It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

BLKosiner’s Book Blog

**PS I am a little (ok a lot) late on getting winners out as of late. I hope to get all packages out this week.

WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

Coming in a little late with this post on Sunday evening… I had a busy day, floor hockey this evening and Amazing Race (had to watch it!) and then well… here I am.  😀

While my week had slowed down last week (thank you thank you!) I am still catching up on my reading.  Here is what was accomplished this last week:

Thoughts on the Oscars and Angelina’s leg… 😛

Deal Breaker by Harlan Coben (audio)

Mental Floss The Book (a history of listory 😉 )

February Recap and Challenge Updates

Heartbreakers by Pamela Wells (YA audio)

I seem to be struggling a bit in the reading department… there is a book I am trying to get through but every time I pick it up I only manage a few pages.  Normally I would just pass on the read, but this one if for a tour so I am determined to come up with something out of it.  😯

New for this week however is:

Gabriel McQueen has only just arrived home on holiday leave from the service when his county-sheriff father sends him back out again with new marching orders. A brewing ice storm, and a distant neighbor who’s fallen out of contact, have the local lawman concerned. So he enlists Gabriel to make the long haul to the middle of nowhere, and make sure Lolly Helton is safe and sound. It’s a trip the younger McQueen would rather not make given the bitter winter weather–and the icy conditions that have always existed between him and Lolly.

But there’s no talking back when your dad is the town’s top cop. And there’ s no turning back when night falls just as Gabriel arrives–and discovers that the weather outside isn’t the only thing that’s frightful. Spotting strangers in Lolly’ s home–one of them packing a weapon–is all it takes to kick Gabriel into combat mode. And his stealth training is all he needs to extract Lolly from the house without alerting her captors. But when the escape is discovered, the heat–and the hunt–are on. And the winter woods are nowhere to be once the ice storm touches down, dropping trees, blocking roads, and trapping the fleeing pair in the freezing dark.

I am almost through this on audio… and I have thoughts… lots of thoughts… and not necessarily good ones…

 

 

 

 

I’m pushing aside
the memory of my nightmare,
pushing aside thoughts of Alex,
pushing aside thoughts of Hana
and my old school,
push,
push,
push,
like Raven taught me to do.
The old life is dead.
But the old Lena is dead too.
I buried her.
I left her beyond a fence,
behind a wall of smoke and flame.

OOH – I am craving Dystopia and this hot little number waits for me on the table!

 

 

 

In 1937, Shanghai is the Paris of Asia, a city of great wealth and glamour, the home of millionaires and beggars, gangsters and gamblers, patriots and revolutionaries, artists and warlords. Thanks to the financial security and material comforts provided by their father’s prosperous rickshaw business, twenty-one-year-old Pearl Chin and her younger sister, May, are having the time of their lives. Though both sisters wave off authority and tradition, they couldn’t be more different: Pearl is a Dragon sign, strong and stubborn, while May is a true Sheep, adorable and placid. Both are beautiful, modern, and carefree . . . until the day their father tells them that he has gambled away their wealth and that in order to repay his debts he must sell the girls as wives to suitors who have traveled from California to find Chinese brides.

As Japanese bombs fall on their beloved city, Pearl and May set out on the journey of a lifetime, one that will take them through the Chinese countryside, in and out of the clutch of brutal soldiers, and across the Pacific to the shores of America. In Los Angeles they begin a fresh chapter, trying to find love with the strangers they have married, brushing against the seduction of Hollywood, and striving to embrace American life even as they fight against discrimination, brave Communist witch hunts, and find themselves hemmed in by Chinatown’s old ways and rules.

At its heart, Shanghai Girls is a story of sisters: Pearl and May are inseparable best friends who share hopes, dreams, and a deep connection, but like sisters everywhere they also harbor petty jealousies and rivalries. They love each other, but each knows exactly where to drive the knife to hurt the other the most.

I read Lisa See earlier this year and really look forward to this one!

 

 

 

For twenty-five years, a reclusive American novelist has been writing at the desk she inherited from a young Chilean poet who disappeared at the hands of Pinochet’s secret police; one day a girl claiming to be the poet’s daughter arrives to take it away, sending the writer’s life reeling. Across the ocean, in the leafy suburbs of London, a man caring for his dying wife discovers, among her papers, a lock of hair that unravels a terrible secret. In Jerusalem, an antiques dealer slowly reassembles his father’s study, plundered by the Nazis in Budapest in 1944.

Connecting these stories is a desk of many drawers that exerts a power over those who possess it or have given it away. As the narrators of Great House make their confessions, the desk takes on more and more meaning, and comes finally to stand for all that has been taken from them, and all that binds them to what has disappeared. Great House is a story haunted by questions: What do we pass on to our children and how do they absorb our dreams and losses? How do we respond to disappearance, destruction, and change?

I have always thought this one looked interesting!

 

So that’s the plan… and to catch up on the books.  I hope you have some great books planned for this week! Please add your link to your Where Are You Reading post below where it says “click here” 

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and those of you who read mainly childrens through YA reads – please also link your post here:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

MarthaE


WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

Well.. it was another week around here.  If you read my morning post today you know just how crazy it was.  With hardly a free hour all week between work and evening commitments, books fell again to the wayside and believe me…. that does not make me happy.  I am person who needs down time to re energize, and books in my life.  When things are out of whack…

I am out of whack.

LOL…. couldn’t resist.  Anyway – here is what did happen here last week:

 

What’s Your Number?  Movie review

 

Very Valentine by Adriana Trigiani ( a re – read but this time with my book club and oh…. the food!!!)

