Photo A Day... June!

Review: Destined by Aprilynne Pike

Book: Destined by Aprilynne Pike
Genre: YA Fantasy
Rating:'''''
For: Fun
From: Bought from Costco

I was really quite anxious for this book since book number 3 (Illusions) ended with quite the unexpected cliff hanger... unexpected because I thought THAT book would end the series, but no, it's actually this one!

So this one picks up right were the last one left off with our heroes, David, Laurel and Tamani, trying to figure out what's going on with this new girl that has been going to their school and what she has to do with the bad "guy" who has been plaguing them now for several books.

Most of this book then turns into a battle in Avalon, some of it I found sufficiently exciting, but for most of it I just didn't care. So I was disappointed in that. I guess it was just to much battle/fighting descriptions for my liking.

However, there are some cool David bits, and suddenly he has a much bigger role in the whole scheme of things than the previous books, so if you are a David fan, you will enjoy that! There were also some pretty cool King Arthur tie-ins (Avalon after all, yes?) that I didn't see coming which I particularly enjoyed.

Once the battle talk is over and we get down to some more interesting things, I was right there again and involved in the story. The growth and the insights into all the characters at this point is really quite fun and it's a bit bitter sweet to see how everything wraps up. I will say one thing, Laurel does make her love choice and the triangle is over!

The author then has a note at the end of the book, just before an epilogue of sorts, that warns you against reading the epilogue, but I say... read it anyway! Then, come and let me know what you think. :)

Bottom line: All in all, a very fun sweet and unique YA fairy story series that I enjoyed throughout.

Other Reviews:

Starry Sky Books
Books With Bite
Books: A True Story
Melissa's Book Shelf

May Reading Recap

Sheesh, I almost don't even want to bother with the recap post today, but then I wouldn't be able to look back years from now and remember just when my reading level started its downward spiral! Even with the 1000 page book, I can do better than this! And I even got a Kindle this month for heavens sake! That means my reading numbers should increase, right? Gah.

I read these four books this month. One was 1000 pages, yes, but the others were wimpy small things, so there's really no excuse for not doing more.

Precious Bane by Mary Webb: Prue Sarn struggles to fit into society and at the same time save her family and farm.

The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss: Kvothe continues to learn and grow in his skills and wisdom both at school and off on his many adventures.

Black Heart by Holly Black: Cassel is torn between using his magic to help the government or join in with the underground crime scene.

Destined by Aprilynne Pike: Laurel and her friends fight in the final battle to save Avalon.

The Wise Man's Fear is my favorite from this list, with Precious Bane coming in second.

Plans for June:

• finish the Robin Hood classic
• finish Code Name Verity, which I've got a good start on currently
• read Ready Player One before it's due at the library
• read About a Boy for book club
• finish Anna Dressed in Blood
• at the rate I'm going that'll be all I can handle!

Top Ten Tuesday: Books That Should Still Be Read in 30 Years

The topic today over at The Broke and the Bookish is a bit of a mouthful.... "books from the last ten years that you hope will still be read 30 years from now." Make sense? There's so many books I could list for this, in fact, so many that my mind is a bit blank, but I'll give it a try anyway.

Books I Hope Will Be Read 50 Years From Now

1. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (published 2007). Of course you knew I would say this one. After all, as I mentioned here before, this book is already being considered "a classic" and is on such reading lists at school already. How cool is that. I KNOW it will be being read 30 years from now, no doubt.

2. Life of Pi by Yann Martel (published 2002.)

3. The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern (published 2011.)

4. The Thief by Megan Whelan Turner (published 2005.)

5. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shafer and Annie Barrows (published 2009.)

6. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford (published 2009.)

7. The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick (published 2007.)

8.The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (published 2004)

9. Inkheart by Cornelia Funke (published 2005)

10. Unwind by Neal Shusterman (published 2009)

What books would you put on your list?

Review: Black Heart by Holly Black

Book: Black Heart by Holly Black
Genre: YA Urban Fantasy
Rating: '''''
For: Fun
From: borrowed from Jenny

This is the third book in the Curseworkers series. The Curseworkers are people who can do magic, basically, by just a touch of their hands; however they are outlawed from working their magic by the government so anyone who does is basically considered criminal. Also, everyone has to wear gloves to protect accidental (or on  purpose) magic from happening.

In this, the third book, we have our hero Cassel, still trying to figure out where he fits in, in this bizarre world. Is he good guy or a bad guy? Will he work with the government or the underground criminals? Is he going to get back with Lila, or not? These are the questions to be answered in this installment.

While I find this series enchanting and fun, this third book was not as engaging for me as the others. Very slow to start and nothing really new was happening. It did pick up, however, and I found the climatic ending to be sufficiently page-turning!

Bottom line: It was mostly good. And I still love Cassel no matter what he decides!

Other Reviews:

The Readventurer
Alternate Readality
The Diary of a Bookworm
Girl in the Stacks

Pin It and Do It Pinteresting Challenge Update Three: Disappearing Nine Patch Wall Hanging

I actually finished it! Now THIS is what this challenge is all about... forcing motivating a person to actually finish a project! I love it!

So I bought these squares at a quilt party my cousin hosted a few weeks ago. It was just 48 (I think) 5 inch squares... so... what to do with them?  (Hey, if you are interested in the quilt site where I got these from, I'm sure my cousin would LOVE a plug! Check it out.. My Lazy Daisy!)

I have this spot in my house, the stairwell, where I have had great plans to hang a seasonal wall hanging for every change of the seasons. At this point, I only had a Christmas one, a fall/Thanksgiving one, a Valentine one, and a flag one for the summer. I especially wanted a springy one that would work between Valentines and summer. So, that's what I decided to do with these squares.

They suggested at the party to make a disappearing nine patch, and I thought that looked easy and it was something I'd never done, so what the heck, I went for it. And then I found ideas on Pinterest and pinned them. (It's one of those getting to Pinterest through the back door kind of projects, know what I mean?)

(I really like this second one but decided it would be too big, plus it's tons more work!)

Anyway, I'm not going to list this step by detailed step, but just show the most awesome (ha ha) pictures I took along the way.

