Mailbox Monday (Sept 17, 2012)

Welcome to Mailbox Monday, the weekly meme created by Marcia from A girl and her books.  This is where I share the titles I have received for review or purchased during the past week.  Mailbox Monday will be hosted in September by Kristen at BookNAround.

The Secret Keeper

by Kate Morton

During a summer party at the family farm in the English countryside, sixteen-year-old Laurel Nicolson has escaped to her childhood tree house and is happily dreaming of the future.  She spies a stranger coming up the long road to the farm and watches as her mother speaks to him.  Before the afternoon is over, Laurel will witness a shocking crime.  A crime that challenges everything she knows about her family and especially her mother, Dorothy -- her vivacious, loving, nearly perfect mother.

Now, fifty years later, Laurel is a successful and well-regarded actress living in London.  The family is gathering at Greenacres farm for Dorothy's ninetieth birthday.  Realizing that this may be her last chance, Laurel searches for answers to the questions that still haunt her from that long-ago day, answers that can only be found in Dorothy's past.  Dorothy's story takes the reader from pre-WWII England through the blitz, to the '60s and beyond.  It is the secret history of three strangers from vastly different worlds -- Dorothy, Vivien, and Jimmy -- who meet by chance in wartime London and whose lives are forever entwined.

The Secret Keeper explores longings and dreams and the unexpected consequences they sometimes bring.  It is an unforgettable story of lovers and friends, deception and passion that is told -- in Morton's signature style -- against a backdrop of events that changed the world. 

Letting Go of Super Mom: Dr. Mommy's 'Get Real' Approach to a Balanced Life

by Daisy Sutherland, DC

***You Are Not Alone***

Women today do it all -- from leading Fortune 500 companies and managing large ministry organizations to running a tight ship at home.  But keeping all those balls spinning can be an impossible task, and the pressure that we place on ourselves to be perfect can be overwhelming.

Letting Go of Supermom is the definitive guide for everything you need to manage your life and your family's life with confidence and grace.  No matter where you are or what your goals, you'll get loads of tips, tricks, and triumphs to help you find the authentic, balanced life you crave, including:

• Parenting and relationship tools
• Time-management and organization tips
• Keys to handling stress - the right way
• Details on nutrition and wellness
• Ways to stay spiritually refreshed, and more

So give up the fight to be perfect in every way, never letting things fall, and always being there for everyone.  It is time to quit trying to be supermom and start becoming the person God made you to be. 

The Summer Before the Storm

by Gabriele Wills

Muskoka, 1914.  It's the Age of Elegance in the summer playground of the affluent and powerful.  Amid the pristine, island-dotted lakes, the granite cliffs, and pine-scented forests of the Canadian wilderness, the young and carefree amuse themselves with glittering balls, lavish picnics, and friendly competitions.  But this summer promises to be different when the charming, ambitious, and destitute son of a disowned heir joins his wealthy family at their cottage on Wyndwood Island.

Through Jack's introduction into the privileged life of the aristocratic Wyndhams and their social circle -- including captains of industry and financial titans -- he seeks opportunities and alliances to better himself, including in his schemes, his beautiful, headstrong, and audacious cousin, Victoria.

Among their large circle of family and friends are hedonists and intellectuals, charlatans and Bohemians, hypocrites and philanthropists; the witty, the frivolous, the heroic, the autocratic, the caring, and the tormented.  Vividly they bring to life the idyllic lifestyle of endless summers on tranquil lakes.  But their charmed lives begin to unravel with the onset of the Great War, in which many are destined to become part of the "lost generation". 

This richly textured tale takes the reader on an unforgettable journey from romantic moonlight cruises to the horrific sinking of the Lusitania, genteel Muskoka to wartime Britain, regattas on the water to combat in the skies over France, extravagant mansions to deadly trenches -- from innocence to nationhood.

The Summer Before the Storm, the first of "The Muskoka Novels", evokes a gracious, bygone era that still resonates in legendary Muskoka. 

What books came home to you this week?