 

The Making Of A Book Club (I was asked to talk about my book club and what we do and how we do it… and as I love talking about my book club…. this is that post 🙂 )

 

One False Move by Harlan Coben (audio book and Coben lOVE!!!)

 

Fun Facts!!!  (Have you played yet?  If not, please do – it is so much fun!!!)

 

The Eyre Report #2 (week two and my journey with Jane Eyre…)

 

 

The books on my radar did not for the most part get read last week so I am sticking with them and only adding…

Every day Christine wakes up not knowing where she is. Her memories disappear every time she falls asleep. Her husband, Ben, is a stranger to her, and he’s obligated to explain their life together on a daily basis–all the result of a mysterious accident that made Christine an amnesiac. With the encouragement of her doctor, Christine starts a journal to help jog her memory every day. One morning, she opens it and sees that she’s written three unexpected and terrifying words: “Don’t trust Ben.” Suddenly everything her husband has told her falls under suspicion. What kind of accident caused her condition? Who can she trust? Why is Ben lying to her? And, for the reader: Can Christine’s story be trusted? At the heart of S. J. Watson’s Before I Go To Sleep is the petrifying question: How can anyone function when they can’t even trust themselves?

 

Doesn’t that sound good?  Cant wait to start it?

 

 

 

Best friends Sydney, Kelly, Alexia and Raven have seen each other through everything…until three of the girls are dumped by their respective boyfriends…on the same night! Reeling from this, the girls decide to create a list of rules to help them avoid future heartache. But soon they find out that while breaking up is hard to do, sometimes staying broken up is even harder!

I mentioned I have been desperate to find audio…. this is from the library – it is a cute listen, I am about half way through.

 

 

Think about life and God. These goofy ideas and beliefs are assumed by millions to be rock-solid truth . . . until life proves they’re not. The sad result is often a spiritual disaster–confusion, feelings of betrayal, a distrust of Scripture, loss of faith, anger toward both the church and God.

But it doesn’t have to be so. In this delightfully personal and practical book, respected Bible teacher Larry Osborne confronts ten widely held beliefs that are both dumb and dangerous. Beliefs like these:

• Faith can fix anything
• God brings good luck
• Forgiving means forgetting
• Everything happens for a reason
• A godly home guarantees good kids

…and more.

We are reading this for my weekly small group study and I am interested in cracking into this one and discussing with the group.

 

 

I think that is all I am going to add right now.  I have several audio books requested from my library but no telling which will come in first or when… hopefully soon.  I have sever audio on my IPOD but none coming up for my kitchen CD player or the car…

I am curious what you are reading and listening to!  Please add you link below where it says click here! 

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If you read mostly MG (middle Grade), Childrens, or YA, then also add your link here:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Abbi (gatorade635)


WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

What a crazy week!  Between work, working out, evening commitments Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday…. I hardly read a thing and almost came before you with a goose egg today…

😯

But… yesterday saved the day and I did finish an audio that I have been working on for a couple of weeks so here is the week of accomplishments (or lack there of):

Awesome video:  Sh** Book Bloggers Say (a must see!)

 

No Comment.  YES!  Comment!!!  (the importance of commenting as part of Reagan’s BBRAW)

 

11-22-63 by Stephen King (a remarkable read – do not miss this one!)

The Eyre Report #1 (my first update to the Jane Eyre self read a long 😀 )

 

So ummm… yeah.  Thats it.  I am reading a couple of books still from last week and have some plans for this week so hopefully back on track.

Sara Beth Riley never dreamt she’d walk straight out of her life.  Actually she’d never dreamt a lot of things that had happened this year … From being kidnapped by her own best friend, to throwing her wedding rings into the Hudson River, to calling an old love in France, to getting inked with said best friend, painting the passionate constellation of these choices into permanence.  But mostly, she could never have dreamt what started it all.  How could it be that her mother’s unexpected death, and the grief which lingered painfully long, turned her into the woman she was finally meant to become?

Sara Beth’s escape begins a summer of change – of herself, of marriage, of the lives of those around her.  In a story that moves from Manhattan to the sea to a quaint New England town, Whole Latte Life looks at friends we never forget, at decisions we linger with, at our attempts to live the lives we love.

OOH sounds good!

Sports agent Myron Bolitar is poised on the edge of the big time. So is Christian Steele, a rookie quarterback and Myron’s prized client. But when Christian gets a phone call from a former girlfriend, a woman who everyone, including the police, believes is dead, the deal starts to go sour. Trying to unravel the truth about a family’s tragedy, a woman’s secret, and a man’s lies, Myron is up against the dark side of his business—where image and talent make you rich, but the truth can get you killed.

I love Coben! 

 

 

 

Everyone in town thinks Meg is volatile and dull-witted and that her younger brother Charles Wallace is dumb. People are also saying that their father has run off and left their brilliant scientist mother. Spurred on by these rumors, Meg and Charles Wallace, along with their new friend Calvin, embark on a perilous quest through space to find their father. In doing so they must travel behind the shadow of an evil power that is darkening the cosmos, one planet at a time.

Never read it… but look forward to it.  This review will come with fun giveaways!

That’s it… keeping it light this week and I have a few to catch up on from last week including my book club read due this Tuesday! 

I am looking forward to seeing what you are reading!  Add your What Are You Reading post to the linky below and I will try to stop by!  😀

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And if you mainly read Middle Grade, and childrens books – add your link here as well:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Laura @BurgandyIce


WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

Mid February already, can you believe it?  My week was busy, but I think they always are…. yet I did get in some book time!  Here is what happened this week:

 

Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles (great debut author’s work!)


