I have 5 copies of How to Score by Robin Wells to giveaway thanks to Hachette Book Group!
About the book:HER LIFE COACH
Museum curator Sammi Matthews isn't just in a dating slump, she's putting men on the injured list. After giving one date a black eye and cracking another's rib, Sammi decides she needs professional help. Enter life coach Luke Jones, who advises Sammi on how to overcome her klutziness. And their phone sessions work! Sammi soon meets a sexy FBI agent who seems to know just what she needs.
IS CHANGING HER LIFE
When his brother Luke goes into federal protection, FBI Special Agent Chase Jones agrees to cover for him. Then Sammi's hot voice sizzles down the line, and the usual "phone only" rule is out. With "Luke" coaching her by day, and Chase dating her by night, Sammi's confidence soars, along with her appeal. Chase falls hard, but how will Sammi feel if and when he comes clean? Chase would rather she break all his bones than risk breaking her heart.
IN WAYS SHE'S NEVER IMAGINED!
About the author:Robin Wells lives outside of New Orleans, LA.
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Five (5) books being given away - giveaway ends July 16th.
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This is the final book of the 6 book win from Kim at Page after Page. Isn't she super!
About the book:When beautiful, unmarried VianneRocher sweeps into the pinched little French town of Lansquenet on the heels of the carnival and opens a gem of a chocolate shop across the square from the church, she begins to wreak havoc with the town's Lenten vows. Her uncanny ability to perceive her customers' private discontents and alleviate them with just the right confection coaxes the villagers to abandon themselves to temptation and happiness, but enrages PereReynaud, the local priest. Certain only a witch could stir such sinful indulgence and devise such clever cures, Reynaud pits himself against Vianne and vows to block the chocolate festival she plans for Easter Sunday, and to run her out of town forever. With or not (she'll never tell), Vianne soon sparks a dramatic confrontation between those who prefer the cold comforts of the church and those who revel in their newly discovered taste for pleasure.
Hailed as "an amazement of riches few readers will be able to resist" by The New York Times Book Review, Chocolat is a timeless and enchanting story about temptation, pleasure, and what a complete waste of time it is to deny yourself anything. (from the back cover)
About the author: “I’m a chocoholic! I admit it! I eat it all the time. Almost on a daily basis…but not quite.” Joanne Harris starts the day with drinking chocolate made from milk and proper chocolate. “It’s a stimulant. A bit like coffee. But it tastes better to me.” She doesn’t diet because “I’m not a nice person if I’m doing things like that.”
Harris, who is half French, grew up in her grandparents’ corner sweetshop in Yorkshire, in the north of England. Her mother had just come over from France and didn’t speak English. Joanne grew up speaking French, and still speaks it with her own daughter at home. “Most of the family that I have contact with is French… I’ve been more or less surrounded by French culture since I was born.” She associates chocolate with France, big family reunions and Easter parades. “A lot of members of my family ended up creeping into this story.”
She lives with her husband, small daughter and several cats in the small Yorkshire mining community of Barnsley where she grew up. Harris feels that small communities the world over have much in common, and Barnsley sometimes felt like Lansquenet in its suspicion of the outsider — “because we were a French family, because my mother moved to England without knowing any English and because we were always those funny people at end o’ t’road…”
How did she feel about her book being transformed into a big Hollywood movie? Various changes had to be made, including the fact that the priest figure becomes the mayor in the film. “I understand that when a book gets optioned you basically abnegate all responsibility for it.” When the book was optioned, most of her attention was taken up with her next book, which she’d already started writing. In the end, she was extremely happy with the film. “I thought that the changes were quite minor and were really in the spirit of making it a better film.” She even contributed a few changes of her own, mainly to do with the character of Vianne. Is there any of Joanne Harris in Vianne Rocher? “Not as much as I would like… I think she is what I would have loved to have been but I am not in any way as confident as she is or indeed as popular. I think there is quite a lot of the priest in me as well.” Like Vianne, though, Harris has a fascination with folklore and alternative beliefs. “I do tend to perform little good-luck rituals… I still cast the runes when I feel like it, and I enjoy making my own incense and growing and using herbs. I like to observe the traditional celebrations at Yule and at other significant times of the year.”
Some readers have seen in Chocolat a comment on the Catholic church. Harris doesn’t feel that way herself. “I never felt that this was to do with religious and secular — it is a story about personalities… It is about tolerance and intolerance.”
The book is also about liberation and indulgence in the pleasures of life, and has struck a chord when many people, sick of the struggle to stay slim, and are feeling that a little indulgence can be good for the soul. Another British author Helen Fielding, whose Bridget Jones’ Diary has also been adapted for the screen, created a popular character who grappled with diet over desire, and Canadian food writer John Allemang, in The Importance of Lunch, has written winningly on the simple pleasures of food. If Chocolat reminds us of anything, though, it’s gorgeous, sensuous and romantic films such as Babette’s Feast and Big Night with their celebration of food and life; similarly the Japanese film Tampopo, with its focus on a noodle shop, and the recent acclaimed Chinese film Shower, where a small community revolves around an old-fashioned bath-house. Small wonder Chocolat has been a massive international success.
