It’s Monday! What Are You Reading, is where we gather to share what we have read this past week and what we plan to read this week. It is a great way to network with other bloggers, see some wonderful blogs, and put new titles on your reading list.
I love being a part of this and I hope you do too! As part of this weekly meme I love to encourage you all to go and visit the others participating in this meme. I offer a weekly contest for those who visit 10 or more of the Monday Meme participants and leave a comment. You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.
Last weeks winner (using Random.Org) was:
Congratulations! Please choose an item out of the PRIZE BOX and email me your choice with your mailing address as well! journeythroughbooks@gmail.com
**Note: With all the wonders that was BEA, I am still catching up and am mailing the last two weeks of winners today.
Things have been pretty wild around here this past week. On Wednesday it was my one year blogiversary and it was wild around here. If you were not at this party, take a moment and check out the comments of the attenders. They cracked me up and we had so much fun.
Then my weekend plans fell through for the 150 MS bike ride I was doing. I just had too much on my plate and had to step out of this event. I worked 10 hours on Friday, and participated as I could in the weekend Bloggiesta (see wrap up post here tonight). The changes you are seeing on this blog: the frsh coat of paint, new header…. all positive outcomes of the Boggiesta.
As for books completed:
Dreaming Of Dior by Charlotte Smith (review will be posted this week)
Guest House by Barbara Richardson (review will be posted this week)
Clementine – Friend Of The Week by Marla Frazee (review will be posted this week)
Boneman’s Daughter by Ted Dekker (review will be posted this week)
At Witt’s End by Beth Solheim (review will be posted this week)
Returning Injury by Becky Due (review will be posted this week)
Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver ***Almost done!
Abandoned:
Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter by Seth Graham Smith AUDIO (I tried – I really did but I just couldn’t get into it.)
I know that’s crazy right? All those books, but I used Bloggiesta time to catch up on writing reviews on books I had finished but have not written reviews for. Now I have and these will be posted in a timely manner.
What’s Brewing This Week?
Not Without Hope by Nick Schuyler
On February 28, 2009, Nick Schuyler, a twenty-four-year-old personal trainer, left for a deep-sea fishing trip with three friends: NFL players Marquis Cooper and Corey Smith, and Will Bleakley, his best friend, who once played football for the University of South Florida.
It was supposed to be a day of fun and relaxation aboard Cooper’s twenty-one-foot boat, which anchored seventy miles west of Tampa, Florida, in the Gulf of Mexico. The friends were out to catch some amberjack and grouper and maybe a few sharks. They planned to drink a few beers, have some laughs, and get home before an approaching cold front hit.
As the seas began to swell and the winds picked up in the late afternoon, they packed their gear and decided to head to shore. One problem. The anchor was stuck.
Inexperienced boaters, they made what would become a fatal mistake, tying the anchor rope to the stern of the boat and hitting the throttle. The anchor did not yank free. Instead, the stern sank and filled with water, and the boat capsized.
And so the nightmare began. The men had to forage for life jackets beneath the boat. They had no emergency beacon to alert authorities, and their cell phones didn’t work so far out in the Gulf. With no food or water, the men clung to the overturned hull through the night as the seas roughened and the cloudy sky became inky black. They were continuously tossed from the boat by brutal waves, and sometimes found each other only by swimming toward their friends’ voices.
During the rare lull, they would pray and talk about the ones they loved, what they would’ve done differently with their lives, and what they would do once they returned home. As the hours passed, the four friends, who had grown up as athletes, worked as a team in their desperate bid to survive. They battled hypothermia, hallucinations, hunger, dehydration, and huge waves.
A witness to incredible heroism and unspeakable tragedy, Nick remained at sea for more than forty hours, holding on, hoping against hope and clinging to the thought that he couldn’t bear to have his mother attend his funeral.
The Duff by Kody Keplinger
Seventeen-year-old Bianca Piper is cynical and loyal, and she doesn’t think she’s the prettiest of her friends by a long shot. She’s also way too smart to fall for the charms of man-slut and slimy school hottie Wesley Rush. In fact, Bianca hates him. And when he nicknames her “Duffy,” she throws her Coke in his face.
But things aren’t so great at home right now. Desperate for a distraction, Bianca ends up kissing Wesley. And likes it. Eager for escape, she throws herself into a closeted enemies-with-benefits relationship with Wesley.
Until it all goes horribly awry. It turns out that Wesley isn’t such a bad listener, and his life is pretty screwed up, too. Suddenly Bianca realizes with absolute horror that she’s falling for the guy she thought she hated more than anyone.
The Cradle by Patrick Somerville
An elusive heirloom cradle symbolizes childhood’s pains and possibilities in Somerville’s spare, elegant first novel (after a story collection, Trouble). Marissa, pregnant with her first child, becomes obsessed with tracking down the antique cradle her mother took when she abandoned the family a decade earlier. Marissa’s husband, Matt, is sure he’s been dispatched on a fool’s errand, but his journey soon connects him to Marissa’s family and his own history of abandonment, neglect and abuse amid a string of foster homes and orphanages. Matt’s quest through four states is interwoven with another drama that takes place 11 years later, in 2008, in which poet and children’s author Renee Owen is haunted by memories of war and a lost love as she prepares to send her son off to fight in Iraq. Again, long-buried secrets come to the surface, one of which poignantly links the two story lines.
Suite Scarlet by Maureen Johnson
According to tradition, when the Martin children turn 15, they inherit a suite in the family’s small Manhattan hotel and a job: to take care of the rooms and their occupant. On Scarlett’s 15th birthday, Amy Amberson sweeps into the suite that Scarlett has just inherited. The woman is demanding and brash, but she does have her charms (and large amounts of cash). In the beginning, Scarlett is overwhelmed, but then her role becomes that of Mrs. Amberson’s assistant for her projects, which change on a whim. When Amy decides to help the theater troupe that Scarlett’s brother is involved in put on Hamlet, the teen begins a romance with one of the actors. Then everything starts to go awry, and when things get tough, Amy abandons ship, and plucky Scarlett is left to step in and save what needs saving, something that she does with flair. Scarlett’s brand of humor is particularly dry and well articulated.
That’s the plan. How about you? What are you reading! Please be sure to click on the LINKY below and put your own What Are You Reading post link there so others (including me!) can stop by and see what great books you have! 😀
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