A chance to win Miss Peregrines Home For Peculiar Children (extended to Tuesday!)

 

Life Is A Trip by Judie Fein (with a giveaway extended to Tuesday!)

 

Bitter Melon by Cara Chow (sometimes, it is good to be mad….)


The Eyre Of My Ways.… yes… I am going there… and yes, I am going in alone.  😯

 

SPIN by Catherine McKenzie ( new release, fun read…. yes, there is a bit of gushing 🙂 )

 

It was a pretty good week, I did not turn the tv on at all and spent my evenings reading until I went to bed.  Probably pretty “Little House On The Prairieish” , but it works for me.  I have another book I will have finished soon and 11-22-63 on audio is going to end this week as well.

So this week here is what I am planning:

When fifteen-year-old Jake Bergamot receives—and then forwards to a friend—a sexually explicit video that an eighth-grade admirer sent to him, the video goes viral within hours. The scandal that ensues threatens to shatter his family’s sense of security and identity—and, ultimately, their happiness. This Beautiful Life is a devastating, clear-eyed portrait of modern life that will have readers debating their assumptions about family, morality, and the choices we make in the name of love.

Wow right? 

 

 

 

 

The Angelini Shoe Company, one of the last family-owned businesses in Greenwich Village, has been making exquisite wedding shoes since 1903 but now teeters on the brink of financial collapse. To save their business from ruin, thirty-three-year-old Valentine Roncalli—apprentice to and granddaughter of master artisan Teodora Angelini—must bring the family’s old-world craftsmanship into the twenty-first century. Juggling her budding romance with dashing chef Roman Falconi, her duty to her family, and a design challenge presented by a prestigious department store, Valentine returns to Italy with her grandmother in a quest to build a pair of glorious shoes to beat their rivals. And in the course of discovering her true artistic voice and so much more in la bella Italia, Valentine will be turning her life and the business upside down in ways she never expected.

This is my book club read for February.  I read this a few years back but am excited to read and review again.  After all… its Adriana!  😀

 

 

 

 

This moving, coming-of-age story follows a young white girl who overcomes family prejudice and cultural differences when she befriends a black girl in a small working-class town.
Twelve-year-old Cassie narrates the dramatic events that unfold when Jemmie, an African-American girl, and her family move in next door. Despite their parents’ deeply held prejudice against each other’s family-exemplified by the fence Cassie’s father builds between their two houses-the girls find they share more similarities than differences. Mutual interests in reading and running draw them together, and their wariness of each other disappears. But when their parents find out about the burgeoning friendship, each girl is forbidden to see the other. A family crisis and celebration provide opportunities for the families to reach an understanding.

I cant wait to dig into this one!

 

 

 

 

The first in a stunning new series, The Cousins War, is set amid the tumult and intrigue of The War of the Roses. Internationally bestselling author Philippa Gregory brings this family drama to colourful life through its women, beginning with the story of Elizabeth Woodville, the White Queen The White Queen tells the story of a common woman who ascends to royalty by virtue of her beauty, a woman who rises to the demands of her position and fights tenaciously for the success of her family, a woman whose two sons become the central figures in a mystery that has confounded historians for centuries: the Princes in the Tower whose fate remains unknown to this day.

I do love Philippa Gregory’s writing and it has been a long time since I indulged in her books!

 

 

 

 

As a big-time New York sports agent, Myron has a professional interest in Brenda. Then a personal one. But between them isn’t just the difference in their backgrounds or the color of their skin. Between them is a chasm of corruption and lies, a vicious young mafioso on the make, and one secret that some people are dying to keep–and others are killing to protect.

I adore Coben… no secret there!

 

 

 

 

So that’s the weeks plan.  I already started the Coben audio – SO GOOD!  And will be looking for more good audio at my library on line later tonight. 

– I will try to stop in and have a cup of coffee with you and see what you are reading 😀

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also, if you mostly read YA, MG, or childrens books, be sure to include your link here as well:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Belle at Bookbelle


WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

Well happy February!  Anyone else watch the Super Bowl on Sunday?  I didn’t relaly watch it… but it was (and is as I type this) on the tv like background cheering. 

My week was fair… I read and listened to everything I said I was going to except Wonderstruck.  I couldn’t get into it.  I haven;t given up on it… just sat it aside for other reads….

Here is what did happen here at Book Journey this past week:

 

A Run In With My Nemesis (ugh…. yes she’s back….)

 

Crescendo by Becca Fitzpatrick (audio review)

January Recap – what I read, how much, how many pages, how many audio minutes, etc… fun and goofy charts….


The Fixer Upper by Mary Kay Andrews (audio review)

 

Make Lemonade by Virginia Euler Wolfe (audio review)

 

Enjoy Every Sandwich with Lee Lipsenthal w/ a GIVEAWAY!!!!

 

The HIGHLIGHT of my week – The Book Club Cook Book came in the mail and oh yeah…. The Bookies (my book club( are in this book twice!!!!  WOO HOO!!!!  Oh yeah… and I read and reviewed it too.  😛

Silence by Becca Fitzpatrick (audio – the third in this set of four books)

 

 

Ok…. my audio week does look impressive – however, Make Lemonade and The Fixer Upper were finished earlier this month, just had not reviewed yet. 🙂 

As for this week…. here is what is on special…. or on the grill…. or up to bat…. or in the hopper….. or next in line….. or, oh you get the picture:

 

When she was seven, a horrific fey attack killed Donna Underwood’s father and drove her mother mad. Her own nearly fatal injuries were fixed by alchemy—the iron tattoos branding her hands and arms. Now seventeen, Donna feels like a freak, doomed by the magical heritage that destroyed her parents and any chance she had for a normal life. Only her relationship with her best friend, Navin, is keeping her sane.

