Mailbox Monday 4-20-2009

It is time for another edition of Mailbox Monday hosted at The Printed Page or In Your Mailbox at The Story Siren. Please stop by those posts and take a look at what packages everybody else got this week! Don't forget to check out my giveaways - I have three ending this week! I will also be posting a new one today or tomorrow!

Within Reach by Barbara Delinsky I won from Beth's Book Reviews - Thanks Beth!






Work in Progress by Kristin Armstrong I won over at Joy Story - Thanks Joy!







A Killer Collection by J.B. Stanley I won from Lori's Reading Corner - Thanks Lori!








The Turnaround by George Pelecanos I won over at Rhapsody in Books. Thanks Rhapsody in books!






How I Got to Be Whoever it is I am by Charles Grodin -

I won from Drey's Library. Thanks Drey!

Nothing But Trouble by Susan May Warren was received for a First Wild Card Tour in June.

PJ Sugar knows three things for sure:
- After traveling the country for ten years hoping to shake free from the trail of disaster that's become her life, she needs a fresh start.
- The last person she wants to see when she heads home for her sister's wedding is Boone - her former flame and the reason she left town.
- Her best friend's husband absolutely did not commit the first murder Kellogg, Minnesota, has seen in more than a decade.

What PJ doesn't know is that when she starts digging for evidence, she'll uncover much more than she bargained for - a deadly conspiracy, a knack for investigation, and maybe, just maybe, that fresh start she's been longing for.

Conscience Point by Erica Abeel was received from Unbridled Books.

Madeleine Shaye is a gifted over-achiever with a dual career as concert pianist and network TV arts correspondent. She adores her college-age daughter, adopted as an infant under murky circumstances, and has a blissful relationship with Nick Ashcroft, scion of a rich, old money family whose lives have intertwined with hers since college. In short, she is the woman with all the luck.

Then her life unravels. She loses her footing in a marketplace skewed toward youth and pop culture. Her daughter announces she's leaving college to work in Guatemala, hinting darkly at mysterious trouble. And Maddy discovers that Nick has betrayed her in a way she could never have imagined.

Conscience Point captures the struggles of accomplished baby boomers scrambling to stay afloat in a post-literate age. It offers smart, enlightening descriptions of the world of music and satisfies our prurient hunger to eavesdrop on the almost too decadent, consequence-free lives of the mega-wealthy.

I received Madewell Brown by Rick Collignon from Unbridled Books.

One morning, nearly fifty years ago, a tall black man with one arm longer than the other walked into Guadalupe, New Mexico. He kept to himself for seven years, and then. . .disappeared. Nobody knew who he was or what became of him. Now, as his last act, an old man named Ruffino Trujillo tells his grown son Cipriano the story about what became of the mysterious black man.

After his father's death, Cipriano discovers an old canvas bag bearing the name of Madewell Brown. Inside, he finds a hand-carved doll, an old blanket, a photo of a Negro League baseball team, and an unmailed letter. Thinking it's the least he can do - Cipriano mails the letter. Arriving in Cairo, Illinois, the letter comes into the hands of a young woman named Rachael Parish who believes it has come from her lost grandfather, Madewell Brown.

Drawn magically forward on Rick Collignon's mesmerizing prose, we follow Rachael to Guadalupe in search of her own identity and watch as Cipriano struggles to make sense of the story his father shared - the story of a dead man who just didn't belong there. (Description from publisher's letter sent with book.)

The Sorrows of an American by Siri Hustvedt came to me from Picador and it was a surprise!

In her fourth novel (following the acclaimed What I Loved), Hustvedt continues, with grace and aplomb, her exploration of family connectedness, loss, grief and art. Narrator and New York psychoanalyst Erik Davidsen returns to his Minnesota hometown to sort through his recently deceased father Lars's papers. Erik's writer sister, Inga, soon discovers a letter from someone named Lisa that hints at a death that their father was involved in. Over the course of the book, the siblings track down people who might be able to provide information on the letter writer's identity. The two also contend with other looming ghosts. Erik immerses himself in the text of his father's diary as he develops an infatuation with Miranda, a Jamaican artist who lives downstairs with her daughter. Meanwhile, Inga, herself recently widowed, is reeling from potentially damaging secrets being revealed about the personal life of her dead husband, a well-known novelist and screenplay writer. Hustvedt gives great breaths of authenticity to Erik's counseling practice, life in Minnesota and Miranda's Jamaican heritage, and the anticlimax she creates is calming and justified; there's a terrific real-world twist revealed in the acknowledgments. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

The Blue Notebook by James A. Levine I received through Shelf Awareness from Spiegel & Grau.

A tribute to the powers of imagination and the resilience of childhood, The Blue Notebook tells the story of Batuk, a precocious fifteen-year-old girl from rural India who was sold into sexual slavery by her father when she was nine. As she navigates the grim realities of the Common Street, Batuk manages to put pencil to paper, recording her private thoughts and stories in a diary. Taking us where few writers have dared to explore, The Blue Notebook is a devastating look at a global crisis. Yet it is also an unforgettable, deeply human, and beautifully crafted novel about the ability of stories to give meaning to our lives.

So Not Happening by Jenny B. Jones came to me for a First Wild Card Tour happening this week.

Bella Kirkwood had it all: A-list friends at her prestigious private school, Broadway in her backyard, and Daddy's MasterCard in her wallet. Then her father, a plastic surgeon to the stars, decided to trade her mother in for a newer model.

