Morning Meanderings… I Am On A Break

Good morning! 

The sun is shining here in central Minnesota which makes me happy in so many ways!  We are supposed to have a week of 50-60 degree weather so by next weekend I am thinking we will be pretty much snow free.

Last night my cousins and their hubbies and my hubby and I all got together for an evening out.  There are five of us girl cousins that try to get together once in a while and that I think is kind of awesome.  Last night we brought the guys too and ended up grabbing some dinner and good conversation.

I did not take pictures, I should have I know… but today since my boys are on my mind (and apparently my theme is family today) I thought I would post pics of them for Alyce’s Saturday Snapshot…

A little back ground history of these two… Justin is the younger, at 21 and goes to College in Mankato.  Brad is the older and is in the Navy.  Growing up they were complete opposites but now they have this cool friendship.

I love this picture.  This was the day we were taking Brad (right) to the airport to go to boot camp.  I was trying to get a good picture of the two of them but of course right before I snap the picture Justin (left) says something funny.
I love this picture. This was the day we were taking Brad (right) to the airport to go to boot camp. I was trying to get a good picture of the two of them but of course right before I snap the picture Justin (left) says something funny.

Christmas 2010, Brad (left) was able to come home on a short leave for Christmas.

 

Mid January 2012, Brad had two weeks back at home and Justin came home a for a weekend so we could all hang out together and do Brad' birthday (which is in December) and Christmas.

 

Brad currently is stationed in Florida and Justin, at this time is in Honduras on his 5th Mission Trip.  So proud of them both.

As for myself today, I think I am pulling the plug on all activity.  I woke up early and made some tea and have been engrossed in pandemonium by Laure Oliver ever since.  I plan to read and catch up on a couple of reviews I need to write and a couple of bonus posts I have been working on. 

I look forward to a day of much reading and just letting the “to do’s” hang tight while I take a day of real relaxation. 😀

The Eyre Report #3

My third check in for my reading project of Jane Eyre.  Now three weeks in, my goal being 70 pages a week, I have just crossed over the 210 page line.  This report was due on the blog this past Sunday and I don’t know how I forgot… but yeah.  I forgot.

Pages 141 – 210 reveals Jane and Rochester staring to get to know one another.  There is the fire in his bedroom (I am still confused about that one) and Jane rushes in and saves his life which he is overly grateful…. and then the next day…

gone.  (Please don’t let him be bipolar….. I dealt with that in Wuthering Heights with Kathryn and I was about to kill her myself in the end of that one!)

Then we move on to the fact that Rochester likes to party PARTY and he is gone for what is it, like two three weeks, hanging with  friends about ten miles away which in this time, is like being in another country!  When he does return, he brings the party with him and then all those people proceed to stay at his house for the next two weeks… (so odd… I would go nuts having company that long!)

Of course, now enters Miss Ingram.  Some hot mama from another family who despite her loveliness, her lovely singing voice,tallness, gorgeous hair, AND her talent at a piano… still remains single. 

I instantly do not like her. 

Imgram and Jane in the corner

Next to Imgram (I can not recall her first name right now… Jane looks plain.  Plain Jane.  I mean, seriously, Jane’s hair will never do what Imgram’s does….

To conclude my recap here – I am now beyond an odd fortune teller part where if I am getting that right… is Mt Rochester (and what sort of insecurity is that????  Spying on his guests!) and if it wasn’t him.. then I misunderstood that whole part.

I leave you with this…. I am into the book.  I have another recap due on Sunday – pager 210 – 280.  I did not have time today to put up a rating but know I would not put it down now…. I am invested and now I have to know what will happen with the snarly lipped Imgram and the shy plain Jane.

Morning Meanderings… Kindle, Nook, and what is Google Play?

Good morning?

Does anyone else ever have visions of running away and living off the land, and books?

Nope? 

Just me… ok.

As I look at all the books I want to read and all the books coming out daily, weekly…. HOURLY that I want to read and then all the things that I do on a daily, weekly , HOURLY basis… such as eat and sleep and work and work out and clean and…

well yeah… where is that pocket of book time?

But look… I have only just started typing, sitting here with COFFEE CUP on an irritatingly snowy morning in Minnesota, should be, could be, should be getting ready for work… but one eye on the time and the other on my keyboard….

and I have already digressed.

WHAT I had wanted to talk about this morning was my NOOK, which I love, and the KINDLE which I think is a better product now then back in the day when you had to choose NOOK or KINDLE and I felt the obvious choice was NOOK but now I am now so sure and yeah I am rambling, one because of the time, and two because of the caffeine…

AND NOW…

of course there are all these other e readers and then this morning I am reading my beloved Shelf Awareness and they are talking about Google Play and if you were hoping when I asked the question this morning that I was going to explain it, that is not the case…

I was really hoping you could explain it to me.  😯

I was looking a little at the website today and I didn’t have a lot of time to dig but I wasn’t sure if it is for your phone, or if you could download it on any e reader or… well… what and where?

ANYHOO…. that’s all.  I just wanted to know.  😀

Have a super day and yeah this probably did not make sense today but really, most days I don’t have a clue what I am going to write about until I sit down and

write.  😀

Have an awesome day!!!!! 

The Flight Of Gemma Hardy by Margot Livesey

 

When Gemma Hardy is found parentless at the age of ten, she is taken from all she has ever known and delivered to Scotland in the hands of her loving uncle and his family.  Then when her uncle dies, Gemma finds herself left in the care of the aunt, who never wanted her in the first place. 

When an opportunity arises for Gemma to go to a private school, she jumps at the chance, however Claypoole, is not the school that she dreamed of and finds out quickly she ins nothing more than an unpaid servant who is teased by the other girls.

When the school goes bankrupt, Gemma finds herself traveling yet again, this time as an au pair on the Orkney Islands.  She is under the employment of Mr. Sinclair, taking care of his eight year old niece.  Gemma finds herself intrigued by the mysterious Mr. Sinclair, rich and single, flying in from London whenever he wishes and upon his arrivals the house seems to come alive with his presence. 

Could Gemma find herself falling for him? 

 

 

 

Bookish people… does any of this sounds familiar?  It should, even if you are having a vague twinge of familiarity in the back of your mind, you should sense something.  Yes, The Flight Of Gemma Hardy is a remix of the beloved (by many), Jane Eyre. 
Perhaps for me, it is all the more familiar, and all the more exciting as I am currently reading Jane Eyre at that same time as I have been reading this book.  You might think that would be redundant, but no – it was invigorating! 
Many years ago Charlotte Bronte opened up her now famous story with this first line:
“There was no possibility of taking a walk that day.”
Now, in 2012 I open up The Flight Of Gemma Hardy to this line:
“We did not go for a walk on the first day of the year.”
Honestly, it kind of gave me goosebumps…. like I was about to enter into something amazing.
Even though I am still reading Jane Eyre (we have a history of failures… but that is another story for another time), I thoroughly enjoyed this more modern take of Jane/Gemma.  Set in the 1950 and 60’s, I was impressed with the story line… never bored with the fact that I was reading two similar books at the same time as Margot Livesey not only breathes a different take and life into her book, she captivates the reader with the spunky Gemma. 
If you liked Jane Eyre, you will love The Flight Of Gemma Hardy!
Thank you to TLC book tours for the opportunity to fly with Gemma!

Morning Meanderings… Audible Sale! The River???

Good morning and happy Wednesday!  I can not even believe it is Wednesday already!  On Sunday is Group Power Class they had us hold our barbell in front of us with weights on it and do calf raises.  At the time, no real big deal.  I mean yeah, you could feel the stretch…

Then on Monday, ooh I could still feel that a bit, hurt a little when I walked… and then yesterday, if I sat at my desk for any amount of time I could hardly walk at all!  Seriously…. my left leg I walked on tip toe because putting my foot flat pulled that muscle too much… and HURT…. that means…

I should do that more often.  😯

Anyhoo, last night in my semi crippled state, propped into the recliner with blanky and lap top two things happened… one good…. one not so much.

