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Review: Wish Upon A Star by Sarah Morgan

14 Jan

My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

The two novellas were both fast fun reads.

Summary via goodreads:

Love is in the air this Christmas!

Christy was hoping to skip Christmas this year. Her kids have other ideas – they’ve put their dad’s name at number one on their Christmas list. So it looks as if Christy will be hightailing it up to the Lake District to play happy families with her ex!

Snow-capped mountains and roaring log fires – Alessandro’s home is like walking into a Christmas card. Is it really safe for her to spend Christmas with her dreamy, funny – no! – entirely infuriating ex-hubby?

Miranda has completely the opposite problem. Being single and pregnant at Christmas was certainly not her wish come true. She doesn’t believe in miracles, but then resident hunk Jake sweeps her off her snow-covered shoes. Come Boxing Day dare she dream that Mr Sex-on-Legs might be for more than just Christmas?

The first was a romance within an on-the-rocks relationship, and (taken as fluff) it was very entertaining. A highly volatile couple, a precocious kid, and a heavy dose of wish fulfillment to top it off.

I admit, I was more interested in the characters in the second story. Jake was introduced in the first story, and this good looking guy (who is very in tune with women and what they want) is my kind of romance hero. I liked the wounded (but recovering) Miranda as well, and I enjoyed getting to know them as they got to know each other.

Both of these stories were perfect as novellas, which gave just enough time to get to know the characters and the situations, then have them resolve without unnecessarily complex obstacles. Whether in front of a winter fire or as an escape from a hot summer day, these winter stories are an enjoyable getaway.

I read this book as an electronic review copy via NetGalley.  Thank you to the publisher for allowing me access.

 
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Posted by on January 14, 2012 in books, reviews

 

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Review: A Regular Guy by Mona Simpson (with book club notes)

10 Nov

A Regular GuyMy rating: 3 of 5 stars (A very low 3 stars, bordering on 2.5)

The problem for me is that I just didn’t get the point of this book.

A Regular Guy is the story of Tom Owens, who (with his good friend) successfully founded a very, very successful biotech company.

He now has more money that he knows what to do with– enough that he can afford not to think about money at all.  He’s dealing with the challenges of taking his high-tech company into its second major product–while it is being managed by someone else.

More than that, he’s taking on (or in some cases, trying to avoid) the challenges of his personal life, including relationships with multiple women and an unacknowledged 10 year old daughter.

The story is a fictionalized version of Steve Jobs life, written by his sister that he didn’t know about until he was an adult (it’s a complicated situation, as you might guess)

In A Regular Guy, the words themselves flowed well enough, and they didn’t get in the way of the story as I often fear in a literary novel. The story was coherent, and worked well enough in that sense.

I simply didn’t get insight into the life of Steve Jobs (or if I did, I just didn’t care), and the story didn’t have enough strength to stand alone.

This was true of the plot, but even more so of the characters. Tom Owens didn’t intrigue me as Steve Jobs, largely because I never saw the charisma the character was described as having, and would have needed to accomplish the things he did. Simply seen as a fictional character, he was both unbelievable and uninteresting, which is a pretty sad combination.

At the beginning of the book, I had some hope for Jane (Owens’ daughter) and her mother, Mary. Jane simply faded into the story (and that may have actually been the point– if so, I feel terrible for the real life model of Jane, and wonder what her relationship with her aunt the writer must be like.) Mary turned into a whiny caricature as the woman who sent her 10 year old daughter driving solo cross country to live with her father becomes resentful as that daughter chooses to spend time with her father.

The one character I found interesting was Noah, a scientist who chose to continue to follow his own path rather than work with Owens and his company. He was an intriguing secondary character, and I find it telling that I have no idea if he had a real life counterpart.

I admit, I was relieved that the rest of my book club had a similar reaction, whether they were all to familiar with the details of Jobs and his life, or relatively uninformed, at least about this chapter. Whatever the point was, it was well hidden.

Book Club Notes

We’d selected this book quite a few months back (we pick about 6 months of books at a time), but moved it up a month due to the timeliness of the tie to Steve Jobs’ death.

We actually live and meet quite near the Apple Campus in Cupertino, and have one ex-Apple employee, and at least one member has a spouse that worked there.  On the other hand, the only Apple product in my house was a gift that doesn’t get all that heavy of use.

