52 Books in 52 Weeks

2012 Read 52 Books in 52 Weeks

2012-12-31T00:01:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the 2012 Read 52 Books in 52 Week Challenge

Also the home of the Mind Voyages, 12 in 2012, Well Educated Mind, Jane Austen and A to Z mini challenges

The rules are very simple and the goal is to read one book (at least) a week for 52 weeks.

The challenge will run from January 1, 2012 through December 31, 2012.
Our book weeks will begin on Sunday.
Participants may join at any time.
All books are acceptable except children books.**
All forms of books are acceptable including e-books, audio books, etc.
Re-reads are acceptable as long as they are read after January 1, 2012.
Books may overlap other challenges.
Create an entry post linking to this blog.
Come back and sign up with Mr. Linky in the "I'm participating post" below this post.
You don't have a blog to participate. Post your weekly book in the comments section of each weekly post.
Mr. Linky will be added to the bottom of the weekly post for you to link to reviews of your most current reads.

All the mini challenges are optional. Mix it up anyway you like. The goal is to read 52 books. How you get there is up to you.

**in reference to children books. If it is a child whose reading it and involved in the challenge, then that's okay. If an adult is doing read aloud with kids, the book should be geared for the 9 - 12 age group and above and over 100 pages. If adult reading for own enjoyment, then a good rule of thumb to go by "is there some complexity to the story or is it too simple?" If it's too simple, then doesn't count.

BW5: Literary cookbooks

2012-01-29T00:01:00.000-08:00

H is for Home

And now for something completely different - literary cookbooks! We've all come across passages in stories about the characters preparing meals or having dinner and could practically smell it, it sounded so good. From the classics like Jane Austen's Emma to modern day cozy mysteries like Cleo Coyle's Coffeehouse mysteries to Harry Potter's Treacle Tart which I'm sure we are just dying to try. (or not!) Here's a round up of a few literary cookbooks to check out:

Literary Feasts by Barbara Scrafford

"Drawing on the culinary traditions of the times and cultures at the center of each novel, the author serves up an eggplant epiphany from Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Love in the Time of Cholera, jam tarts from D.H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers, to Mrs. Ramsay's famous boeuf en daube dinner in Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse, and much more. Accompanying thought-provoking essays define the role of food in each work: as a part of a larger metaphor, in Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man; as a way of depicting character, like the bland diet of the dull Mr. Woodhouse in Jane Austen's Emma; as a means of adding vivid detail in Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth."

The Jane Austen Cookbook by Maggie Black

"Jane Austen wrote her novels in the midst of a large and sociable family. Brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, friends and acquaintances were always coming and going, which offered numerous occasions for convivial eating and drinking. One of Jane’s dearest friends, Martha Lloyd, lived with the family for many years and recorded in her “Household Book” over 100 recipes enjoyed by the Austens. A selection of this family fare, now thoroughly tested and modernized for today’s cooks, is recreated here, together with some of the more sophisticated dishes which Jane and her characters would have enjoyed at balls, picnics, and supper parties. A fascinating introduction describes Jane’s own interest in food, drawing upon both the novels and her letters, and explains the social conventions of shopping, eating, and entertaining in late Georgian and Regency England. The book is illustrated throughout with delightful contemporary line drawings, prints, and watercolours"

Kafka's Soup by Mark Crick

"If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to make dinner with Franz Kafka, Jane Austen, or Raymond Chandler, this is the chance to find out.Literary ventriloquist Mark Crick presents fourteen recipes in the voices of famous writers, from Homer to Virginia Woolf to Irvine Welsh.Guaranteed to delight anyone in love with food and books, these witty pastiches will keep you so entertained in the kitchen that you’ll be sorry when the guests arrive."

Do you have any favorite or different cookbooks to share? What recipes have you tried from some of your readings?

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If any of you were reading Ahab's Wife, did you finish it? Tell me what you think of it in the comments. Check out these discussion questions (spoilers included so don't click unless you want a hint of things to come)

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Link to your most current read. Please link to your specific book review post and not your general blog link. In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field leave a link to your specific post. If you have multiple reviews, then type in (multi) after your name and link to your general blog url.

If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW4: Mystery of Nevada Barr

2012-01-22T00:01:00.000-08:00

A couple years back I discovered Nevada Barr's Anna Pigeon mystery series when I read "Blind Descent" and was delightfully pulled into the mysterious world of spelunking and murder. Her writing puts you right there with Anna as she battles claustrophobia to go save an injured friend.


Blind Descent

Amazon: "Feisty, resourceful forest ranger Anna Pigeon faced everything from raging fires to deep-water dives with cool aplomb in her first five adventures. Very early in Blind Descent her courage is put to an even greater test when she learns that a woman seriously injured while exploring a cave next door to New Mexico's Carlsbad Caverns is a friend who has requested Pigeon's help in getting her out. "A chilling image filled Anna's mind: herself crouched and whimpering, fear pouring like poison through her limbs, shutting down her brain as the cave closed in around her." Pushing aside her fears, Pigeon takes the plunge, leading readers through a truly harrowing series of tight squeezes...."

I dipped my toes into Anna's life again with "Winter Study" as she battles both nature and man in the frozen winter of Isle Royale National Park. You could practically feel your toes freezing off as you read the story.

Winter Study

Publisher's Weekly: "In bestseller Barr's chilling 14th mystery thriller to feature National Park Service ranger Anna Pigeon (after 2005's Hard Truth), Anna joins the team of Winter Study, a research project intended to study the wolves and moose of Michigan's Isle Royale National Park, the setting for 1994's A Superior Death. Complicating the study is Bob Menechinn, an untrustworthy Homeland Security officer assigned to shadow the research. Crowded into inhospitable lodgings and persecuted by unrelenting cold, Anna is far from her comfort zone as nature turns awry with a series of bizarre events. The team stumbles upon the tracks—and the mutilated victim—of a preternaturally large, unidentified beast, and local packs of wolves descend on human-populated areas, a behavior out of step with their species. The campfire legends of youth metastasize into adult fears as Anna must piece together a connection between these anomalies while guarding herself from the strangers around her. Barr's visceral descriptions of the winter cold nicely complement the paranoia that follows the appearance of the mythic monsters at play.

There are 16 books in the series and easily read as stand alones. Barr just released the 17th book "The Rope" which takes you back to the beginning of Anna's story.

The Rope

Amazon: "In The Rope, the latest in Nevada Barr’s bestselling novels featuring Anna Pigeon, Nevada Barr gathers together the many strings of Anna’s past and finally reveals the story that her many fans have been long asking for. In 1995 and 35 years old, fresh off the bus from New York City and nursing a broken heart, Anna Pigeon takes a decidedly unglamorous job as a seasonal employee of the Glen Canyon National Recreational Area. On her day off, Anna goes hiking into the park never to return. Her co-workers think she’s simply moved on—her cabin is cleaned out and her things gone. But Anna herself wakes up, trapped at the bottom of a dry natural well, naked, without supplies and no clear memory of how she found herself in this situation.

As she slowly pieces together her memory, it soon becomes clear that someone has trapped her there, in an inescapable prison, and no one knows that she is even missing. Plunged into a landscape and a plot she is unfit and untrained to handle, Anna Pigeon must muster the courage, determination and will to live that she didn’t even know she still possessed to survive, outwit and triumph.

Check out the first paragraph here and find out more about Nevada Barr and all her books here. I'm slowly making my way through the series and look forward to reading them all.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW3: Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund

2012-01-15T00:01:00.000-08:00

Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund

Chapter one

"Captain Ahab was neither my first husband nor my last. Yet, looking up—into the clouds—I conjure him there: his gray-white hair; his gathered brow; and the zaggy mark; I saw it when lying with him by candlelight and, also, taking our bliss on the sunny moor among curly-cup gumweed and lamb's ear. I see a zaggy shadow in the rifting clouds. That mark started like lightning at Ahab's temple and ran not all the way to his heel (as some thought) but ended at Ahab's heart.

That pull of cloud—tapered and blunt at one end and frayed at the other—seems the cottony representation of his ivory leg. But I will not see him all dismembered and scattered in heaven's blue—that would be no kind, reconstructive vision; no, intact, lofty and sailing, though his shape is changeable. Yesterday, when I tilted my face to the sky, I imaged not the full figure but only his cloudy head, a portrait, glancing back at me over his shoulder.

What weather is in Ahab's face?"

Does it sounds intriguing! I started reading it Saturday afternoon and it quickly captured me. There are a few ladies on the WTM forum who are joining me in reading the story. Play along with us and Read Ahab's Wife starting today.

Synopsis: "Captain Ahab was neither my first husband nor my last." This is destined to be remembered as one of the most-recognized first sentences in literature--along with "Call me Ishmael." Sena Jeter Naslund has created an entirely new universe with a transcendent heroine at its center who will be every bit as memorable as Captain Ahab. Ahab's Wife is a novel on a grand scale that can legitimately be called a masterpiece: beautifully written, filled with humanity and wisdom, rich in historical detail, authentic and evocative. Melville's spirit informs every page of her tour de force. Una Spenser's marriage to Captain Ahab is certainly a crucial element in the narrative of Ahab's Wife, but the story covers vastly more territory. After a spellbinding opening scene, the tale flashes back to Una's childhood in Kentucky; her idyllic adolescence with her aunt and uncle's family at a lighthouse near New Bedford; her adventures disguised as a cabin boy on a whaling ship; her first marriage to a fellow survivor who descends into violent madness; courtship and marriage to Ahab; life as mother and a rich captain's wife in Nantucket; involvement with Frederick Douglass; and a man who is in Nantucket researching his novel about his adventures on her ex-husband's ship. Ahab's Wife is a breathtaking, magnificent, and uplifting story of one woman's spiritual journey, informed by the spirit of the greatest American novel, but taking it beyond tragedy to redemptive triumph."

There are 167 chapters averaging 4 pages each for a total of 667 pages. You can read at your own pace and when we come up for air on Saturday January 21, we'll see where we all stand and take it from there. Or read 48 pages a day which will have you finishing in two weeks.

I found a list of interesting discussion questions on Harper Collin's site. There are some spoilers so don't look at the questions if you think it will ruin your reading experience. The questions will give you things to think about as you read or after you read it. I'll post the questions in the Miscellaneous and Readalongs link above on the 29th and you can discuss the book and answer them in the comments or on your blog.

Available in paperback or ebook format at Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

For more information about Sena Jeter Naslund and her other novels, go here.

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Link to your most current read. Please link to your specific book review post and not your general blog link. In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field leave a link to your specific post. If you have multiple reviews, then type in (multi) after your name and link to your general blog url.

If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW2: Sarah Addison Allen

2012-01-08T00:01:00.000-08:00


Sarah Addison Allen

It always amazes me when I discover a new to me author and get enthralled in a story to learn that he or she is so young. There are times I am reading a story and you get the feeling of a very old soul. One who knows, whose lived a dozen lifetimes. One whose been around a while, been writing forever. The ladies on the Well Trained Mind group have been talking up a storm about Sarah Addison Allen's novels so decided I must read one. I picked up Garden Spells which I have found to be an incredibly charming story. As it turns out it was her debut novel which was published in 2007. Since then, she's released three other stories which I look forward to reading.


Garden Spells

Booklist: Take a pinch of marigold to stimulate affection, add a dash of snapdragon to repel evil influences, finish with a generous helping of rose petals to encourage love, then stand back and let nature take its course. It may be the recipe for Claire Waverley's successful catering business, but when it comes to working its magic on her own love life, she seems to be immune to the charms found only in the plants that have always grown behind the Waverley mansion. Like generations of Waverley women before her, Claire has accepted her family's mysterious gifts, while her estranged sister, Sydney, could not run away from them fast enough. Knowing it's just a matter of time before her abusive boyfriend finally kills her, however, Sydney escapes with her young daughter back home to the only place she knows she'll be safe.


The Sugar Queen

Barnes and Noble: "Josey Cirrini is sure of three things: winter is her favorite season, she’s a sorry excuse for a Southern belle, and sweets are best eaten in the privacy of her closet. For while Josey has settled into an uneventful life in her mother’s house, her one consolation is the stockpile of sugary treats and paperback romances she escapes to each night…. Until she finds her closet harboring Della Lee Baker, a local waitress who is one part nemesis—and two parts fairy godmother. With Della Lee’s tough love, Josey’s narrow existence quickly expands. She even bonds with Chloe Finley, a young woman who is hounded by books that inexplicably appear when she needs them—and who has a close connection to Josey’s longtime crush. Soon Josey is living in a world where the color red has startling powers, and passion can make eggs fry in their cartons. And that’s just for starters."