Fun and easy! Though you should know, I am not a perfectionist and when it comes to quilting, sometimes that can be not so good. I had some issues with this for sure. I unpicked a couple times, and the binding is too small which messed up the corners, but that's okay. The Amish make mistakes on purpose you know! See, now I don't have to worry about that!

Now I have a springy looking wall hanging ready to hang just as we approach summer and it's time for my patriotic flag one! Of course.

How are your Pinterest projects coming along?

My Star Wars Story

It looks like it's been 35 years since Star Wars opened... Memorial Day weekend in 1977. Where was I that weekend?

I was finishing up 5th grade I think it was. My dad went on a business trip to Denver, sometime shortly after that weekend, maybe into the summer, I'm not sure. But while he was there, he went to this movie that everyone was talking about.

When he came home, he was raving about it! My 11 year old self was enthralled by his excitement. Besides, I'd seen the trailers on TV and I just KNEW this was a movie I had to go see.

At some point, we ended up with the soundtrack album and there were some awesome pictures on it. This only proved to intrigue me further.

Finally, FINALLY, my dad took us to see it! I have no idea when it was, but sometime that summer of 1977 I'm sure. It was a the huge old awesome theater in Salt Lake, The Centre, and it was at a time when once you were in the theater, you could stay there until you wanted to leave. So we stayed through two showings of it!

That was the coolest thing ever!

And thus the Star Wars phenomenon began in my life.

The impressions of my nearly 12 year old self:

• I knew that Luke was the hero of the show, but even at not quite 12, I was especially taken with Hans Solo, yet I knew not why!
• The garbage shoot scene was my favorite!
• Except for the double sunset scene which always gives me chills... oh the music.
• The special effects were astounding.
• The sound and the music blew me away. This may have been the beginning of my fascination with sound and music in movies.
• The movie was full of so many emotions that I was overwhelmed. 

I remember later that year I learned a Star Wars dance, learned to play Star Wars on the piano, and ended up with my very own copy of the disco Meco version of the Star Wars song which was a big hit with my 6th grade class. I also started collecting little Stars Wars figures, and also, trading cards which came in bread packages. I remember loving it when Star Wars characters were on the Teen Beat magazine cover and I even remember an article that talked about the whole trilogy (what a concept back then!) and then speculated that there would be a SECOND trilogy that would take place before this one, as a prequel of sorts. Could that really be? I was beyond excited!

Bottom line: I really really love Star Wars (the original.) Always have, always will!

What's YOUR Star Wars story?

A Potential Buffy Watch Along

There's a bunch of us (and by a bunch I mean four or five) out there in bloggerland/twitterverse that seem to have never managed to get on the Buffy bandwagon. Are you one of us? If so, we're thinking of fixing this issue!

Here's the thing, Memory over at Stella Matutina keeps talking about doing a Buffy month in June. (Check out her post just today!) I have no idea what she's got planned, but I figure what better time to once and for all see what this Buffy craze is all about!

You know the Buffy craze? How everyone (well lots of people I trust and believe anyway) say that it's one of the best TV shows ever? How when I ask in a post "who's your favorite vampire" people respond with Spike... whom I don't even know because I've never watched this show? How there's some dude named Joss Whedon who made name for himself in TVland because of this show, and how people (lots of people I trust and believe anyway) talk about his stuff non-stop? (And whose other stuff I love on my own!)

You know all that?

And maybe you are like me and have actually TRIED to watch it, but have only managed a few episodes and all you can think is.... seriously? THIS is what everyone is raving about? But it's so...so...so... dumb? (Gasp... I said it!) Is this you?

And yet you still want to give it chance because of all the things people say about this show?

Is this is you? Then you are just like me (and the other bunch of us I mentioned above) and you need to ponder the possibility of a "watch along" in June!! Yes, it's time to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer with us similar minded, curious, potential fans. And at the same time you can learn all about it and participate in Memory's Buffy month. And if we get slogged down with the first few strange and weird episodes, we can help each other push through them!

Well? So? Are you in?

We don't have specifics yet, but I'm thinking at least watch season 1 in June, maybe even get through season 2, so that after that we will be hooked, so they say, and can watch the rest during the remainder of the summer without problems. We'll maybe make up a little schedule and maybe have some days to post thoughts or something... maybe have some Twitter convos or.... I don't know...just basically have fun watching it "together" and cheering each other on.

So I thought I'd throw this idea out there to see if any of my readers are interested in joining us so we can make sure and let you know when we DO have a plan!

Let me know if this sounds like something you want to be a part of.

And let me know if you are a huge Buffy fan and would be willing to cheer us on! That would be fun too. Maybe you can even re-watch with us. Because after all, what else will you be doing in June, right?

Review: The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss

Book: The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss
Genre: Fantasy
Rating:'''''
For: Fun
From: bought from Amazon

'There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.' The Wise Man's Fear ' Patrick Rothfuss



As most of you know, I've been dying to read this book since finishing the first book in the series, The Name of the Wind, last year. It feels like such an accomplishment to have finally done it! I think we all have to pat ourselves on the back when we manage these thousand page books!

This book starts off right where the last one ended. There's the "present" day time where our hero Kvothe is an obscure innkeeper who has decided to sit down with his student Bast and a dude called Chronicler, to once and for all tell his story. You see, somehow he has become a legend in his own time, and even now no one knows who he is, but the stories, these awesome unbelievable stories, are out there. But the stories, as legends tend to do, are much embellished. He's decided it's time to set things straight, or at least to just tell it like it is.

So while those little parts, called Interludes throughout the book, are in third person... most of the book is told in first person through Kvothe's eyes as he is relating what's happened to him. However, that's not to say that strange goings on are not happening during the interludes too... because something is definitely up there, which makes you, as a reader, feel okay about the jumping back and and forth between the times and stories.

Anyway, this book starts off with Kvothe at the University where he is, as always, struggling with trying to find enough money to pay his tuition and to simply survive. When an opportunity comes along for him to maybe find a patron (someone to sponsor his education) he jumps at the chance and is off to seek out this guy and quite the adventure ensues.