I was really surprised that 4 of the 5 of us meeting hadn’t finished the book (which is only 384 pages, not a major chunkster).  I’m even more surprised that one of those was me (I finished after the meeting).  One member had a very good excuse (an eye injury, and the book wasn’t easily available as audio), the rest of us just found it difficult to make this book a priority.

As I mentioned above, we all had similar feelings about the book.  I did find it easier to finish reading after the meeting, perhaps because I gave up on finding a point and just made my way through!

 
2 Comments

Posted by on November 10, 2011 in Book Club, books, L, reviews

 

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Review: You Are My Only by Beth Kephart

27 Oct

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

You Are My Only was breathtakingly beautiful, and very emotional. I wasn’t ready for it to end– I want to know what’s next for these characters.

Synopsis via Goodreads:

Emmy Rane is married at nineteen, a mother by twenty. Trapped in a life with a husband she no longer loves, Baby is her only joy. Then one sunny day in September, Emmy takes a few fateful steps away from her baby and returns to find her missing. All that is left behind is a yellow sock.

Fourteen years later, Sophie, a homeschooled, reclusive teenage girl is forced to move frequently and abruptly from place to place, perpetually running from what her mother calls the “No Good.” One afternoon, Sophie breaks the rules, ventures out, and meets Joey and his two aunts. It is this loving family that gives Sophie the courage to look into her past. What she discovers changes her world forever. . . .

The riveting stories of Emmy and Sophie—alternating narratives of loss, imprisonment, and freedom regained—escalate with breathless suspense toward an unforgettable climax.

The story follows Sophie in the present day, as she starts to chafe against the boundaries of her life, which seems stranger and stranger by the page. Within those confines she’s a bright, curious, and overall NORMAL 14 year old (even if she moves frequently with no warning, she’s home-schooled on an odd assortment of subjects, and is forbidden to have contact with anyone else).

I absolutely loved spending time with her, even as my heart was breaking for all she discovered.

Emmy’s story is set 14 years earlier, when her Baby disappears. I found my time with Emmy even more beautiful and heartbreaking, even while Emmy never came off the paper for me. I mourned her situation, and the truly beautiful writing brought that sorrow home. I never quite related to her as a person, but her situation was compelling.

I don’t normally rave about the writing in a book. I’m more likely to complain that it distracts me from the story, even (or maybe particularly) when the writing is beautiful. In this case, the story is simple enough that the words themselves are not a distraction, but simply build layer upon layer of emotion.

Thank you to Egmont USA and NetGalley for giving me electronic access to You Are My Only for review.

 
5 Comments

Posted by on October 27, 2011 in books, reviews

 

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Chat: Learning Curves by Elyse Mady

20 Jul

Learning CurvesI can’t call this a review, because I don’t really know what to make of this book.

If you’d asked me whether I read romance novels, I would not have hesitated before saying yes.  I read historical romance (mostly regency and surrounding time periods), I read romantic suspense, I read books that walk the thin line between women’s fiction or chick lit and romance. I even read a little paranormal romance.  However, it turns out I don’t really read this particular kind of straightforward contemporary romance.

Synopsis via Goodreads:

Leanne Galloway has no time for dating; her focus is on launching her academic career. Dragged along to her childhood frenemy Gillian’s bachelorette party at a male strip club, she just wants to get through the evening—but she can’t help interfering when Gillian sends a note to a sexy dancer proposing a hot hookup.

Brandon Myles is working backstage at the Foxe’s Den to fund his post-graduate studies in dance, but he’s forced onstage when the headliner fails to show up. He feels a surprisingly strong connection with a quiet woman watching from a table full of tipsy bridesmaids, and he’s delighted when she appears backstage after his set.

After a scorching spontaneous encounter, Leanne and Brandon agree to go their separate ways. But they’re both grad students on a small campus, and avoiding each other and denying their attraction won’t work for long, especially when a jealous rival appears, determined to ruin both their academic careers.

Oh my!

It was very steamy, and Brandon was perfect in every way– even just damaged enough for her to have some work to do…  Although it had a plot that took place outside the bedroom, it felt like the entire book revolved around sex.

Since the lead character was working on a Ph.D. in literature, I kept wanting to read more into the book.  Is the emphasis on sex actually standing in for something else?  Are the (rather flat) supporting characters actually archetypes representing a larger class of people?