The Girl Who Chased The Moon

B&N: "Emily Benedict has come to Mullaby, North Carolina, hoping to solve at least some of the riddles surrounding her mother’s life. But the moment Emily enters the house where her mother grew up and meets the grandfather she never knew, she realizes that mysteries aren’t solved in Mullaby, they’re a way of life: Here are rooms where the wallpaper changes to suit your mood. Unexplained lights skip across the yard at midnight. And a neighbor, Julia Winterson, bakes hope in the form of cakes, not only wishing to satisfy the town’s sweet tooth but also dreaming of rekindling the love she fears might be lost forever. Can a hummingbird cake really bring back a lost love? Is there really a ghost dancing in Emily’s backyard? The answers are never what you expect. But in this town of lovable misfits, the unexpected fits right in"


The Peach Keeper

B&N: "Thirty-year-old Willa Jackson might be returning to her rural North Carolina home to escape her failed marriage, but what awaits her is anything but a smooth, quiet healing period. Instead, Willa tosses herself into a 75-year-old murder mystery and a developing relationship with a local benefactor. The new novel by Sarah Addison Allen (The Girl Who Chased the Moon; Garden Spells; The Sugar Queen) contains a poignant mix of human drama, sibling feuds, and Southern hospitality."

Check her out and tell me what you think.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

Week one - The sky's the limit

2012-01-01T00:01:00.000-08:00

Josephine Wall - Doorway to the Stars

Happy New Year! I am so thrilled to have you all joining in on our quest to read 52 books in 52 weeks. Welcome back to those who are diving in for another round and welcome to those who are joining in for the first time. The picture above says it all. Books are a doorway to the universe - a mind voyage. You'll never quite know where they will take you. They can enlighten you, thrill you, teach you, make you laugh or make you cry. They offer a temporary escape from your day to day or enhance your day to day. Reading to me is as necessary as breathing. All I know is that if I don't read every day, I get really cranky. Seriously!

The goal of the challenge is to read 52 books. Ordinarily you'd think, okay I'll read at least one book a week and reach the goal. However, there are books that take longer than a week to read. And there are some books that can be read in two or three hours.    I'd hate to see anyone sacrifice quality for quantity by reading a short book just to make the goal for the week. Read what you want, explore and dive into those longer books, engage your mind and soul and don't worry. Do your best and challenge yourself and see what happens. How you get there is up to you.

There are a few mini challenges that are available and all the information about them are in the tabs above: 12 in 2012, A to Z Challenge, Jane Austen, Mind Voyages and Well Educated Mind. Also, throughout the year, I will be posting some mini weekly challenges such as pick a book based on its cover, with a certain word, with a number or color. Challenge you to read a certain genre or author.   Your choice if you want to participate or not. The goal is to have fun. I also be borrowing from various challenges around the blogosphere presenting you with ideas for books to read throughout the challenge.

Speaking of challenging: I have a mission for you which will start mid January. Your first mission, should you choose to accept it, is to read "Ahab's Wife" by Sena Jeter Naslund and then tackle.....Moby Dick

A few folks from the Well Trained Mind boards have decided to tackle the stories and since I've haven't read either one yet, am jumping on the band wagon. You are welcome to join in. More information will be provided once we figure out the plan *grin*

I'm excited. 2012 is going to be an awesome new year and I'm looking forward to hearing all about your reads, which will inevitably lead to my wishlist growing larger! Happy Reading!

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Link to your most current read. Please link to your specific book review post and not your general blog link. In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field leave a link to your specific post. If you have multiple reviews, then type in (multi) after your name and link to your general blog url.

If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

Please note: keep in mind that we have all ages involved in the challenge, so please keep your reviews clean. If I come across any link that is not appropriate (vulgar language, x-rated, that type of thing) it will be deleted.

BW 52: All wrapped up and tied with a ribbon!

2011-12-25T00:01:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah to you and yours. There are a few presents under the tree that look suspiciously like books. *grin* Love it when my family shops off my Amazon wishlist. Hope you get everything you want and more for Christmas. The year seems to have passed in a flash and we are ending it with gratitude and optimism for a joyous new year. Our quest to read 52 books is coming to an end for this year. How did you do?

Did you reach the goal of 52 books or did you manage to beat your own personal best?
What book are you ending the year with?
Did you discover a new author or genre? Did you love them or hate them?
Did you challenge yourself to read more non fiction if prefer fiction or more fiction if you prefer non fiction?
Did you read from a list or wing it?
How many classics did you read? What did you think of the writing style or author?
Name one book that you thought you'd never read and was pleasantly surprised you like it.
What are your top ten favorite books?
What are your ten least favorite books?
Did you start any books that you just simply couldn't finish?
What did you think of the mini challenges and did you join in or complete any?
Did your family join in on the fun?
How many books have you added to your wishlist since the beginning of the year?
What was your favorite thing about the challenge?

Congratulations and thank you to everyone who joined in. I hope you enjoyed your reading year and discovered some new and interesting authors and genres. Thank you to all who followed our progress. Are you ready to join in yet? *grin* I had a lot of fun and look forward to another year of exploring different topics, books and authors. Best wishes for a happy reading new year!

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Link to your last read and/or wrap up post for 2011. Please link to your specific post and not your general blog link. In the Your Name field,type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis or indicate wrap up post. In the Your URL field leave a link to your specific post.

If you don't have a blog, leave a comment in the comment section about your reading year.

BW 51: Happy Birthday Jane Austen

2011-12-18T00:01:00.000-08:00

Jane Austen

We are talking about all things Jane Austen today in honor of her birthday which was December 16th. Although she only wrote six novels, her books have remained popular and some of the most widely read over the years. Her novels: Emma, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Northanger Abbey, Sense and Sensibility and Persuasion are all available on line for your reading pleasure. Links are available in the Jane Austen tab up above. You want to know a little secret. I haven't read a single one of them...yet. I don't have any excuses since I do have all her books. Which brings us to why one of the mini challenges is to read the works of Jane Austen. So as challenge to myself I am committing to the freshman level and reading at least two books. How about you?

Austen's books have also spurred a number of Austen inspired books. Sourcebooks is celebrating all things Darcy and making them available through all online book sellers in ebook format for $1.99 each through December 30th.

A Darcy for Everyone! Sourcebooks Celebrates Jane Austen’s Birthday!

From Tuesday December 13^th – Friday December 30^th the following eBooks will be priced at $1.99 at all online e-tailers. Whether you like Darcy as a tortured vampire, a modern day rock star, a Texas rancher or anything and everything in between! There truly is a Darcy for everyone!

A Darcy Christmas – Carolyn Eberhart, Sharon Lathan and Amanda Grange

Darcys and the Bingleys – Marsha Altman

Darcy’s Voyage – Kara Louise

Fitzwilliam Darcy, Rock Star – Heather Lynn Rigaud

The Man Who Loved Pride and Prejudice – Abigail Reynolds

Mr. and Mrs. Fitzwilliam Darcy: Two Shall Become One – Sharon Lathan

Mr. Darcy Goes Overboard – Belinda Roberts

Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife – Linda Berdoll

Mr. Darcy, Vampyre – Amanda Grange

Pemberley Chronicles – Rebecca Ann Collins

Pemberley Ranch – Jack Caldwell

Searching for Pemberley – Mary Lydon Simonsen

Trials of the Honorable F. Darcy – Sara Angelini

Darcy and Fitzwilliam – Karen V. Wasylowski

For more information check out this link at Sourcebooks

Also check out The Republic of Pemberley and Jane Austen.org for all things Jane Austen.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

2012 Read 52 books in 52 Weeks

2011-12-13T00:01:00.000-08:00

Are you ready for another round of Reading 52 books in 52 Weeks? Whether you are just joining in or continuing on for another round, the rules are very simple. The goal is to read one book (at least) a week for 52 weeks. Make the year easy and casual or kick it up by exploring new to you authors and genres. Challenge yourself to read at least one classic a month or delve into that chunkster (more than 600 pages) you always wanted to tackle. The goal is to read 52 books. How you get there is up to you.

I have several mini challenges to make it fun:

12 in 2012: Read 12 books in 12 different categories

A to Z challenge: Read books alphabetically by title and/or author.

Jane Austen: Read all things Jane Austen

Mind Voyages: Explore the hugo and nebula winners, take side trips through the different decades reading the nominees.

Well Educated Mind: Explore the classics in five categories: Fiction, Autobiography, History/Politics, Drama and Poetry.

The mini challenges and weekly challenges are optional, Mix it up anyway you like.

The challenge will run from January 1, 2012 through December 31, 2012.
Our book weeks begin on Sunday.
Participants may join at any time.
All books are acceptable except children books.
All forms of books are acceptable including e-books, audio books, etc.
Re-reads are acceptable as long as they are read after January 1, 2012.
Books may overlap other challenges.
Create an entry post linking to this blog.
Sign up with Mr. Linky in the "I'm participating post" below this post.
You don't have a blog to participate. Post your weekly book in the comments section of each weekly post.
Mr. Linky will be added to the bottom of the weekly post for you to link to reviews of your most current reads.

I'm participating in 2012

2011-12-12T20:09:00.000-08:00

I'm participating in 2012

BW50: X is for Qui Xiaolong

2011-12-11T00:01:00.000-08:00

Qiu Xiaolong

I just finished reading "Death of the Red Heroine" by novelist and poet Qiu Xiaolong, book one in his inspector Chen series and found it to be extremely interesting. Set in the mid 1990's in China, it was a police procedural blending fact and fiction delving into the politics and culture of the country. Publisher's Weekly says:

"Set a decade ago in Shanghai, this political mystery offers a peek into the tightly sealed, often crooked world of post-Tiananmen Square China. Chen Cao, a poet and T.S. Eliot translator bureaucratically assigned to be chief inspector, has to investigate the murder of Guan Hongying, a young woman celebrated as a National Model Worker, but who kept her personal life strictly and mysteriously confidential. Chen and his comrade, Detective Yu, take turns interviewing Guan's neighbors and co-workers, but it seems most of them either know nothing or are afraid to talk openly about a deceased, highly regarded public figure. Maybe they shouldn't be so uneasy, some characters reason; after all, these are "modern times" and socialist China is taking great leaps toward free speech. Chen and Yu make headway when they stumble on Wu Xiaoming, senior editor of Red Star magazine, who apparently was involved with Guan before her death. Tiptoeing around touchy politics and using investigative tactics bordering on blackmail, Chen slowly pieces together the motives behind the crime. The author, himself a poet and critic, peppers the story with allusions to classical Chinese literature, juxtaposing poignant poetry with a gruesome murder so that the novel reads like the translation of an ancient text imposed over a modern tale of intrigue. This is an impressive and welcome respite from the typical crime novel."

I discovered Qui Xiaolong while searching for an author whose name begins with X for my a to z by title challenge. Glad I discovered him and look forward to reading more of his Detective Chen novels. The books in the series are:

Death of a Red Heroine


A Loyal Character Dancer


When Red is Black

A Case of Two Cities


Red Mandarin Dress

The Mao Case

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW49: 2012 Readalongs and Events

2011-12-04T00:01:00.000-08:00

Hello my darlings! I am in the midst of working on the site for 2012, revamping the mini challenges so if you see some of the pages disappearing or changing, you'll know why. If you have any suggestions for a mini challenge or challenge within the challenge, let me know.

I've come across a few 2012 read-a-longs and events that look interesting. I just finished reading J.R. Ward's first novel in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series - Dark Lover. If you are into vampires, you'd probably enjoy this one. I love series and enjoyed it enough to want to read the rest of the series. Unlike Christine Feehan's Dark series which was just a bit too emotional and ridiculous for me and had me quitting the series after the first couple books. And it just so happens Literary Escapism is hosting a Black Dagger Brotherhood Read-a-long which will run through the end of March.

For those who like George R.R. Martin, Adventures of 2.0 will be hosting a Read-a-long of A Game of Thrones, and The Lit Bitch will be hosting A Game of Thrones challenge to read the whole series.

For those wanting something a bit more seriousness to it, A Literary Odyssey is hosting Shakespeare Reading Month in January or Breadcrumb Reads group read of Reading Shakespeare: A Play a Month.

Howling Frog Books (don't you just love that title) will be hosting a Greek Classics Challenge which should fit in nicely with our Well Educated Mind Mini challenge (which unfortunately I totally failed at this year.)

I'll be posting the Mr. Linky Sign up for 2012 in a couple weeks. Happy Reading!

