People can be so nice. Offering to help out, listen to problems, make a difficult task easier. Perhaps create a celebration in your honor for an achievement, organizing a party and inviting friends and family. How nice to be thought of!

But what if you don't want a party? Don't feel successful? Need some time to yourself to think and try to make decisions about what to do next? In The Graduate by Charles Webb, that's how the book starts. Benjamin Braddock just graduated from college and has received a scholarship to continue into a teaching program for two years. But now he doesn't think that's what he wants to do. He knows he doesn't want to attend the party his parents are throwing for him. Then he falls into an affair with his father's business partner's wife - the seductive Mrs. Robinson. To further complicate matters, when Ben becomes enamored with her daughter Elaine, Mrs. Robinson is both jealous and fiercely protective.

Radical and provocative when it came out in 1963, The Graduate delves into disillusionment, sexual revolution, discordance, and non-traditional relationships.

Thank you Stephen King. Thank you for publishing a book this year that is not over 800 pages.

Joyland is (to me at least) a return to "classic" King. It's 1973 and college student Devin Jones needs a summer job, and a change. His girlfriend makes it clear that she'll be working in Boston - without him. But never fear, there are openings to work at Joyland amusement park in North Carolina! Sure it's a kind of a tourist trap that sells fun and employs an assortment of newbie workers and seasoned carnies. Maybe cleaning up after kids who get sick on rides isn't the greatest job. And having people put their trust in you to run rides, from the ferris wheel to the bumper cars, based on some very short training is pretty nerve wracking. But there can't be anything real about a murdered girl haunting the funhouse. Or can there?

I had fun reading Joyland and I suspect King had a good time writing it. Ghosts, carnies, creepy underground tunnels, old school rides, a mysterious woman, a visionary boy, and a great off-season storm make for spooky reading goodness. Oh, and a fantastic book cover from Hard Case Crime publishing!

So many books, so little time. My "to read" list on Goodreads continues to grow (currently 547 titles). I realize it's most likely I won't get to read them all, but I love to have choices. Sometimes I browse through my list and a title I marked a year or two ago catches my eye - I think "Ooh, time to read that one!". Sometimes it's a book I've been waiting to see published.

I picked up one of my new titles a couple weeks ago, Amity & Sorrow by Peggy Riley. A debut novel, the book begins with a mother, Amaranth, driving her daughters away from their home. We learn that they were all part of a cultist religious compound, the father having fifty wives, the only education for the children is what they are told - no reading, radio, TV, etc. While Amaranth became close with several of her sister wives, her husband was changing from a devoted leader to a fanatic zealot.

Her daughters Amity and Sorrow know no other life, though Amity has a sense that there has been a serious wrongdoing. Sorrow becomes completely distraught and withdrawn at her separation from home and family. Neither is aware that their mother is trying to save them an unenlightened and dangerous life.

Told in varying chapters by Amaranth and Amity, it's rather scary to realize how indoctrinated they are, but it does make sense that they would do and believe what they've been told in such a narrow and controlled world. I would suggest this book if you liked reading Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer, or followed the TV series Big Love.