New Hampshire plus July's books

I did a fair bit of reading in July. Still haven't reviewed it all. You know the drill. I love talking book so if you see something interesting talk to me.

Light from Uncommon StarsSF/F

Sacrifice mystery

The Night Women mystery

Lander LGBT, SF

Bravely historical YA (tie in to the Brave movie)

Wretched Waterpark middle grade supernatural mystery

Inhuman YA SF

Silver Under Nightfall vampire fantasy/LGBT

When Blood Lies historical mystery

Vinland Saga Omnibus, Vol. 12 historical manga

Leaving Mass for New Hampshire and back again:

I realized too late that when I planned to go from Fall River to Salem NH to see the America’s Stonehenge, I originally was going to Lizzie Borden’s house the night before and never took a second look at the distance/time. It was nearly one hundred miles and 1 ½ hours to get there so there was no way I could do the house tour. I wouldn’t even leave Fall River until 12-12:30 so I settle for finding Lizzie’s parent’s place, Maplecroft and the cemetery and just doing a drive by viewing.

I had in mind that Fall River was a smallish village, you know like Cabot Cove or something. I was so damn wrong. It’s a huge town of nearly 100,000 people. It IS old, filled with Victorian homes and very narrow roads. I did find Lizzie’s place, got a partially obstructed pic (because there are cars and people everywhere) I accidentally took the neighbor house instead of Maplecroft (honestly the neighboring home was prettier). I could have walked all over taking pictures of the beautiful homes in this place. I was happy I opted out of doing the Fall River ghost tour which would have been up and down some really steep hills. I need to see what if anything I can do to strengthen my knee in that respect.

I found the cemetery easily. I found two separate Borden clusters but as far as I could tell neither were Lizbeth (which is what she wanted to be called and what’s on her tombstone) and that branch of the family. I did find some other interesting graves but saw it was 11 AM so I really needed to get on the high way…and my GPS fails. It says the address for my next destination doesn’t exist. I try just the town, same, zip code, same, type in America’s Stonehenge nothing. Well Dad had given me his older GPS which is still newer than mine (I have no luck with Ways on my phone it spends half the time going ‘lost satellite’) and HIS gps has the same issues.

I try calling my parents to see if I somehow copy and pasted the address wrong and Mom’s phone was doing what MINE was before it totally died, making a call and dropping it immediately. I try and try. I say fuck it and aim for Salem MA and see if I can figure this out tomorrow, just flip flop my plans. But ten miles later I have to pee bad and need caffeine so I pull into the insane amount of Dunkin Donuts they have all over RI and MA. After I pee and fuel up with a brown sugar cold cream I try the GPS again thinking maybe just maybe that cemetery was a total dead spot. This time dad’s gps hit on the name America’s Stonehenge and I’m off.

Right into Boston traffic. OMFG. There are too many people in New England. All I really wanted at this point is to go home and live where there aren’t so many people. It almost doubled my 1 ½ hour of trip. I eventually get to the America’s Stonehenge (yes I put in two links to give a fuller picture). I haven’t been there since I was like 12 and it was called Mystery Hill. It is now the heat of the day thanks to all the delays. It was a miserable time, heat wise. I was drenched with sweat, could barely hold my cane it was so wet and couldn’t peel my shorts down to pee. I felt awful and hadn’t the foresight to get a sports drink ahead of time (got it after)

That said the actual site was nice. I didn’t think about how far it was a half mile. Technically it would be a granny trail since it was wood chipped the whole way BUT there was ups and downs with lots and lots of roots and rocks. I did it without much trouble or pain and I was damn proud of myself. What I didn’t do which disappointed me - I didn’t read that much of the four page info map they gave us because of the heat. I took pics of all the numbered things. I read them after the fact. It was just too hot to stay outside and try to read it (the heat index was 104).

I was also disappointed that in the short video (I don’t know if the map says anything) that they did NOT address what the earliest owners of the site did. One of them was one of the earliest saviors of this site but he was convinced that Irish monks were behind this site. I will say it’s not impossible the Neolithic builders made it across the ocean to make this place because there is definitely that feel to it (having been to those sites in Wales and Ireland) It’s also possible that Native Americans did something that looked similar and it could also be Colonial. The archaeology here is sketchy thanks to those early owners who did fake ogham etc. on some of this which was ignored by the modern placards. It’s like own it, explain it, don’t pretend it didn’t happen.

Not much has changed in the terminology from 40 years ago. It was still the oracle chamber (and you had to walk through it. I loved that) and the ‘sacrificial altar.’ I doubt that. I truly do. One we don’t have a lot of evidence that the neolithic people were doing this and if these were Irish monks they sure as hell wouldn’t be. Could it be a grooved Native American sacrificial site? Maybe but more likely it was a lye stone or a cider mill.

Regardless I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the traffic to Peabody less and with all due respect to any locals, Peabody on Newbury street sucks. There is a barrier on the road (permanent) so you have to go up and down the road to get to a cross over and the gps was lagging so I was passed the turns by the time it said turn. I wanted an Italian restaurant less than .1 mile from my hotel. 35 minutes later, I gave up. I went to the pizza place next door but they only have full pies. Nope. I almost walked to Wendy’s. Instead I try again to find the place I want. Fail again. Circle back and then notice the other Italian place (literally they’re 500 yards from each other) has Chris Petroni (see him on Foodnetwork) making their menu. I pop in there had rigatoni with pepperoni. It was good, not great. I stagger home, got the phone working, went for a swim. I find out later Bertucci’s is a chain and is known for being pretty average.


( Stonehenge and more )