Or is this simply a fun wish-fulfillment fantasy where the regular girl (good looking but nothing spectacular in the looks department, successful in her chosen field but awkward in the rest of her life) wins the perfect guy, and in doing so fixes most of the other problems in her life?  One where all the other trappings really don’t matter?

For the most part, I enjoyed reading it, even when being confused about what to make of it.  I admit to having some issues with the ending, but I think those are me against the genre, and I’m not going to sweat it.  It was quick and fun, and I’ll probably read more in its vein, trying to sort out the rules of the road, such as they are.

I requested this book for review from the publisher via NetGalley.  Thank you to Carina Press and NetGalley for giving me access to this book.

 
2 Comments

Posted by on July 20, 2011 in books, reviews

 

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Review: Don’t Breathe a Word by Jennifer McMahon

13 Jul

Don't Breathe a WordMy rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

Summary via Goodreads.com:

On a soft summer night in Vermont, twelve-year-old Lisa went into the woods behind her house and never came out again. Before she disappeared, she told her little brother, Sam, about a door that led to a magical place where she would meet the King of the Fairies and become his queen.

Fifteen years later, Phoebe is in love with Sam, a practical, sensible man who doesn’t fear the dark and doesn’t have bad dreams—who, in fact, helps Phoebe ignore her own. But suddenly the couple is faced with a series of eerie, unexplained occurrences that challenge Sam’s hardheaded, realistic view of the world. As they question their reality, a terrible promise Sam made years ago is revealed—a promise that could destroy them all.

Certainly, the characters were interesting, even compelling.  They were complex, and just when you thought you understood where they were coming from, the world would shift.  This was mostly true of the secondary characters, but it was true of the primary ones as well, although in a more subtle way.  This was a story where the past mattered, regardless of how much the characters thought they’d left it behind.

The story was full of twists and turns, and they often didn’t make sense at the time, although the story held together in the end.  Some questions remain, but what would be the fun if they didn’t…

This is a book where the reader is supposed to be uncertain whether there is something supernatural happening, whether there are bad guys trying to make it look that way, or (just maybe) mental illness is making a fairly normal situation seem completely bizarre.

The problem is that for most of the book, I didn’t buy any of these explanations. I think this was a deliberate choice of the author, creating a situation that didn’t make sense however you looked at it, and throwing in more events that almost (but not quite) fit one explanation or another.

Oh sure, there was more than enough craziness going around, but something more clearly had happened. The possible world of fairies and magic was murky (again, I think deliberately), but there was no clear motivation for someone the be manipulating the situation.

In McMahon’s Dismantled, I loved the ambiguity, and I bought (with reservations) both possibilities. I’d hoped for the same here.

I have to say that the book pulled in together in the end, so maybe the fault was in my imagination along the way.

I requested access to this book via NetGalley so that I could review it.  Thank you to Harper Collins for giving me access.

For other views of this book, check out these blogs (most of them loved it!):

 
4 Comments

Posted by on July 13, 2011 in books, reviews

 

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Review: The Girl in the Garden by Kamala Nair

14 Jun

The Girl in the GardenMy rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a beautiful, thoughtful story that occasionally nudges towards melodrama, but never quite gets there.

Kamala Nair follows in the footsteps of Jhumpa Lahiri with this beautifully written story of the child of Indian immigrants, but she also shows other influences– I loved the echoes of The Secret Garden.

The Girl in the Garden begins with a letter from the adult Rakhee to her fiance. For the reader, it simply sets up questions. There aren’t many answers for her fiance either.

The story really gets started with the second chapter. Rakhee remembers back to a key time in her childhood. She is in 5th grade in Plainfield, Minnesota, where she doesn’t quite fit in with her classmates. Again, this section is largely setup, but it is already building a compelling picture of her life, of who her parents are, and how that has shaped who she is.

Then, as Rakhee and her mother arrive in India, a whole knew world is introduced. This was a different view of India than I’ve seen before, a more rural India. The challenges Rakhee faces are both familiar (dealing with a grandmother she remembers meeting before, but who has aged badly since then) and the exotic(stories of a monster from Indian folklone that lives in the forest and must be avoided).

Rakhee is quickly drawn into the tangled affairs of her family, issues she is too young to deal with, and that her mother makes a small effort to hide from her.

The story is narrated by an adult Rakhee telling the story of her younger self, so the viewpoint is an interesting mix of the naivete of the child, with occasional insight from the adult Rakhee.

