Anne of Avonlea by L.M. Montgomery

Rating: 5.0

What it's about:
Anne of Green Gables is all grown up--almost. At sixteen, Anne has transformed from student to teacher, and she's the new big sister to seven-year-old twins, quiet Dora and mischievous Davy. A grumpy new neighbor has moved next door, and Anne's best friend, Diana, is falling in love.Despite all these changes, she's still the same fun, impulsive Anne--a romantic dreamer with a redheaded temper. -taken from Barnes&Noble.com

My thoughts:
I am really enjoying re-reading the Anne of Green Gables series as an adult. Anne of Avonlea is the second in the series. In it we see Anne as a girl of 16 who is almost as precocious as she was in the previous book. She's grown up a little though and has become the school teacher of Avonlea. She learns some of life's lessons throughout the book and by the end has become quite a young woman. This series is so charming and beautifully written. Anne's imagination is truly contagious. When I finish one of the books I can't wait to start the next.

Survival of the Sickest by Dr. Sharon Moalem

Rating: 4.0

What it's about:

Was diabetes evolution's response to the last Ice Age? Did a deadly genetic disease help our ancestors survive the bubonic plagues of Europe? Will a visit to the tanning salon help lower your cholesterol? Why do we age? Why are some people immune to HIV? Can your genes be turned on—or off?

Survival of the Sickest is fi lled with fascinating insights and cutting-edge research, presented in a way that is both accessible and utterly absorbing. This is a book about the interconnectedness of all life on earth—and especially what that means for us. Read it. You're already living it.

My thoughts:

Survival of the Sickest is an interesting and thought provoking book about disease. The author takes a handful of diseases, for example diabetes and favism, and looks at them from an evolutionary perspective. She shows how some of the diseases we have today might have actually been a good thing for our ancestors. "Evolution likes genetic traits that help us survive and reproduce-it doesn't like traits that weaken us or threaten our health (especially when they threaten it before we can reproduce)." If diabetes helped our ancestors survive the last ice age, those genes would have been passed on in reproduction. Dr. Moalem definitely makes sense in Survival of the Sickest. It gets a bit scientific in parts though and a little hard to digest. After reading this book I won't look at hereditary disease in quite the same way.