Tag Archives: books

Welcome to Mailbox Monday!

Mailbox Monday is a place to share all the wonderful books that have come to live in your home– including paper books, e-books and audio books.

Mailbox Monday was started by Marcia, who is now blogging at A girl and her books. When Marcia was ready to move on from being the weekly host, she was kind enough to set up the Mailbox Monday Blog Tour, August’s host is Staci at Life in the Thumb.

As for my mailbox:

Books for review:

UnderDogs by Markus Zusak

(I looked for a better description, but couldn’t find one anywhere.  This one is on the cover flap, the Scholastic web site, Goodreads, and so on)

Before THE BOOK THIEF, Markus Zusak wrote a trilogy of gritty, funny, and at times heart-breaking novels about the Wolfe brothers: THE UNDERDOG, FIGHTING RUBEN WOLFE, and GETTING THE GIRL. We’re proud to present these novels together in one volume for the first time, and to be introducing American readers to THE UNDERDOG, never before published in the United States. Fans of THE BOOK THIEF won’t want to miss reading the novels that launched Markus Zusak’s stellar career.

The Exquisite Corpse Adventure by National Children’s Book & Literacy Alliance

With Jon Scieszka, Katherine Paterson, Shannon Hale (Goodreads Author), Gregory Maguire, Lemony Snicket, Kate DiCamillo, Natalie Babbitt, Susan Cooper , M.T. Anderson, Megan McDonald, Linda Sue Park, Patricia McKissack, Fredrick McKissack, Steven Kellogg, Nikki Grimes, Jack Gantos

(Audiobook from Brilliance Audio)

It all starts with a train rushing through the night. . . . Well, actually, it starts when Jon Scieszka, former National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, writes a cliff-hanger episode and passes it on to the next member of a cast of celebrated writers and illustrators, who continues the story and passes it on. And what happens between episodes one and twenty-seven? Think werewolves and mad scientists, a talking pig, plenty of explosions, a blue Star Wars lunchbox, two meatballs, a whole army of villains and varmints, and one just plain bad egg. Not to mention our heroes, eleven-year-old twins Nancy and Joe, raised in a circus, who must find the pieces of a Top-Secret Robot in order to rescue their parents before . . . tick, tick, tick!

This Dark Endeavor: The Apprenticeship of Victor Frankenstein by Kenneth Oppel

(Audiobook from Brilliance Audio)

Victor and Konrad are the twin brothers Frankenstein. They are nearly inseparable. Growing up, their lives are filled with imaginary adventures…until the day their adventures turn all too real.

They stumble upon The Dark Library, and secret books of alchemy and ancient remedies are discovered. Father forbids that they ever enter the room again, but this only peaks Victor’s curiosity more. When Konrad falls gravely ill, Victor is not be satisfied with the various doctors his parents have called in to help. He is drawn back to The Dark Library where he uncovers an ancient formula for the Elixir of Life. Elizabeth, Henry, and Victor immediately set out to find assistance in a man who was once known for his alchemical works to help create the formula.

Determination and the unthinkable outcome of losing his brother spur Victor on in the quest for the three ingredients that will save Konrads life. After scaling the highest trees in the Strumwald, diving into the deepest lake caves, and sacrificing one’s own body part, the three fearless friends risk their lives to save another.

Your turn

What came in your mailbox this week? Let me know, then go to Life in the Thumb to check out others!

Welcome to Mailbox Monday!

Mailbox Monday is a place to share all the wonderful books that have come to live in your home– including paper books, e-books and audio books.

Mailbox Monday was started by Marcia, who is now blogging at A girl and her books. When Marcia was ready to move on from being the weekly host, she was kind enough to set up the Mailbox Monday Blog Tour, August’s host is Staci at Life in the Thumb.

As for my mailbox:

Books from the publisher:

Close Your Eyes by Amanda Eyre Ward

I was on Twitter a couple of weeks ago when @atrandom started teasing us with news of their Secret Read, an upcoming book that had them delighted.  When we gave in and asked for details, they wouldn’t tell us, but would send us a copy!

For most of her life, Lauren Mahdian has been certain of two things: that her mother is dead, and that her father is a murderer.

Before the horrific tragedy, Lauren led a sheltered life in a wealthy corner of America, in a town outside Manhattan on the banks of Long Island Sound, a haven of luxurious homes, manicured lawns, and seemingly perfect families. Here Lauren and her older brother, Alex, thought they were safe.