But when vicious wood elves abduct Navin, Donna is forced to accept her role in the centuries-old war between human alchemists and these darkest outcasts of Faerie. Assisted by Xan, a gorgeous guy with faery blood running through his veins and secrets of his own, Donna races to save Navin—even if it means betraying everything her parents fought to the death to protect.

I’m in a book funk… cant find one that calls to me and nabbed this one off the TBR…. hope it is a win!  😀

 

 

 

 

We ve Got a Job tells the little-known story of the 4,000 black elementary-, middle-, and high school students who voluntarily went to jail in Birmingham, Alalama, between May 2 and May 11, 1963. Fulfilling Mahatma Gandhi s and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. s precept to fill the jails, they succeeded where adults had failed in desegregating one of the most racially violent cities in America. Focusing on four of the original participants who have participated in extensive interviews, We ve Got a Job recounts the astonishing events before, during, and after the Children s March.

This one I started last night… and wow.  I am already fired up and passionate about this book.

 

 

 

 

When Kate Sandford lands an interview at her favorite music magazine, The Line, it’s the chance of a lifetime. So Kate goes out to celebrate—and shows up still drunk to the interview the next morning. It’s no surprise that she doesn’t get the job, but her performance has convinced the editors that she’d be perfect for an undercover assignment for their gossip rag. All Kate has to do is follow “It Girl” Amber Sheppard into rehab. If she can get the inside scoop—and complete the thirty-day program—they’ll reconsider her for the position at The Line. Kate takes the assignment, but when real friendships start to develop, she has to decide if what she has to gain is worth the price she’ll have to pay.

OOH… this sounds like fun….

 

 

 

As for audio…. I don’t know…. 11-22-63 is still going but it is 30 hours long so I will be here a while… I just started part 2 of 4 parts.  I will finish Perfect Chemistry this week and Bitter Melon.  I will probably need to make a trip to the library because I really have nothing on deck to go into next.

So that’s the week plan 😀  Note I will have a birthday celebration here on Thursday – I do love excuses to celebrate and that usually means a give away (or two) for those of you I celebrate with long distance 😀

Now I am super excited to see what you have on your reading agendas this week (Maybe I will find that audio I am looking for…. 😛 )  Add your What Are You Reading link below where it says click here and I will try very hard to pop in and see you!  😀

 

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Also… don’t  forget if you review Middle Grade Reads and Children’s books… don’t forget to link on to the kid version of this meme here:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Niina at For The Love Of Reading


WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

Wow, how did it get to be Monday already?   I think I had a good reading and blogging week… but the week was hindered when Thursday evening I became sick and remained that way through the weekend.  I am still sniffling now but had a good nap today and am hopeful that this is the end of it and I can get back on schedule tomorrow.  My workouts have suffered, but my reading has not as when not wanting to move…. I can always read.  😀

Cinder by Marissa Meyer (I am so glad I read this!  I really LOVED it!!!)

 

Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer (a book I have been meaning to read for years – an audio that really amazed me – true story.)

The Condition by Jennifer Haigh (have you read Haigh yet?  You need to!)

 

Never Eighteen by Megan Bostic (debut author this year and a great read!!!!)

One For The Money – Book and Movie review (I read the books YEARS ago, seen the movie on Saturday!)

 

I also finished Crescendo and The Fixer Upper on audio and watched Into The Wild the movie and have reviews yet to post on both of these.  I am in the process of listening to Silence which is the final and follow up book to Crescendo.

So this week hubby will be working out of town which for a wild girl like me means….

more books.  😛 

I already peeked this afternoon to see what I was up for this week and am excited to share with you the plan:

On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas, President Kennedy died, and the world changed. What if you could change it back?

In this brilliantly conceived tour de force, Stephen King – who has absorbed the social, political, and popular culture of his generation more imaginatively and thoroughly than any other writer – takes listeners on an incredible journey into the past and the possibility of altering it.

It begins with Jake Epping, a 35-year-old English teacher in Lisbon Falls, Maine, who makes extra money teaching GED classes. He asks his students to write about an event that changed their lives, and one essay blows him away: a gruesome, harrowing story about the night more than 50 years ago when Harry Dunning’s father came home and killed his mother, his sister, and his brother with a sledgehammer. Reading the essay is a watershed moment for Jake, his life – like Harry’s, like America’s in 1963 – turning on a dime.

Not much later his friend Al, who owns the local diner, divulges a secret: his storeroom is a portal to the past, a particular day in 1958. And Al enlists Jake to take over the mission that has become his obsession – to prevent the Kennedy assassination.

So begins Jake’s new life as George Amberson, in a different world – of Ike and JFK and Elvis, of big American cars and sock hops and cigarette smoke everywhere. From the dank little city of Derry, Maine (where there’s Dunning business to conduct), to the warmhearted small town of Jodie, Texas, where Jake falls dangerously in love, every turn is leading, eventually of course, to a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald and to Dallas, where the past becomes heart-stoppingly suspenseful – and where history might not be history anymore. Time-travel has never been so believable. Or so terrifying.

I started this one a couple days ago… it is a 30+ hour audio so thought I had better get started!  So far?  Loving it!

 

 

 

Frances, a Chinese-American student at an academically competitive school in San Francisco, has always had it drilled into her to be obedient to her mother and to be a straight-A student so that she can go to Med school. But is being a doctor what she wants? It has never even occurred to Frances to question her own feelings and desires until she accidentally winds up in speech class and finds herself with a hidden talent. Does she dare to challenge the mother who has sacrificed everything for her?