Harris published two earlier books, both darker in tone — “I was aiming for a kind of literary horror/gothic genre” — and not nearly as widely read. Recently, her work is much more optimistic and fun, though she still tends to write darker stories when the weather is bad, and happy stories when the sun shines (“I wrote Chocolat from March to July, and it shows”). Since Chocolat, she has published two more books with mouth-watering themes: Blackberry Wine, narrated by a bottle of vintage wine, and The Five Quarters of an Orange, which contains recipes for crepes. “I come from a family where there is a long tradition of cooking and recipes are handed down from various parts of the family — usually down the French side.” As the film of Chocolat was being released, she was at work on a screenplay for Coastliners, to be published as a novel in 2003, about two communities of villagers on a French island, fighting for a beach.
Harris reads widely in English and French, citing Nabokov and Mervyn Peake as major inspirational influences for their love of language. She taught French at Leeds Grammar School for many years and had been writing in her spare time when she hit the big time with Chocolat in 1999. Although she sometimes misses her former existence as a teacher, she is very happy to be able to make a living out of writing. “Giving up teaching was a very difficult decision for me to take; it was a job I enjoyed, and that I was good at, and I was very much aware that I was giving it up for something much riskier and, in some ways, something quite alien to my nature. However, some rainbows you have to chase.” If writing for a living stopped giving her pleasure, she would go back to teaching “without a qualm”. But she’d keep on writing.
“I know I'd write whether I was being published or not. I'm addicted.”(from Barnes and Noble website)
Chocolat Publisher/Publication Date: Penguin, January 2000 ISBN: 978-0-14-028203-3 306 pages
This is book 5 of the 6 book win from Kim at Page after Page.
About the book:
To: You From: Human Resources Subject: This book
Dear Reader,
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What exactly are you waiting for? This book has it all:
Humor
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Cooking tips
Great Danes
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Dolphin-shaped driftwood sculptures
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(from the back cover)
About the author: Meg Cabot knows that one of the best cures for feeling gawky and conspicuous is reading about someone who sticks out even more than you do. Her books for young adults invariably feature girls who have extraordinary powers that carry extraordinary burdens. Cabot's Princess Diaries series offers up the secret thoughts of Mia Thermopolis, who discovers at age 14 that she is actually the princess of a small European country. This revelation adds significantly to her extant concerns about crushes, friendships, school, and other matters falling under adolescent scrutiny.
Cabot, a native of Indiana weaned on Judy Blume and Barbara Cartland, was already a successful romance novelist (as Patricia Cabot) before she began writing for young adults; her alter-alter ego, Jenny Carroll, began a new series shortly after The Princess Diaries debuted. The Carroll books are divided between the Mediator series, starring a girl who can communicate with restless ghosts; and the 1-800-WHERE-R-YOU books, in which a girl struck by lightning acquires the ability to locate missing people.
Cabot writes her books in a conspiratorial, first-person style that resonates with her readers. She has obviously kept a grip on the vernacular and the key issues of adolescence; but what makes her books so irresistible is the mixing of the mundane with the fantastic. After all, who wouldn't like to wake up and be a princess all of a sudden, or a seer? Cabot takes such offhand notions and roots them firmly in the details of average, middle-class American life. She has also tiptoed into mystery and paranormal suspense with other YA novels and series installments.
Cabot continues to write adult novels under various permutations of her given name (Meggin Patricia Cabot): from 19th-century historical romances to contemporary chick lit. And, as with her books for teens, these romances have earned praise for their lighthearted humor and well drawn characters. (from Barnes and Noble website)
The Boy Next Door Publisher/Publication Date: Avon Books, October 2002 ISBN: 978-0-06-009619-5 374 pages
About the book: This stunning novel begins on a winter night in 1964, when a blizzard forces Dr. David Henry to deliver his own twins. His son, born first, is perfectly healthy, but the doctor immediately recognizes that his daughter has Down syndrome. For motives he tells himself are good, he makes a split-second decision that will haunt all their lives forever. He asks his nurse, Caroline, to take the baby away to an institution. Instead, she disappears into another city to raise the child as her own. Compulsively readable and deeply moving, The Memory Keeper's Daughter is a brilliantly crafted story of parallel lives, familial secrets, and the redemptive power of love. (from the back cover)
About the author: Kim Edwards is the author of the short story collection The Secrets of the Fire King, which was an alternate for the 1998 PEN/Hemingway Award, and she has won both the Whiting Award and the Nelson Algren Award. A graduate of the Iowa Writer's Workshop, she is an assistant professor of English at the University of Kentucky. (from the book)
This is book 3 of the 6 books won from Kim at Page after Page.
About the book:Ambrose Zephyr is a contented man. He shares a book laden Victorian house with his loving wife, Zipper. He owns two suits, one of which he was married in. He is a courageous eater, save brussels sprouts. His knowledge of wine is vague and best defined as Napa, good; Australian, better; French, better still. Kirroyale is his drink of occasion. For an Englishman he makes a poor cup of tea. He believes women are quantifiably wiser than men, and would never give Zipper the slightest reason to mistrust him or question his love. Zipper simply describes Ambrose as the only man she has ever loved. Without adjustment.
Then, just as he is turning fifty, Ambrose is told by his doctor that he has one month to live. Reeling from the news, he and Zipper embark on a whirlwind expedition to the places he has most loved or has always longed to visit, from A to Z. Amsterdam to Zanzibar. As they travel to Italian piazzas, Turkish baths, and other romantic destinations, all beautifully evoked by the author. Zipper struggles to deal with the grand unfairness of their circumstances as she buoys Ambrose with her gentle affection and humor. Meanwhile, Ambrose reflects on his life, one well lived, and comes to understand that death, like life, will be made bearable by the strength and grace of their devotion.