But one morning, six-year-old Lauren and eight-year-old Alex awoke after a night spent in their tree house to discover their mother’s body and their beloved father arrested for the murder.

Years later, Lauren is surrounded by uncertainty. Her one constant is Alex, always her protector, still trying to understand the unraveling of his idyllic childhood. But Lauren feels even more alone when Alex reveals that he’s been in contact over the years with their imprisoned father—and that he believes he and his sister have yet to learn the full story of their mother’s death.

Then Alex disappears.

As Lauren is forced to peek under the floorboards of her carefully constructed memories, she comes to question the version of her history that she has clung to so fiercely. Lauren’s search for the truth about what happened on that fateful night so many years ago is a riveting tale that will keep readers feverishly turning pages.

The Gap Year by Sarah Bird

Each month, TLC Books hosts a Book Club of the Month Contest, where one (or more) book clubs can win up to 10 copies of an upcoming book for their members.  (Sign up to get the monthly e-mails).  I thought this book looked interesting to me and the members of one of my clubs, so I entered– and one!  I have 8 copies, waiting to distribute.

Cam Lightsey, lactation consultant, is a single mom, a suburban misfit who’s given up her rebel dreams to set her only child on an upward path.

Aubrey Lightsey, a pretty, shy girl who plays clarinet, is ready to explode from wanting her “real” life to begin.

When Aubrey meets Tyler Moldenhauer, football idol of students and teachers alike, the fuse is lit. Aubrey metastasizes into Cam’s worst teen nightmare: full of secrets and silences, uninterested in college. Worse, on the sly she’s in touch with her father, who left when she was two to join NEXT!—a celebrity-ridden cult—where he’s a headline grabber. As the novel unfolds—with emotional fireworks, humor, and edge-of-your-seat suspense—the dreams of daughter, mother, and father chart an inevitable, but perhaps not fatal, collision . . .

Your turn

What came in your mailbox this week? Let me know, then go to Life in the Thumb to check out others!

Welcome to Mailbox Monday!

Mailbox Monday is a place to share all the wonderful books that have come to live in your home– including paper books, e-books and audio books.

Mailbox Monday was started by Marcia, who is now blogging at A girl and her books. When Marcia was ready to move on from being the weekly host, she was kind enough to set up the Mailbox Monday Blog Tour, August’s host is Staci at Life in the Thumb.

As for my mailbox:

Books for review:

Every Step You Take: A Memoir by Jock Soto

Pretty much the only dancers I know anything about are those on So You Think You Can Dance, so I jumped at the chance to widen my knowledge.

Jock Soto, one of the greatest ballet dancers of our time chronicles the unique circumstances of his extraordinary career, his life among other legends of dance, and his background as a half-Navajo, half-Puerto Rican gay man struggling to succeed in the straight white world of the arts. Regarded as the greatest ballet dancer since Baryshnikov, Soto has achieved a level of success and fame enjoyed by few. Ballet aficionados will be familiar with Soto from the award-winning PBS documentary, Water Flowing Together, which chronicled his life and career. Now, lifelong dance adherents and causal fans alike will have the chance to hear the captivating story of one of the world’s greatest living performers.

Murder Most Persuasive by Tracy Kiely

After the death of Elizabeth Parker’s great-uncle Martin Reynolds, the family’s house in the picturesque Maryland town of St. Michaels is sold. When the new owners dig up the pool, they find the body of the man thought to have run off eight years earlier after embezzling over a million dollars from the family business.

This grisly discovery not only unearths old questions about what really happened to the stolen money, but it brings Detective Joe Muldoon bac k into the family’s lives. Eight years earlier, Elizabeth’s cousin Ann reluctantly broke off her relationship with Joe due to family pressure. Ann always regretted that decision and now fears that it is too late for her and Joe–especially after she becomes the main suspect.

In a clever and entertaining story with echoes of Jane Austen’s Persuasion, Elizabeth tries to not only match wits against a killer who’s had an eight year head-start, but to also try her hand at matchmaking.

Hell and Gone by Duane Swierczynski

After barely walking away with his life from a shootout that will go down in Hollywood history, ex-cop Charlie Hardie discovers things can, in fact, get even worse. He is kidnapped by a team of team of undercover operatives and forced to stand guard over an underground prison that houses the most dangerous criminals on earth.