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW48: Book link love

2011-11-27T00:01:00.000-08:00

We are coming in to the homestretch with just 5 weeks left in our quest to read 52 books. I'm in the homestretch with NaNoWriMo and close to the 50,000 word mark so today we'll check out some more authors who blog. Hopefully it will give you a few new ideas for books to read in 2012. Have you started your book bucket list for 2012? An eclectic mix of writers of crime, paranormal, thrillers, suspense, romance.

I follow these group blogs and have read many of their books.

Murder She Writes: Lori Armstrong, Allison Brennan, Toni McGee Causey, Sylvia Day, Laura Griffin, Sophie Littlefield, Jennifer Lyon, Roxanne St. Claire, Karen Tabke and Debra Webb.

The Deadline Dames: Another group blog by writers of paranormal, romance, thrillers: Rachel Vincent, Devon Monk, Jackie Kessler, Jenna Black, Karen Mahoney, Keri Arthur, Lillith Saintcrow, Rinda Elliott and Toni Andrews.

Riding with the Top Down: Leanne Banks, Kylie Banks, Helen Brenna, Debra Dixon, Kathleen Eagle, Cindy Gerard, Lois Greiman, Michelle Hauf, Betina Krahn and Christie Ridgeway.

The Debutante Ball: Changes each year - meet the new class of 2012: Joanne Levy, Erika Marks, M. Molly Backes, Rachel Bertshe, Linda Grimes.

If you haven't checked out my favorite author blog Murderati lately, they've made a few changes, added some new faces, lost a few.

Have fun exploring. Happy Reading!

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW47: Big U, little U, what begins with U

2011-11-20T00:01:00.000-08:00

In my quest to complete the A to Z challenge by author and title, I am up to U. I managed to squeak past Q with a two-fer when I read Quicksilver by Amanda Quick. How lucky was that! So, U. Big U, Little u, what begins with U.

I came across this interesting little book the other day about mathematical obsession and thought I'd give it a go: Uncle Petros and Goldbach's Conjecture: A Novel of Mathematical Obsession by Apostolos Doxiadis. In the process get to read an new author as well. Plus there is always my fall back gal when it comes to the alphabet, Sue Grafton and her Alphabet Series with p.i. Kinsey Milhone set in the 1980's pre cell phones and computers.

So now the search is one for an author whose first name or last name ends with U. AND, their books sound interesting and hopefully aren't chunksters that will take forever to read. I have Leon Uris's QB VII on the shelves and read it several years ago. It's on standby in case can't find anything else. Not ready to delve into any of his other stories. Will save him for next year. So did a bit of searching and found a few people I've never heard of before.

Then you have the known - Upton Sinclair and John Updike. Plus a list of freebies on Project Gutenberg that you can check out at your own risk.

After a bit of Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble browsing, decided I'll go with Lisa Unger's Beautiful Lies. Sounds quite interesting and thankfully so easy to download on my nook.

Synopsis: What if your family was a lie? What if your name was a lie? What if your whole life was just a pack of Beautiful Lies?

If Ridley Jones had slept ten minutes later or had taken the subway instead of waiting for a cab, she would still be living the lie she used to call her perfect life. Instead, she's in the wrong place at the right time to unleash a chain of events that begins with a mysterious package on her doorstep. A package that informs her that her entire world is just an illusion. Forced to question everything she knows about herself, Ridley wanders into dark territory, where everyone is hiding something.

Anyone else doing the A to Z quest? If you are, which letter are you on?

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BW46: A poetic moment

2011-11-13T00:01:00.000-08:00

Courtesy of Zedam Nabil

I'm in the midst of typing up all my crazy writings for NaNoWriMo so leaving you with a poetical moment that rings so true.

Drop a Pebble in the Water

by

- James W. Foley -

Drop a pebble in the water:
Just a splash, and it is gone;
But there's half-a-hundred ripples
Circling on and on and on,
Spreading, spreading from the center,
Flowing on out to the sea.
And there is no way of telling
Where the end is going to be.

Drop a pebble in the water:
In a minute you forget,
But there's little waves a-flowing,
And there's ripples circling yet,
And those little waves a-flowing

To a great big wave have grown;
You've disturbed a mighty river
Just by dropping in a stone.

Drop an unkind word, or careless:
In a minute it is gone;
But there's half-a-hundred ripples
Circling on and on and on.
They keep spreading, spreading, spreading
From the center as they go,
And there is no way to stop them,
Once you've started them to flow.

Drop an unkind word, or careless:
In a minute you forget;
But there's little waves a-flowing,
And there's ripples circling yet,
And perhaps in some sad heart
A mighty wave of tears you've stirred,
And disturbed a life was happy
Ere you dropped that unkind word.

Drop a word of cheer and kindness:
Just a flash and it is gone;
But there's half-a-hundred ripples
Circling on and on and on,
Bearing hope and joy and comfort
On each splashing, dashing wave
Till you wouldn't believe the volume
Of the one kind word you gave.

Drop a word of cheer and kindness:
In a minute you forget;
But there's gladness still a-swelling,
And there's joy a-circling yet,
And you've rolled a wave of comfort
Whose sweet music can be heard
Over miles and miles of water
Just by dropping one kind word.

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BW45: Haunted Bookshop Mysteries

2011-11-06T00:01:00.000-07:00

Mix together a book shop, haunt it with a disembodied spirit of a private eye, and you have the makings of an interesting mystery series. Alice Kimberly aka Cleo Coyle of the Coffee House Mysteries has come up with a wonderful cozy mystery series that is quite entertaining. I read the first book in the series and will be going back for more and reading the rest of the books in the series. I'm a series junkie.

The Haunted Bookshop Mysteries

The Ghost and Mrs. McClure

The Ghost and the Dead Deb

The Ghost and the Dead Man's Library

The Ghost and the Femme Fatale

The Ghost and the Haunted Mansion

The Characters:

Penelope

After her husband’s suicide, young widow Penelope Thornton-McClure moves herself and her young son from New York City back to her little seaside New England hometown of Quindicott, Rhode Island. When she arrives, however, she finds her aunt Sadie Thornton in financial trouble and about to lose the family's old bookshop.

Unwilling to allow the business to fail, Pen cashes her late husband’s life insurance money and uses every penny to overhaul the inventory and remodel the place. As fate would have it, the construction rouses the spirit of a dead man, a private investigator from New York who’d been gunned down on the premises in 1949 while investigating a murder.

     Waking from a half-century of slumber, the hard-boiled ghost is less than thrilled to find himself cosmically imprisoned within the fieldstone walls of Pen’s bookstore...

Jack
Shepard, PI

In life, Jack's pulse pounded to the rhythm of the city streets: the smoky dice joints and swingin’ suds clubs. Why couldn’t he have been gunned down in a joint like that? Instead, he got lead poisoning in the god-forsaken sticks, eternity in cornpone alley. There's only one thing that makes this backwater existence tolerable. Her name is Penelope...

     Okay, so the broad is one of those annoying do-right, fair-play Jane types, but she has a nice face, a sweet voice, and Jack always had been a sucker for redheads. If he hears her thoughts right, Penelope doesn't even believe in ghosts. Well, he never believed in them, either. But, brother, had he been wrong.

     Now he's a disembodied spirit, sentenced for his sins to exist in a world he hardly knows. Lucky for him his purgatory comes with an auburn haired angel, a doll named Penelope he can't stop watching or watching over...

Coming January 3rd, 2012

The Ghost and The Bogus Bestseller

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BW 44: Parasol Protectorate

2011-10-30T00:01:00.000-07:00

How about dipping your toes into Steampunk. I picked up Gail Carriger's Soulless, the first novel in her Parasol Protectorate series. It's Victorian English society meets vampires, werewolves, ghosts type of story, with some romance and comedy thrown. Sound interesting. There are five books in the series including:


#2

Look up Steampunk on Amazon and you'll come across a wide variety of very interesting and what look like, entertaining non fiction and fiction books. Including The Steampunk Bible: An Illustrated Guide to the World of Imaginary Airships, Corsets and Goggles, Mad Scientists, and Strange Literature by Jeff Vandermeer, another interesting writer well worth checking out.

Steampunk Bible

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BW 43: National Novel Writing Month

2011-10-23T00:01:00.000-07:00

Modern Water Clock by Bernard Gitton

The clock is ticking down to National Novel Writing Month and writing 50,000 words in 30 days. Crazy idea that I discovered back in 2007 and have participated in ever since. It's stressful, time consuming and wild, but fun as you create a story while ignoring your inner editor as well as household duties and other activities for 30 days. It helps if you have understanding family members who are aware all your energy is going to be taken up with writing. I had thought of bypassing the whole challenge this year but between my husband encouraging to join in again and a wonderful idea that's been growing by leaps and bounds, I decided to do it once again. Guess it is turning into an annual thing.

The goal is to simply write and hopefully by the end of the month, you have the makings of an interesting story. Of course it will need loads of editing, but that's all part of the writing process. Plus the process of sitting down and writing at least 1667 words a day forms a habit so by the end of the month, if you aren't already in the habit of writing everyday, it will have become a habit. So, just to let you know if November's Sunday posts are a bit short or perhaps wacky, you'll know the reason why.

There are lots of writers who are pantsters who basically just write, fly the seat of their pants and make things up as they go, without any planning. Then there are the plotters - those who outline, create character sketches, and map out their stories. I lean more toward plotting, than pantster. This year I found a great book to help me out - K.M. Weiland's Outlining Your Novel: Map Your Way to Success which is available in both book and ebook format. It is chock full of useful information and highly recommend it. There are several authors out there in the blogosphere who are very encouraging when it comes to NaNoWriMo and have been posting tips on their websites.

Larry Brooks who wrote Story Engineering: Mastering The Six Core Competencies of Successful Writing as well as several fiction novels has come up with 31 Empowering Posts in 31 Days.

Alexandra Sokoloff, who writes spooky, scary mystery thrillers which I really enjoy as well as Screenwriting Tricks for Authors has come up with a series of great articles which are immensely helpful.

And if you are wondering if anything good comes out of this craziness, here is a link to a list of authors who have had books published which they started during nano. Maybe I'll be on that list in a few years. *grin*

Anyone else joining in on Nanowrimo this year?

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BW42 - Old New York

2011-10-16T00:01:00.000-07:00

Chrysler Building courtesy of joiseyshowaa's

We did a bit of futuristic armchair traveling with J.D. Robb aka Nora Roberts who introduced us to a futuristic new york in her In Death series. Let's do a bit of historical fiction traveling in old New York. I found a series of mystery books and authors that haven't read yet thanks to Bookmarks Magazine.

Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow

B&N Synopsis: "The story opens in 1906 in New Rochelle, New York, at the home of an affluent American family. One lazy Sunday afternoon, the famous escape artist Harry Houdini swerves his car into a telephone pole outside their house. And almost magically, the line between fantasy and historical fact, between real and imaginary characters, disappears. Henry Ford, Emma Goldman, J. P. Morgan, Evelyn Nesbit, Sigmund Freud, and Emiliano Zapata slip in and out of the tale, crossing paths with Doctorow's imagined family and other fictional characters, including an immigrant peddler and a ragtime musician from Harlem whose insistence on a point of justice drives him to revolutionary violence."


Time and Again by Jack Finney

B&N Synopsis: "Sleep. And when you awake everything you know of the twentieth century will be gone from your mind. Tonight is January 21, 1882. There are no such things as automobiles, no planes, computers, television. 'Nuclear' appears in no dictionary. You have never heard the name Richard Nixon."

Did illustrator Si Morley really step out of his twentieth-century apartment one night -- right into the winter of 1882? The U.S. Government believed it, especially when Si returned with a portfolio of brand-new sketches and tintype photos of a world that no longer existed -- or did it"


Murphy's Law by Rhys Bowen

Book one in the Molly Murphy Series set in the early 1900's. Author Synopsis: Molly Murphy has to flee from Ireland and finds herself in deep trouble on Ellis Island in Murphy's Law.

Murder on Astor Place by Victoria Thompson

Victoria Thompson's Gaslight series starting with Murder on Astor Place set in the late 1800's.

B&N Synopsis: "After a routine delivery, midwife Sarah Brandt visits her patient in a rooming house-and discovers that another boarder, a young girl, has been killed. At the request of Sergeant Frank Malloy, she searches the girl's room, and discovers that the victim is from one of the most prominent families in New York- and the sister of an old friend. The powerful family, fearful of scandal, refuses to permit an investigation. But with Malloy's help, Sarah begins a dangerous quest to bring the killer to justice-before death claims another victim."

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ink to your most current read. Please link to your specific book review post and not your general blog link. In the Your Name field, type in your name and the name of the book in parenthesis. In the Your URL field leave a link to your specific post. If you have multiple reviews, then type in (multi) after your name and link to your general blog url.