Richardson's lovely prose comes alive with an honesty and intensity that will leave you breathless and inspired by the simple beauty and power of love. The End of the Alphabet is a timeless, resonant exploration of the nature of love, loss, and life. (from the book jacket)
About the author: CS Richardson has worked in publishing for more than twenty years. He has received the Alcuin Award (Canada's highest honor for excellence in book design) several times, and lectures frequently on various facets of publishing, design, and communication. He lives in Toronto, Canada. (from the book jacket)
The End of the Alphabet Publisher/Publication Date: Broadway Books, September 2008 ISBN: 978-0-7679-2763-5 128 pages
This is book 2 from the 6 book win from Page after Page.
About the book:An Arresting portrait of the struggles that women faced for control of their own bodies, The Birth House is the story of Dora Rare - the first daughter in five generations of Rares.
As apprentice to the outspoken Acadian midwife Miss Babineau, Dora learns to assist the women of an isolated Nova Scotian village through infertility, difficult labors, breech births, unwanted pregnancies, and unfulfilling sex lives. During the turbulent World War I era, uncertainty and upheaval accompany the arrival of a brash new medical doctor and his promises of progress and fast, painless childbirth. In a clash between tradition and science, Dora finds herself fighting to protect the rights of women as well as the wisdom that has been put into her care.
About the author: Ami McKay's work has aired on various Canadian radio programs. Her documentary, Daughter of Family G, won an Excellence in Journalism Medallion at the 2003 Atlantic Journalism Awards. Originally from Indiana, she now lives with her family in a former birth house in Scots Bay, Nova Scotia.
The Birth House Publisher/Publication Date: Harper Perennial, October 2007 ISBN: 978-0-06-113587-3 416 pages
I picked up six - yes six books! in a win from Kim over at Page after Page. She was having a "cleaning off her shelves" giveaway - and even though I was the second winner I still got six great books. Thanks Kim!!!
About the book:Their story began with one letter on their wedding night.
I made a promise today at the church and I'm making another promise tonight. I'm going to write to you every week. . .Laurel, I will always stand by you. No matter what. . .
It ended almost forty years later, when Jack and Laurel Cooper died in each other's arms. But before he took his last breath, Jack wrote his wife one final "Wednesday letter."
When the Cooper children return home, they discover the thousands of letters left behind. As they read them, clues to a shattering family secret emerge - and they are brought face-to-face with a life-changing moment of truth. (from the back cover)
About the author:New York Times bestselling author Jason F. Wright is a consultant whose articles on vastly varied topics have appeared in nationwide publications. He is the founder and managing editor of a widely-read political website.
The Wednesday Letters Publisher/Publication Date: Penguin, August 2008 ISBN: 978-0-425-22347-5 288 pages
This week's pre-publication "can't-wait-to-read" selection is:
The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood
Publisher/Publication Date: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, September 22, 2009
I read The Handmaid's Tale last year and really like it - so I am looking forward to this one!
About the book:The long-awaited new novel from Margaret Atwood, The Year of the Flood is a brilliant visionary imagining of the future that calls to mind her classic novel The Handmaid’s Tale.
Adam One, the kindly leader of God’s Gardeners — a religion devoted to the melding of science and religion — has long predicted a natural disaster that will alter Earth as we know it. Now it has occurred, obliterating most human life. Two women have been spared: Ren, a young trapeze-dancer, locked inside a high-end sex club; and one of God’s Gardeners, Toby, who is barricaded inside a luxurious spa. Have others survived?
By turns dark, tender, violent, thoughtful, and witty, The Year of the Flood unfolds Toby’s and Ren’s stories during the years prior to their meeting again. The novel not only brilliantly reflects to us a world we recognize but poignantly reminds us of our enduring humanity. (from Barnes and Noble website)
About the author: When Margaret Atwood announced to her friends that she wanted to be a writer, she was only 16 years old. It was Canada. It was the 1950s. No one knew what to think. Nonetheless, Atwood began her writing career as a poet. Published In 1964 while she was still a student at Harvard, her second poetry anthology, The Circle Game, was awarded the Governor General's Award, one of Canada's most esteemed literary prizes. Since then, Atwood has gone on to publish many more volumes of poetry (as well as literary criticism, essays, and short stories), but it is her novels for which she is best known.
Atwood's first foray into fiction was 1966's The Edible Woman, an arresting story about a woman who stops eating because she feels her life is consuming her. Grabbing the attention of critics, who applauded its startlingly original premise, the novel explored feminist themes Atwood has revisited time and time again during her long, prolific literary career. She is famous for strong, compelling female protagonists -- from the breast cancer survivor in Bodily Harm to the rueful artist in Cat's Eye to the fatefully intertwined sisters in her Booker Prize-winning novel The Blind Asassin.
Perhaps Atwood's most legendary character is Offred, the tragic "breeder" in what is arguably her most famous book, 1985's The Handmaid's Tale. Part fable, part science fiction, and part dystopian nightmare, this novel presented a harrowing vision of women's lives in an oppressive futuristic society. The Washington Post compared it (favorably) to George Orwell's iconic 1984.
As if her status as a multi-award-winning, triple-threat writer (fiction, poetry, and essays) were not enough, Atwood has also produced several children's books, including Princess Prunella and the Purple Peanut (1995) and Rude Ramsay and the Roaring Radishes (2003) -- delicious alliterative delights that introduce a wealth of new vocabulary to young readers. (from Barnes and Noble website)
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
I am about 1/2 way through this book and absolutely love it! I hope to finish it and have a review posted by tonight! Highly recommend so far!
