Reading Recommendations: Might As Well Laugh About It Now, Marie Osmond with Marcia Wilkie

The last time life was simple for Marie Osmond was minutes before she was fitted for a designer gown to wear on her television debut at age three. Since then, her days have been a combination of charmed moments and challenging hours, hilarious episodes and heart breaking events. "I started the school of life experience early", says Marie, "and discovered that its unpredictable lessons could be both surprisingly good and genuinely difficult."

After losing decades of journals in a 2005 house fire, Marie writes out her most vivid memories and influential experiences, the public and the very personal, as true life stories for both her own children and her countless fans, whom she has always considered to be "family".

The beloved super star opens the door to her thoughts on many of her milestones and missteps, career pressures and expectations, her phenomenally popular line of collectable dolls, marriage and divorce, depression, weight issues, tough choices, and the incredible joys and challenges in being a working mother raising eight children.

Marie's resilience and familiar humor will have every reader feeling at home as she imparts her insights on surviving the school of life and graduating with a degree in unstoppable optimism.

And

On a hot and beautiful day in the English countryside, six year old Joanna Mason witnesses an appalling crime. Thirty years later, the man convicted of the crime is released from prison.

Sixteen year old Reggie works as a nanny for a doctor devoted to her new son. But Dr. Hunter has gone missing, and Reggie, no stranger to bad luck and worse, seems to be the only person who is worried.

Detective Chief Inspector Louise Monroe is also looking for a missing person, unaware that hurtling toward her is an old friend, Jackson Brodie, himself on a journey that becomes fatally interrupted.

As lives and histories intersect, as past mistakes and current misfortunes collide, Jackson is caught up in the most personal, and dangerous investigation of his life.

"Kate Atkinson simply starts her story, grabs hold of the reader and doesn't let go", writes Janet Maslin of the New York Times. This novel amply confirms her status as one of the most inventive and delightful writers at work today. A real page turner!

And

After the emotional roller coaster ride of dealing with infertility, Kate and her husband, Jon, rejoiced in the birth of their twin daughters. Three years later, she was pregnant again, with sextuplets. Their quiver was filling fast, a little too fast, and being happy wasn't exactly their first reaction.

"I blinked hard and then stared at the bright screen positioned slightly to my right. There was no mistaking what I saw, yet I was in a state of denial. My doctor began his fateful count. One--aaah. Two--Ok. Three--now I was scared. Four--I started sobbing hysterically. The chill of reality washed over me as I watched my husband, my best friend, cheerleader, and storehouse of strength, slowly drop to his knees at the count of five--but the count continued.

And so it began. Though encouraged to consider selective reduction, both for the sake of Kate's health and to increase the babies' chances for survival, the Gosselins opted to play the hand God had dealt them. They accepted the six miraculous blessings and all the challenges that came with them.

This then is their story, one the reader won't soon forget.

See you at Rylander!