If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW41: Nora Roberts

2011-10-09T00:01:00.000-07:00


Nora Roberts - October 10, 2011

Happy birthday to my favorite author - the diva of romance and romantic suspense Nora Roberts. I discovered her books back in 2007 and fell in lurve. She has written almost 200 novels (complete booklist) including a number of stand alone books as well as series which are all unique and interesting. She writes the type of stories that make you fall in the love with the characters and makes you want to turn right around and read the book over again, when you are done. She also write a futuristic crime novel series called the In Death series under the pseudonym J.D. Robb. There are 33 books (chronological list) in the series (which I've read most of them twice) and I just finished the latest New York to Dallas. And I recently started listening to audio books in the car and am currently listening to Naked In Death which is the very first book in the series. I can sense that listening to the series will keep me busy for quite a while. Besides being a prolific writer, she and her husband own a bookstore in Maine called Turn the Page and also a historic inn called Inn Boosboro with rooms named after literary characters including Eve and Roark from the In Death series. She has a new trilogy named after the Inn Boonsboro and the first book is The Next Always being released on November 1st.

Tidbits from her website:

Every Nora Roberts and J.D. Robb title released in 2010 hit the New York Times bestseller list. That’s keeping up a streak started in 1999.
With Treachery in Death (February 2011) Nora will have published 195 full-length novels.
Nora has written 173 New York Times bestsellers including 27 written as J.D. Robb and one written together with J.D. Robb
Since her first bestseller in 1991, Nora’s books have spent a total of 879 weeks on the New York Times list…that’s equivalent to more than 16.5 consecutive years of weekly bestsellers.
Nora’s books have spent a combined 178 weeks at the number one spot on the New York Times bestseller list – that’s more than 3 years.

Once you read one of her books, you'll understand why.

Happy Birthday Nora!

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW40: Spooktacular October

2011-10-02T00:01:00.000-07:00

I've seem to have gotten into a vampire, werewolf, ghosts, angels and demons reading kick lately. Last year for the month of October I read Frankenstein and was surprised because the story wasn't even close to what the movie had been like. Maybe I had watched Mel Brooks Young Frankenstein one too many times *grin* Then I read Dracula: The Undead by Dacre Stoker, Bram's great grandnephew, inventive sequel to Dracula.

Barnes and Noble: At last—the sequel to Bram Stoker's classic novel Dracula, written by his direct descendant and a Dracula historian Bram Stoker's Dracula is the prototypical horror novel, an inspiration for the world's seemingly limitless fascination with vampires. Though many have tried to replicate Stoker's horror classic- in books, television shows, and movies-only the 1931 Bela Lugosi film bore the Stoker family's support. Until now.

Dracula The Un-Dead is a bone-chilling sequel based on Bram Stoker's own handwritten notes for characters and plot threads excised from the original edition. Dracula The Un-Dead begins in 1912, twenty-five years after Dracula "crumbled into dust." Van Helsing's protégé, Dr. Jack Seward, is now a disgraced morphine addict obsessed with stamping out evil across Europe. Meanwhile, an unknowing Quincey Harker, the grown son of Jonathan and Mina, leaves law school for the London stage, only to stumble upon the troubled production of "Dracula," directed and produced by Bram Stoker himself.

The play plunges Quincey into the world of his parents' terrible secrets, but before he can confront them he experiences evil in a way he had never imagined. One by one, the band of heroes that defeated Dracula a quarter-century ago is being hunted down. Could it be that Dracula somehow survived their attack and is seeking revenge? Or is their another force at work whose relentless purpose is to destroy anything and anyone associated with Dracula?

I thoroughly enjoyed it, however, I've never actually read Dracula by Bram Stoker. Decided this year I'm finally going to read Dracula, especially since I'm on the fore mentioned vampire kick. Plus I happened to stumble across his very first book The Snake's Pass which looked really interesting so picked it up:

Amazon: Arthur Severn, a young Englishman on holiday in the west of Ireland, is forced by a storm to stop for the night in a mysterious village, where he hears the legend of "The Snake's Pass." Long ago, it is said, St. Patrick battled the King of the Snakes, who hid his crown of gold and jewels in the hills near the village. But it is not only legend that haunts the town. The figure of the demonic money-lender Black Murdock looms over the village, as he searches for the lost treasure while manipulating the townsfolk to his own evil ends. Even more threatening than Murdock is the shifting bog, personified as a baneful "carpet of death," which will swallow up anything -- and anyone -- in its path. Art and his friend Dick will brave the dangers of the bog to seek out the treasure, but the sinister machinations of Murdock will lead to a deadly conclusion! Featuring a slow accumulation of terror worthy of Le Fanu, The Snake's Pass was Bram Stoker's first novel. A clear precursor to Dracula, The Snake's Pass was the only of Stoker's novels set in his native Ireland. This edition follows the text of the first edition published at New York in 1890.

Come along and join me in a spooktacular read of Dracula by Bram Stoker. And along the way, you may as well check out his other stories.

What spooktacular books are you reading this month?

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW 39: Banned Book Week

2011-09-25T00:01:00.000-07:00

Celebrate reading!

It is that time of year when we get to celebrate our freedom to read whatever we choose.

American Library Association: "Banned Books Week (BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment. Held during the last week of September, Banned Books Week highlights the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship by spotlighting actual or attempted bannings of books across the United States.

Intellectual freedom—the freedom to access information and express ideas, even if the information and ideas might be considered unorthodox or unpopular—provides the foundation for Banned Books Week. BBW stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints for all who wish to read and access them.

The books featured during Banned Books Week have been targets of attempted bannings. Fortunately, while some books were banned or restricted, in a majority of cases the books were not banned, all thanks to the efforts of librarians, teachers, booksellers, and members of the community to retain the books in the library collections. Imagine how many more books might be challenged—and possibly banned or restricted—if librarians, teachers, and booksellers across the country did not use Banned Books Week each year to teach the importance of our First Amendment rights and the power of literature, and to draw attention to the danger that exists when restraints are imposed on the availability of information in a free society."

The most frequently challenged books in 2010 were:

1) And Tango Makes Three, by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson;

2) The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie;

3) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

4) Crank by Ellen Hopkins;

5) The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins;

6) Lush by Natasha Friend;

7) What My Mother Doesn't Know by Sonya Sones;

8) Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich;

9) Revolutionary Voices edited by Amy Sonnie;

10) Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

The most frequently challenged classics are listed below. See the reason why here.

The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
Ulysses, by James Joyce
Beloved, by Toni Morrison
The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
1984, by George Orwell
Lolita, by Vladmir Nabokov
Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
Catch-22, by Joseph Heller
Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
Animal Farm, by George Orwell
The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway
As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner
A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway
Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston
Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison
Song of Solomon, by Toni Morrison
Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell
Native Son, by Richard Wright
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey
Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
For Whom the Bell Tolls, by Ernest Hemingway
The Call of the Wild, by Jack London
Go Tell it on the Mountain, by James Baldwin
All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren
The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien
The Jungle, by Upton Sinclai
Lady Chatterley's Lover, by D.H. Lawrence
A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
The Awakening, by Kate Chopin
In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote
The Satanic Verses, by Salman Rushdie
Sophie's Choice, by William Styron
Sons and Lovers, by D.H. Lawrence
Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
A Separate Peace, by John Knowles
Naked Lunch, by William S. Burroughs
Brideshead Revisited, by Evelyn Waugh
Women in Love, by D.H. Lawrence
The Naked and the Dead, by Norman Mailer
Tropic of Cancer, by Henry Miller
An American Tragedy, by Theodore Dreiser
Rabbit, Run, by John Updike

What challenged book will you be reading this week?

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW 38: L is for Laurie R. King

2011-09-18T10:26:00.000-07:00


Laurie R. King - September 19, 1952

Happy Birthday Laurie R. King

I currently have two of Laurie R. King's books from her Mary Russell Series in my TBR pile: Justice Hall and Locked Rooms. The series follows Mary Russell and her relationship with Sherlock Holmes and their adventures in crime solving.

From her website: In 1994, The Beekeeper’s Apprentice was published, featuring young Mary Russell who becomes an apprentice, then partner of Sherlock Holmes in early 20th century England. Books in that series appear regularly, taking the duo and their cohorts on into the Twenties and around the world, winning admiration far and wide. These historical novels allow King to explore all sorts of ideas: the roots of conflict in the Middle East and Afghanistan; feminism and early Christianity; patriotism and individual responsibility, while also having a rousing good time with revisiting the scenes of The Hound of the Baskervilles and Kim, setting a pair of Bedouin nomads down in a grand country house in England, and forging an unlikely relationship between two remarkably similar individuals who happen to be separated by age, sex, and background.

There are 11 books in the series with the latest release September 6th of The Pirate King.

I'm a sucker for series and usually like reading them in order so don't know how I ended up with two books out of order. Something tickled my fancy the day I bought them. In honor of Ms. King's birthday this week, I'll be reading Justice Hall. If you like detective fiction and Sherlock Holmes, be sure to check out the Mary Russell Series.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW37: Book Bloggers Appreciation Week

2011-09-11T00:01:00.000-07:00

This week is Book Blogger Appreciation Week in which we celebrate all things books. I have discovered so many different books that I probably would have never read otherwise through the book blogging community. It's also created some wonderful connections not only with book bloggers, but also with writers and publishers.

Book Blogger Appreciation was started by Amy Riley of My Friend Amy in an effort to recognize the hard work and contribution of book bloggers to the promotion and preservation of a literate culture actively engaged in discussing books, authors, and a lifestyle of reading.

The first Book Blogger Appreciation was observed in the fall of 2008 and occurs every September. The week spotlights and celebrates the work of active book bloggers through guest posts, awards, giveaways, and community activities. Book Bloggers are encouraged to register their participation for inclusion in a database of book bloggers.

The theme is Cultivating a Community of Bloggers and Readers. There will be all kinds of giveaways and contests, guest posts by authors, publishers and bloggers. Come join in on the party. You may just win some awesome books and establish some new friendships.

The daily topics this year are:

Monday, September 12 - Community: It is the opportuntity to highlight those bloggers who have made book blogging a unique experience. Mentors, bloggers who have encouraged you to try a different kind of book, opened your eyes to a new issue, made you laugh or supported you with comments on your blog.

Tuesday, September 13th: Blogger Interviews: An interview swap between bloggers and a chance to get to know them better. I swapped with Brianna of The Book Vixen who took over "The Novel Challenge blog" with the help of a few other bloggers when Wendy decided to move on to other things. Be sure to check out her interview on My Two Blessings and my interview on her site.

Wednesday, September 14th: Community Part II: A day to share tips for connecting with the community.

Thursday, September 15: Readers: Book bloggers blog because we love reading. Has book blogging changed the way you read? Have you discovered books you never would have apart from book blogging? How has book blogging affected your book acquisition habits? Have you made new connections with other readers because of book blogging? Choose any one of these topics and share your thoughts today!

Friday September 16th: Blogging: The world of blogging is continually changing. Share 3 things you are essential tried and true practices for every blogger and 1-3 new trends or tools you’ve adapted recently or would like to in the future.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW36: I is for Intellectual Devotional

2011-09-04T00:01:00.000-07:00

Some time ago I picked up this nifty, interesting book The Intellectual Devotional: Revive Your Mind, Complete Your Education, and Roam Confidently with the Cultured Class. It is a secular educational devotional, much like a spiritual devotional with 365 days of lessons. Each day is devoted to a certain topic: Monday is history, Tuesday is literature, Wednesday is visual arts, Thursday is Science, Friday is music, Saturday is Philosophy and Sunday religion.

Since the general edition has come out, the authors David Kidder and Noah Oppenheim have come out with a few other editions: Biographies, American History, Modern Culture and Health. They are available in hard cover or in ebook format now.

Fun to read, stimulates your mind, and makes you want to find out more. And honestly a good bathroom book. *grin*

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW 35: H is for Heminway, sort of.....

2011-08-28T10:36:00.000-07:00

Hello, my darlings! I'm still on vacation in Washington and have been sharing one computer with my hubby and son. I haven't been spending a whole lot of time online, in favor of reading and enjoying our wonderful view when we aren't out and about.