I found this at my library…. thought it sounded good!

In LIFE IS A TRIP: The Transformative Magic of Travel, Santa-Fe based travel writer Judith Fein describes many such in-betweens. For her, the most mundane moments are often turning points, when a trip can turn into a catharsis, where plans are thrown out and intuition takes over. Fein loves to take herself off the beaten path and then wait to see what happens. Her collection of essays is not so much about an intrepid traveler as a spiritual searcher, someone willing to travel to the ends of the Earth to find answers.

I started this one this afternoon and am enjoying the funny short travel stories…

Ben and Rose secretly wish their lives were different. Ben longs for the father he has never known. Rose dreams of a mysterious actress whose life she chronicles in a scrapbook. When Ben discovers a puzzling clue in his mother’s room and Rose reads an enticing headline in the newspaper, both children set out alone on desperate quests to find what they are missing.

Set fifty years apart, these two independent stories–Ben’s told in words, Rose’s in pictures–weave back and forth with mesmerizing symmetry. How they unfold and ultimately intertwine will surprise you, challenge you, and leave you breathless with wonder

I must be into “BIG ADVENTURES” as this baby is over 600 pages.  But – this was going to be my first book of the year and got pushed back.  Now it is time.

I think that is more than enough for this week – but it should be a fun week to read!  I am hoping to get around to many of you to see what you are reading as well!  Please add your link below where it says “Click Here” and stop in and see a few of the other readers who have linked up as well.  You never know where your next great read may come from!  😀

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and for those of you who are mainly YA, MG, and Childrens book readers…. be sure add your link here as well:

 

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Hardcover Feedback


WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

Well, the week wasn’t all that I had hoped book wise.  I actually had a FULL week of long work hours and evening plans every single night Monday thru Friday.  So busy in fact, I hardly made it around to see any of your posts. I had little book time until these last couple of days which has been wonderful.


Henry’s Sisters by Cathy Lamb (our book club read, a lot of good food…. and a little bra burning…)


Murder On The Orient Express by Agatha Christie (audio and GOOD audio!)

 

52 Small Changes by Brett Blumenthal ( a wonderful book for making changes for the good)

 

Born Standing Up by Steve Martin (good, but not great and left me hanging…)

 

at Team Kickin’ It:

Weekly Check In

 

When Its Hard To Find Time To Work Out

 

52 Small Changes – the book and The CHALLENGE

 

The week was skimpy but I have plans for this next one.  While I will have evening events Monday and Wednesday and possibly Thursday… I should get a little time during the week, late evenings and over the weekend. 

The plan?

Doc Hendley never set out to be a hero. In 2004, Hendley-a small- town bartender- launched a series of wine-tasting events to raise funds for clean-water projects and to bring awareness to the world’s freshwater crisis. He planned to donate the proceeds through traditional channels, but instead found himself traveling to one of the world’s most dangerous hot spots: Darfur, Sudan.

There, Doc witnessed a government-sponsored genocide where the number-one weapon wasn’t bullets-it was water. The Janjaweed terrorists had figured out that shooting up a bladder containing 10,000 liters of water, or dumping rotting corpses into a primary water source is remarkably efficient for the purposes of mass extermination. With limited funds, Doc realized that he couldn’t build new wells costing $10,000 a pop, but he could hire local workers to restore a damaged well for a mere $50 each. He’d found his mission. Today, Doc and Wine to Water continue to help stricken peoples repair and maintain water- containment systems in places like Darfur, Cambodia, Uganda, and Haiti.

Doc is a regular, rough-and-tumble guy who loves booze, music, and his Harley- but he also wanted to help. Wine to Water is a gripping story about braving tribal warfare and natural disasters and encountering fascinating characters in far-flung regions of the world. It is also an authoritative account of a global crisis and an inspirational tale that proves how ordinary people can improve the world.

This book is seriously right up my alley and I can not wait to read and chat with you about it!

 

 

 

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. . . .

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

Ok… we will see on this one.  It may be a genre stretch but I LOVE this cover!
The noise between Patch and Nora is gone. They’ve overcome the secrets riddled in Patch’s dark past…bridged two irreconcilable worlds…faced heart-wrenching tests of betrayal, loyalty and trust…and all for a love that will transcend the boundary between heaven and earth. Armed with nothing but their absolute faith in one another, Patch and Nora enter a desperate fight to stop a villain who holds the power to shatter everything they’ve worked for—and their love—forever.
While still listening to the second in this series, Crescendo, Reagan from Miss Remmers Reviews raved to me about the third book. Silence…. so…. onward we go! 😀
After graduating from Emory University in Atlanta in 1992, top student and athlete Christopher McCandless abandoned his possessions, gave his entire $24,000 savings account to charity and hitchhiked to Alaska, where he went to live in the wilderness. Four months later, he turned up dead. His diary, letters and two notes found at a remote campsite tell of his desperate effort to survive, apparently stranded by an injury and slowly starving. They also reflect the posturing of a confused young man, raised in affluent Annandale, Va., who self-consciously adopted a Tolstoyan renunciation of wealth and return to nature. Krakauer, a contributing editor to Outside and Men’s Journal, retraces McCandless’s ill-fated antagonism toward his father, Walt, an eminent aerospace engineer. Krakauer also draws parallels to his own reckless youthful exploit in 1977 when he climbed Devils Thumb, a mountain on the Alaska-British Columbia border, partly as a symbolic act of rebellion against his autocratic father.
A book I have wanted to read for years… and never had.  Until now.
Thats the week.  How is yours looking?  I am hoping to make my rounds and see what you are reading.  Please add your linky below where it ways Click here.