This adventure includes things like helping this important guy (the potential patron) woo a wife, catching bandits who are robbing this guy's tax collectors,  experiencing some time in Fae land (which is unheard of) and then learning the way of the Adem people (who have a fascinating culture,) which is also unheard of, and finally rescuing a couple of girls from some really bad guys!

All at the age of barely 17! (I find it interesting that this book is an adult fantasy when the main guy is a teenager throughout... maybe it's because he is older and looking back on his life? The first book didn't have much by way of "adult" content, but this second definitely does!)

As with the first book, I absolutely LOVE the writing, the story, the characters, everything! It really truly has everything that I love about epic fantasy. This book, however, did drag for a me just a bit during some of the adventures. We really got into detail about certain things and I found myself anxious to "get back to the story already!" Thus the reason for the "only" four star rating.

And as you all know, I love Kvothe to death, but he did start to do some things and make some decisions that bugged me! It's to be expected I suppose! But still.

My other complaint is the romance.... it makes me crazy! I'm becoming not that fond of Deena, the girl that Kvothe is gaga for. She is just not nice enough to him. He deserves better I'm thinking. Yet, he does some pretty rough things too, so there's that. Anyway, this connection they have, if it doesn't go somewhere soon, I might lose it!

Bottom line: I loved it, as expected.

Other Reviews:

Between the Covers
The Book and Biscuit
Only The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy
Adventures in Borkdom

The Sunday Salon: The Final Countdown

Outside my window: Sunday afternoon and it's peaceful outside. There're birds, and sunshine, and neighbors talking. It always seems really nice outside my window, have you noticed?


I am listening to: the birds mentioned above. So far, I haven't turned on music, but I just might in order to do the next little prompt....

Song of the week: I've had a lot of new to me songs I've been enjoying this week and it's hard to choose what to share!  Well, anyway, here's a new one from the new Silversun Pickups album called Here We Are:

Sounds very Radiohead, yes?

TV Talk: You know, not much TV going on right now. The Survivor finale was anti-climatic in every sense of the word. It was a boring season all around I must say. I actually watched American Idol (while cleaning) and then made book club watch Adam Lambert when he sang on the results show! Silly me. I liked it though so oh, well. Even though I was expecting him to sing this new song, which I dare you to listen to and NOT dance or at least tap your foot!  I caught up on one Once Upon a Time episode, but have one more to go. That show remained fun for me all season long. Really enjoyed it. If Grim comes to Netflix, maybe I'll go for that one and compare. 

READING REPORT: 

Books Finished: Still no books finished this week. Those 1000 page books KILL me in this department! But I'm so so close to finishing it! Just a hundred and fifty or so pages left! I can do it today, really. Awesome book though. (The Wise Man's Fear)

Books Started: I did start reading my first Kindle book! The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood! Wow, that's quite the book so far. Talk about old English language! I also started Destined by Aprilynne Pike... the fourth in that Wings series. 

Books Up Next: Up next will be Black Heart, and About a Boy, and Ready Player One which I got from the library.... and hopefully some quick easy things that I can finish fast so my month tally won't look so very bad!

I am thinking: that whoever is playing outside right now sounds like they are having a lot of fun. 

I'm grateful for: the fact that my vacuum wasn't broken after all, and just needed to be reset because it thought it was plugged. I'm also grateful that I managed to get the WiFi working again this morning, because you know, we would DIE without that. 

Around the house: I cleaned this week pretty dang good, just so you know. It does happen sometimes. 

Pinterest of the Week: Yesterday I managed to put together the blocks for my little nine patch wall hanging. You'll have to wait for pictures though next week for my wrap up post.... that's assuming I keep working on it and maybe finish it!

Favorite things of the week: Book club was great, lots of book talk as always. (Hopefully a report will show up here soon!) Lots of reading time this week was good so I could polish off a few hundred fantasy pages. Awesome weather this week which includes the crazy rainstorm! Oh, and I got a haircut which makes such a difference. 

Utah Book Bloggers:  One more day to sign up! We need to you help make a fun Utah Book Month! If you are NOT a Utah blogger, you can read a Utah book and review it that month, or interview a Utah author... we'll match you up. If you ARE a Utah blogger, you can do those things AND interview another Utah blogger, so we can get to know each other better. That's not too hard, right? So come sign up now if you are interested! You don't have to commit to a ton, or do a lot, just let us know if you want to play.

Least favorite thing: headaches... lots of headaches, and neck aches and other such random body faultiness. I hate that.

Family Matters: Two more weeks of school for the two youngest kids. It's the final countdown! I can't believe it! Let's hope they make it through. Last week of job training for kid #1.... let's do some hoping for him too! And kid #2 has plans to start rehearsing to dance for the library in the summerfest parade! Wahoo for that!

The coming week: performances like crazy for us! Violin recital, orchestra concert and choir concert. Yippy!

Book Club Report: What We Thought of Precious Bane

Overall, this book was a big hit at book club! Four and five stars all around! We for sure decided it's a classic that needs more love, so please, go out, find it and read it!

My review can be found here, but quickly, this book is about a small English town int he 1800s, more specifically about a particular family in the town. There's a brother and a sister in this family and the brother has some greed issues, and the sister has some physical beauty issues. This is the story of how they both deal with those issues and how the ending is a bit different for each of them.

Here are a few general book club thoughts:

• We all wondered why this book is not more well known? Especially given the fact that it's really quite good! Is it because it's about poor farmers and not rich gentry? If so.... that is just... dumb.
• We loved the contrast between the negative and positive reactions of each of the characters and their situations. 
• Some of us learned a new saying (or two) about the hare-lip affliction.... "a hare has crossed my path" or  "hare shotten." We realized this term "hare lip" is not even really used anymore at all and is now referred to as cleft lip or palate.
• Everyone agreed, this book is symbolism at it's best. It's there and you actually "get" it. 
• What is the "precious bane?" We decided his greed and her lip.
• We were fascinated with the "sin eating" which is an event that begins this story. They believed that when a person dies, another person needs to take on the dead person's sins by eating bread over the casket. We'd never heard of this tradition before.
• We all agreed that the dialect and language of the book took awhile to get into but once we did, it was fun and interesting. The book is written by how the people talk and you may even have to read parts out loud to actually get it. 