Bonnie Grove started writing when her parents bought a typewriter, and she hasn’t stopped since. Trained in Christian Counseling (Emmanuel Bible College, Kitchener, ON), and secular psychology (University of Alberta), she developed and wrote social programs for families at risk while landing articles and stories in anthologies. She is the author of Working Your Best You: Discovering and Developing the Strengths God Gave You; Talking to the Dead is her first novel. Grove and her pastor husband, Steve, have two children; they live in Saskatchewan.
List Price: $14.99 Paperback: 384 pages Publisher: David C. Cook; New edition edition (June 1, 2009) Language: English ISBN-10: 1434766411 ISBN-13: 978-1434766410
Kevin was dead and the people in my house wouldn’t go home. They mingled after the funeral, eating sandwiches, drinking tea, and speaking in muffled tones. I didn’t feel grateful for their presence. I felt exactly nothing.
Funerals exist so we can close doors we’d rather leave open. But where did we get the idea that the best approach to facing death is to eat Bundt cake? I refused to pick at dainties and sip hot drinks. Instead, I wandered into the back yard.
I knew if I turned my head I’d see my mother’s back as she guarded the patio doors. Mom would let no one pass. As a recent widow herself, she knew my need to stare into my loss alone.
I sat on the porch swing and closed my eyes, letting the June sun warm my bare arms. Instead of closing the door on my pain, I wanted it to swing from its hinges so the searing winds of grief could scorch my face and body. Maybe I hoped to die from exposure.
Kevin had been dead three hours before I had arrived at the hospital. A long time for my husband to be dead without me knowing. He was so altered, so permanently changed without my being aware.
I had stood in the emergency room, surrounded by faded blue cotton curtains, looking at the naked remains of my husband while nurses talked in hushed tones around me. A sheet covered Kevin from his hips to his knees. Tubes, which had either carried something into or away from his body, hung disconnected and useless from his arms. The twisted remains of what I assumed to be some sort of breathing mask lay on the floor. “What happened?” I said in a whisper so faint I knew no one could hear. Maybe I never said it at all. A short doctor with a pronounced lisp and quiet manner told me Kevin’s heart killed him. He used difficult phrases; medical terms I didn’t know, couldn’t understand. He called it an episode and said it was massive. When he said the word massive, spit flew from his mouth, landing on my jacket’s lapel. We had both stared at it.
When my mother and sister, Heather, arrived at the hospital, they gazed speechlessly at Kevin for a time, and then took me home. Heather had whispered with the doctor, their heads close together, before taking a firm hold on my arm and walking me out to her car. We drove in silence to my house. The three of us sat around my kitchen table looking at each other.
Several times my mother opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Our words had turned to cotton, thick and dry. We couldn’t work them out of our throats. I had no words for my abandonment. Like everything I knew to be true had slipped out the back door when I wasn’t looking.
“What happened?” I said again. This time I knew I had said it out loud. My voice echoed back to me off the kitchen table.
“Remember how John Ritter died? His heart, remember?” This from Heather, my younger, smarter sister. Kevin had died a celebrity’s death.
From the moment I had received the call from the hospital until now, I had allowed other people to make all of my bereavement decisions. My mother and mother-in-law chose the casket and placed the obituary in the paper. Kevin’s boss at the bank, Donna Walsh, arranged for the funeral parlor and even called the pastor from the church that Kevin had attended until he was sixteen to come and speak. Heather silently held my hand through it all. I didn’t feel grateful for their help.
I sat on the porch swing, and my right foot rocked on the grass, pushing and pulling the swing. My head hurt. I tipped it back and rested it on the cold, inflexible metal that made up the frame for the swing. It dug into my skull. I invited the pain. I sat with it; supped with it.
I opened my eyes and looked up into the early June sky. The clouds were an unmade bed. Layers of white moved rumpled and languid past the azure heavens. Their shapes morphed and faded before my eyes. A Pegasus with the face of a dog; a veiled woman fleeing; a villain; an elf. The shapes were strange and unreliable, like dreams. A monster, a baby—I wanted to reach up to touch its soft, wrinkled face. I was too tired. Everything was gone, lost, emptied out.
I had arrived home from the hospital empty handed. No Kevin. No car—we left it in the hospital parking lot for my sister to pick up later. “No condition to drive,” my mother had said. She meant me.
Empty handed. The thought, incomplete and vague, crept closer to consciousness. There should have been something. I should have brought his things home with me. Where were his clothes? His wallet? Watch? Somehow, they’d fled the scene.
“How far could they have gotten?” I said to myself. Without realizing it, I had stood and walked to the patio doors. “Mom?” I said as I walked into the house.
She turned quickly, but said nothing. My mother didn’t just understand what was happening to me. She knew. She knew it like the ticking of a clock, the wind through the windows, like everything a person gets used to in life. It had only been eight months since Dad died. She knew there was little to be said. Little that should be said. Once, after Dad’s funeral, she looked at Heather and me and said, “Don’t talk. Everyone has said enough words to last for eternity.”
I noticed how tall and straight she stood in her black dress and sensible shoes. How long must the dead be buried before you can stand straight again? “What happened to Kevin’s stuff?” Mom glanced around as if checking to see if a guest had made off with the silverware.
I swallowed hard and clarified. “At the hospital. He was naked.” A picture of him lying motionless, breathless on the white sheets filled my mind. “They never gave me his things. His, whatever, belongings. Effects.”