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and for those who read mainly YA, Middle Grade, and Childrens books, be sure to add your link to the MG version as well here:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

Coming in a little late today – I got caught up in the previous post tonight and well…. yeah.  😀

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Lydia from The Lost Entwife


WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

I did not accomplish all I had hoped I would this past week.  Even with the week off I spent a lot of time writing, not so much reading – and I was gone with friends over the weekend crafting at our cabin.  That said – here is what did happen…

Divergent by Veronica Roth (First book of the year!!!  And it is a good one!)

Introducing …. a new blog with a different focus:  Team Kickin It!  (Stop by and say hello!)

 

Folly Beach by Dorthea Benton Frank ( good beach read!)

 

Boo by Rene Gutteridge (fun audio that oddly gave me Twilight flashbacks of Bella’s dad….)

 

Cook Yourself Thin Faster by Lauren Deen  (good recipes – easy and fast to make and low cal too!)

 

My How Book Blogging Has Changed... (my thoughts on some not so positive changes to the book blogging community over the past year)

 

This week I have some catching up to do… and a busy week ahead – work, evening commitments and Navy Son is home for a couple weeks!  SSQQUUEEE!!!!

I do have a few things planned though…

Whether as New Year’s resolutions, birthday wishes, or daily promises, most everyone vows at some point to make a major life change. But change is easier said than done, especially when it comes to better managing our wellness amidst the chaos of everyday living. Fortunately, wellness coach and award-winning writer Brett Blumenthal has devised a way to inspire and motivate her readers to live healthier and make positive changes in their lives. Although Blumenthal’s method is not a quick fix, it is a surprisingly simple one: make one small change per week, for fifty-two weeks, and at the end of a year, you’ll be happier and healthier. After all, it is the small changes that are the most realistic, instead of trying to overhaul your lifestyle all at once. 52 Small Changes addresses all areas of wellbeing, including nutrition, exercise, stress management, mental wellness, and even the health of one’s home environment. By guiding readers through these changes at an easy, manageable pace, Blumenthal provides an engaging roadmap to lasting results and “a happier, healthier you.”

I haven’t looked at this one yet but I am excited to check it out!

After her boss is caught in a political scandal, fledgling Washington lobbyist Dempsey Jo Killebrew is left broke, unemployed, and homeless. out of options, she reluctantly accepts her father’s offer to help turn birdsong—the fading Victorian mansion he recently inherited in Guthrie, Georgia—into a real estate cash cow. but birdsong turns out to be a moldering Pepto-bismol-pink dump with duct-taped windows, a driveway full of junk, and a grumpy distant relation who’s claiming squatter’s rights. Stuck in a tiny town where everyone seems to know her business, Dempsey grits her teeth and rolls up her sleeves, and begins her journey back to the last place she ever expected: home.

Mary Kay Andrews is a hoot – I look forward to listening to this one!

In the midseventies, Steve Martin exploded onto the comedy scene. By 1978 he was the biggest concert draw in the history of stand-up. In 1981 he quit forever. This book is, in his own words, the story of “why I did stand-up and why I walked away.”

Emmy and Grammy Award winner, author of the acclaimed New York Times bestsellers Shopgirl and The Pleasure of My Company, and a regular contributor to The New Yorker, Martin has always been awriter. His memoir of his years in stand-up is candid, spectacularly amusing, and beautifully written.

At age ten Martin started his career at Disneyland, selling guidebooks in the newly opened theme park. In the decade that followed, he worked in the Disney magic shop and the Bird Cage Theatre at Knott’s Berry Farm, performing his first magic/comedy act a dozen times a week. The story of these years, during which he practiced and honed his craft, is moving and revelatory. The dedication to excellence and innovation is formed at an astonishingly early age and never wavers or wanes.

Martin illuminates the sacrifice, discipline, and originality that made him an icon and informs his work to this day. To be this good, to perform so frequently, was isolating and lonely. It took Martin decades to reconnect with his parents and sister, and he tells that story with great tenderness. Martin also paints a portrait of his times — the era of free love and protests against the war in Vietnam, the heady irreverence of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in the late sixties, and the transformative new voice of Saturday Night Live in the seventies.

I loved Steve Martin as a kid!  Had to give this one a try 🙂

 

 

 

I’ve experienced a lot the last few years and I have a lot to share. So I hope that you’ll take a moment to sit back, relax and enjoy the words I’ve put together for you in this book. I think you’ll find I’ve left no stone unturned, no door unopened, no window unbroken, no rug unvacuumed, no ivories untickled. What I’m saying is, let us begin, shall we?

A Christmas gift!  Cant wait to read!

 

 

Thats the week!  What does your week look like?  I would love to see what you are reading!  Add your link below to where it says click here! 

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For those who enjoy reading Childrens, Middle Grade and YA – check in at this link as well:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

First off – Happy New Year!  I hope all of you have had a wonderful time this last holiday week of Christmas to New Years…. and now today, here we all are in 2012.  I am glad to have you here celebrating with me 🙂

Welcome to It’s Monday!  What Are You Reading?  This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Lori from Escape With Dollycas Into A Good Book

WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

**Please note one change for 2012… if you are in Canada or out of the US and win the comment contest here, I will send you the $5 Amazon gift card to use on any Amazon purchase.  It has just become too pricey to mail the books out of the states.  If you are out of the US and have a US address I can send the book to for you, that would work. 😀

Again, Happy New Year!  I have spent pretty much all of today reading my first book of the year, Divergent and loving it.  I was hoping to have the review up today but I am still about 60 pages from finishing so it will go up Monday late afternoon instead.  I actually have several great reads lined up for the week and I have the week off so I am looking forward to some wonderful writing time and reading too!  😀 

Here is what was true of this past week:

The Black Shard by Victoria Simcox with a signed GIVEAWAY!