Pinterest Challenge Update: Cowgirl Cookies

So I had hopes to do more this week on the Pin It Do It Challenge than just the one project, but there was no time for quilting, which was the other project I've been working on. Maybe this weekend?

Anyway, I did the Cowgirl Cookie gift jars for little Mother's Day presents. Here's the link to the original post complete with instructions.

These look easy, do they not? But I had issues. I did two of them and had one wide mouth jar and one regular. Well, I ran out of room! Even though I was packing it as tight as I could as per the instructions! In the wide mouth jar, I managed to squeeze in the last sugar layer... barely! (No room at all for the pecans!) But there was no hope for the other one as you can see here:

So I dumped it out, found another wide mouth jar, and started over again. What a pain. Anyway, in the end they turned out pretty cute, don't you think? Well, at least I think so. Not sure what the moms thought when they got them. It was sort of a luke warm reaction. Oh, well.

I did make the cookies too... and they were YUMMY! Forgot to take a picture though.

Oh, and P.S..... if you want different colors of M and M's on off season... Zurchers has them! (Is Zurchers a Utah place or country wide? I've no idea!) But they are expensive! Sheesh.

I was going to make something for book club from Pinterest, but ended up going with good old standbys.

I'll be back next week to let you know if and/or what I manage to fit in this week crafty-wise!

Who's Your Author Rock Star?

Yesterday, I was asked this very question while I was working at the library. The guy in charge of programming is making a list of potential author appearances, and he basically said, if money is no matter, who would you want to see come? Yes, who is your author rock star?

Well, of course, if you've been reading here awhile, you know the answer I have to that question, though since he came just awhile back, my guess is he's not coming back anytime soon. :( (Just in case you are new reader, click here to find out who my rock star author is.) Except I know he has plans for Chicago, luckies.

So putting him aside for now, here are some others I suggested:

Suzanne Collins
Patrick Ness
Jeff Kinney
Neal Shusterman
Daniel Handler
Judy Blume
Melina Marchetta
Stephanie Perkins
John Green
Cassandra Clare

You may be surprised by a few on that list, but I was trying to keep in mind who would have a general wide spread rock star appeal, though a few of my personal rock stars did manage crept in. Also, I was not including of any of our local rock star authors such as Brandon Mull, Shannon Hale and Brandon Sanderson.

I'll be sure and let you know if we do manage to snag a real rock star author for a future event!

But it made me wonder how YOU would answer this question. If you could get anyone to come for an author event, who would it be? Who would you absolutely FREAK about, and stand in line hours for, then scream and jump for joy for when they walk into the room?

Who is YOUR author rock star?

It's a Kindle!

I'm feeling a little strange this week because I have finally joined the e-reader ranks! Yes, it's true. My husband surprised me with a Kindle Fire for Mother's Day and now I must embrace the change! I could feel it coming, this eminent embracing. I've been dragging my feet, I've been leery, I've even done a little eye rolling. I can remember years ago doing a post about the Kindle when I very first heard of it. It sort of freaked me out then.

And now, here we are, a happy Kindle owner!

After only three days of playing with it, here are my observations:

• You need a cover. It's too hard to hold without one, and too scary to haul around the house even. I finally got one on Tuesday, and of course, it's purple. (Which totally matches my phone!)
• I think reading blogs will be very fun on this thing, though commenting is still a bit hard (like on the phone) but maybe I'll get better at that.
• So far I've only nabbed three books... all free. A Tale of Two Cities, which I'm dying to re-read, The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, which I think is pretty much one of the oldest "modern" Robin Hood stories which I'd like to read for Melissa's Classic Double Challenge, and the first volume of Clarissa, which I wanted to join in on the year long buddy read but didn't want to buy the book (and now I'm too late to join anyway!) 
• That battery does last long! I've yet to watch a movie or TV show on it though, that would be a pretty good battery test.
• I'm glad to have notebook/apps/etc. on it so I can do all sorts of things besides reading
• Reading on it, by the way, is very nice. I can get used to this!
• One of the first things I wanted to do was NetGalley, but that place is SLOW and a little confusing... so I gave it a break and now I've totally forgotten about it!
• And having a bigger screen for Draw Something is awesome! :)

The Sunday Salon: Mother's Day

Mother's day today. A happy one to all of you! It's not my most favorite day of the year, but you know, it'll be okay! :)

Outside my window: Beautiful day. Seems like we've been have a lot of beautiful days lately. It's nice.

 I am listening to: The husband is blasting his England Dan Pandora radio station and singing along with every song. He loves that station, and says "I guess this is just my kind of music!" Also I'm hearing some violin practicing going on in the next room. A recital is coming up. Time to get serious!

Song of the week:





TV Talk: Survivor finale today. I'm curious how it will shake down. Too bad I can't watch it. But I will later.  The Vampire Diaries finale was so crazy I didn't even GET what happened! Sheesh. You gotta pat attention with that show or else! The Amazing Race finale was anti-climatic last week. Whatever. I haven't watched much else, but I am really looking forward to some Falling Sky coming up in a few weeks!

READING REPORT: Very very boring this week. So sorry. I've just been reading and reading and reading The Wise Man's Fear, but not as much as I'd hope to. I'm to about page 400 in nearly 1000 page book, so it may be the same story this week. Dang life gets in the way. And maybe the fact that I added crafty stuff to my line up this week. I guess that could be the difference too.

Books Finished: None

Books Started: None

Books Up Next: Who knows? 

I am thinking: that eating something about now would be nice. 

I'm grateful for: my mom. :)

Around the house: Last week I moaned about the broken chair... this week it's the dishwasher.. which technically isn't broken but is really doing it's job lousy. I'm sick of it. Time for a new one. 

Pinterest of the Week: The cute little Mother's Day presents I'm giving today come from Pinterest.... these things. 

Favorite things of the week: Working on the garden yesterday was nice, hard though. I hope it grows. Seeing two musicals, one at the school and one a the community theater was fun. Doing some quilting this week was fun...well technically it was piecing, which is the best part. Texting my sister about Stefan and Damon was fun, she is just now watching the first season. 

