong at 80. Frank clearly saw his mother as an amazing, fearless woman and it was a lovely book.
Carol Ann Harris, Lindsey Buckingham's ex-girlfriend, dishes the dirt about Fleetwood Mac during the "Rumours" and "Tusk" years in "Storms". Now this was what I wanted to read about when I read Ken's book on making Rumours. She talks about the partying and the craziness and how Lindsey's physical abuse finally forced her to leave after being with him for 8 years. It was definitely interesting.
"The Queen's Vow" by C. W. Gortner was very dense. It took me awhile to get through it. It's a novel about Queen Isabella of Castile, someone I know very little about, other than being Queen Catherine of Aragon's mother. Isabella certainly doesn't come off looking very good, since she expelled the Jews from her kingdom in 1492 (the same year she financed Christopher Columbus's expedition to the Americas) after centuries of peaceful co-existence (oh, and after she borrowed money from them to finance her costly crusades to expel the Moors). Not cool, Isabella. Just not cool. I know, I can't judge someone based on the mores of our day, but still, it's hard not to.
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