Canadian Lakes Safety

BY ROGER STOBERT

MOBILE WATCH COORDINATOR SPANKKY@CHARTER.NET

CANADIAN LAKES MOBILE WATCH (MW) held the 2021 Appreciation Golf Outing and Picnic on Wednesday, August 25, for the Mobile Watch volunteers and for the Canadian Lakes Safety officers to demonstrate the community’s gratitude for their good work. Their daily patrols, constant vigilance, and assistance help to make our community safe and promote the well-being of our residents.

Canadian Lakes Safety and the Mobile Watch would like to thank the more than 100 volunteers who attended the picnic. Canadian Lakes Safety and the Mobile Watch would also like to give a special thanks to Dennis and Georgette Zywica, Tom Gawenda, Gene and Fran Maloziec, Chuck Adams, Roger and Tracie Stobert, Casey Smith, Bill Hull, and the maintenance and custodial teams for their assistance with the picnic preparations, conduct, and cleanup. Thank you, Diane and the deli staff, at Hixson’s Family Market for the extra effort under difficult conditions. As a result, great food and fellowship were had by all.

Our deepest gratitude is also extended to the following sponsors for their generous support of the Mobile Watch. Through their benevolence numerous prizes were presented to the MW volunteers:

Rev. Tom Keef gave the invocation. Rob Mickey, former Canadian Lakes Safety Director, Paul Szymkowicz, CLPOC Board President, and Harold Wolf, CLA President, were guest speakers recognizing the Mobile Watch for their volunteer service to Canadian Lakes.

Dennis and Georgette Zywica, Ken and Kathy Towne, and Barb and John Cruden were inducted into the Mobile Watch Decade Club, joining the other 57 previous volunteers who have been in the MW for ten years or more. They were presented with a certificate and recognized for their service, sacrifice, and dedication to the Mobile Watch and Canadian Lakes. Their faithful efforts are a tribute to their conscientiousness and compassion for the community and their fellow residents. It is with gratitude and pride that we honor and thank them along with the previously inducted MW Decade Club members.

Finally, we wish to give special thanks to all the Mobile Watch volunteers, including the area captains, backup captains, and patrollers, who make the Mobile Watch possible. Their continued contribution and support help to ensure the safety of our community.

If you believe the safety of your community is important and are interested in becoming a prestigious Mobile Watch volunteer, please contact Roger Stobert, Mobile Watch Coordinator, 231-288-0148 or spankky@charter.net.

BY JOYCE B. WILCOX

What do two professional assassins, three recently relocated British households, a 16-year-old Montana homesteader in 1918, a film star and her special needs nephew, and a former NFL third-string quarterback from Cleveland have in common? Let’s read and find out, shall we?

If you’re looking for an explosive thriller that manages to hit it out of the park this fall, look no further than The Hit. This espionage extraordinaire captures at lightning speed throughout each well-crafted chapter. With his complex characters, twisting turns of events, and close encounters of the clandestine kind, this is Baldacci at his very best.

This page-turning, action-packed thriller contains not one, but two incredibly skilled assassins working for the U.S. government and traveling around the globe executing their solo missions. Jessica Reel and Will Robie have been equally trained to be proficient and professional in their pursuit of evil. Enemies of the state have much to fear from these two until Reel inexplicably turns rogue and sets her sights on members of her own agency. Why did she turn? Who will be her next target? Robie is given a new mission of bringing in Reel, dead or alive. The two are pitted against each other as secrets are slowly revealed, other assassinations occur, and the safety of the entire world is threatened. A perfectly paced plot with captivating characters, the reader is entertained and entranced from first sentence to finale. The Hit is a hit.

Although the title sounds as though this book is an autobiography, Kerry Fisher has actually crafted a captivating mainstream novel of fiction about three women experiencing life’s challenges during early adulthood. Written from the alternating points of view of each of the women, the plot is well-developed, easy to follow, and spellbinding. Taking place in England, this compelling read is seasoned with intriguing plot twists, dashes of colloquial British expressions, and sprinkles of delightful humor.

As these three families simultaneously move in as neighbors, the reader

is presented with their developing friendships and their overlapping interactions, as well as their relentless struggles in life. Kate is an EMT and a divorced mother trying to start fresh with her teenage daughter as they attempt to escape Kate’s past. Gisela is married to a successful small businessman and seems to be living the perfect life as a stay-at-home mother of two teenagers. Sally and her husband, while married ten years and childless, appear to be enjoying life with their respective careers as they travel the globe. But all three families have secrets. As their friendships evolve, their secrets unravel and the reader is riveted. Kerry Fisher definitely knows the secret to writing a good book and she’s telling.