Utah Book Bloggers:  We posted the sign up for participating in Utah Book Month this last week, and those will stay open for another week or so. We'd love for tons more Utah bloggers to participate. Doesn't it sound fun? Yes? Come! 

Least favorite thing: unhappy kids.

Family Matters: Everyone seems a little stressed. Here's hoping that eases up soon. I'm tired of stress, you know?

The coming week: Book club! And that's always a good thing. 

Review: Precious Bane by Mary Webb

Book: Precious Bane by Mary Webb
Genre: Classic
Rating: '''''
For: Book Club
From: Paperback Swap

Here's a book I'd never heard of until it was suggested (by Kim from Good Clean Reads) at book club last year when we were figuring out this year's schedule. She seemed so enthused about it that there was nothing we could do but add it to our line up!

And I must say, I'm so glad we did because it's quite the gem. So why haven't I heard of this book before? This could definitely go into the category of good books that seem to get overlooked.

This is a story set in England around the time of Napoleon. It's about a family living in a very small farming community with little to no contact with outsiders. But most importantly, it's the story of a girl named Prue who was born with a harelip, and how she is the strength of her family even though the defect was considered a curse. Basically, it's the story of how she watches the downfall of her family and yet rises above it to survive.

The thing that stands out especially about the style of this book is that it's written using the dialect of the time and place. It took awhile to get the hang and feel of it, as these things often do, but once that kicks in, it's a blast. I loved it! Many words are totally made up based on what they sound like coming out of your mouth! My favorite is "tuthree" as in "we saw tuthree new lambs born today!"  (two or three, get it?)

Anyway, there were so many like that that I loved and which I had taken the time to write them down to share.

Not only that, but there were so many profound and deep thoughts scattered throughout! Many wonderful life observations! You know, I'm going to have to read this one again sometime if only for the purpose of writing these down.

Despite the sadness and the tragedy that is the most part of this book, it's also a really nice love story. Because of course Prue, even though she has this deformity, finds love! And you just want to cheer for her and say, "You go girl!"

Bottom line: I really enjoyed it!

Other Reviews:

One Librarian's Book Review
Good Clean Reads
Alternate Readality
Book Nut

So tell me, have you heard of or read this book? 

Top Ten Tuesday: My Author Amazing Race!

Today's Top Ten list provided by The Broke and the Bookish is quite the unique one! The question is, what authors would you like to see in a reality show and which show? Well now. How to answer THAT?

So I've decided to send some of my favorite authors on an Amazing Race. Of course, they are going to have to go to bookish/literary places like:

Bath and London, England,
Concord, Massachusetts
Monterrey, California
Prince Edward Island, Canada
The Congo, Africa
Greece and Rome
Dublin, Ireland
China
Molokai, Hawaii

...just to name a few! (Let's face it, there's a literary tie to pretty much anywhere, is there not?)

As for the teams themselves?  Here's what I've come up with:

Team 1: John and Hank Green
Team 2: Scott Westerfeld and Justine Larbalestier
Team 3: Maureen Johnson and Stephanie Perkins
Team 4: Shannon Hale and Libba Bray
Team 5: Markus Zusak and Melina Marchetta
Team 6: J. Scott Savage and James Dashner
Team 7: Dan and Rob Wells
Team 8: Brandon Sanderson and Patrick Rothfuss
Team 9: Kiersten White and Aprilynne Pike
Team 10: Bill Bryson and Michael Perry

I was going to think of funny nicknames for them all, as per Amazing Race tradition, but the only one I really liked was the Awesome Aussies. I'm thinking you know which team I'm referring to here! Hopefully it's not too awkward that I matched up Markus and Melina (oh, cool twin names, yes?) but I think they'll handle it!

And now, let's get this race started!

Mark, get set, GO!!!

Pinterest Challenge Update: Two Projects Done!

This week I really got in the mood to work on some crafty projects and then it just sort of took over. I've been missing this part of my creative life, and so I've really enjoyed trying to get it back again, using Trish's Pinterest Challenge as an excuse.

The first project we did was the Calendar Journal. I first saw this when Kailana of The Written World posted about it here. You can also find out about it here on the original post. The idea is to take index cards and date them for each day of the year, then use old postcards to divide them into months. Then each day you write something you did that day, labeling it by the year. So after many years, your index cards will be full of stuff you did on that particular day for all those years. Make sense?

Anyway, I thought it would be a good project to do with the girls, and they agreed! But I must say, we took the idea and totally changed it up. Here's what we ended up doing:

We decided we wanted more permanent sturdy containers for the cards, so we went to Hobby Lobby and ended up with these tin boxes with handles, which we then painted and sticker-ed up. Then, we got stacks of both white and colored index cards (which we didn't cut in half as suggested in the original instructions) and divvied them up between us. Then, instead of using postcards, we decided to create our own month dividers. My 13 year old daughter created them using google images and photoshop. I just picked a handful of pictures from our files and got them printed. Then we laminated them. Also, instead of using a date stamp for all the index cards, we just sat and hand wrote the dates on them all while we watched TV one night!

We had a great time doing this together, and I hope we can all keep up with writing our one thing down each day, for years to come!
___________________________________________________

The second thing I did from my Pinterest board was make this for dinner one night. It's called Black Bean Lasagna, and the family enjoyed it, but they did say, "It tastes very healthy." So you can take that however you'd like! (Here's the original link to the recipe.)

I currently have projects three and four in progress, so I'll save those to report on when they are done! But one of them has to do with quilting! Wahoo! I can't wait to show you!

How's your crafty projects coming along?

A Bunch of Random Mini Rants

I was going to post a review today but have too much jumbling around in my head so I'm doing one of those funky rambly posts that are fun to do and which I haven't done in awhile. (Unless you count the Sunday posts which are a different sort of ramble thing.)

So here's what I'm thinking today (much of which is spawned by Twitter, for those of you who wonder what the purpose of Twitter is... it's for spawning weird thinkings) and most (all?) of which are little mini rants, so be warned:

** All this talk of a book called 50 Shades of Grey is creeping me out. I hear it's a pretty, shall we say, graphic and racy book. I don't get the appeal. Everyone (okay, nearly everyone) moans about certain other badly written romance books with abusive guys, but they love this one? I'm so confused here. Yeah, I won't be reading this one and I wish I'd stop hearing about it. Plus, it sorta makes me sad that Ian Somerhalder will be playing this dude in the movie.

** BEA is coming up and when I look at the calendar it is actually on a week that I maybe might could have probably actually gone! BUT, the more I think about it, the more I feel that it's a club to which I just don't belong and wouldn't fit in. I don't know. Maybe some day I'll go and test out that theory. But I get the feeling that I just don't have the coolness factor and the blogging biggness needed for such an event. However, I do love Armchair BEA and plan to participate! Sign ups going on now for that so do come join in if you find yourself sitting at home wondering what it would be like to play with the popular people!

** Speaking of clubs... I still wonder how bloggers fit into the whole writing conference thing. There was one that just happened locally which I heard a lot about which I would also feel weird attending, only being a blogger writer. Though it sounded awesome and I know I would have loved it. Okay, fine, so it appears I have some identity crisis issues, yes? :) And so what else is new? Suggestions for me? Suck it up and get over it?

** All the memories everyone was Tweeting (and emailing at work too) about Maurice Sendek and his books yesterday was making me weepy! I don't have any particular memories beyond the fact that I've loved Where the Wild Things Are since I can remember. Oh, and the Pierre... I don't care.... book too. The others I'm not so familiar with. But yeah, he knew how to do it, and so I add my thoughts to the realm.

** Another frustrating thing that makes me sad.... the fact that I love to promote the Utah authors yet can't seem to get myself on their publishers' lists. I get lots of emails now (I think that's been bumped up because of Bloggiesta) about weird random books that I have no interest in, yet nothing from the local authors (the big ones I'm talking here) and their new and upcoming books. Except Brandon Mull, I think I'm on his list. Which is funny because his aren't my favorite! Figures. Anyway, it just makes me sad, you know?

** Here's something I saw today, "Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do, but gets you no where." I'm pretty much worrying all the time, like seriously, ALL THE TIME! There's truly so much to worry about! I do wish I could stop, but in the end, I guess I enjoy rocking.

** We've been watching old home movies lately. Our life at 20 years ago. I miss it. And I know that in 20 years from now if we watch movies from today, I'll think the same thing about today. Yes? So, there's something to think about.

** I just have to thank Trish and her Pinterest challenge. It caused me to go putter in my "craft" room yesterday and dig out some old projects that maybe... just maybe... I'll try to finish this summer. And maybe... just maybe... I'll get a crafty sort of bug going again and I know if I do, everything will be good.

** So I added Instragram to my phone. Now I'm wondering what's next? I follow you all and see your pictures? I  tweet more pictures? Do you all really truly like that sort of thing? It doesn't bore you silly?

Wow, I should feel better now, don't you think? I swear ranting is a necessary evil. If you listened/read... I thank you!

Now, I'm off to be productive in a different sort of way!

P.S. Where can I find pink/red m and m's when it's no where near Valentines Day?

Character Connection: Kvothe from The Kingkiller Chronicles

Since I am deeply engulfed in the second book of this series, The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss, it is only fitting that I dedicate my Character Connection post this month to its hero:

You may remember me mentioning him back when I reviewed the first book, The Name of the Wind, but just let me expound here on all the many ways there are to love this character:

• First of all he has red hair. Not dark and floppy, not blond and messy, but RED.  And tons of it. So that's something different.
• And there's the green eyes. Piercing, emerald ones at that! :)
• He's very very smart and clever. Like.... there's been no one at University like him before or since. 
• He not only uses his smartness to do well in his studies, but to come up with mischievous schemes, which is always endearing, is it not?
• He's a musician, one that brings people to tears with his lute playing and his song singing. What's NOT to love about that?
• He's bookish. Not only smart, but he loves books and reads like crazy and he lives and breathes for the Archives! (The library, of course.)
• He's romantic, but in a quiet, shy sort of way. He seems scared to death of the girl he likes and at this point in the story (I have tons left to read you see) he's yet to make a move. But oh, so romantic.
• He's generous. He, himself, has pretty much nothing, But when he does get a little money, he always shares with people (specifically the girl living in the Underthing) who have even less than him.
• He's reckless, especially when it comes to Ambrose! And I find myself yelling at him in my head.... KVOTHE!!! What ARE you thinking? Stay AWAY from that awful dude!!!
• He's loyal to his friends, other boys who seem to not fit in anywhere.
• He saves people from fires and other such hazards. 
• Did I mention the lute playing?
• Not only ALL of that, but he can cook too. I just read the part where they are going crazy for his apple pie. 
• Oh, and then there's the magic bit. Magic, he does it. And better than anyone else of course. 

Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Quotes from Books

-- Mr. Rochester from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

"Because that's what Hermione does," said Ron, shrugging, "When in doubt, go to the library.'

Utah Book Month Sign Ups

Awhile back, a few of us Utah book bloggers decided it was time to try having another Utah Book Month, and we've finally figured out the details and are now asking for participants!

The details:

• promote Utah authors, bloggers and books during the month of August by.....
• reading and reviewing books written by Utah authors
• interviewing and highlighting Utah authors
• having Utah book bloggers interview and highlight each other
• giving away Utah books
• hosting mini challenges about Utah books and authors

 

The Rick Riordan Experience

Last year I got to see my most favorite author, but last week, we got to go see my 13 year old daughter's favorite! Rick Riordan of Percy Jackson fame came to our neck of the woods and we were there! I stood in line to get tickets for nearly two hours several weeks before, and the day of the event I stood in line for an hour outside, and then waited  for another hour in our actual seats. All this for a one hour presentation! (Usually at these events we get to meet the author afterwards and get books signed, but this guy is too big. He presigned books which we could buy, but no meet and greet afterwards.)

Anyway, the things we do for authors, huh? Officially crazy I'm thinking.

So I filmed some stuff so you could see a little of what it was like. The kids screamed like he was a rock star. It was fun to be part of. The excitement was pretty intense. And the library staff was so great too, and a little crazy as you can see.

Take a look:

And then he read from The Mark of Athena, due out in October. The kids LOVED it. Here it is, the first chapter:

Fun times. Another great author encounter to stick on our list!

The Sunday Salon: I Crafted Stuff!

Outside my window: It's dark on a Saturday night. And quite chilly I must say. But it'll be perfect sleeping temperature. I just hope to sleep. Sleep is not easy to come by lately it seems. 

 I am listening to: nothing at the moment except for a Jazz game in the background

Song of the week: I've been obsessed with the Someone I Used to Know song all week.If you haven't heard (and seen) this cover of it though, here it is. (I know I'm late to the party here, but maybe there's a few of you that are even later than me!)




TV Talk: Just caught up on  American Idol and Survivor. American Idol is just meh as I've been saying. I do like Philip now though.... ish. And I was glad to see Kat go on Survivor. She's only 22? Wow. Vampire Diaries was quite shocking this past week. When's the finale on that one? I'm sad to see it almost over for the season. But I am getting excited to start watching Falling Skies again. Tomorrow is The Amazing Race finale. Yay.

READING REPORT:
Books Finished: This week I finished Precious Bane... early for book club! Wow. I need to see if any book clubbers need to borrow it now.

Books Started: YAY! I finally started The Wise Man's Fear... here's hoping tomorrow I can knock off lots and lots of its pages!

Books Up Next: You know, I'm just not sure what'll be next. Strange feeling.

I am thinking: wow, has it been a month already since our Arizona adventure? Yeah that was fun, I want to do something like that again please.

I'm grateful for: really really cold ice water. 

Around the house: Our chair is broken... very very broken. It's time for a new one for sure.

Pinterest of the Week: Because I signed up for the Pinterest Challenge, I thought I'd report here some progress, though there will be "real" posts too. So, we are going to make this casserole for dinner tomorrow. And today we started in on the journal calendar that several of us fell in love with. (I blame Kailana for that one in particular though.) And that has been fun. Also, I bought some quilt scraps and plan to make a disappearing nine patch wall hanging from that. I played a bit with that today too. So, it's been a crafty-ish sort of day! So fun. Can't wait to make a quilty thing again. 

Favorite things of the week: There were lots of awesome things this past week. Seeing Rick Riordan was fun, getting Utah Bloggers organized (at least started) was fun (see our new Twitter here!), chit chatting with Jenny, Susan, Robin and Heidi was fun, seeing The Avengers was fun, going for a walk in the canyon was fun, crafting with the girls today was fun, having an impromptu picnic today was also fun. Lots of nice things this week. 


Utah Book Bloggers: So maybe I'll add a section here to report this sort of stuff each week. We'll try it and see. So here's the thing. we want to have what we've decided to call Utah Book Month in August. The idea is to promote authors, bloggers and books from Utah. We have lots of fun things planned, so stay tuned for more details that will hopefully be coming up next week. If you aren't from Utah, there are ways for you to participate also... if you want! Yay! :)

Least favorite thing: I ate a lot of crap this week. And I tried to get back into the exercise routine, but failed. And my hair is bugging me. Yes, that's probably my least favorite thing of the week for sure!

Family Matters: The big college daughter has been going to a high school prom tonight! They went with her boyfriend's little sister and participated in all the stuff except the actual dance. Too funny, yes? The big college son helped his girlfriend sell her car. That was quite the exciting evening around here. The 17 year son played in a tennis tournament today (Regionals) and took 2nd place and is now going on to State. How cool is that?  And the youngest got to go to see her favorite author with me!

The coming week: Ummm... so what IS happening this next week? Mother's Day on Sunday. You know what I want for Mother's Day? A center speaker and a sub woofer speaker for my TV. No kidding. Once and for all, I'd like to set up the surround sound correctly. 


And now, I'm going to go read. Have a lovely Sunday!

Movie Review: The Avengers

Movie: The Avengers
Genre: SiFi Adventure
Starring: Robert Downey Jr, Chris Hemsworth, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, and tons more! 
Rating: PG13
MY Rating: Two thumbs up

We got to go to this yesterday with my husband's work group as a celebration for a deadline they made... or something. But that was cool! I figured I'd get to it eventually, but not on opening day!

So, as you may (or may not) know, this movie was a sort of mash up of several other movies based on Marvel comic characters. (I'm not Marvel comic savvy, but I'm guessing there are comics of The Avengers? Someone?  Yes? So the mash up idea is not a movie industry creation? I'm not sure.) Anyway, in this one, they all come together to save the world from Loki, the bad guy from Thor. Let the special effects, the fights, the explosions and the one-liners begin!!

My random thoughts:

• My favorite parts were for sure the interaction between the heroes themselves. Such funny stuff! How they tried to get along... or not.... and how they played off each others strengths and weaknesses. It was great fun.
• There were plot bits that were a little hard to follow, but I always find this is the case with me and these types of movies. I figure, though, that the story itself isn't really the important part, but it's about the action. Yes?
• I really love Loki! Dang, what is it about him? He's one of those sympathetic villains to me. You know, the ones you feel quite sorry for? The ones you kinda want to help? Anyone else feel this way? 
• Usually I notice the music, as you should know by now if you read stuff here, but I didn't notice the music this time. What does that mean? Probably because....
• ......this movie is FULL of crazy awesome action! Lots of fighting, and not just bad guys and heroes, but heroes against heroes. 
• I didn't realize The Hulk was so, so, so scary! I never did see this movie, but am very familiar with the old TV show which I loved. Was he that scary then? Can't remember.
• I did find that it was nice to be familiar with all the other movies and to know the back stories of these guys. They referred to that quite a lot.
• And who was that bow and arrow dude? Coolness. Hawkeye I'm told and I've never heard of him. Let's have his movie please!

2. Thor (I love how he talks!)
3. Captain America (his old fashion-ness is endearing.)
4. Hawkeye (but he may move up once I get to know him!)
5. Black Widow (you go girl!)
6. The Hulk (though I quite enjoyed Dr. Banner)

Did I get them all? Who's your favorite Avenger?

Bottom line: I really enjoyed this movie! It's a blast and funny and crazy and all the good superhero stuff we love.