 

My 2011 recap of the best and the worst of each month

 

The Dead and The Gone by Susan Beth Pfeffer (2nd in the World As We Knew It trilogy)


My final book/audio counts for 2011

 

The 2011 WHERE Are You Reading Counts are in and I posted my map and a link for others who participated as well.

 

This World We Live In by Susan Beth Pfeffer (yet to be reviewed)

 

Winter Bone by Daniel Woodrell (yet to be reviewed)

 

I am planning on doing a giveaway a day here this week and todays was posted this morning, you can still enter by going to the post and letting me know what your first book of the year is going to be.

 

I am actually really excited about the books and audio I have going on this week to kick off the new year, and a new crisp and clean 2012 Reading map!  Here is what is happening:

One choice can transform you. Pass initiation. Do not fail! Thrilling urban dystopian fiction debut from exciting young author. In sixteen-year-old Beatrice Prior’s world, society is divided into five factions — Abnegation (the selfless), Candor (the honest), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent) — each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue, in the attempt to form a “perfect society.” At the age of sixteen, teens must choose the faction to which they will devote their lives. On her Choosing Day, Beatrice renames herself Tris, rejects her family’s group, and chooses another faction. After surviving a brutal initiation, Tris finds romance with a super-hot boy, but also discovers unrest and growing conflict in their seemingly “perfect society.” To survive and save those they love, they must use their strengths to uncover the truths about their identities, their families, and the order of their society itself.

Currently reading and should finish tonight… I have pretty much read this non stop all day (errr… except for the two hour nap I had… 😳 )

With its glistening beaches, laidback Southern charm, and enticing Gullah tradition, Folly Beach has long been one of South Carolina’s most historic and romantic spots. It is the land of Cate Cooper’s childhood, the place where all the ghosts of her past roam freely. Cate never thought she’d return to the beach house named for this lovely strip of coast. But circumstances have changed, thanks to her newly dead husband, whose financial—and emotional—perfidy has left Cate homeless and broke.

Yet Folly Beach holds more than just memories. Once upon a time another woman found unexpected comfort within its welcoming arms. An artist, writer, and sometime colleague of the revered George Gershwin, Dorothy Heyward enjoyed the greatest moments of her life at Folly with her beloved husband, DuBose. And though the Heywards are long gone, their passion and spirit linger in every sunset and ocean breeze.

And for Cate, Folly holds the promise of unexpected fulfillment . . . of the woman she’s always wanted—and is finally ready—to become.

I am on tour for this one, coming up on Wednesday!  🙂

 

 

 

Ever since the Bommarito sisters were little girls, their mother, River, has written them a letter on pink paper when she has something especially important to impart. And this time, the message is urgent and impossible to ignore River requires open-heart surgery, and Isabelle and her sisters are needed at home to run the family bakery and take care of their brother and ailing grandmother.

Isabelle has worked hard to leave Trillium River, Oregon, behind as she travels the globe taking award-winning photographs. It’s not that Isabelle hates her family. On the contrary, she and her sisters Cecilia, an outspoken kindergarten teacher, and Janie, a bestselling author, share a deep, loving bond. And all of them adore their brother, Henry, whose disabilities haven’t stopped him from helping out at the bakery and bringing good cheer to everyone in town.

But going home again has a way of forcing open the secrets and hurts that the Bommaritos would rather keep tightly closed Isabelle’s fleeting and too-frequent relationships, Janie’s obsessive compulsive disorder, and Cecilia’s self-destructive streak and grief over her husband’s death. Working together to look after Henry and save their flagging bakery, Isabelle and her sisters begin to find answers to questions they never knew existed, unexpected ways to salve the wounds of their childhoods, and the courage to grasp surprising new chances at happiness.

Let me just say I have been reading this for the last couple of days and it is a WINNER!  This is our January book club read and w-o-w!!!

 

 

 

After graduating from Emory University in Atlanta in 1992, top student and athlete Christopher McCandless abandoned his possessions, gave his entire $24,000 savings account to charity and hitchhiked to Alaska, where he went to live in the wilderness. Four months later, he turned up dead. His diary, letters and two notes found at a remote campsite tell of his desperate effort to survive, apparently stranded by an injury and slowly starving. They also reflect the posturing of a confused young man, raised in affluent Annandale, Va., who self-consciously adopted a Tolstoyan renunciation of wealth and return to nature. Krakauer, a contributing editor to Outside and Men’s Journal, retraces McCandless’s ill-fated antagonism toward his father, Walt, an eminent aerospace engineer. Krakauer also draws parallels to his own reckless youthful exploit in 1977 when he climbed Devils Thumb, a mountain on the Alaska-British Columbia border, partly as a symbolic act of rebellion against his autocratic father.

I have never read this although I have always wanted to – now this week I will be listening to it on audio.

 

 

 

As medical director of the famed Preventive Medicine Research Institute, Lee Lipsenthal helped thousands of patients struggling with disease to overcome their fears of pain and death and to embrace a more joyful way of living. In his own life, happily married and the proud father of two remarkable children, Lee was similarly committed to living his life fully and gratefully each day.

The power of those beliefs was tested in July 2009, when Lee was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. As Lee and his wife, Kathy, navigated his diagnosis, illness, and treatment, he discovered that he did not fear death, and that even as he was facing his own mortality, he felt more fully alive than ever before. In the bestselling tradition of Tuesdays with Morrie, told with humor and heart, and deeply inspiring, Enjoy Every Sandwich distills everything Lee learned about how we find meaning, purpose, and peace in our lives.

