Book Reviews - Santee Lakes, CA

Since we have a lot of time to read – what a joy that is!!!! Quiet and no worries about work to distract focus from the plot. We scour thrift shops, used book stores and even pay full discounted price for paperbacks at CostCo. Luckily, in Santee, CA the library had a used book retail section that sold books for as low as $0.75. And, on Fridays even those were half-price. Needless to say we picked up a lot there. Occasionally, we meet like-minded readers in the RV parks and exchange our “read” for “unread” with other campers; getting introduced to “new” authors along the way.

Over the years, Boots has maintained a 4-page list of books/authors we are still looking to read – that doesn’t include any of the classics or factual books we throw into the mix on a regular basis. We store the library under our bed. As time has gone on, we are weeding out other stuff to allow for more space for our books.

So, we thought we’d include some reviews that might interest you in reading some authors you might not have tried before or like in the case of Anna Karenina some classic that you might want to skip.

Stieg Larrson’s trilogy: Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Girl Who Played With Fire, and Girl Who kicked The Hornet’s Nest.
Even though we haven’t finished the 3rd book of the series, the author had us hooked in the first few sentences. He is very good at the story telling part and the main character’s story is amazing. These are not easy books to read, in that the main character has a hard life and even harder response.

The mystery and dialogue keeps the reader wanting more. Conversations, meals, dog walks, etc. etc. etc. are ignored for the hours it takes to finish a book. Really, we craved each page and then the next book. We had mistakenly bought the Girl Who Played With Fire first. As soon as Ruthi read the first page, it was clear there was an earlier book. So, we went off to CostCo to get Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. That was how good the author was at hooking you immediately.

We have been looking for the paperback version of the 3rd book both because of price and ease of reading. Except for the outrageous price (and size, for that matter) of the paperback large print version, only hardbacks were available. In one used book store, we did find a European English version of the 2nd book in paperback. Ruthi’s sister, Betty, is sending her copy for us to read – YEA! So, now, we await Girl Who kicked The Hornet’s Nest in the mail, to finish the trilogy.

Unfortunately, the author has passed away. While there is reportedly another book by him near completion, we think this may be all there is. The 3 books have been made into Swedish movies, we think only the 1st one is an American film – none of which we have seen yet.

Why Boots didn’t like Anna Karenina: While it was interesting to read the history of Russia during that period, the character of Anna was incredible annoying. It was difficult to sympathize with her and Boots was relieved when Anna finally killed herself. Whereas; Boots found the Levin/Kitty love story to be much more appealing. She thought Levin was the most admirable character in the book. An aside, the characters addressed each other by their full names and the wives took the husband’s name and added an “a” at the end. Anna married Alexei Alexandrovich Karenin and became Anna Karenina.

Laundry - Santee Lakes, CA

Laundry is one of the challenges of full-time RVing. While some rigs do have their own washer/dryer combination, we opted not to do that. Sometimes the campsites do not allow that amount of water/power consumptions. The RV machines are combinations and do small loads rather inefficiently with respect to resources. The dryer part can usually take a very long time compared to regular machines. So, we have traded off that convenience for conservation.

Most campground facilities are relatively inexpensive ($1.25 wash/$1 dry) and conveniently located throughout the camp. The biggest negative is that other patrons do not always know how to wash; or dry for that matter. Too much softener in the machine carries over to the next few loads. If there isn’t a lot of usage for a particular machine the standing water (that which has not been totally drained) will be stale at best; stagnant at worse.

Ruthi will be sniffing her way from machine to machine selecting the best. Luckily, we do not have much in the way of laundry 1 load a week at most. We have separated the collection bags (hot water verses cold water) and minimized any color-running items (i.e., no more “red” sweatshirts that make all “whites” into “pinks”). Then there is the water quality. Some rustic campgrounds have their own water that is rich in hard minerals.

This wouldn’t be a problem if the campground had informed us of the situation but they didn’t (buyer beware). So, after ruining a few of Boots’ shirts (favorite, of course), we asked about the water and were informed that the iron content was pretty high. So, we were off to the town Laundromat from then on. Why couldn’t they have just mentioned it? It’s not like they are making a fortune off the 4 machines (2 washers, 2 dryers) they have in the room.