Or so he’s told. As Hardie goes deeper, and finds himself behind bars, he begins to wonder: who is running the asylum and are the good guys the ones behind bars or the ones walking the halls? But, Hardie knows that the world outside hasn’t stopped and that his family is in peril as he languishes in this pseudo-prison.

Soon, Hardie is plotting a desperate escape that will visit a Pandora’s box of mayhem upon the state of California. He’ll make some new enemies. But he’ll take care of many more. Because nobody does justice like Charlie Hardie. And if you threaten his family, you better believe there’ll be hell to pay.

A Single Shot by Matthew F Jones

After the loss of his family farm, John Moon is a desperate man. A master hunter, his ability to poach game in-season or out is the only thing that stands between him and the soup kitchen line. Until Moon trespasses on the wrong land, hears a rustle in the brush, and fires a single fateful shot.

Following the bloody trail, he comes upon a shocking scene: an illegal, deep woods campground filled with drugs, bundles of cash and the body of a dead young woman, killed by Moon’s stray bullet.

Faced with an ultimate dilemma, Moon has to make a choice: does he take the money and ignore his responsibility for the girl’s death? Or confess?

But before he has a chance to decide, Moon finds himself on the run, pursued by those who think the money is theirs. Men who don’t care about right and wrong and who want only one thing from John Moon: his body, face down in a ditch.

Take a Chance on Me by Jill Mansell

This isn’t exactly a review book, it’s a thank you from Sourcebooks for responding to a survey they e-mailed out. Jill Mansell’s an author I’ve been meaning to try for a while, so I’m thrilled to receive this.

Cleo Quinn doesn’t have a great track record when it comes to men, but now Will’s come along she’s optimistic. Handsome, attentive and an absolute gentleman when it comes to her questionable cooking skills, he could be her Mr Right. Things are definitely looking up for Cleo… apart from one small problem with a rather large ego. Johnny LaVenture, sculptor extraordinaire and her childhood adversary, is back in Channing’s Hill and tormenting Cleo as if he’d never been away.

But life never goes to plan, does it? Johnny isn’t the only one stirring up trouble and, for Cleo’s family and friends, all kinds of sparks are starting to fly. If you think you can put the past behind you, think again…

From Brilliance Audio

Now Playing(Stoner & Spaz II) by Ron Koertge

Ghetto Cowboy by G. Neri

Your turn

What came in your mailbox this week? Let me know, then go to Life in the Thumb to check out others!

Welcome to Mailbox Monday!

Mailbox Monday is a place to share all the wonderful books that have come to live in your home– including paper books, e-books and audio books.

Mailbox Monday was started by Marcia, who is now blogging at A girl and her books. When Marcia was ready to move on from being the weekly host, she was kind enough to set up the Mailbox Monday Blog Tour, August’s host is Staci at Life in the Thumb.

As for my mailbox:

Books for review:

The End of the Wasp Season by Denise Mina

When a notorious millionaire banker hangs himself, his death attracts no sympathy. But the legacy of a lifetime of selfishness is widespread, and the carnage most acute among those he ought to be protecting: his family.

Meanwhile, in a wealthy suburb of Glasgow, a young woman is found savagely murdered. The community is stunned by what appears to be a vicious, random attack. When Detective Inspector Alex Morrow, heavily pregnant with twins, is called in to investigate, she soon discovers that a tangled web of lies lurks behind the murder. It’s a web that will spiral through Alex’s own home, the local community, and ultimately right back to a swinging rope, hundreds of miles away.

Goodie One Shoes by Roz Siegel

A Jimmy Choo Sandal. A Manolo Blahnik mule; a Sergio Rossi slide, a Prada sliver-heeled boot. As magic as Cinderella’s glass slipper. Even when they don’t fit, they can determine your life—or end it. Emily knows these things because she owns a discount shoe store on the colorful Upper West Side of Manhattan—Emily’s Place a neighborhood hangout for shoe lovers, where customers could find a sympathetic ear, a hot cup of coffee and the perfect shoe. Unfortunately, someone has decided that a sexy stiletto-heeled shoe is an excellent murder weapon. A member of the Emily’s Place “family”—the staff of women who run the store and love the shoes in it—is murdered with a red Jimmy Choo high-heeled shoe—sharp as an ice pick, the spiked heel is embedded in her head. Emily is still reeling from the shock of her friend’s murder when a bag is shoved through her mail slot containing the mate to the shoe that was the murder weapon. Emily realizes that her store and everyone connected to it is a target and that a psycho killer is stalking them all. In fact the killer seems to particularly want Emily to suffer. She insists on working with the detective assigned to the case, Paul Murphy to find the killer—and she will do whatever it takes. It’s personal.