“I don’t know, Kate,” she said. Like it didn’t matter. Like I should stop thinking about it. I moved past her, careful not to touch her, and went in search of my sister.
Heather sat on my secondhand couch in my living room, a two seater with the pattern of autumn leaves. She held an empty cup and a napkin; dark crumbs tumbling off onto the carpet. Her long brown hair, usually left down, was pulled up into a bun. She looked pretty and sad. She saw me coming, her brown eyes widening in recognition. Recognition that she should do something. Meet my needs, help me, make time stand still. She quickly ended the conversation she was having with Kevin’s boss, and met me in the middle of the living room.
“Hey,” she said, touching my arm. I took a small step back, avoiding her warm fingers.
“Where would his stuff go?” I blurted out. Heather’s eyebrows snapped together in confusion. “Kevin’s things,” I said. “They never gave me his things. I want to go and get them. Will you come?”
Heather stood very still for a moment, straight backed like she was made of wood, then relaxed. “You mean at the hospital. Right, Kate? Kevin’s things at the hospital?” Tears welled in my eyes. “There was nothing. You were there. When we left, they never gave e anything of his.” I realized I was trembling.
Heather bit her lower lip, and looked into my eyes. “Let me do that for you. I’ll call the hospital—” I stood on my tiptoes and opened my mouth. “I’ll go,” she corrected before I could say anything. “I’ll go and ask around. I’ll get his stuff and bring it here.”
“I need his things.”
Heather cupped my elbow with her hand. “You need to lie down. Let me get you upstairs, and as soon as you’re settled, I’ll go to the hospital and find out what happened to Kevin’s clothes, okay?”
Fatigue filled the small spaces between my bones. “Okay.” She led me upstairs. I crawled under the covers as Heather closed the door, blocking the sounds of the people below.
I have 5 copies of A Hint of Wicked by Jennifer Haymore to giveaway thanks to Hachette Book Group!
About the book:CAUGHT BETWEEN DUTY AND DESIRE . . .
Sophie, the Duchess of Calton, has finally moved on. After seven years mourning the loss of her husband, Garrett, at Waterloo, she has married his cousin and heir, Tristan. Sophie gives herself to him body and soul. . . until the day Garrett returns from the Continent, demanding his title, his lands-and his wife.
TORN BETWEEN TWO HUSBANDS . . .
Now Sophie must choose between her first love and her new love, knowing that no matter what, her choice will destroy one of the men she adores. Will it be Garrett, her childhood sweetheart, whose loss nearly destroyed her once already? Or will it be Tristan, beloved friend turned lover, who supported her through the last, dark years and introduced her to a passion she had never known? As her two husbands battle for her heart, Sophie finds herself immersed in a dangerous game-where the stakes are not only love . . . but life and death.
A HINT OF WICKED
About the author: As a child, Jennifer Haymore traveled the South Pacific with her family on their homebuilt sailboat. The months spent on the sometimes-quiet, sometimes-raging seas sparked her love of adventure and grand romance. Since then, she's earned degrees in Computer Science and Education and held various jobs from bookselling to teaching inner-city children to acting, but she's never stopped writing.
You can find Jennifer in Southern California trying to talk her husband into yet another trip to England, helping her three children with homework while brainstorming a new five-minute dinner menu, or crouched in a corner of the local bookstore writing her next novel.
You can follow Jennifer on Twitter at http://twitter.com/jenniferhaymore.
Rules
Only residents of U.S. or Canada
No PO Boxes
Five (5) books being given away - giveaway ends July 15th.
Leave a comment w/email address to enter. (may leave all entries in one comment)
Follow my blog +1
Post about it on blog or any social network - leave me a link +3.
If someone says you referred them you will each get +3!
I received this book from the author and Bostick Communications.
About the book:Did the Australian government really bring known Nazi party members to Australia and protected them until their deaths?
Having survived the horrors of the Eastern Front, Peter Fischer leaves post-war Germany behind and moves to Australia. Forty years later, Eric Messer is struggling to find his place at a new high school south of Perth. The two meet just before the Gulf War, sparking a strange friendship tainted by mistrust and half-truths, and complicated by a mysterious and overly friendly Austrian named Baum.
Of Germany descent himself, Eric becomes fascinated by the men and the stories they tell. Are they possibly wanted Nazi war criminals? (from the back cover)
About the author: At just 33 years old and with a decade of prominent journalism, advertising and writing work already behind him, Campbell Jefferys is one of the rising stars of Australian literature. He is the author of two books, with a third on the way. In 2008, he was writer-in-residence at the Peter Cowan Writers Centre in Perth, Australia. He currently lectures part-time at the University of Hamburg. Winner of the General Fiction category of the 2009 Next Generation Indie Book Awards, Hunter also received an honorable mention at the New York Book Festival (from letter that came with book)
Hunter Publisher/Publication Date: Swirl, January 2009 ISBN: 978-1-84549-333-2 264 pages
I received this book from Miriam at Hachette books for a blog tour in July. I am so excited as I had posted this one as a Waiting on Wednesday book way back in April!
About the book:The Boatwrights just won 318 million dollars in the GeorgiaState lottery. It's going to be the worst day of their lives.