Mount Rainer - sunset

My guys in backyard, hanging out

So I'm leaving you with a short pictorial of writers at work. Back when they did it the old fashioned way - using a typewriter

Ernest Hemingway working on For Whom the Bell Tolls 1939


William Faulkner working on screenplay 1940

Ralph Ellison in Rome in 1957


Agatha Christie

George Bernard Shaw 1929

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BW34: G is for Gansky

2011-08-21T00:01:00.000-07:00

I'm just about to take off on a trip to Seattle and trying to decide which books to take with me to read on the airplane. Yes, I have my nook but you have to power all electronics down on take off and landing which I discovered was a royal pain in the but the last time we flew. Also I'm up to the O's in my A to Z by Title and Author Challenge. So I let that be my guide. A year or so ago I picked up A Ship Possessed by Alton Gansky to read for the Christy Award Challenge. First time author read for me and he writes christian supernatural thrillers along the lines of Frank Peretti (so excited he finally has a new novel coming out in march 2012 and Ted Dekker.

Synopsis of A Ship Possessed: The USS Triggerfish--an American World War II submarine--has come home over fifty years after she was presumed lost in the Atlantic. Now her dark gray hulk lies embedded in the sand of a San Diego beach, her conning tower barely above the breaking surf. The submarine is in the wrong ocean, her crew is missing . . . And her half-century absence is a mystery that's about to deepen. For the Triggerfish has returned, but she has not returned alone. Something is inside her -- something unexpected and terrible. To J. D. Stanton, retired Navy captain and historian, falls the task of solving the mystery surrounding a ship possessed. What he is about to encounter will challenge his training, his wits, and his faith. Complicating his mission is a ruthless madman bent on obtaining a secret artifact stolen from the highest levels of the Nazi regime. And poised in the middle is a young woman, a lieutenant who must contend with invisible forces she never knew existed. A Ship Possessed is a story of faith, courage, and determination in the face of unexpected and unknown evil.

Chilling, goose bumps, heart racing, exciting can't put down books. Thoroughly enjoyed it and started looking for more of his books. Discovered Out of Time in the bargain books at Bereans the other day so just had to get it.

Synopsis of Out of Time: J.D. Stanton has set sail with two Navy men and a crew of five troubled teenagers. Two days out they encounter a strange storm that damages their craft and leaves them on an eerie sea with no way to take a bearing. Suddenly a dark object emerges through the mist--HMS Archer--a long lost WWI British military ship. Stanton and his shipmates board the ship but find no trace of the crew, only their belongings. Soon Stanton realizes they are on a ship that is "out of time"--and they are out of time, too, because one of the teenagers needs immediate medical treatment. Stanton and the others begin to catch ghostly glimpses of the original crew. Stanton learns that one of the "ghosts" had planned to murder the crew of the Archer. Now one of the teens is bonding with that murderer. Will he attempt to murder Stanton's crew, too?

So, I'll be reading Out of Time on the plane. I also have Finder's Fee in my TBR Pile and looking forward to reading more of his other novels. Alton Gansky has written over 40 books specializing in suspense and supernatural suspense. He's also written a few nonfiction novels dealing with biblical mysteries.

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BW33: F is for Fantasy and Science Fiction

2011-08-14T00:01:00.000-07:00

Josephine Wall's Lady of the Lake

Fantasy and science fiction genre books have always been my very first real book true love. I couldn't get enough of it back in the 70's and 80's and I go back to it time and again. NPR recently polled their readers and the result "Your Picks: Top 100 Science Fiction Fantasy Books" No, I didn't vote because I found about it after the fact, but found the list very interesting.

I highlighted the ones I've read and surprisingly it's almost half the list.

1. The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy, by J.R.R. Tolkien
2. The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
3. Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card
4. The Dune Chronicles, by Frank Herbert
5. A Song Of Ice And Fire Series, by George R. R. Martin (only 1st one so far)
6. 1984, by George Orwell
7. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury
8. The Foundation Trilogy, by Isaac Asimov
9. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
10. American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
11. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman
12. The Wheel Of Time Series, by Robert Jordan (only 1st book so far)
13. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
14. Neuromancer, by William Gibson
15. Watchmen, by Alan Moore
16. I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov
17. Stranger In A Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein
18. The Kingkiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss
19. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
20. Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
21. Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K. Dick (in my TBR pile)
22. The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
23. The Dark Tower Series, by Stephen King (only 1st one so far)
24. 2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke
25. The Stand, by Stephen King
26. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
27. The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury
28. Cat’s Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
29. The Sandman Series, by Neil Gaiman
30. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
31. Starship Troopers, by Robert Heinlein
32. Watership Down, by Richard Adams
33. Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey
34. The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein
35. A Canticle For Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller
36. The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells
37. 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, by Jules Verne
38. Flowers For Algernon, by Daniel Keys
39. The War Of The Worlds, by H.G. Wells
40. The Chronicles Of Amber, by Roger Zelazny
41. The Belgariad, by David Eddings
42. The Mists Of Avalon, by Marion Zimmer Bradley
43. The Mistborn Series, by Brandon Sanderson
44. Ringworld, by Larry Niven
45. The Left Hand Of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin
46. The Silmarillion, by J.R.R. Tolkien
47. The Once And Future King, by T.H. White
48. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman
49. Childhood’s End, by Arthur C. Clarke
50. Contact, by Carl Sagan
51. The Hyperion Cantos, by Dan Simmons
52. Stardust, by Neil Gaiman
53. Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson
54. World War Z, by Max Brooks
55. The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle
56. The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman
57. Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett
58. The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever, by Stephen R. Donaldson
59. The Vorkosigan Saga, by Lois McMaster Bujold
60. Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett
61. The Mote In God’s Eye, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
62. The Sword Of Truth, by Terry Goodkind
63. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy
64. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
65. I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson
66. The Riftwar Saga, by Raymond E. Feist
67. The Shannara Trilogy, by Terry Brooks
68. The Conan The Barbarian Series, by R.E. Howard
69. The Farseer Trilogy, by Robin Hobb
70. The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
71. The Way Of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson
72. A Journey To The Center Of The Earth, by Jules Verne
73. The Legend Of Drizzt Series, by R.A. Salvatore
74. Old Man’s War, by John Scalzi (on my TBR pile)
75. The Diamond Age, by Neil Stephenson
76. Rendezvous With Rama, by Arthur C. Clarke
77. The Kushiel’s Legacy Series, by Jacqueline Carey
78. The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. LeGuin
79. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury
80. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire
81. The Malazan Book Of The Fallen Series, by Steven Erikson
82. The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde
83. The Culture Series, by Iain M. Banks
84. The Crystal Cave, by Mary Stewart
85. Anathem, by Neal Stephenson
86. The Codex Alera Series, by Jim Butcher
87. The Book Of The New Sun, by Gene Wolfe
88. The Thrawn Trilogy, by Timothy Zahn
89. The Outlander Series, by Diana Gabaldan (only 1st one so far, 2nd book in TBR pile)
90. The Elric Saga, by Michael Moorcock
91. The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
92. Sunshine, by Robin McKinley
93. A Fire Upon The Deep, by Vernor Vinge
94. The Caves Of Steel, by Isaac Asimov
95. The Mars Trilogy, by Kim Stanley Robinson
96. Lucifer’s Hammer, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
97. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis
98. Perdido Street Station, by China Mieville
99. The Xanth Series, by Piers Anthony
100. The Space Trilogy, by C.S. Lewis

How many of the books on the list have you read? (if any)

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BW32: E is for Emerson

2011-08-07T00:01:00.000-07:00

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Something simple this week to think about rather than enticing you with more books to weigh down your TBR piles or wishlist.

A Nation's Strength

What makes a nation's pillars high

And it's foundations strong?

What makes it mighty to defy

The foes that round it throng?

It is not gold. Its kingdoms grand

Go down in battle shock;

Its shafts are laid on sinking sand,

Not on abiding rock.

Is it the sword? Ask the red dust

Of empires passed away;

The blood has turned their stones to rust,

Their glory to decay.

And is it pride? Ah, that bright crown

Has seemed to nations sweet;

But God has struck its luster down

In ashes at his feet.

Not gold but only men can make

A people great and strong;

Men who for truth and honor's sake

Stand fast and suffer long.

Brave men who work while others sleep,

Who dare while others fly...

They build a nation's pillars deep

And lift them to the sky.

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BW31 - D is for Donohue

2011-07-31T00:01:00.000-07:00

A couple months back, Keith Donohue's publicist sent me an email asking if I wanted to review his latest novel Centuries of June. She said:

Created out of myths drawn from all across America, the novel is both a murder mystery and ghost story that takes place entirely in the bathroom of an old house on one night in June, yet it covers five hundred years of American history. It is a tale with nine narrators: the victim and eight suspects, each of whom narrates her own story, explaining why she has a reason to bump off the protagonist. There’s an old man in a bathrobe who may or may not be the ghost of Samuel Beckett, and a baby who goes from newborn to toddler in the time it takes to tell the tale.

The story is a collage of styles—folklore, a shipwreck account, archives of historical documents, oral histories, the western, silent film, hard-boiled murder mystery, erotic fantasy, dreams, and allusions. Evocative and, at times, madcap, the novel has everything from flying feathers and dancing flappers to baseball and vaudeville, and has received four glowing trade reviews—two calling it a tour de force.

Of course, who wouldn't be intrigued by that. I looked up the book on Amazon which fortunately and Yippie for me had the look inside feature so I could read the first few pages. If the first pages, heck if the first paragraph doesn't grab my attention, then I know the rest of the book won't. I started reading and kept reading and decided I wanted to read the book and accepted her offer. So guess what's next on the nightstand?

In an interview about the book, Donahue has said:

"The Novel is a kind of mash-up and I'd be happy enough if people read it as historical fiction or magical realism or a black comedy or a murder mystery or an existential ghost story.

Likewise, the inspiration for Centuries of June is a mash-up of ideas and images. I knew I wanted to write about American myths and came across the painting of The Virgin by Gustav Klimt--which depicts a group of naked women resting in a clot beneath these wild and colorful quilts. I began to think about what their stories might be and how those tales might be interwoven with this speculation on time, memory, and the American story. In the actual writing, all sorts of other notions shoehorn their way into the book--from Bachelard's The Poetics of Space to the stateroom scene in the Marx Brothers' A Night at the Opera. The novel becomes a mosaic, like the patterns in the Klimt painting."

Even more intriguing. If you want to find out what other folks think about the story, check out the TLC Book Tour participants reactions. I'll let you know what I think when I'm finished reading it.

He's also written two other books that look equally intriguing:

Inspired by the W.B. Yeats poem that tempts a child from home to the waters and the wild, The Stolen Child is a modern fairy tale narrated by the child Henry Day and his double.

On a cold night in January, a stranger appears on the doorstep of Margaret Quinn, a widow living a solitary existence in a small Pennsylvania town. A nine-year-old orphan named Norah, dressed in tatters, claims to have found a welcome there. Margaret’s own daughter, Erica, ran away 10 years earlier, and the orphan appears at first to be an answer to a mother’s prayers. Margaret passes off Norah as her granddaughter and enrolls her in school, where Norah reveals to the other children her mysterious, unearthly powers.

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BW 30: C is for Cara Black

2011-07-24T00:01:00.000-07:00

Butte Montmarte, Paris, France by Julie K

I just finished reading the first book in Cara Black's Aimee Leduc Series called Murder in the Marais. I had heard about her stories and when I came across them while wondering through Book Passages in San Francisco, just had to check out the first book in the series:

Synopsis: It is November 1993 and the French prime ministerial candidate is about to sign a treaty with Germany that will severely restrict immigration, reminiscent of the Vichy laws. Aime Leduc is approached by a rabbi to decipher a fifty-year-old encrypted photograph and place it in the hands of Lili Stein. When she arrives at Lili's apartment in the Marais, the old Jewish quarter of Paris, she finds a corpse in whose forehead is carved a swastika. With the help of her partner, a dwarf with extraordinary computer hacking skills, Aime is determined to solve this horrendous crime. Then more murders follow. Her search for the killer leads her to a German war veteran involved in the 1940s with a Jewish girl he was supposed to send to her death. It takes Aime undercover inside a neo-Nazi group, where she must play a dangerous game of current politics and old war crimes. Many of the older Jews in the Marais are afraid and prefer to leave the past alone, but the horrible legacy of the death camps and the words "never forget" propel Aime to find out the true identities of the criminals past and present.

Murder in the Marais was her debut novel and the first in a series of now 11 books following the exploits of Private investigator Aimee Leduc in Paris, France. I discovered Aimee is a feisty chick who jumps into situations fearlessly, throws herself body (literally) and soul into her investigations. She isn't afraid of a few bruises and once she's on somebody's trail, doesn't let go. I was amazed at this character's tenacity. I was exhausted just reading the story. Paris is more than just the setting, it is also a living breathing character that helps bring the story to life. The rest of the books in the series are:


Murder in Belleville

Murder in the Sentier


Murder in the Bastille


Murder in Clichy


Murder in Montmartre

Murder in LLe Saint Louis


Murder in the Rue De Paradis

Murder in the Latin Quarter

Murder in the Palais Royal


Murder in Passy

If you like murder mysteries, this is one series well worth checking out.