I have seen this on a few blogs and admit… it has me curious…

 

 

 

It’s 1996, and Josh and Emma have been neighbors their whole lives. They’ve been best friends almost as long – at least, up until last November, when Josh did something that changed everything. Things have been weird between them ever since, but when Josh’s family gets a free AOL CD in the mail,his mom makes him bring it over so that Emma can install it on her new computer. When they sign on, they’re automatically logged onto their Facebook pages. But Facebook hasn’t been invented yet. And they’re looking at themselves fifteen years in the future.

By refreshing their pages, they learn that making different decisions now will affect the outcome of their lives later. And as they grapple with the ups and downs of what their futures hold, they’re forced to confront what they’re doing right – and wrong – in the present.

If there is time, I hope by the weekend to be reading this one!  A gift from my son for Christmas. 

 

There it is!  A very bookish week but I am loving it!  😀 

I am looking forward to what you are starting your year out with!  Please add your link below to where it says “click here” – I should be able to get around and see you all!  😀

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And for those of you who read a lot of YA, Middle Grade, and Childrens reads, pop in and link here as well:

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

 

Happy day after Christmas!

This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!

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 telling me how many you visited.  **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.

This past weeks winner:

Deb Nance

WOO HOO!!!!  Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves  and email me your choice with your mailing address as well!   journeythroughbooks@gmail.com

I hope everyone had a happy Christmas/Holiday/Weekend.  I sure did. College Son has been all ours all weekend and that’s rare and nice.  We watched movies, are WAY too much and had a great time. I thought I would put this post up last night like I usually do… but honestly – I just took a day off from the internet and the blog and being unplugged ….

was nice.  😀

As for what I read and accomplished this past week:

 

Stories I Only Tell My Friends by Rob Lowe


Pumpkin Rolls recipe (so good!!!)


Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (this time on audio!)  – a little recap before the movie comes out!

 

The Christmas Cookie Club by Ann Pearlman with giveaway!

 

Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell (not reviewed yet)

Two challenges hosted here – its not to late 😀  : 

The 2012 WHERE Are You Reading Challenge (Map out where your books are from)

The 2012 Dystopia Challenge (care to give it a try?  :D)

 

I did not get as much book time in as I had hoped but plenty of audio while cooking cleaning, gift wrapping, and tree assembly 😀

So this week I am hoping to clean up several books I have lying around that I would like to clean up before we go in to the new year.  Because next week…. next week I am treating myself to a week of books I have waited too long to read!

However – I am adding a little audio to my week and here is what is either playing now… or playing soon:

 

“The murderer is with us–on the train now . . .”

Just after midnight, the famous Orient Express is stopped in its tracks by a snowdrift. By morning, the millionaire Samuel Edward Ratchett lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside. One of his fellow passengers must be the murderer.

Isolated by the storm, detective Hercule Poirot must find the killer among a dozen of the dead man’s enemies, before the murderer decides to strike again . . .

Ok…. perhaps a little cheesy, but I have never had the pleasure or reading or listening to an Agatha Christie book and I really wanted to do so before the end of 2011.

 

 

 

Nora should have known her life was far from perfect. Despite starting a relationship with her guardian angel, Patch (who, title aside, can be described anything but angelic), and surviving an attempt on her life, things are not looking up. Patch is starting to pull away and Nora can’t figure out if it’s for her best interest or if his interest has shifted to her arch-enemy Marcie Millar. Not to mention that Nora is haunted by images of her father and she becomes obsessed with finding out what really happened to him that night he left for Portland and never came home.

The farther Nora delves into the mystery of her father’s death, the more she comes to question if her Nephilim blood line has something to do with it as well as why she seems to be in danger more than the average girl. Since Patch isn’t answering her questions and seems to be standing in her way, she has to start finding the answers on her own. Relying too heavily on the fact that she has a guardian angel puts Nora at risk again and again. But can she really count on Patch or is he hiding secrets darker than she can even imagine?

I read Hush Hush (the first in this set of books) over a year ago.  It has taken me way too long to get to this one! 

 

 

 

 

The biggest thing to happen to Skary, Indiana, is renowned horror novelist Wolfe Boone–or, “Boo,” as the locals fondly call him. For the past sixteen years, the reclusive writer has been the town’s greatest attraction, having unintentionally turned the once-struggling Skary into a thriving tourist-trap for the dark side: from the Haunted Mansion restaurant, famous for its “bloody fingers” (fries splattered with ketchup) to Spooky’s Bookstore (where employees dress like the walking dead).

But when a newly reformed Wolfe suddenly quits the genre and subsequently starts to pursue Skary’s favorite girl-next-door, Ainsley Parker, the little town made famous by his writings becomes truly horrified. Soon, a scheme is plotted to put the fright back into Skary–and get their most famous resident out of love and back into the thrill business.

I read Rene Gutteridge last winter and enjoyed her… now looking through the audio at my local library I find her again and this book is the first in a trilogy…. I am…. curious… 😀

 

 

 

So that I think is safely it.  I want to go into 2012 really clean on half read books so my work is cut out for me this week 😀  I have so much to do this week with a year-end recap of what was great this past year, Challenge results, and a couple great challenges I am hosting myself.  It all should be a good time.  😀

I look forward to seeing what you accomplished this past week.  😀  Add your post below where it says “click here” 

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Also – be sure to check out the Middle Grade version of Its Monday What Are You Reading: