Does Reading Help Deal with COVID19 Struggles & Fun News!

Hello Dear Readers!

With COVID-19 changing our lives, I find myself wanting to sink into the alternate reality that our beloved books can provide. I constantly have an e-book and a paper book going, making sure they are different genres so I don’t start getting too dark or fluffy or mix up the stories and characters in my mind. Sooo many options to read for us to self-love, stay sane, and lower anxiety during these tumultuous times!!!! 

I am excited to brag and share that I was blessed with reading, for the FIRST TIME EVER, the unedited version of The Legend of Lady MacLaoch book 2, also known as Legend of the Viking! Author Becky Banks had me do a peer reading and it was such a fun story to read and continue to break curses with Cole and Rowan.  I can’t wait to zoom with her and talk through it all. I totally recommend reading or re-reading The Legend of Lady Maclaoch so you are ready when book two is published sometime this year.

One last thing to share is my book club has picked our March book. I am waiting for the paper version to be delivered to our local bookstore before I read so all I can share is my excited impatience to start reading! Book Club is reading It Ends with Us by Colleen Hoover. Grab a copy and read with us! 

Book Club!!! February 2020 Book Pick: Stillhouse Lake by Rachel Caine

Hello Dear Readers!

Sorry, for the delay with book club updates! COVID-19 seems to defenestrate our daily schedules! To catch up- Book Club read Stillhouse Lake by Rachel Caine for our February 2020 read. It is a first in series novel (although after reading it, I don’t know if I have the guts to jump into book two!) Anyways, Wowzers! I have read Ms. Caines YA series and this was definitely not anything like those. She went deep and dark. The pace in the beginning, maybe about a quarter or so of the book, is a bit slow setting up the plot, daily lives of the family, flashes into how AWFUL the ex-husband/dad is with his serial killer history (or is it just history?!) and the characters. Then, BAM!, the book explodes into action and I cannot imagine living with the constant adrenaline ups and downs, emotional baggage and precautions the Proctor family live with and through.

One thing I appreciated about the story is that it really made me think and expand my understanding on victims of crimes, especially prolific murderers, and that there are more than “the usual” types of victims out there. Beyond the victims and their families, it is the family of the criminals left behind that are (or can be) victims, innocent to what is/was going on around them. Stillhouse Lake uses that as the impetus for us to follow Gwen and her teenage kids, surviving day to day after they find out their husband/father was a horrific serial killer. With him in jail, they are blamed and stalked for crimes they had nothing to do with or knowledge of. The support system for the family of the murderers is definitely not set up for help, safety and mental health.  However, for us dear readers, it makes for a thrilling tale of suspense.

Book Club!!! I'm Finally a Member of One & January 2020's Pick

I am excited to announce I have been invited to join a book club! I have been interested for years but

the timing has never worked out, nor my courage to join if I am being honest, as well as the types of book clubs I have had access to. This book club, my book club, was recently dreamed up by a friend so it’s brand new! The idea that everyone she invited are newbies is very appealing to me. I get anxious meeting new people, remembering names and faces, the small talk, learning what people are ok or not okay with, etc. Having everyone in the same proverbial boat eases the ol’ anxiety.

For those of you involved in book clubs- do you have a theme or dos and don’ts? How do you choose the books? We decided that we will rotate local eateries with happy hours! No house cleaning! Wahoo! Every month a different member will get to choose the location and then announce the next month’s book we get to read and discuss the following month. Topically we have it narrowed down to no books from the horror genre and under 400 pages.

At our January meeting the book announced as our first ever read was: Ines of My Soul by IsabelAllende. The novel is based on real life people and events from Spain to Peru to the conquering of Chile in the 1500’s. Ines is writing her memoir for her daughter of her time helping and experiencing these events and the men she loved throughout her life.

I am happy to announce I finished the book prior to our upcoming meeting! Ines of My Soul is not a book to escape into but, if you have time, to sink into. You need the chance to immerse yourself into the words, language, historical culture… As mentioned, it is written as a memoir. Ines is very honest and candid about her life, loves, actions and choices she has made. She is an amazingly strong and resilient woman living in awful and violent times. The atrocities she recounts can turn your stomach.

One thing that was disappointing for me, is that the book is a little dry with the story I thought I was going to get. I wished for more romance and personal interaction of the main characters. I suppose more like Outlander. You are following a strong woman traveling and supporting the men she loves throughout her life and receiving large chunks of interesting history. I felt like the author did an amazing job giving us the history but it was all a little dry. It was almost like someone was narrating the history of the times and expeditions for me, documentary style, and sometimes she was actually part of the story herself. It’s more the story of the men and their battles than of Ines, other than her movements around them and following them. I found myself skipping here and there to get back to those portions of the story.

Isabel Allende is a remarkable, talented, award winning author with a large list of books to read. This is the only book I have read of hers and I would say that I would try her out again when I am in the mood for a book I can sink into for hours, uninterrupted. I would also say, for those of you who read books male vs female writers, based on their voices when reading them, this author almost sounds like a male writer in my mind, for this book at least. Also, if you are interested or visiting/visited Peru or Chile this book would give some really interesting history and understanding of their cultures.  

Anne Bishop's The Others Book Series

I just finished racing, I mean reading, Anne Bishop’s the Others 5 book series (see photos for individual novel titles). I could not stop reading it! The story just clicked and I needed to see what would happen to everyone. I will admit, I am one of those that might hop onto Goodreads to see if there is an end to a series or if there will be more books… no spoilers though. I have to draw the line somewhere. When I saw that there was an actual end (not counting the spin off series, Wahoo!) I knew I was happily in trouble, and sleep would be in peril. It helps that this series is best read as one long, continuous “book”, rather than a book here and a book there. The horror will enthrall you and you embrace why it needs to be there. The lives of the characters will peak your interest to see how they can, or if they can, live together peacefully. You’ll ponder if the Others will finally eradicate all the humans or what?! Ultimately, the Others rule this fantasy world, however, the humans have somehow forgotten it. Gulp…

Anne Bishop creates a world where humans and Others (Elementals, shifters and Tera Indigna) try to live in an everyday world together. There are strict boundaries, rules and expectations. Defiance, mostly by humans, will be punished with swift and violent justice by the shifters and Sanguinetti. Humans are only meat after all.

The series unfolds with the author introducing Meg, a cassandra sangue, or sweet blood, who has escaped captivity from her controller. She is a blood prophet. She needs to hide and she wants to survive. She finds herself following visions to the Lakeside settlement, controlled by the various forms of shifters, and is beyond reach of human law. Meg is the butterfly whose wings cause unknown changes that will forever affect the world as the characters know and understand it. Meg is both feared and coveted for her abilities but fragile because even a paper cut can cause a vision of the future, all at great cost to her and the safety of the Others.

The language is descriptive and visceral. You can feel yourself in the midst of everything, visualizing it, smelling it, watching it as the crows flying above it all might see the world, while rooting for various sides and characters. To be honest, I just wanted the Others to win the wars. You’re amused at the shifters trying to figure out Meg and how to help her. She’s not meat like most humans. You love that the characters are drawn to the wonderful kooky person Meg is. They want to protect her, help her, and be around this innocent strong woman. You meet vampires, shifters, elementals and their amazing ponies that command specific natural disasters, the keepers of the earth, amazing humans, and awful humans.

For the romantics our there- There is a romance sewn into the story but it’s only tugged here and there. I would describe it as you would watching two best friends, who people assume are together but aren’t romantically together…yet. You secretly wish they would try dating and kiss, becoming more, but fear what would happen if it failed. They are so in sync it would be unfathomable to not see them together as one whole. Myself, I really wanted the romance to happen, to show promise quicker but that’s not true to the world the Others and humans live in. However, there is love and it does bloom.

This series has intense moments, charming moments, side stories you hope don’t last long as you try to get back to the main story. Yes, I admit to impatience. The author creates a pace I had to force myself to stop reading rather than what my brain kept whispering, “Just one more section, one more chapter.” What is going to happen next?! How are they going to figure out what will really occur and what will the future really look like! I was on the fake edge of my seat, cuddled in my bed, devouring these books to see what would happen. I would definitely recommend this series for readers of fantasy, urban fantasy, paranormal, light romance readers wanting to expand their bookshelves, and fans of Patricia Briggs or other Anne Bishop novels.

Ilona Andrew's Hidden Legacy Series and More...

Hello dear readers!

What a year it has been! I am so proud to share I am getting time to read back little by little. It makes my heart happy. Hopefully that will lead to more time on my blog sharing with you. I am excited to share that I am currently devouring a “new to me author” and in the last month have read the first two and am currently halfway through the last available book in one of her many series! The author is Ilona Andrews and it is her Hidden Legacy series starring Mad Rogan and Nevada Baylor.  I am absolutely hooked on the characters, the action, the sexual tension, the various relationships and magical world created in our everyday mundane universe. I will definitely be checking out her other series after reading a few Christmas theme books. Thank you Jill Shalvis for your Heartbreaker Bay series I have on my “To Read” shelf! It has multiple books that have a Christmas season theme and I have been putting them off until December to read.

If I don’t make it back before the New Year I wish you all a happy, sparkling, and Merry Christmas season. I’ll make sure to add a note to Santa, when my kids send out their letters to him, we would all love at least one new read in our stockings this year.

Happy 2018 & Happy Reading!

I hope you fall in love with at least one book this new year!

Happy New Year My Dear Readers! 

With the new year comes organizing, cleaning, detoxing, resolutions and positivity… or sometimes sarcastic humor about all of the aforementioned. I saw a quote and loved how fitting it is: “New Year’s Resolutions: 1) Read? 2) Read. 3)Read!” That’s how I feel about most of my resolutions and goals. It’s the thought process behind getting off the couch to work out or getting snuggled into the couch to read and tell myself to not look around at the chores I could be doing.

Goodreads has an awesome Reading Challenge feature you can set up for your reading goals! Every year, since 2011, I have set a goal for how many books I plan to read for the year. Some years have been amazingly successful and others… not so much. At least I was being optimistic. LOL! This year I decided to keep the bar a little on the lower side- 25 books in the next year. I know with my two little ones it is hard to get my dedicated 10-15 minutes every day of reading in but we will see what the year brings!

What are some of your reading goals? Trying new authors or genres? Picking up a series or outlandishly large tome of a novel you know you might love but haven’t tried reading yet because how daunting it is? For me that series is Game of Thrones. I wonder if I will try it this year or put it off some more?

Happy 2018 and I wish you an adventurous year in reading and hope you fall in love with at least one amazing book! 

Hello & Happy Fall!

 

Hello Dear Readers!

It has been a very long time since I posted but I have an excellent excuse- we had our 2^nd child in April and, for those of you familiar with babies know, he just doesn’t feel sorry for me so I can get reading time included in our schedule! HAHA! I am slowly getting some reading time in though and hope to start posting reviews and recommendations soon.

In the meantime, my husband has decided that my beloved collection of books (and yes it is prolific) needs to be moved out of the baby’s room. On one hand, I wonder how empty the room will look (guess I’ll have to start a new collection of books for the kids from baby board books to Classics to Young Adult novels) since they are nestled snuggly in built in shelves. On the other hand, my new job is to imagine and design the bookshelves for my books! I’m in love with some of the ideas percolating in my mind and waiting to see what can actually be created in real life. I am enthusiastically hopping onto Pinterest and IKEA for ideas. Morphing those into something that will work with our Master bedroom space as well as other areas of the house for the inevitable books that just won’t quite fit on the shelves. Heaven knows I couldn’t possibly get rid of them! I might want to re-read a particular one or loan one to a friend. Luckily I have been blessed with a handy and creative husband who, so far, is intrigued by my ideas. Let’s cross our fingers! IKEA is a LONG drive from where I live.

Prior to April I was loving the J.R. Ward Bourbon Kings series. It’s a dynasty story that doesn’t focus on one set of characters for each book, but the author continues the story along as a mini series of sorts and you are brought into the folds of this old family and the saga drama of their lives. While I wait for book three to be released I am trying out Maya Banks’ A KGI Novel: Whispers in the Dark.

I wish everyone happy reading, hoping you get more time to unwind with a book than I do, and enjoy this beautiful fall season.

Weis & Astor's Blackwell

Blackwell is a gothic horror novel that lovers of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, Stephen King, and gothic literature will enjoy. The novel is written by two authors, Alexandrea Weis with Lucas Astor, but you never get a split feel throughout the novel (much like Christina Lauren has been able to achieve). The writing is well done, the language fitting the time period the authors locates us in, and author ploys are placed successfully without dragging the reader down and inundating them with too much side information.

The novel follows the intertwining lives of O’Connor & Blackwell from the day they meet at Harvard on. Blackwell comes from a privileged and aristocratic upbringing. He is morally flawed individual but an intriguing character that the reader wants to follow. Is he going to lead a life with love in it or follow a darker path? The writer seems to really want to show the readers that you can question the soul and try to create “workarounds” to stay pure or virginal as well as how we handle life experiences. There is power in love and ultimately the choices you make will lead you on the path of love and its magic of healing or if you let too much darkness seep into your life down the path of damnation.

There is a large focus on the religion of Voodoo. I really enjoyed these segments of the novel because Voodoo is not often used in literature. It especially helped create a spiritual and karmically bound story line for the second half of the novel. The book cover fits the novel brilliantly and I loved it.

Blackwell is a dark novel that will give some readers satisfaction and leave some saying, “Well written, but the story was horrifying and depressing.”   

Christine Brae's In This Life

In this Life by Christine Brae is a bittersweet romance about listening to your heart and accepting where life leads you. This novel follows a woman who finds herself in love with two different men who are immensely important in her life. As Anna struggles to figure out what to do in her life and which man is her fate and destiny, the reader is drawn in to the joy, questions of one’s faith and struggles life hands the characters and what “we” do to survive and embrace them.

The author has a clear voice and has a talent for building the chemistry between the three main characters. While the story line is somewhat predictable in that you can guess where the author is leading you, it is worth the journey of getting there and not knowing exactly how you will be taken there. I found myself tearing up a few times during various scenes with the characters. The author does a good job with the emotion and imagery so you are there with the characters as they struggle with being honest with themselves and questioning if there is something greater out there for them or is this what God’s plan is…

I would recommend this novel to lovers of Nicholas Sparks, anyone wanting a more realistic romantic story to immerse them in, or Christian fiction readers who also like a little spice in their life.