If you’re looking for a quick, comical read with a touch of quirky, why not sample this out-of-the-courtroom and onto-the-football-field fiction by John Grisham? With the beach reads tucked away in the sandbox, perhaps some fine fall fluff is just what the librarian recommended before transitioning into the heavier book jackets of winter. Try on John Grisham’s departure from the courtroom for size and see how this football farce fits.

The field is set as Rick Dockery’s life is forever changed after his horrendous performance as the called upon third-string Cleveland Brown quarterback in the final minutes of the AFC Championship game. In three passes he single-handedly causes his team to lose their 17-point lead, the game, and their chance to play in the Super Bowl. As Dockery struggles to recover from injuries, he finds that he’s been cut by the Browns, shunned by other teams, threatened by fans, and forced to leave the country—and that’s chapter one. The fun begins as Dockery accepts a contract as quarterback for the Panthers of Parma, Italy. Never mind that he’s never been to Europe or that he doesn’t speak Italian. His world soon evolves into all things Italian from parmesan to pigskin. This includes an introduction to modified American football games complete with want-tobe football teammates working other day jobs and a translator in the huddles echoing the calls. Did I mention the deliciously described multi-course meals following all practices or the vivid tours of the historic and picturesque countryside? While Playing for Pizza is not Grisham’s usual legal thriller, it is his nineteenth novel, proving that he is an author who can still deliver even when it’s pigskin pizza.

Well-known for her strong characters, her wit, and her warmth, Lorna Landvik’s background in stand-up comedy and acting is ever present in her voice as a writer. As one of her biggest fans, I’m thrilled she continues to entertain us from the written page as well as from the stage. With Welcome to the Great Mysterious she has proven that she can handle depth to her characters, while offering a small-town perspective to life’s bigger issues.

Geneva Jordan is a sensational star of stage, screen, and television living a New York life of luxury and excess. She is also the sister of a fraternal twin, aunt to her sister’s only child, and that child’s godmother. Geneva finds herself on an unexpected hiatus from work when she is summoned for a command performance in Minnesota to look after her 13-year-old nephew who has Down syndrome, while her sister and husband travel abroad. What follows is Geneva’s adventure into reality like no other as she learns how to come out of the spotlight and bask in the glow from the heart of a special needs child. Landvik assists Geneva, as well as her readers, with understanding all that is truly important in life, all the while permitting us to laugh as we learn.

While reading this remarkable work of historical fiction you’ll find yourself saying things like, “I’m not sure if I could do that,” “I know I couldn’t do that,” and “there’s no way you could get me to do that.” But Hattie Big Sky does all that and more at a very young age. Modeling Hattie after her great-grandmother’s incredible life journey, Kirby Larson brings history to life in this true coming of age novel. With a compelling and unfolding plot accompanied with a knack for placing the reader in the action on the page, Larson has created big fans with Hattie Big Sky.

The story begins in 1917 when Hattie is 16 years old, and the reader discovers that she has been orphaned since the age of five and shuttled from one older relative to the next. Currently living in Iowa with a distant cousin, life hasn’t been easy as no one can afford to keep and raise an extra child. One day, Hattie unexpectedly receives a letter informing her she has inherited her little-known uncle’s homestead claim in Vida, Montana and summons the courage to strike out on her own. She boards a train, heads west, and takes on the world. Her inheritance includes a drafty shack, an outdoor privy, a cow, and 320 undeveloped acres of land. She also discovers that in order to secure the claim she has 10 months to accomplish the following tasks: cultivate and harvest 40 acres, set 480 rods of fencing, and pay the required fees. And yes, Hattie has arrived in the middle of nowhere in January where it is 40 degrees below zero with several feet of snow already on the ground. Relentless complications, endearing friendships, unforeseen tragedies, and unparalleled perseverance, all peppered with the author’s sense of humor, make this novel an extraordinary tale.

The answer to my previously asked question as to what links these individuals is actually your choice. Either it’s an incredibly diverse guest list of people to be invited to your next dinner party, or to be on the safe side, my suggestion to you would be that they become the characters you invite into your home when you read and enjoy these five recommended books.