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BW29: B is for Books and Blogs

2011-07-17T10:11:00.000-07:00

Books, books, books. We all love books and blogs about books and websites about books and authors talking about books. So, today, I'm going to share a few blogs, websites and author sites I enjoy reading.

I went to Bouchercon a couple years back and one of the panels I attended was the introduction of MULHOLLAND BOOKS, an new imprint of Little, Brown and Company. The imprint would focus on suspense novels: crime novels, thrillers, police procedurals, spy stories, even supernatural suspense. And the authors: Marcia Clark, (yes, the one of OJ fame), Mark Billingham, Duane Swierczynski, and Sebastian Rotella to name a few. New to me authors that definitely piqued my interest. Mullholland's website is great and chock full of original fiction to read including Mark Billingham's original short story, THE WALLS which is available to read or listen to in audio book form.

I know I've probably mentioned them before, but they bare mentioning again. MURDERATI is a group blog of murder mystery authors who enjoy discussing everything from, what else, murder to what's going on in their lives and how it relates to writing. There have been a few new additions to the group so be sure to check them out. I'm slowly making my way through reading each author's books and they keep making life difficult for me by adding new authors. *grin* I'll never run out of reading material.

Since I'm involved in A Round of Word in 80 Days, a writing challenge, I've discovered some great independent and self published author you should check out.

Kait of Fang and Shadow

Laurel of Creative Moments

Claire of Doing it Write Now

Also book bloggers whom I've been following it seems like forever and love talking about books.

Candace of Beth Fish Reads: She covers the books offered by several imprints.

Staci of Life in the Thumb: She loves all things Darcy.

Jackie of Literary Escapism: I've discovered many fantasy and paranormal books through her posts.

That ought to keep you all busy and your wishlists feed for a while.

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BW28: A is for Art Mysteries

2011-07-10T10:14:00.000-07:00

Painter's Palette at the Ready by Cobalt123

A couple years back I was introduced to the writings of Iain Pears, a writer and art historian. I happened to stumble across The Titian Committee in our local used bookstore and since I was taking an art class at the time, thought it would be interesting. Which started my love affair with art mysteries.

Pears wrote a series of art mysteries centered around a couple art historians Jonathan Argyll and Flavia di Stefano of Rome's Art Theft Squad. His books are a fascinating, interesting and educational way to learn about art within a fictional mystery. The books in the Flavia Di Stefano mystery series are:


The Raphael Affair


The Titian Committee


The Bernini Bust


The Last Judgement

Giotti's Hand

Death and Restoration


The Immaculate Deception

Pears has also written four other stories including An Instance of the Fingerpost, The Dream of Scipio, The Portrait, and Stone's Fall.

I had the opportunity to review Stone's Fall and discovered myself entrenched in a fascinating story.

It is told through the view points of three men, in three different time periods and revolves around John Stone, his widow, Elizabeth Ravenscliff, and a mysterious child mentioned in Stone's Will.

In the year 1909, Matthew Braddock is hired by Elizabeth to find the child. In the course of his search, he meets numerous characters involved in Stone's life. One is Henry Cort. Henry Cort takes over the story in Part two beginning in 1890 and tells how he also became involved in the life of John Stone and Elizabeth. He tell the story of his evolution as a spy and how he played a roll in John Stone's life. He leaves a mysterious package for Braddock to open at a later point. John Stone takes over the story bringing the reader back to 1867 and how he evolved as one of the most richest and powerful men in the world. The story ends with a shocking twist that was totally unexpected.

I've since acquired An Instance on the Fingerpost, The Raphael Affair, and Death and Restoration. An Instance on the Fingerpost is a chunky book at 750+ pages. It's one of those books you need to clear the decks for because it will take a while to read.

Amazon synopsis: "The year is 1663, and the setting is Oxford, England, during the height of Restoration political intrigue. When Dr. Robert Grove is found dead in his Oxford room, hands clenched and face frozen in a rictus of pain, all the signs point to poison. Rashomon-like, the narrative circles around Grove's murder as four different characters give their version of events: Marco da Cola, a visiting Italian physician--or so he would like the reader to believe; Jack Prestcott, the son of a traitor who fled the country to avoid execution; Dr. John Wallis, a mathematician and cryptographer with a predilection for conspiracy theories; and Anthony Wood, a mild-mannered Oxford antiquarian whose tale proves to be the book's "instance of the fingerpost." (The quote comes from the philosopher Bacon, who, while asserting that all evidence is ultimately fallible, allows for "one instance of a fingerpost that points in one direction only, and allows of no other possibility."

If you love art and you enjoy mysteries, there are quite a few other authors who also write art crime novels. Check out the list from Amazon.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW 27: Z is for Zhivago

2011-07-03T00:01:00.000-07:00

I'm getting closer to reading Dr. Zhivago by Boris Pasternak. I kind of have a mental as well as written list of books I want to read and since I am doing the A to Z challenge by author, two books away from the P's. If I decided to do it by title, I'd never get to it. I've already read Tolstoy's War and Peace and Anna Karenina. I don't know what it is I find so fascinating about Russian Literature. Maybe it is the time period, the characters or just the writing. Pasternak himself has an interesting history.

He was born in 1890 in Moscow and studied philosophy at Moscow University. He worked in a chemical factory during world war one and then ended up working for the soviet commissariat of education after the revolution. His first book of poetry was published in 1913. He had to turn to translating European writers works for 10 years from 1933 to 1943 because his political viewpoint was opposed by the soviets and didn't meet the communist party line. During this time, he wrote Dr. Zhivago, but it was rejected by soviet publishers in 1956. His manuscript was smuggled out of the country and published in Italy in 1957. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1958 but he was unable to leave the country to accept it. He was forced to decline the prize by his government. The book was on the New York Times best seller list for 26 weeks in 1958 and 1959. One of the reasons I decided to read the book is because of the Take a Chance challenge to read a book from my birth year. I discovered it was on the list. Pasternak died of natural causes in 1960 at the age of 70. The novel was banned in Russia until 1987.

Dr. Zhivago is a political social romantic drama about 5 young people during the Russian Revolution spanning from 1901 to 1943. Sounds similar to War and Peace so it will be interesting to compare this one to them. Here's an interesting piece of trivia. Boris's father, Leonid was a Russian Impressionist painter and not only painted portraits of Tolstoy but illustrated War and Peace.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW26: Y is for Young Adult

2011-06-26T00:01:00.000-07:00

Deep in the Forest by Movito

We are halfway there, my darlins. Are you enjoying the ride, exploring new books or different genres, expanding your horizons? Reading is such an adventure - for us, for our kids. For my last class, I had to read "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" which was one of the most challenged books in the past due to the subject matter and the use of the 'n' word. The class discussions were interesting because we were 1) given the task of pretending we were a teacher trying to convince the school board not to remove the book from school curriculum and 2) responding to the other students as a parent who wanted the book banned.

It was an interesting exercise because it made me look at both sides of the issue - the pros and cons. It also confirmed my belief that books should not be banned. However, what should be done is make sure books are age appropriate. There are just some books I think should be reserved for college age and adults, rather than middle age or high school students, because of their maturity levels.

When I was in high school, 11th grade, two of the books we were assigned for an English class was "The Clockwork Orange" and "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest." My parents were totally against me reading either book and when the school refused to substitute another book, they had me transferred into another class. This was during the time period when Go Ask Alice came out about a teenage girl who was a drug addict. That was considered one of the more controversial books during the 70's. I did read Go Ask Alice - doubt my parents ever knew, because I didn't tell them. However, never had the desire to read Clockwork or Cuckoo's Nest.

I recently came across an article in the Wall Street Journal entitled "Darkness Too Visible" about the darkness prevalent today in young adult books. Many young adult fiction authors took to their blogs upset by the article, in defense of their books. There are several links so take your time, check them out and come on back, let me know what you think.

Go ahead. I'll wait. (examining finger nails.) You back! Good.

To be honest, there are quite a few young adult novels with themes I won't read because of their content. But the same goes for adult novels as well. There are always going to be books that some will consider too dark, where another person will think of it as the best book they ever read in the whole wide world. It all depends on your perspective. Is it any reason to ban a book, remove it from the shelves. No. It just means as a parent, we have to be diligent in paying attention to what our children are reading and open and willing to discuss whatever comes up.

Compared to Clockwork Orange or the other books of the early decades, are they more dark or just as dark?

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW25: X is for Xanadu

2011-06-19T00:01:00.000-07:00


Courtesy of ZedZap

Hello my darlins. Happy Father's Day to all the dads. I have fried my brain this week working on the last paper due for my humanities class. Instead of a final we had to write a project paper and my subject was George Bernard Shaw. Interesting, scary, dude. I am now technically done with all my classes to earn my Bachelor of Science in Liberal Arts through Excelsior College. Officially I have to wait for my advisor to review everything and send out my graduation application packet, which will take a couple months. So, I will leave you with a poem to mull over and think about, while my brain recovers.

Xanadu - Kubla Khan

Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.

So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:
And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!

The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw:
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she played,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight 'twould win me
That with music loud and long
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW24: W is for what shall we read next?

2011-06-12T00:01:00.000-07:00

Despite all the books we have on our shelves, sometimes nothing sounds good. And you sit there and stare at the pile, wondering what am I in the mood for? What should I read next? Well, I discovered through Jenners of Life With Books, (she's a hoot by the way, be sure to check her blog out) some widgets that will help you decide or pick something new to read. Great when doing a theme based book challenge.

Whichbook.net is an interesting search engine with 12 choices and their opposites from such as happy or sad, beautiful or disgusting, easy or demanding, etc. You get to make up to four choices, then press go and see what books come up. I recently discovered through this process a really interesting book called Salamander by Thomas Wharton. It's on my shelves waiting to be read. You can also come up with some rather interesting finds and unusual names.

Picking 'happy', 'larger than life', 'optimistic', and 'short', the first thing that came up was "The Voluptuous Delights of Peanut Butter and Jam" by Lauren Liendenberg. Stop. I know what you're thinking but nope. There isn't anything hinky about it. I looked it up and sounds rather interesting. You can get lost for a while, plugging in various choices and seeing what the engine comes up with. A fun diversion and who knows, you may just discover a new author or interesting book.

Other interesting book search engines:

The Book Seer

What Should I Read Next

Library Things Zeitgeist

Or pick a book randomly using Random.org and New York Times Best Seller Listing. Plug in 1950 to 2011 into the Random generator, then go to the New York Times list, pick the year, then your birth month and see what comes up.

Have fun!

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW 23: V is for Virginia

2011-06-05T00:01:00.000-07:00

Virginia Woolf

I found this essay by Virginia Woolf on the love of reading. It speaks for itself and gives us plenty to think about our reading journeys.

The Love of Reading

Virginia Woolf

At this late hour of the world's history books are to be found in every room of the house - in the nursery, in the drawing room, in the dining room, in the kitchen. And in some houses they have collected so that they have to be accommodated with a room of their own. Novels, poems, histories, memoirs, valuable books in leather, cheap books in paper - one stops sometimes before them and asks in a transient amazement what is the pleasure I get, or the good I create, from passing my eyes up and down these innumerable lines of print? Reading is a very complex art - the hastiest examination of our sensations as a reader will show us that much. And our duties as readers are many and various. But perhaps it may be said that our first duty to a book is that one should read it for the first time as if one were writing it.

One should begin by sitting in the dock with the criminal, not by mounting the bench to sit among the Judges. One should be an accomplice with the writer in his act, whether good or bad, of creation. For each of these books, however it may differ in kind and quality, is an attempt to make something. And our first duty as readers is to try and understand what the writer is making from the first word with which he builds his first sentence to the last with which he ends his book. We must not impose our design upon him; we must not try to make him conform his will to ours. We must allow Defoe to be Defoe and Jane Austen to be Jane Austen as freely as we allow the tiger to have his fur and the tortoise to have his shell. And this is very difficult. For it is one of the qualities of greatness that it brings Heaven and earth and human nature into conformity with its own vision.