When Bella's mom falls in love with a man she met on the Internet - a factory worker with two bratty sons - Bella has to pack up and move in with her new family in Truman, Oklahoma. On a farm no less!

Forced to trad her uber-trendy NYC lifestyle for down-home charm Bella fees like a pair of Rock & Republic jeans in a sea of Wranglers.

At least some of the people in her new high school are pretty cool. Especially the hunky football player who invites her to lunch. And maybe even the annoying - but kinda hot - editor of the school newspaper.

But before long, Bella smells something rotten in the town of Truman, and it's not just the cow pasture. With her savvy reporter's instincts, she is determined to find the story behind all the secrets.

D0-Over by Robin Hemley was received from Hachette Books (My Giveaway for this books ends Monday at Midnight!)

Robin Hemley's childhood made a wedgie of his memory, leaving him sore and embarrassed for over forty years. He was the most pitiful kindergartner, the least spirited summer camper, and dateless for prom. In fact, there's nary an event from his youth that couldn't use improvement. If only he could do them all over a few decades later, with an adult's wisdom, perspective, and giant-like height...

In the spirit of cult film classics like Billy Madison and Wet Hot American Summer, in DO-OVER! Hemley reencounters paper mache, revisits his childhood home, and finally attends the prom--bringing readers the thrill of recapturing a misspent youth and discovering what's most important: simple pleasures, second chances, and the forgotten joys of recess.

How Not To Look Old by Charla Krupp was received from Hachette Books. (My giveaway for this book ends Friday at Midnight!)

Charla Krupp knows that aging sucks! So she's here to help. It's every woman's dream: looking hip, sexy, fresh, and pretty--whether you're in your 30's, 40's, 50's, or 60's. Now it's every woman's necessity: looking younger will help you hold onto your job and your partner--particularly when everyone around you seems half your age. It's about making the ultimate "to-do" list of LITTLE beauty and fashion changes that pay off BIG TIME.

Charla Krupp, beauty editor and expert, known for her real woman's approach to looking fabulous, offers brutally frank and foolproof advice on how not to look old.

Bobbi Brown Living Beauty was received from Hachette Books. (My giveaway for this book ends Friday at Midnight!)

Bobbi Brown began the trend toward natural-looking cosmetics with a simple philosophy: Women want to look and feel like themselves, only prettier and more confident. Today, top editors at elite fashion magazines--including In Style, Vogue, Allure, and Harpers Bazaar--revere her, and celebrities and millions of regular women throughout the world swear by her beauty advice. Now Bobbi Brown has written THE book redefining beauty for women over 40, BOBBI BROWN LIVING BEAUTY. In this refreshing look at beauty and aging, Bobbi offers specific makeup tricks for a stunning face--showing how makeup can solve most of the flaws that many women go under the knife to fix. In fact, the right makeup can create an even skin tone, lift the cheeks, plump a smile...even take years off any woman's face. The key is to use makeup to enhance each woman's best features and showcase her natural beauty. With step-by-step makeup instructions and quotes from beautiful women like Marcia Gay Harden, Vera Wang, Susan Sarandon, and Lorraine Bracco, Bobbi Browns natural, celebratory approach to aging will enlighten and inspire women everywhere.

The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon was received from Doubleday through Shelf Awareness.

The Angel's Game is a dazzling novel that brings us back to the unique and mysterious world of The Shadow of the Wind - and is certain to be one of the most talked-about and widely read books of the year.

In the turbulent and surreal Barcelona of the 1920s, David Martin, a young novelist obsessed with a forbidden love, receives an offer from an enigmatic publisher to write a book like no other before - a book for which "people will live and die." In return, he is promised a fortune and, perhaps, much more.

Soon David begins to see frightening parallels between the book he's been commissioned to write and an old religious manuscript retrieved from the Cemetery of Forgotten Books. Meanwhile, David's ethereal publisher's sinister scope of influence begins to encroach more and more upon his own life.

Once again, the author of The Shadow of the Wind takes us into a dark, gothic universe, creating a breathtaking adventure of intrigue, romance, and tragedy and a dizzyingly constructed labyrinth of secrets where the magic of books, passion, and friendship blends into a masterful story.

Obsession by Gloria Vanderbilt was received from ECCO through Shelf Awareness

Talbot Bingham is a renowned architectural genius who with his formidable wife, Priscilla, creates an architectural community. When he dies unexpectedly in the middle of their tenth-wedding anniversary celebration, the devastated Priscilla is left keeper of the flame of Talbot's genius. Going through her husband's archives, she comes unexpectedly upon a pile of neatly tied letters, and the shocking secret of her husband's intimate life - a discovery that topples the foundation of her soul and spirit.

Obsession explores the mysteries of the human heart, provoking questions of whom we choose to love, and why. The reader is left to decide whom Phoebe is actually weaving inexplicably in and out of her tale - does she represent another facet of Priscilla, or ha she in part invented the other woman who completed the world her husband so recently inhabited?

I have also received the following books over the last few weeks but keep running out of time to post about them - so without further ado:

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe

Passion Unleashed by Larissa Ione

The Shipwreck of a Nation by H. Peter Nennaus

Outcasts United by Warren St. John

Ultimatum by Matthew Glass

Crazy for the Storm by Norman Ollestad

Stone's Fall by Iain Pears

Shanghai Girls by Lisa See

Bad Mother by Ayelet Waldman

Mischief Maker's Manual by Sir John Hargrave

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I would love to hear about the books that you got this week!

(All descriptions are from book covers unless otherwise noted.)