When Shaw McBride and Romeo Zderko pull up at a convenience store off I-95 in Georgia, their only thought is to fix a leaky tire and be on their way again to Florida-away from their dull Ohio tech-support jobs. But this happens to be the store from which a 318,000,000 million dollar Jackpot ticket has just been sold -- and when a pretty clerk accidentally reveals to Shaw the identity of the winning family, he hatches a ferociously audacious scheme: He and Romeo will squeeze the family for half their prize.
That night, he visits the Boatwright home and takes the family hostage, while Romeo patrols the streets nearby, prepared to murder the Boatwrights' loved ones at any sign of resistance. At first, the family offers none. But Shaw's plot depends on maintaining constant fear-merciless, unfaltering terror-and soon, under the pressure, everyone's sanity begins to unravel . . .
At once frightening, comic, and suspenseful, RAVENS is a wholly original and utterly compelling novel from one of our most talented writers.(from Barnes and Noble website)
About the author: George Dawes Green is a highly acclaimed novelist and poet and the founder of the New York City club for raconteurs, The Moth. He currently divides his time between Georgia and New York.(from the book jacket)
I received this book from Sarah at Pocket Books. Isn't the cover beautiful?
About the book: From beloved New York Times bestselling author Mary Alice Monroe comes a new novel of the sultry South Carolina lowcountry, and the proud traditions and earthy resilience of the people who live there. Publishers Weekly embraced Time Is a River, Monroe's "novel of strong Southern women," saying "the author's love for her characters is palpable throughout." Now she returns with Last Light over Carolina, the deeply moving story of another strong woman, Carolina Morrison, struggling to prove that love is a light that never dies.
Every woman in the low country knows the unspoken fear that clutches the heart every time her man sets out to sea. Now, that fear has become a terrible reality for Carolina Morrison. Her husband, shrimp boat captain Bud Morrison, the only man she's ever loved, is lost and alone somewhere in the vast Atlantic fishing grounds, with a storm gathering and last light falling.
As the action unfolds on this one terrifying, illuminating day, Carolina and Bud Morrison look back across thirty years of love and loss, joy and sorrow. Carolina walked away from a well-to-do upbringing to marry Captain Bud Morrison. She embraced his extraordinary lifestyle by the sea and the customs of a historic shrimping village. Yet lately, hard times and the loneliness of long separations have driven them apart -- and driven her to make a mistake that threatens to shatter their once-unbreakable bond forever.
When Bud Morrison is overdue at the docks, the close-knit community rallies together to search for one of its own. But Carolina knows that it is their love that must somehow call him home, across miles of rough water and unspeakable memories. And she swears that if she is given one more chance -- for love and for forgiveness -- nothing will ever take her from this man's side again.
In Last Light over Carolina, Mary Alice Monroe once again explores a vanishing feature of the southern coastline, the mysterious yet time-honored shrimping culture, in a convincing and compelling tale of an enduring marriage.(from Barnes and Noble website)
About the author: Mary Alice Monroe is the New York Times bestselling author of eleven novels, including Time is a River, Sweetgrass, Skyward, The Beach House, The Four Seasons, and The Book Club. She is an active conservationist and lives in the low-country of South Carolina.(from Barnes and Noble website)
Last Light over Carolina Publisher/Publication Date: Pocket Books, July 2009 ISBN: 978-1-4165-4970-3 384 pages
I won this book from Anna at Diary of an Eccentric - and it is autographed to me from the author~ Very cool! Anna's was one of the first blogs that I started following about 9 months ago when I started blogging - and it is still one of my favorites!
About the book:The summer of 1978, ten-year-old Vicki Anderson rides her bike to the local park and goes missing. Her tight-knit blue-collar Pennsylvania neighborhood, where children roam the streets at night playing lightning tag, above ground pools sparkle in backyards, and flowers scent the air, will never be the same.
Down the street from Vicki's house, another family is in crisis. Troubled by her past, headstrong Natalia Kisch has abandoned her husband and two daughters for another man. Frank Kisch, grappling with his anger, is left to raise their girls alone, oblivious to his daughters' struggles with both disappearances: Eva, seventeen, plunges into an affair with her married high school teacher, and nine-year-old Sissy escapes to a world of imagination and storytelling that becomes so magical it pierces the reality of the everyday.
When Natalia unexpectedly returns, the struggles and tensions that have built over the summer erupt into a series of events that change the Kisches irrevocably - forcing them to piece together their complicated pasts and commitments to one another.
In this haunting, atmospheric debut, Sandra Novack examines loss, loyalty, and a family in crisis. Lyrical and elegiac, Precious illuminates our attempts to make sense of the volatility that surrounds and consumes us, and explores our ability, even during the most trying times, to remember and hold on to those we love most. (from the book jacket)
About the author:Sandra Novack's fiction has appeared in The Iowa Review, The Gettysburg Review, Gulf Coast and Mississippi Review, among other publications. She has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize three times, and holds an MFA from Vermont College. Novack currently lives in Atlanta, Georgia, With her husband, Phil, and many animals.
Precious Publisher/Publication Date: Random House, February 2009 ISBN: 978-1-4000-6680-3 288 pages
A: Operation Kid-to-Kid™ is a partnership of Group Publishing, Inc. and nondenominational Christian organizations dedicated to creating hands-on service projects for children in North America. Operation Kid-to-Kid™ projects have ministered to kids all over the world. Over the years, Group’s Operation Kid-to-Kid™ has become one of the largest forces mobilizing children in serving other children around the world. Millions have been impacted with gifts of comfort critters, school supplies, Bibles, hygiene kits, Christmas gifts, Bible coloring books, and socks and shoes. Operation Kid-to-Kid™ gives children a meaningful service project that will change their hearts as they help change the world.