The great writers thus often require us to make heroic efforts in order to read them rightly. They bend us and break us. To go from Defoe to Jane Austen, from Hardy to Peacock, from Trollope to Meredith, from Richardson to Rudyard Kipling, is to be wrenched and distorted, to be thrown violently this way and that. And so, too, with the lesser writers. Each is singular; each has a view, a temperament, an experience of his own which may conflict with ours but must be allowed to express itself fully if we are to do him justice. And the writers who have most to give us often do most violence to our prejudices, particularly if they are our own contemporaries, so that we have need of all our imagination and understanding if we are to get the utmost that they can give us. But reading, as we have suggested, is a complex art. It does not merely consist in sympathising and understanding. It consists, too, in criticising and in judging.

The reader must leave the dock and mount the bench. He must cease to be the friend; he must become the judge. And this second process, which we may call the process of after-reading, for it is often done without the book before us, yields an even more solid pleasure than that which we receive when we are actually turning the pages. During the actual reading new impressions are always cancelling or completing the old. Delight, anger, boredom, laughter succeed each other incessantly as we read. Judgment is suspended, for we cannot know what may come next. But now the book is completed. It has taken a definite shape. And the book as a whole is different from the book received currently in several different parts. It has a shape, it has a being. And this shape, this being, can be held in the mind and compared with the shapes the essays of other books and given its own size and smallness by comparison with theirs.

But if this process of judging and deciding is full of pleasure it is also full of difficulty. Not much help can be looked for from outside. Critics and criticism abound, but it does not help us greatly to read the views of another mind when our own is still hot from a book that we have just read. It is after one has made up one's own opinion that the opinions of others are most illuminating. It is when we can defend our own judgment that we get most from the judgment of the great critics - the Johnson's, the Dryden's and the Arnold's.

To make up our own minds we can best help ourselves first by realizing the impression that the book has left as fully and sharply as possible, and then by comparing this impression with the impressions that we have formulated in the past. There they hang in the wardrobe of the mind - the shapes of the books we have read, like clothes that we have taken off and hung up to wait their season. Thus, if we have just read, say, Clarissa Harlowe for the first time we take it and let it show itself against the shape that remains in our minds after reading Anna Karenina. We place them side by side and at once the outlines of the two books are cut out against each other as the angle of a house (to change the figure) is cut out against the fullness of the harvest moon.

We contrast Richardson's prominent qualities with Tolstoy's. We contrast his indirectness and verbosity with Tolstoy's brevity and directness. We ask ourselves why it is that each writer has chosen so different an angle of approach. We compare the emotion that we felt at different crises of their books. We speculate as to the difference between the 18th century in England and the 19th century in Russia - but there is no end to the questions that at once suggest themselves as we place the books together.

Thus by degrees, by asking questions and answering them, we find that we have decided that the book we have just read is of this kind or that, has this degree of merit or that, takes its station at this point or at that in the literature as a whole. And if we are good readers we thus judge not only the classics and the masterpieces of the dead, but we pay the living writers the compliment of comparing them as they should be compared with the pattern of the great books of the past.

Thus, then, when the moralists ask us what good we do by running our eyes over these many printed pages, we can reply that we are doing our part as readers to help masterpieces into the world. We are fulfilling our share of the creative task - we are stimulating, encouraging, rejecting, making our approval and disapproval felt; and are thus acting as a check and a spur upon the writer. That is one reason for reading books - we are helping to bring good books into the world and to make bad books impossible. But it is not the true reason.

The true reason remains the inscrutable one - we get pleasure from reading. It is a complex pleasure and a difficult pleasure; it varies from age to age and from book to book. But that pleasure is enough. Indeed that pleasure is so great that one cannot doubt that without it the world would be a far different and a far inferior place from what it is. Reading has changed the world and continues to change it.

When the day of judgment comes therefore and all secrets are laid bare, we shall not be surprised to learn that the reason why we have grown from apes to men, and left our caves and dropped our bows and arrows and sat round the fire and talked and given to the poor and helped the sick - the reason why we have made shelter and society out of the wastes of the desert and the tangle of the jungle is simply this - we have loved reading.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW22: U is for Unicorn Pegasus Kitten

2011-05-29T00:01:00.000-07:00

Clash of the Geeks

Funny how life works out sometimes. Friday night I was just about to go to bed, but before I did, checked my stat counter and found I had gotten an extreme number of hits in a couple hours for an old post I'd written back in 2010 about a painting created by Jeff Zugale for Wil Wheaton (remember Wesley of star trek fame) and John Scalzi and a fan fiction contest. Check it out here and watch their hilarious video. It'll give you some insight into their minds. Anyway, when one of my posts suddenly starts getting lots of hits, somebody's mentioned it somewhere. So I followed the various worm trails until I discovered that Wil had tweeted while doing storytime at the Phoenix Comicon being held this weekend in AZ:

@Wilw If you're in the theater for Story time, look up the Unicorn Pegasus Kitten painting now. It's important.

My post came up # 1 on the google search over Wil Wheaton or John Scalzi. Odd but true and I kind of got a kick out of that. What he should have said was look up www.unicornpegasuskitten.com while I give a reading out of the book. Well, I figured it was just the universe talking to me, because I was in the midst of brainstorming "U" ideas.

Honesty, I had totally forgotten about the painting and the book created as a result of the contest. The end result is Clash of the Geeks with offerings by Wil Wheaton, John Scalzi, Patrick Rothfuss, Catherynne Valente, Stephen Toulouse, Rachel Swirsky, Scott Mattes, Bernardette Durbin, and John Anealio. All the proceeds benefit the Lupus Foundation of America.

The book is available in ebook format on the Clash of the Geeks website for free with voluntary payments strongly encouraged which will go to the Lupus Foundation. Check it out and you are all on the honor system here. If you choose to download it, be sure to donate. I did. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW 21: T is for Trevor

2011-05-22T00:01:00.000-07:00


William Trevor May 24, 1928

Today I'd like to introduce you to Irish author, William Trevor. On May 24, he will be celebrating his 83rd birthday. He was born in Mitchelstown, County Cork, Ireland. Coincidentally my great grandmother was from County Cork as well. Hmm... I wonder! He graduated from Trinity College in Dublin with a degree in History, worked as a teacher and sculptor until becoming a full time writer in 1968. He emigrated to England in 1954 and today resides in Devon, England.

His first book, written in 1958 "A Standard of Behavior" met with little success, however after writing short stories, his next book "The Old Boys" won the 1964 Hawthornden Prize for Literature. He has won a number of prizes over the years for his works including the Irish Times Irish Literature Prize for Fiction, Whitbread Book of the Year, and Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 2002 for "The Story of Lucy Gault."

Story of Lucy Gault

According to Maureen Corrigan of NPR in her article about "William Trevor: A Short Story Master's Life Work and his most recent volume of short stories called "Selected Stories, Trevor is

"a master of capturing those small shifts in consciousness that shatter someone's world. Because he's an Irishman living in exile (Trevor has lived most of his long life in England) and because so many of those aforementioned epiphanies take place oh-so-discreetly, the comparisons to James Joyce have been inevitable. But as the 48 recent stories in this volume attest, Trevor has a more developed taste for the macabre than Joyce ever did. It creeps up on a reader slowly: the awareness that so many of these tales are about being trapped, buried alive, thwarted at every turn of life's labyrinth. And, yet, the signature response of Trevor's characters to their bricked-in situation is a fatalistic shrug garnished with Black Irish humor."

Selected Stories

In an interview with Mira Stout of The Paris Review, Trevor says of his writing:

"I think all writing is experimental. The very obvious sort of experimental writing is not really more experimental than that of a conventional writer like myself. I experiment all the time but the experiments are hidden. Rather like abstract art: You look at an abstract picture, and then you look at a close-up of a Renaissance painting and find the same abstractions."

In response to her question why he's never created a hero in any of his stories:

Because I find them dull. Heroes don’t really belong in short stories. As Frank O’Connor said, “Short stories are about little people,” and I agree. I find the unheroic side of people much richer and more entertaining than black-and-white success.

Read the whole interview here for more insight into William Trevor, his writing, Irish writers and heroes, politics and more. It's rather insightful.

For more information on William Trevor, his book list and a critical perspective, go here.

Happy Birthday, William Trevor

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW20: S is for Stereotyping

2011-05-15T00:01:00.000-07:00


Chimamanda Adichie

In my Humanities class this week, we are discussing world literature and stereotyping of different cultures One of the authors we talked about is Nigerian author Chimamanda Adichie. She gave a very interesting talk about "The Danger of the Single Story" and how the single story creates stereotypes. I wanted to share it with you today.

Her talk is well worth listening too and also made me curious about her and her books which fit in well with our armchair traveling mini challenge.

Purple Hibiscus

Half of a Yellow Sun

The Thing Around Your Neck

She's an interesting woman and I look forward to reading her books and the start of my armchair traveling through the continent of Africa. Speaking of which, how is your armchair traveling going? Visited any where interesting lately?

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW19: R is for Roxanne

2011-05-08T00:01:00.000-07:00

Roxanne St. Claire

Hello my darlings! I'm on vacation this week and have been reading the latest series by one of my favorite authors, Roxanne St. Claire, who wrote the romantic suspense series "The Bullet Catchers." Her latest series is "the Guardian Angelinos."

"The Guardian Angelinos are a Boston-based family that flies under the radar of the law to solve crimes, save lives, protect the innocent, and take down the guilty. This team of rule-breaking, risk-taking, wave-making siblings and cousins aren’t afraid to get into the face of criminals as one of the toughest, grittiest security and PI firms around. This close-knit clan of protection, investigation, law enforcement, technology, weaponry, and legal experts all have one simple creed: The good guys win and the bad guys get the holy hell kicked out of them."

I'm loving the characters in these stories just as much as I adored the tough bullet catchers in her other series.

She's a multifaceted writer with great imagination and very interesting characters. Check out her booklist here. A free prequel is available for Edge of Sight which tells the history of Sam and Zach's story in Taken to the Edge.

I hope each and every one of you have a Happy Mother's Day. My mother's day present this year. Getting to spend it with my mom who we almost lost to a stroke a few months ago. She is recovering and I'm so thankful I get to share the day with her. So hug your mom close today and tell her how much you appreciate her, because you'll never know when she could be taken from you.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW18: Q is for Queen

2011-04-30T21:11:00.000-07:00

Philip and Elizabeth: Portrait of a Royal Marriage

All eyes were on England Friday for the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton. One of the first questions my hubby asked: What is their last name? Good question. I always thought since it was called Windsor Castle, their last name was Windsor. I was half right. On the official website of The British Monarchy (fascinating website - check it out) I discovered this:

The Royal Family name of Windsor was confirmed by The Queen after her accession in 1952. However, in 1960, The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh decided that they would like their own direct descendants to be distinguished from the rest of the Royal Family (without changing the name of the Royal House), as Windsor is the surname used by all the male and unmarried female descendants of George V.

It was therefore declared in the Privy Council that The Queen's descendants, other than those with the style of Royal Highness and the title of Prince/Princess, or female descendants who marry, would carry the name of Mountbatten-Windsor.

This reflected Prince Philip's surname. In 1947, when Prince Philip of Greece became naturalised, he assumed the name of Philip Mountbatten as a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy.

The effect of the declaration was that all The Queen's children, on occasions when they needed a surname, would have the surname Mountbatten-Windsor.

And with the marriage of Prince William and Kate Middleton, the queen has announced:

The Queen has today been pleased to confer a Dukedom on Prince William of Wales. His titles will be Duke of Cambridge, Earl of Strathearn and Baron Carrickfergus.

Prince William thus becomes His Royal Highness The Duke of Cambridge and Miss Catherine Middleton on marriage will become Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cambridge.

William and Kate: A Royal Love Story

Congratulations to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. May their marriage be as blessed as his grandparents.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW17: P is for Poetic Prophecy

2011-04-24T09:08:00.000-07:00

Courtesy Jeff Golden

Happy Easter! National Poetry Month is coming to a close and what better way to send it out than with this:

The Nail

Laurene H. Bell

The nail is used for many things,

A useful securing tool;

A hammer is taken by the hand

And drives it, that's the rule.

A nail is needed when you build,

It's a necessary thing.

It was also used over two thousand years ago

To hang upon a tree, the King.

He took the pain and suffering

For all mankind, you see.

Yet He took the torture just for you,

And He took it just for me.

You cannot keep a good man down,

Through the years many have said.

He went down a man, and rose a King

To deliver the spiritually dead.

He is on the throne

At God's right hand.

The First, the Last,

The Great I Am.

No nail, no hammer can touch Him now--

The mighty King on high.

What He built is forevermore,

Salvation for you and I.