First – I discovered that Audible.com was having a members sale.  $4.95 audio books!  Of it is like browsing through a virtual book store… I walked away with:

The first three were on the sale, and the last one I used a credit for as I have had my eye on this one since I first seen it.  OOH Audio fix!!!

Have any of you watched that new show The River?  Someone recently told me that I would like it as I really enjoyed LOST.  Well, I just happened to catch it on tv last night and thought I would give it a shot.  It’s ummm… a bit odd, and I am pretty sure that right before I shut it off, they were going to eat the dog.  I don’t know… I couldn’t watch that.  Here is a clip of what the show is about:

 

 

It looks good.. but I don’t know if it is for me.  😀

Ok I am off to conquer another work day and a work out and yeah, my volunteer time with the students tonight.  By the time I get home it will be time to  Survivor and Modern Family – both give me great joy.  😀

Ice by Linda Howard

Young widower Gabriel McQueen has just arrived back to his childhood town on military leave to see his young son and his father the sheriff.  Gabriel had hardly put a foot in the door when his father informs him of an incoming ice storm.  In Maine, this is dangerous news and he is quick to do as his father tasks.

The task:  To go deep up into the mountains and bring back long time resident Lorelei Helton to safety.  Gabriel know Lorelei (Lolly) all to well and she was rather a pain in his back side back in High school and basically there is no love lost between them.  Begrudgingly he heads up into the mountains to bring her to safety before the storm hits and leaves her stranded.

After abandoning his truck when the roads get too bad and taking the last mile on foot, Gabriel finds Lolly being held captive in her home by a couple of strangers hell-bent on keeping her or killing her, it didn’t matter which… and now Gabriel unarmed has more to deal with then just the enraging Lolly.

Well now…. *clears throat*… its been a while since I have brought out the bag of snarky.  Ok actually that’s new… I thought of it when I was planning this review, but I am keeping it.. in the case I need to pull it out again. 

My one previous experience with Linda Howard was in 2001 when our very small book club at the time read Mr. Perfect.  I loved it.  I thought it was hilarious and a bit scandalous… (in 2001 I was not much of an adventurous reader…), I have always meant to read her again… but alas, it never happened.

Then recently at my library I seen this audio… the synopsis sounded good… ice storm, bad people, a mountain top rescue and a sheriff’s son… good enough for Sheila! 

But wait… lets start with the cover.  In my defense… the audio book I checked out from the library had a big Kitchigami Library sticker over that picture, or I can tell you if I would have seen that cover I never would have chosen this book.

Why not?

Yes, yes, you in the back waving your arm wildly – that’s right… I don’t like romance books.  And honestly I would have read the synopsis, looked at the cover, looked at the synopsis again, and said “huh?”  It doesn’t make sense to me….

and now to dig into that bag of snarky…. hang on, it’s going to be a bumpy ride…

Right from the start there is an exceptionally LLLLOOOONNNNNGGGGG description of how Gabriel would rather rescue anyone than Lolly.  How she bugged him so much in school and he just found her irritating.  I think I groaned out loud…. right then you knew it was going to be love.

And now if you are thinking, “Sheila, you are spoiling the book!” …. nope… trust me, within the first 5 minutes you get this scene and many more like it.  Honestly with this kind of writing throughout the book time and again… hinting of what is to come… I am not spoiling the book… the book is spoiling the book.  😯

The people in Lolly’s house are not scary, they are laughable… but I don’t think they were meant to be… they are just so dumb…. and in the end… ugh…. don’t get me started…. I seriously think I rolled my eyes… hello?  Who ordered the clichés?  Would you like to super size that?

Finally I thought this book must be Linda Howard’s early writing as it just isn’t well-developed…. imagine my surprise when I noticed it was released in 2009!

My advice is do not buy this book… if you are curious or think it sounds like a good read, I recommend picking it up from your local library.  Save a tree.

My choice of theme songs for Gabriel and Lolly:

Morning Meanderings… *COUGH COUGH* What???

Good morning.