Q: What is a Comfort Critter? Where do I get the Comfort Critters?
A: Comfort Critters are adorable, easy-to-assemble crafts designed especially for kids to make and receive. Custom-made Comfort Critters are available from Group and Group suppliers. This year’s special critter is a cuddly little turtle that reads “God Cares” and features a pocket so each child can include a special message to another child in need.
Q: We all want to teach our kids about God’s compassion. Why are the Operation Kid-to-KidTM Comfort Critters so effective for this purpose?
A: Children learn by doing. While activities like collecting spare change definitely serve a good purpose, it’s hard for young children, who don’t really understand the value of money yet, to understand how the money they collect will minister to other children. But all children know what it’s like to be scared or lonely. They know how a teddy bear, stuffed animal, or blankie makes them feel better. As they use their own hands to make these little turtles, they are creating personal, tangible expressions of compassion. The handy sewn in pocket gives them the opportunity to send a message from their own hearts. And because they make two turtles—one to give away and one to keep—they will have a touchable reminder that other children are struggling and in need of compassion and comfort.
Q: How many Comfort Critters will I need?
A: You will need two for each child participating—one for them to keep, and one to give away.
Q: Can I use a different Comfort Critter for our church service project?
A: Not if you are distributing it through International Bible Society for disaster relief. They’re counting on receiving these Comfort Critters with the special message of God’s love. IBS has learned it’s important that items distributed to children should be identical. No child should feel less special because his or her Comfort Critter doesn’t look like the others.
Q: Do I have to send my Comfort Critters to the International Bible Society for distribution?
A: Feel free to tweak your Operation Kid-to-Kid™ program. You can use your Comfort Critters as a local community service project—or send the items with your church mission team.
Q: Besides the Comfort Critters, what other Operation Kid-to-Kid™ projects can my group participate in?
A: There are so many ways to involve children in ministry throughout the year. Through the Rome VBS program, you can send monthly Bible readers to children in the underground church around the world. Since it is dangerous for these children to own a Bible, these comic book-style readers offer much needed encouragement.
The Operation Kid-to-Kid Prayer Bear missions program warms hearts and minds and allows children to share the joy of God’s love. Kids will learn what it means to help others as they create a Prayer Bear that says “Jesus” in English, Spanish, and French. Plus, everyone can personalize a message to put in their Bear’s pocket to send to an orphan in Africa. Join us in one of the world’s largest forces mobilizing kids in serving others around the world.
This easy, hands-on mission program can serve those in your local community, be sent to military personnel, or simply be sent to the International Bible Society for distribution to children around the world.
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!
You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
Jim Stovall is a national champion Olympic weightlifter, former president of the Emmy Award-winning Narrative Television Network, and a highly sought after author and platform speaker. Jim was honored as the International Humanitarian of the Year, joining previous recepients Mother Teresa and Nancy Reagan. He is the author of the best-selling book The Ultimate Gift, now a major motion picture.
Publisher: David C. Cook; New edition edition (June 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1434765938
ISBN-13: 978-1434765932
AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:
Once upon a time, there was an enchanted kingdom in a land far, far away. The kingdom was ruled by a benevolent and much-loved king. He had led his people through many difficult times, and they had finally reached a golden age of peace, prosperity, and happiness.
The king summoned all of his wise men together and said, “Now that our land is enjoying a season of prosperity and peace, I wish to leave a permanent legacy of my reign as your ruler.”
The king went on to tell his wise men that he would like their best thoughts and ideas as to what he could do to create a fitting tribute to all the people of the kingdom and his reign as their leader. Each of the wise men left the Throne Room determined to come up with the best idea to present to the king, as they all knew that the king’s chosen action would be remembered for generations.
On the appointed day and hour, the wise men reconvened in the Throne Room.
The king said, “I want to hear your suggestions one at a time, so that I might determine what would be a fitting legacy for me to leave in honor of my reign as king.”
The first wise man approached the steps leading to the throne, bowed with dignity, and began. “Your Highness, since the beginning of recorded history, great rulers have left magnificent feats of architecture as tributes to their greatness. One need only look to the east and think of the great pyramids that have stood for generations and will remain throughout time, paying homage to the pharaohs.”
The wise man bowed again and backed away from the throne.
The king fell silent and was lost in deep thought, then said, “I am pleased with your suggestion as it has much merit. Indeed, a great edifice could stand for thousands of years to proclaim the greatness of our people and my reign as their king.”
The second wise man approached the throne and bowed reverently. He said, “Oh, great King, if I may humbly suggest that a gold coin be designed and minted bearing your image and in your honor. This coin could be distributed throughout the kingdom and, carried along the trade routes as if by friendly winds, it would literally be distributed around the world signifying your power and majesty.”
The king nodded and smiled. He seemed pleased with this suggestion also. He then beckoned the next wise man to approach. The wise man dutifully bowed and said, “Your highness, may I suggest that a monument of heretofore unknown proportion be erected in your image. Great reflecting pools and immense gardens would surround the statue. People would travel from the four corners of the earth to marvel at its splendor and pay respect and tribute to your greatness.”
The king smiled and stated, “Each of these suggestions has been well thought-out and presented. Before I go to deliberate my final decision, are there any other suggestions?”
After a long pause, the eldest wise man stepped forward. The king smiled and said, “My great and wise advisor, you have been with me from the beginning of my reign to this day, and you have always served me well. What say you in this matter?”
