Sunday Salon: Books to Start Out the New Year

Welcome to the Sunday Salon where bloggers share their reading each week. Visit The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer and It's Monday: What Are You Reading by Reading Date. 

I haven't gotten much read over the holidays, but am into at least three different books that I pick up at random, in between chores. 

Had to drive in to Chicago at 3 a.m. the other day to get our guests to their connection at O'Hare Airport. The sleet storm that followed canceled all or most flights, so we stayed over and cocooned indoors looking out at the Windy, Sleety City that had suddenly gotten cold, as winter is supposed to be. Our visitors finally made it out of Chi Town on New Year's Eve.

No new books in the mail....I did get to the library and found two books with an Asian theme to start out the new year.

The Girl Who Wrote in Silk by Kelli Estes, published July 7, 2015 by Sourcebooks Landmark.

Inara Erickson is exploring her deceased aunt's island estate when she finds an elaborately stitched piece of fabric hidden in the house. As she peels back layer upon layer of the secrets it holds, Inara's life becomes interwoven with that of Mei Lein, a young Chinese girl mysteriously driven from her home a century before. 

Through the stories Mei Lein tells in silk, Inara uncovers a tragic truth that will shake her family to its core — and force her to make an impossible choice.
Inspired by true events, Kelli Estes's brilliant and atmospheric debut serves as a poignant tale of two women determined to do the right thing, and the power of our own stories. (goodreads)

Sisters of Heart and Snow by Margaret Dilloway, published April 7, 2015 by Putnam.
The award-winning author of How to Be an American Housewife ( see my 2011 review) returns with a story of estranged sisters, forced together by family tragedy.
Rachel hasn’t returned  home since being kicked out by her strict father after an act of teenage rebellion. Drew, her younger sister, followed her passion for music but takes side jobs to make ends meet. When their deferential Japanese mother, Hikari, is diagnosed with dementia and gives Rachel power of attorney, Rachel’s domineering father, Killian becomes enraged.

In a moment of lucidity, Hikari asks Rachel for a book in her sewing room, and Rachel enlists her sister’s help in the search. The book—which tells the tale of real-life female samurai Tomoe Gozen, an epic saga of love, loss, and conflict during twelfth-century Japan—reveals truths about Drew and Rachel’s relationship that connects them in ways that turn their differences into assets. (goodreads)

I missed Dilloway's second book, The Care and Handling of Roses With Thorns, a novel about the art of rose breeding, published in 2012, but am adding this to my list of books to read in 2016.

These are the new books I'm starting out with this new year. How about you?