As the summer goes on, Rakhee discovers the secret in the garden in the forest, and much later the secret behind the secret in the garden. Her aunts and cousins face life altering decisions, as does her mother, and eventually Rakhee herself.

As I referred to in the beginning, this tangled web of problems sometimes brushes against the edge of believable, looking like it might head towards the ridiculous. It isn’t any one person or situation, but the combination of them. The Girl in the Garden doesn’t cross that line, probably due to the strength of the writing and the characters.

I requested and received an electronic review copy of The Girl in the Garden from Grand Central Publishing via NetGalley.  Thank you to both for allowing me to read and review this wonderful book.

 
5 Comments

Posted by on June 14, 2011 in books, reviews

 

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Review: The Cat, the Professor and the Poison by Leann Sweeney

28 Apr

The Cat, the Professor and the Poison (Cats in Trouble Mysteries)My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

This book is very close to my ideal cozy mystery, and I almost missed out on reading it!

I’m not very good about keeping up with series that I enjoy, and I’ve been particularly out of the loop with cozy mysteries.  I was offered The Cat, the Lady and the Liar for review, and jumped on the opportunity, since I liked The Cat, the Quilt and the Corpse.  I didn’t realize it was book 3, and when I realized I had missed book 2 (this one), I almost skipped over it.  I’m very glad I didn’t.

Summary via Goodreads.com:

Between her kitty quilt-making business and her three beloved cats, Jill has her hands full. That doesn’t stop her from wanting to solve the mystery of the milk cow that’s gone missing from her friend’s farm. But imagine her surprise when a stolen cow leads to the discovery of fifty stray cats and one dead body-a victim of cold-blooded murder…

Amateur sleuth? Check. Jillian, the main character is interesting in and of herself. She’s got a good back-story, and is living a quiet life that allows here the flexibility to follow up on cats in trouble when she finds them.

Supporting characters? Check. They were great this time around. OK, Tom might be a little too perfect in his role as love interest (smart, tech savvy, tough, emotionally aware, good looking… yum!), but beyond that… I like that Jill’s link to the Police Department is her good friend Candace, lending some girl power to the sleuthing. And Kara, with her link to Jill’s past, lent a nice bit of depth to the relationships here.

Bad Guys? Yep. There were kinda-bad guys, and really-bad guys, and it was hard to tell one from the other until the end. My one real issue with this book was the attempt to, in the end, redeem a really-bad guy into the kinda-bad camp. Sorry, his actions leave him firmly where he was for me.

Mystery? Yes! Clues were left and followed up on, and the final result and the track taken to get there all made sense. It was a little lightweight, as is to be expected from a cozy, but I don’t see that as a problem.

Hook? Yes, the cats are the cute hook that gives this series that something extra that cozies usually have. There were cats everywhere, wonderful pets, brand new kittens, kitties needing rescuing. There are smart cats, but not overly so– no cats knocking books off the shelf to spell the name of the murderer.

I’m really looking forward to reading the next book,and spending more time with all these characters– particularly the cats :-) .

 
3 Comments

Posted by on April 28, 2011 in books, reviews

 

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Review: Science Fair Season by Judy Dutton

19 Apr

Science Fair Season: Twelve Kids, a Robot Named Scorch . . . and What It Takes to WinScience Fair Season: Twelve Kids, a Robot Named Scorch . . . and What It Takes to Win by Judy Dutton

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I’m already thinking about all the people I know that need to read this book.

Science Fair Season strikes a wonderful balance between the stories of the 11 competitors it follows, each with a different set of challenges to overcome and support to get there, and the research and science of their projects.

It’s the story of a science fair, but not one like what you would see at your local elementary school every year. This contest is nationwide, and has exhibits from teens that take their science very, very seriously. They produce patentable work and research breakthroughs that get the attention of adults working full time in their field.

Each of these kids has a story.

In some cases, it is a story of true genius that needs to be directed in a productive direction, before it explodes (that was a little too literally true in the case of the young man obsessed with building his own nuclear reactor).

Others are kids who have shone in some other area, never dreaming that science would call to them (One girl had a well established acting career that she thought would be her future!).

Some are just average kids, up until the moment they found a question that caught their interest, and an adult willing to help them look into it.

And a few are kids with the deck stacked against them– a girl with a diagnosis of a terrifying disease, kids from a school at a “juvenile correction facility”, kids from an Indian reservation with a terrifyingly high poverty rate.