The last few days I have listened to my husband cough… err… hack, and thought well at least I dont get colds as easy as he does.  THEN this morning as I am typing away, having my coffee I catch myself clearing my throat, and yeah… a little *cough*.

GAH.

I started to listening to Great House this morning and as it plays on my kitchen cd player and the narrator is going on about a missing Daniel and a desk she kept his letters in I suddenly realized I had no real idea what this story was about.  I had seen it around the last year or so… I liked the cover, I picked it up at the library…. but now I am in a story of what?  Poetry, a desk, a missing man…. so I had to go on line and try to read something about the book and find out that the desk becomes almost a character… a center piece around which the story is set.  Ok… now I am engaged…

Our narrator has written seven novels at that desk and when a mysterious daughter calls to claim it after two decades….  hmmmm… interesting.

Ok.. .I have to get ready for work, stop back in later I have a snarky review coming up which while the book was BAD BAD BAD… I had a lot of fun with the review.

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:

Morning Meanderings… Sunday Salon

Good morning!  Happy Sunday! 

My recap of this week is so much more laid back then last week! I absolutely had nothing in my evenings all week.  I know right?  That never happens!  I usually am looking at my week thinking – ok I have that Monday evening, that on Tuesday evening, that on Wed… 

but nope, this past week my Monday group was cancelled, Wednesday activities I usually volunteer for were cancelled due to the snow storm that hit Brainerd (sort of), Thursday I was supposed to have a belated dinner with friends and one of them had to go to the cities so we decided to postpone… and that was all I had planned for the week!

On Friday night hubby and I had chicken fajita and watched the movie Moneyball.  I will review it this week but in the meantime know that it is good and worth seeing!  😛  On Saturday evening we went out to dinner with friends Robb and Julie to a restaurant we had never been to before.  It was about a 30 minute drive but the food was good, the conversation was awesome. Robb and Julie had just completed the Polar Plunge earlier on Saturday.

Beyond that – I received some pretty exciting books in the mail this week:

 

AND – Bloggiesta is back!!!  Woo Hoo!  I am so excited and you can sign up to be a part of it now… and trust me, you want to be a part of it!  😀

That’s a wrap!  Today I have church, then working out… some reading this afternoon and tonight Floor Hockey and then Amazing Race.  Ahhh…. a good Sunday 😀

Heartbreakers by Pamela Wells

Sydney’s boyfriend decides to break off the relationship.  Kelly’s boyfriend has big plans for Valentine’s Day… just not with her.  Raven is stuck in the middle of two guys and can not decide.  Alexia has never had a serious boyfriend and wonders if she ever will.

Four friends all single start to wonder if this teenage love is worth all the pain of heartbreak.  Together they make a list of 25 Rules that they call the Breakup Code.  These rules are to get them all through the next few months and they are to make sure that not one of them falters…

  • Rule No 1:  You must not text or IM the ex boyfriend

but rules were made to be broken…

right?

I think I have found a true YA book that really felt to me to be YA… a young YA.  There is no paranormal activity, while partying is mentioned, it is just that…a mention.  No sex, no drugs, just clean sweet relationships that reminded me of Jr High.

(Yup…. we are going to have a flashback…. hang on!)

I remember those first what I thought were serious relationships in that 14 – 17 year range.  And I quite easily remember what it felt like when “the one” you thought was :the one”… wasn’t.  Seriously, do you remember that feeling?  You though you were going to die from the pain of heart-break!  I remember barely being able to get my head off the pillow…

This is the kind of love we are talking about in Heartbreakers.  The girls are still young and each break up or relationship feels overpowered with emotions.  And of course you can’t break girl code – your friends come first at this time in your life and if that say he’s wrong for you… then he is… even if you think he is so right.

I thought how each chapter started with one of the Break Up Codes was smart writing.  I thin I would have liked it more if the chapters and codes were in order instead of the code skipping around that is in the book.

Over all I can imagine that this would be a book more appreciated by tweens.  I have heard this book be compared to the Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants and I think that is a fair comparison.

**Update:  Pamela has a third book in the series coming out yet in 2012!

 

Amazon Rating

Goodreads Rating

Borrowed from my local library