Repeat It Today With Tears by Anne Peile

Susanna is a secretive child, obsessed with the father she has never known and determined that one day she will find him. As an adolescent she becomes increasingly distanced from life at home with her mother and sister. When she finally discovers her father’s address and seeks him out, in the free and unconventional atmosphere of 1970s Chelsea, she conceals her identity, beginning an illicit affair that can only end in disaster.

Books I bought:

Both of these are for the Nerds Heart YA tournament!  Check back here on August 5 for my decision as to which book advances to the next round.

What Momma Left Me by Renee Watson

How is it that unsavory raw ingredients come together to form a delicious cake? What is it about life that when you take all the hard stuff and rough stuff and add in a lot of love, you still just might have a wonderful life? For Serenity, these questions rise up early when her father kills her mother, and leaves her and her brother Danny to live with their kind but strict grandparents. Despite the difficulties of a new school, a new church, and a new neighborhood, Serenity gains strength from the family around her, the new friends she finds, and her own careful optimism.

How I Made It to Eighteen by Tracy White

How do you know if you’re on the verge of a nervous breakdown?  For seventeen-year-old Stacy Black, it all begins with the smashing of a window. After putting her fist through the glass, she checks into a mental hospital.  Stacy hates it there but despite herself slowly realizes she has to face the reasons for her depression to stop from self-destructing.  Based on the author’s experiences, How I Made it to Eighteen is a frank portrait of what it’s like to struggle with self-esteem, body image issues, drug addiction, and anxiety.

I have a feeling these are going to be hard to compare!

Your turn

What came in your mailbox this week? Let me know, then go to Life in the Thumb to check out others!

Welcome to Mailbox Monday!

Mailbox Monday is a place to share all the wonderful books that have come to live in your home– including paper books, e-books and audio books.

Mailbox Monday was started by Marcia, who is now blogging at A girl and her books. When Marcia was ready to move on from being the weekly host, she was kind enough to set up the Mailbox Monday Blog Tour, July’s host is Gwendolyn at A Sea of Books

As for my mailbox:

Books for review:

Pirate King by Laurie R. King

It’s here!  I have it at last!  My most anticipated book of the year arrived last Monday, and I couldn’t read it until Thursday– the horror of it all!

I’ve read it, but I won’t publish my review until release date, September 6.  I will say that fans of the series must read this book, and that it stands alone even better than most of the others, so feel free to pick it up if the description intrigues you !

In England’s young silent-film industry, the megalomaniacal Randolph Fflytte is king. Nevertheless, at the request of Scotland Yard, Mary Russell is dispatched to investigate the criminal activities that surround Fflytte’s popular movie studio. So Russell is traveling undercover to Portugal, along with the film crew that is gearing up to shoot a cinematic extravaganza, Pirate King. Based on Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance, the project will either set the standard for movie-making for a generation or sink a boatload of careers.

Nothing seems amiss until the enormous company starts rehearsals in Lisbon, where the thirteen blonde-haired, blue-eyed actresses Mary is bemusedly chaperoning meet the swarm of real buccaneers Fflytte has recruited to provide authenticity. But when the crew embarks for Morocco and the actual filming, Russell feels a building storm of trouble: a derelict boat, a film crew with secrets, ominous currents between the pirates, decks awash with budding romance—and now the pirates are ignoring Fflytte and answering only to their dangerous outlaw leader, La Rocha. Plus, there’s a spy on board. Where can Sherlock Holmes be? As movie make-believe becomes true terror, Russell and Holmes themselves may experience a final fadeout.

Domestic Violets by Matthew Norman

I’m reading this for a TLC Book Tour.  It’s been getting fantastic buzz, and I’m looking forward to reading it.

Tom Violet always thought that by the time he turned thirty-five, he’d have everything going for him. Fame. Fortune. A beautiful wife. A satisfying career as a successful novelist. A happy dog to greet him at the end of the day.