The elderly wise man replied quietly, “Your highness, may I suggest that each of my colleagues has proposed a fitting tribute to your greatness in the traditional sense; however, great buildings, gold coins, and monuments serve as tributes to other rulers from other days. May I humbly offer my suggestion? Something altogether different?”
The king nodded in assent.
“The one thing that could pay tribute to your greatness for thousands of years to come would be the proclamation of the Wisdom of the Ages. This would be an opportunity for you, oh great one, to communicate the greatest secret of the known world to benefit all humanity.
“Buildings and coins and statues will all pass away, but the Wisdom of the Ages would last forever. This would, indeed, be a fitting tribute to the king I humbly serve.”
The king fell into deep thought. Finally, he told all of his servants and the wise men to leave him so that he might choose the tribute most fitting to his reign as their king.
TEASER TUESDAYS asks you to: Grab your current read. Let the book fall open to a random page. Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12. You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given! Please avoid spoilers!
I can't believe that I haven't done a teaser since the middle of May! Seems like everything was happening at once there for awhile!
Kevin bellowed out in comical operatic parody, "You gotta pizza pie! I wanna pizza pie! Oh no, it's for you, not I! Please share your pizza pie!" (p85 Talking to the Dead)
Talking to the Dead Publisher/Publication Date: David C. Cook, June 2009 ISBN: 978-1-4347-6641-0 368 pages
Title: The King's Legacy Author: Jim Stovall Publisher:David C. Cook
First sentence: Once upon a time, there was an enchanted kingodm in a land far, far away.
My thoughts: This book was a very quick read. It reminded me of a fable (as the first sentence sort of reveals). It is about a King who wishes to leave a legacy so future generations will remember him and the people he ruled. His wise men are called upon to suggest what a good legacy would be. They suggest great architecture, coin with his face, or a statue in his likeness. However, the last wise man suggests he delcare a proclamation of the Wisdom of the Ages.
After much thought, the King agrees that the proclamation would be the way to go. When his wise men cannot agree as to a way to sum up what the Wisdom of the Ages should be or say, the King opens up his court to hear from his subjects. Anyone who feels they can contribute to what the Wisdom of the Ages should bbe can be heard.
A diverse group comes forward - one a day - to share their thoughts. To name a few -they ranged from a farmer, a mother, and a teacher, to a physician and a judge. Each one comes forward with their own thoughts for the King to contemplate.
This book was well written, and contains a good message, but I have never been a big fan as to this style of writing (fables/fairy tales). If this book sounds interesting to someone out there though, I would love to send it on (U.S. only please/no P.O. boxes). Just leave a comment below with your email and I will draw a winner next Tuesday, June 30.
Please watch for the First Wild Card Tour tomorrow to read the first chapter!
About the author:Jim Stovallhas been a national champion Olympic weightlifter, a successful investment broker and entrepreneur. He is Co-Founder and President of the Narrative Television Network, which makes movies and television accessible for our nation's 13 million blind and visually impaired people and their families. Although originally designed for the blind and visually impaired, over 60% of NTN's nationwide audience is made up of fully-sighted people who simply enjoy the programming.
Jim Stovall hosts the Network's talk show, "NTN Showcase." His guests have included Katharine Hepburn, Jack Lemmon, Carol Channing, Steve Allen, and Eddie Albert, as well as many others. The Narrative Television Network has received an Emmy Award and an International Film and Video Award among its many industry honors.
NTN has grown to include over 1,200 cable systems and broadcast stations, reaching over 35 million homes in the United States, and NTN is shown in 11 foreign countries.
Jim Stovall joined the ranks of Walt Disney, Orson Welles, and four United States presidents when he was selected as one of the "Ten Outstanding Young Americans" by the U.S. Junior Chamber of Commerce. He has appeared on "Good Morning America" and CNN, and has been featured in Reader's Digest, TV Guide and Time magazine. He is the author of a previous book entitled You Don't Have To Be Blind To See, as well as his new book Success Secrets of Super Achievers. The President's Committee on Equal Opportunity selected Jim Stovall as the 1997 Entrepreneur of the Year. (from Barnes and Noble website)
The King's Legacy Publisher/Publication Date: David C. Cook, June 2009 ISBN: 978-1-4347-6593-2 160 pages
I won this book from Mari at Bookworm with a View. You can always find great reviews and giveaways over at this blog!
About the book:Cornelia Brown surprised herself when she was gripped by the sudden, inescapable desire to move to the suburbs with her husband. Her mettle is quickly tested by her impeccably dressed, overly judgmental neighbor Piper Truitt - the embodiment of everything Cornelia feared she'd find in suburbia. With Lake, another recent arrival, Cornelia shares a love of literature and old movies - as she forms an instant bond with this warm yet elusive woman and her perceptive, brilliant young son Dev.
Acclaimed bestselling author Marisa delosSantos's literary talents shine in the complex interactions she creates between three unforgettable women, deftly entangling her characters in a web of trust, betrayal, love, and loss that challenges them in ways they never imagined. (from the back cover)
About the author: The bestselling author of Love Walked In, Marisa de los Santos is an award winning poet with a Ph.D. in literature and creative writing. She lives in Wilmington, Delaware, with her husband and children. (from the back cover)
Belong to Me Publisher/Publication Date: Harper Collins, April 2008 ISBN: 978-0-06-14028-7 400 pages
I have 5 copies of How to Score by Robin Wells to giveaway thanks to Hachette Book Group!