So when you see a simple nail with it's sharpened end,

And need to build or repair,

Lift up your eyes, your heart and mind

And thank Him with a prayer.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW16: O is for Owl

2011-04-17T00:01:00.000-07:00


Painting by Donna L. Derstine

Forgive me, but I'm madly working on finishing a paper for my humanities class so keeping it short and sweet this week. Did you ever have a nursery rhyme get stuck in your head, but then couldn't remember the whole thing. Has happened many a time to me, particularly with this one. It was published in 1871. Enjoy!

The Owl and the Pussycat

Edward Lear

The Owl and the Pussycat went to sea

In a beautiful pea-green boat,

They took some honey, and plenty of money,

Wrapped up in a five pound note.

The Owl looked up to the stars above,

And sang to a small guitar,

"O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,

What a beautiful Pussy you are, you are, you are,

What a beautiful Pussy you are."

Pussy said to the Owl "You elegant fowl,

How charmingly sweet you sing.

O let us be married, too long we have tarried;

But what shall we do for a ring?"

They sailed away, for a year and a day,

To the land where the Bong-tree grows,

And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood

With a ring at the end of his nose, his nose, his nose,

With a ring at the end of his nose.

"Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling your ring?"

Said the Piggy, "I will"

So they took it away, and were married next day

By the Turkey who lives on the hill.

They dined on mince, and slices of quince,

Which they ate with a runcible spoon.

And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand.

They danced by the light of the moon, the moon, the moon,

They danced by the light of the moon.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW15: N is for Nature

2011-04-10T00:01:00.000-07:00

National Geographic: Bamboo Forest, Japan

As I mentioned last week, April is National Poetry Month so I'm going to continue with the poetry theme this week. I was never a huge fan of poetry growing up and I know the reason why. When I learned about it in high school and college, it seemed complicated. I really didn't understand the art form and it was just something to memorize, analyze and get through. Instead of appreciating the words, we'd get lost in the verbage - Iambic, anapest, pentameters, blah, blah, blah. I wasn't taught to appreciate it, because the ones teaching it, didn't seem to appreciate it either. If you want someone to get excited about something, you have to be excited about it yourself. I was just reading in A Thomas Jefferson Education that you can have the greatest teacher in the world, but if the student doesn't care about what their teaching, the lesson is lost. And if the teacher doesn't care, well.... In one ear and out the other.

With age comes wisdom and with wisdom comes appreciation. I've come to appreciate the art form, love Haiku, love the poets who think out of the box and break the rules. I was listening to NPR the other day and they were interviewing Billy Collins whom I have never heard of. He intrigued me so I looked him up on the internet and read a few of his poems. He's one of those who thinks outside the box. I spotlighted one of his poems on My Two Blessings.

Inspiration for poetry comes from all forms but it think the main inspiration is nature. Nature is beautiful, emotional, awe inspiring. My mouth literally drops open when I see some of the shots National Geographic photographer have taken, whether watching documentaries on the television or wandering about their website. Makes me want to write a poem myself. There are many different forms including: Ballade, blues, cento, cinquain, elegy, epic, haiku, prose and sonnets just to name a few. Have you ever tried to write a Haiku. Some of the greatest traditional haiku poets are Basho, Yosa Buson, Kobayashi Issa, and Masaoka Shiki. I learned about Basho when doing Five in a Row with James. Grass Sandals: The Travels of Basho was one of the books we rowed and I fell in love with the Haiku.

The first day of the year:

thoughts come - and there is loneliness;

the autumn dusk is here.

-- Basho

A haiku is made up of simple words and grammar about nature, feelings, experiences and consists only of 17 syllables. The first line 5 syllables, the 2nd line 7 syllables and the 3rd line 5 syllables. It doesn't rhyme but paints a picture in your head. I have a challenge for you this week, besides reading poetry and that is to write a poem in any form including a haiku. Post it on your blog or post it in the comments, but I dare you to try and see what you can come up with. I flexed my writing wings a bit and attempted a poem and a haiku from that poem. Here's my attempt.

Poem by Robin of My Two Blessings

Unity

We are the branches.

He is the tree.

Stately, strong

All in unity.

One without the other

like dead branches fall

together, three in unity.

Roots stretch deep,

Anchored to the ground.

Branches reach high,

Seek the sky.

There are no bounds.

Flowers bud.

Fragile, but strong.

Green vine cling

tenacious and long.

Deep brown limbs

lift to the sky.

We are the branches.

He is the tree.

Stately, strong

All in unity.

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Haiku

Green vines, cling and twine
deep brown limbs stretch to the sky

fragile flowers bud.

Your turn!

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW14: M is for Milton

2011-04-03T00:01:00.000-07:00

April is National Poetry month so what better way to celebrate poetry than with John Milton. In our Well Educated Mind quest, poetry is one of the categories. Most of the poets on the list may be found online. There are numerous site where you may read Paradise Lost or even download it to your e-reader from Project Gutenberg.

Paradiselost.org is full of information about Milton, his life and his works. Darkness Visible, hosted by Christ's College at Cambridge University, has everything you need to know about Milton and Paradise Lost including plot summary of each of the books, history of the illustrations, Milton's life, religion and politics and his influence on later writers. It is a wonderful, interesting, educational site for studying Paradise Lost. You'll get lost for a few hours, in a good way. Believe me!

The beginning of book 1

Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste
Brought death into the World, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden, till one greater Man
Restore us, and regain the blissful seat,
Sing, Heavenly Muse, that, on the secret top
Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire
That shepherd who first taught the chosen seed
In the beginning how the heavens and earth
Rose out of Chaos: or, if Sion hill
Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that flowed
Fast by the oracle of God, I thence
Invoke thy aid to my adventurous song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar
Above th' Aonian mount, while it pursues
Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme.
And chiefly thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer
Before all temples th' upright heart and pure,
Instruct me, for thou know'st; thou from the first
Wast present, and, with mighty wings outspread,
Dove-like sat'st brooding on the vast Abyss,
And mad'st it pregnant: what in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support;
That, to the height of this great argument,
I may assert Eternal Providence,
And justify the ways of God to men.

Say first--for Heaven hides nothing from thy view,
Nor the deep tract of Hell--say first what cause
Moved our grand parents, in that happy state,
Favoured of Heaven so highly, to fall off
From their Creator, and transgress his will
For one restraint, lords of the World besides.
Who first seduced them to that foul revolt?
Th' infernal Serpent; he it was whose guile,
Stirred up with envy and revenge, deceived
The mother of mankind, what time his pride
Had cast him out from Heaven, with all his host
Of rebel Angels, by whose aid, aspiring
To set himself in glory above his peers,
He trusted to have equalled the Most High,
If he opposed, and with ambitious aim
Against the throne and monarchy of God,
Raised impious war in Heaven and battle proud,
With vain attempt. Him the Almighty Power
Hurled headlong flaming from th' ethereal sky,
With hideous ruin and combustion, down
To bottomless perdition, there to dwell
In adamantine chains and penal fire,
Who durst defy th' Omnipotent to arms.

Continue it here, here, or here.

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If you don't have a blog, tell us about the books you are reading in the comment section of this post.

BW13 - L is for linky love

2011-03-27T00:01:00.000-07:00

I'm currently reading an e-book by an author I discovered during ROW80 called Hush Money by Susan Bischoff. Another one of my blogging authors I stumbled over. Over the past year, a few aspiring writers I've been following have had their first books published or decided to self publish. Of course, I just had to read their books. Or new to me authors who've been around awhile but I just discovered them. So today I thought I'd throw a little linky love their way and introduce you to some of them. Check out their blogs, check out their books.

Jody Hedlund - her debut novel The Preacher's Bride

Susan Bischoff of Hunting High and Love - the Talent Chronicles

Kait Nolan (hostess of Row80) - The Mirius Novella Trilogy

Michelle Davidson Argyle of The Innocent Flower - debut novel "Cinders"

Karen Harrington's of Scobberlotch - "Janeology "

K.M. Weiland's of Wordplay - "A Man Called Outlaw", plus "Behold the Dawn" and nonfiction writing book: "Crafting Unforgettable Characters: A Hands-On Introduction to Bringing Your Characters To Life."

C.J. Darlington's "Thicker than Blood" and "Bound By Guilt"

Christine Fonseca - "Emotional Intensity in Gifted Students." Excellent, excellent book and she's recently released "101 Success Secrets for Gifted Students."

Susan Helene Gottfried of West of Mars - "Trevor's Song" and "the Demo Tapes Year 1 and Year 2"

Follow them for a while and get to know them. I have read or have most of their books in my TBR stack waiting to be read. Happy Reading!

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Link to your reviews:

BW12 - K is for Kane

2011-03-20T00:01:00.000-07:00

Ben Kane

Happy Spring! Do you like historical fiction? Me, not so much....they often times can be, well, dull, flat and boring. I am pleased to say I've discovered one author whose writing is excellent. His stories capture your imagination, his characters are three dimensional and the historical aspects are educational to say the least. I had the pleasure of reading "The Forgotten Legion" last year by Ben Kane and totally fell in like with his writing. He approached me asking if I'd be interested in reading his book and I'm so glad I took him up on his offer.

Check out my review of story here, then come on back.

The Forgotten Legion is book one is a trilogy following several characters: Romulus, Fabiola, Tarquinius and Brennus in ancient Rome. The other two books in the trilogy are


Released March 16, 2010

and

U.S. Release date: March 29, 2011

Ben sent me two copies of The Silver Eagle, one to give away, last year. It unfortunately got buried in my bookshelves. I came across it the other day, slapped myself silly up side the head for losing it and decided to read it. Coincidentally or should I say synchronicity in the works, Ben contacted to let me know The Road to Rome was coming out in the U.S. and would I like a copy to read and review. Emphatic yes with a heartfelt apology for forgetting about the other book.

It all actually works out well since I won't have to wait to find out what happens to the characters in the next book. I already have it. :) So my darlings, I will be reading both books and hosting a giveaway mid April. If you love historical fiction and you haven't checked out Ben Kane yet, then now is the time to do so. His parents are Irish, which pretty much makes him Irish so the books can apply to the Ireland Reading Challenge and the Armchair Traveler.

It's that time of year again. Get your spring reading list together and sign up for the Spring Reading Thing 2011 hosted by Katrina of Callapidder Day's. If you haven't done it before, It's a fun, low pressure, set your own goals reading challenge. I participate every year.

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J is for Judge

The votes from both the folks on Well Trained Mind board and comments here are as follow:

The Pint Man - 3 (Pub fiction - setting a bar)

Silent Mercy - 0 (legal thriller)

Comedy in a Minor Key - 2 (Jewish holocaust type of story)

Where Shadows Dance -1 (historical detective thriller)

Bound by Guilt - 0 (Christian thriller)

By Nightfall - 2 (relationship story)

The Pint Man wins. Will download it to my nook and let you guys know how I like. Thanks for playing.

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Link to your reviews:

BW11 - J is for judge

2011-03-13T18:31:00.000-07:00

I have a challenge for you this week: Judge a book by its cover. Much easy said than done, believe me. The task is to pick out a book based on its cover. However, you can not look inside or on the back to see what it is about. Nor can you look up the information online. Based on its cover, decide what you think its about and write up a little snippet, either here or one your blog. Read the book and then let us know if you were right, close or not even in the ballpark.

The first time I ever did this was for another challenge by Jenners of Life with Books who hosted the Take a Chance Challenge. I went into the bookstore and failed miserably. I just couldn't keep from checking out the synopsis. I went online instead to Amazon and picked out books based on their covers. I selected 5 unknown to me authors and then using Random.org selected one of the books.You can read about it here.

Saturday James and I went to Borders and I decided to give it another try. I browsed through the books and then I saw this one:

There wasn't a whole lot to go on, it was beautifully packaged and captured my attention so decided to buy it. My guess based on the cover, the title and information provided: It's a historical fiction mystery, involving an intriguing lady, thorny roses represent death so must have a murder or two and the maze, many puzzles to figure out. I know that's generic but that's the best I can do. What do you think?

I went on to Amazon and picked out a few random books based on their covers. I know absolutely nothing about them. Your task, pick one and tell us what you think it is about.


The Pint Man by Steve Rushin

Silent Mercy by Linda Fairstein

Comedy in a minor Key by Hans Keilson

Where Shadows Dance by C.S. Harris

Bound By Guilt - C.J. Darlington

By Nightfall by Michael Cunningham

They all looked rather intriguing to me. What about you? Would you pick up any of them because of the cover? Pick out which one you think I should read. I'll read the book that gets the most votes, then report back to you what it was about.

It's daylight savings time again - hope you didn't forget to set your clocks forward.

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Link to your reviews: