If It's a BOOK, Let's Have It

 WOW!  What an incredible book....this was my 2nd time listening to this amazing book and I found it just as compelling as I had the first time. It tells the story of a young woman - Elizabeth Holmes - who starts her own blood testing company at the age of 19.  She wants to Help People, but somewhere along the line, her values got all twisted and she got caught up in a web of lies, deceits, power, money, and self aggrandizement.   MANY people - powerful people - fell under her charismatic spell and her vision for testing people's blood from a single drop of blood.  No needles needed.  Only that is not what happened at all.  The machines didn't work and she continually lied about that.  She lied about them being FDA approved, about them being used on the battlefields of Afghanistan, about the results of the tests, about how far along they were in testing the machines; just lies, lies, lies.   The work environment at her company - Theranos - wa...

  Four stars.  I really enjoyed listening to this book - until the last couple of chapters.  The ending was disappointing to me. But, before then....it's the story of a young Chinese girl sold into slavery so her mother can give her brother an education after the father dies.  It's also a story of the lot of women - both poor women and wealthy women....subserviant to their husband and his wishes.  It's also a story about having their feet bound.  Which women THOUGHT made them more appealing to a man and a future husband.  It's such a cruel cruel tradition and yet it persisted for so many years. There are two main characters in this story: Lingjing - the rich pampered lady and Little Flower, her servant.  It's a story of jealousy, talent, poverty, pride and it is also a love story.  Both women end up, after a series of unfortunate circumstances, in dire circumstances.  Both are doomed to live a life of poverty working in a silk factory ow...

  Delightful Book; but a total fairy tale! The story takes place in a small town in Washington.  It involves an Octopus who talks and also gets out of his cage at night collecting items lost on the floor of the aquarium.   The main human characters are Tova - a 70 year old lady who cleans the aquarium.  Her 18 year old son died mysteriously and her husband died of cancer.  The other main Character is Cameron - a 30 year old who was abandoned by his mother when he ws 9 years old.   Through a series of impossible circumstances, Cameron learns that Tova is his grandmother.   I give it 4 stars as it was just a fun, pleasant read.  Nothing heavy, which was a nice change.