Science Fair Season takes the science seriously, and it takes these competitors seriously. It is a book which is extremely readable by anyone with an interest in the next generation of scientists, as well as anyone that likes a good story of determination and effort, and where it can get anyone that really, really tries.

I requested an electronic galley of Science Fair Season from the publisher through NetGalley.  Thank you to Hyperion Book and NetGalley for the chance to read and review this book!

 
6 Comments

Posted by on April 19, 2011 in books, reviews

 

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Review: To Have and to Kill by Mary Jane Clark

20 Jan

To Have and to Kill: A Wedding Cake Mystery (Wedding Cake Mysteries)My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

I really wanted to like To Have and to Kill, and in the end I did. Unfortunately, it was the “just liked” kind of like, not the enthusiastic kind.

Summary via Keplers.com:

Piper Donovan never imagined that decorating wedding cakes could be so dangerous! A struggling actress with no immediate prospects and a recently broken engagement, Piper moves back in with her parents to take stock of her life. She steps tentatively into the family bakery business and finds herself agreeing to create a wedding cake for the acclaimed star of a daytime television drama. But soon someone close to the bride-to-be is horribly murdered and it seems that somebody is ruthlessly determined to stop the wedding.

With the help of her former neighbor, Jack, a handsome FBI agent with a soft spot for the gorgeous cake-maker, Piper moves closer to the truth. As she narrows in on a suspect, Piper realizes that it’s hotter in the kitchen than she may be able to handle. . . .

Something about the writing style didn’t quite work for me. The sentences were short, without much detail. This may be a purely personal thing, but somehow it never drew me into the world of the book.

Piper was an interesting character, at least on the surface. She had lots going on in her life, including her relationships with friends and family. I never felt I really got to know Piper, even though I was told a lot about her, including her thoughts and plans. I did like the fledgling love interest with her friend, and hope that develops in future books.

The mystery would have drawn me in if I’d been more attached to the characters. Unfortunately, I wasn’t convinced by the motive at the end– I’d examined the character and dismissed them as a suspect because the motive didn’t seem compelling enough.

I was drawn to this book due to the wedding cake angle. There isn’t much of that world in this book, although I enjoyed what was there. Instead, I saw lots of the world inside a soap opera, which I loved! That was the best aspect of the book for me.

I haven’t read Mary Jane Clark before. I’m interested in picking up one of her other books, since I’d love the same look into the TV News world as I did into the world of the soaps, and I think the writing style could work more for me with a thriller than a cozy-ish mystery.

I requested an electronic copy of To Have and to Kill from Harper Collins via NetGalley. Thank you to everyone involved for this opportunity.

 
3 Comments

Posted by on January 20, 2011 in books, reviews

 

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Review: The House on Olive Street by Robyn Carr

16 Nov

The House on Olive StreetMy rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

This was my first Robyn Carr book, but it won’t be my last.

This is grown up chick lit– fiction that looks at four women, each at a crossroads in her life,drawn together by the unexpected death of the fifth member of their group.

Elly is a college professor. She’s now involved in a relationship that she’s not willing to share with the world (including her friends) because it doesn’t fit with her image of herself.

Beth writes murder mysteries, but she is very shy in her everyday life. Part of this shyness is a need to hide the problems in her marriage– problems that sometimes leave physical signs.

Barbara Ann works hard as a writer of romance novels, but can’t quite make it to the next level of success. She is also mom to young men, and it often seems like she’s mom to her husband as well. The effort of caring for these adults (or close to it) that don’t in any way appreciate it finally gets too much for her.

Sable is a highly successful author, but she’s built a shell around herself, one based on a whole new identity she created in an effort to escape her past, a past that is catching up to her.

I loved meeting all four of these women. They all became very real to me, even if their lives and problems ranged from ones that I see everyday to ones I can only stretch my mind to imagine.

Each woman was a mixture of strength and weaknesses. Their relationships were similar– the group had been held together by Gabby, and when she was gone, they didn’t always know how to deal with one another.

Each woman makes a personal journey over the course of the book. Each of them touched me, and left me wishing I’d see them again.

I received an electronic copy of this book from Harlequin for review purposes.  Thank you for this opportunity!

 
2 Comments

Posted by on November 16, 2010 in books, reviews

 

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