The reality, though, is far different. He’s got a wife, but their problems are bigger than he can even imagine. And he’s written a novel, but the manuscript he’s slaved over for years is currently hidden in his desk drawer while his father, an actual famous writer, just won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. His career, such that it is, involves mind-numbing corporate buzzwords, his pretentious archnemesis Gregory, and a hopeless, completely inappropriate crush on his favorite coworker. Oh . . . and his dog, according to the vet, is suffering from acute anxiety.

Tom’s life is crushing his soul, but he’s decided to do something about it. (Really.) Domestic Violets is the brilliant and beguiling story of a man finally taking control of his own happiness—even if it means making a complete idiot of himself along the way.

Black Light by Patrick Melton, Marcus Dunstan, & Stephen Romano

The debut novel from the writers of the multi-million-dollar-grossing Saw movie franchise.

Private investigator Buck Carlsbad’s psychic abilities place him in high demand among those looking for quick solutions to supernatural problems. But for Buck, each case is only a link in the chain of a lifelong obsession: to locate the long departed spirits of his mother and father, killed in an unsolved murder when he was only a child.

Then Buck gets a call from a reclusive billionaire with a very strange request, and finds himself on a bullet-fast train headed straight to hell.

BLACK LIGHT is the explosive debut that combines a noir sensibility with supernatural suspense and high concept action, as Buck leads the reader through an underworld of exotic darkness and adventure.

Tithe by Holly Black (audiobook)

Welcome to the realm of very scary faeries!

Sixteen-year-old Kaye is a modern nomad. Fierce and independent, she travels from city to city with her mother’s rock band until an ominous attack forces Kaye back to her childhood home. There, amid the industrial, blue-collar New Jersey backdrop, Kaye soon finds herself an unwilling pawn in an ancient power struggle between two rival faerie kingdoms — a struggle that could very well mean her death.

Your turn

What came in your mailbox this week? Let me know, then go to A Sea of Books to check out others!

Welcome to Mailbox Monday!

Mailbox Monday is a place to share all the wonderful books that have come to live in your home– including paper books, e-books and audio books.

Mailbox Monday was started by Marcia, who is now blogging at A girl and her books. When Marcia was ready to move on from being the weekly host, she was kind enough to set up the Mailbox Monday Blog Tour, July’s host is Gwendolyn at A Sea of Books

As for my mailbox:

Books for review:

Dark Souls by Paula Morris

Welcome to York, England.

Mist lingers in the streets.

Narrow buildings cast long shadows.

This is the most haunted city in the world. . . .

Miranda Tennant arrives in York with a terrible, tragic secret. She is eager to lose herself amid the quaint cobblestones, hoping she won’t run into the countless ghosts who supposedly roam the city. . . .

Then she meets Nick, an intense, dark-eyed boy who knows all of York’s hidden places and histories. Miranda wonders if Nick is falling for her, but she is distracted by another boy — one even more handsome and mysterious than Nick. He lives in the house across from Miranda and seems desperate to send her some sort of message. Could this boy be one of York’s haunted souls?

Soon, Miranda realizes that something dangerous — and deadly — is being planned. And she may have to face the darkest part of herself in order to unravel the mystery — and find redemption.

Charlie Joe Jackson’s Guide to Not Reading by Tommy Greenwald

Charlie Joe Jackson may be the most reluctant reader ever born. And so far, he’s managed to get through life without ever reading an entire book from cover to cover. But now that he’s in middle school, avoiding reading isn’t as easy as it used to be. And when his friend Timmy McGibney decides that he’s tired of covering for him, Charlie Joe finds himself resorting to desperate measures to keep his perfect record intact.

This middle-grade audiobook from Brilliance Audio looks like a great option for reluctant readers!

Books purchased

Another Audible.com sale, and 10 more audiobooks purchased for $5.95 each (including 2 upcoming book club books!).  Add that to the 2 bought for credits, and I should be set for listening material for awhile!

Sale:

1. Agent to the Stars by John Scalzi
2. A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan (book club)
3. We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
4. Match Me If You Can by Susan Elizabeth Phillips
5. Ten Things I Love About You by Julia Quinn
6. Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi
7. Packing for Mars by Mary Roach
8. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
9. I’d Know You Anywhere by Laura Lippman
10. Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri (book club)

With credits

• Blackout by Connie Willis
• I Think I Love You by Allison Pearson

Your turn

What came in your mailbox this week? Let me know, then go to A Sea of Books to check out others!