Have you seen it? What'd you think?

Speaking of superheroes... I'm really quite excited about the new Spiderman... and I know I know... the others are still quite recent but still, I can't help it. It looks awesome. And then there's Batman coming up and he's my favorite one of all. Yay for the summer superhero movies!

Trailer for The Avengers:

Review: Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson

Book: Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson
Genre: Mystery- ish/ Psychological Thriller
Rating: ' ' ' ' '
For: Fun
From: the library

I went to a library thing awhile back and at that thing the staff took turns raving about some of their favorite books of the year. It was fun trying to determine from that presentation which books I would really run out to read.

As it turned out, this book happened to be one that rose to the top in my mind of "must reads" after that fun book talk presentation. So I was excited when it actually came to me after putting it on hold.

But I must say, it wasn't as great as I expected it to be. Maybe they talked it up TOO  much at that library thing? Maybe my expectations where just messed up? I don't know. But it was a bit of a disappointment, sad to say.

So there's this girl who wakes up and doesn't know her life. Her body is too old, her husband is a stranger, her house is unfamiliar and so on. We get clues, along with her, that she has been in some sort of an accident and that every night, after she sleeps, she goes back years to her 20s or sometimes even childhood. She remembers things during the day, but each night, she has to start over again. And again. And again.

She has this doctor dude who suggests she start writing a journal, which she does. He then calls her everyday to remind her about the journal and where she's hidden it. So every day, she re-reads what she's written and then adds to it. This process allows her to discover some things that just don't make sense.

And thus we have the mystery!

Yes, the premise is awesome! But I got bogged down in the repetition, which due to the nature of the story, is quite inevitable right? We see everything from her point of view, which makes sense because it adds to the whole "I wish I know what's going on" feeling, but that meant that every day, we had to repeat everything, along with her, that had been happening. That got old, and I started getting anxious for the "real" stuff.

Also, this book has some language and other "stuff" thrown in that just seemed so jarring and unnecessary. I can handle stuff if it seems relevant to the story, but this just didn't. At least to me. If you read it, what do you think? Did it make sense to be in there for the story? Or was it just shock factor? At any rate, whether it did or didn't, it bugged me.

And, as we always seem to say, you need to connect to the character in order to feel the story, and I just didn't connect....which in turn meant I just didn't really connect to anything else. Know what I mean?

That all being said, I still give it three stars, which means I liked it, yes. The end did start to get pretty page-turning and breath-holding, once things finally started to happen. Of course, I was so very curious as to what was REALLY going on that despite the problems I had with patience, I wanted to keep reading to find out.

Bottom line: It was okay for most of it, pretty good for some of it, and plain stupid for bits of it.

Other Reviews:

Jenny's Books
Book Journey
Book Addiction
Life...With Books

Review: Supernaturally by Kiersten White

Book: Supernaturally by Kiersten White
Genre: YA Paranormal
Rating: '''''
For: Fun
From: I bought it Borders, I think, during their close out sale.

This book is more of the same silly funny crazy stuff that you'll find in the first book, Paranormalcy. In this book, Evie has left the center where she was raised and worked all her life (the center that tracks and contains paranormal creatures) and is instead living a "normal" life with her vampire roommate and seeing Lend, her awesome cool water elemental boyfriend, on the weekends.

But then, of course, weird things start happening and she wonders if the Fey are back at their mischief and are after her again. She decides to start working small jobs for the center again, with the help of a new friend named Jack, who gets under her skin in a strange and mysterious way.

And the small jobs turn into fairly big ones. And Jack ends up causing stress with Rend, of course. And all sorts of things begin to go wrong and she has to fix everything!

There's really not much more to say except it's fun! The style is so snarky and witty and silly that you just laugh the whole way through. Evie is a great character whose adventures are fun to follow. There is more to come as book three comes out this year. :)

Bottom line: The word fun just keeps coming to mind! Fun book! I enjoyed it!

Other Reviews:

Books With Bite
All-Consuming Media
Good Books and Good Wine
Small Review

Top Ten Tuesday: Books to Movies

Often when I'm reading a book I'll think, wow! This would make SUCH a good movie! Now that The Broke and the Bookish are asking for a list of just such desires, I can't think of which ones I've recently thought that about. So, I've looked over some of my favorite books, thinking about them with regard to movies, and here's what I've come up with:

Top Ten Books I Wish Would Become a Movie

1. Pope Joan...I heard once this was going to be a movie, but I've never seen anything more about it
2. Katherine by Anya Seton.... epic love story on the screen!
3. The Shadow of the Wind... I think this would an awesome movie mixing the bookish fanaticism, the love story and the horror all in one!
4. The Historian... let's see some REAL vampire stuff and maybe learn something too
5. Partials... here's a more recent read that I think would make a fun movie
6. The Name of the Wind... we know from the Game of Thrones success that people love watching epic fantasies come to life
7. The Night Circus... I think this would make a beautiful movie

And some that ARE being made movies:

8. Ender's Game
9. The Book Thief
10. Life of Pi

All that being said, having a favorite book be turned into a movie is a scary scary thing. And those three listed right above? Ah, I'm so nervous. Please people, do a good job with them!

What books would you like to see as a movie? Does it make you nervous when it actually DOES become one?

Review: The House at Tyneford by Natasha Solomons

Book: The House at Tyneford by Natasha Solomons
Genre: Historical Fiction
Rating:''''' 
For: Read Along
From: Bought at Changing Hands bookstore in Arizona


SPOILER FREE REVIEW:

I really loved this book. But I knew I would. It was just what I needed, an adult historical romance in among all the YA dystopia and MG fantasy I've been reading of late.

This book tells the story of a girl from Vienna Austria, who, just before WWII is about to start, goes to live as a domestic servant in a big manor house in England. This is because her family can feel the imminent threat to Jewish people, and they send her there to protect her, while they wait for Visas to go to America. The plan is that everyone will meet up in about a year's time, in America.

In reading the author note that follows the book, this is in fact what many families did to survive. I'd never heard of it before, but I guess this is what the author's great aunt did, thus the inspiration for the story. She was also inspired by the stories of beautiful seaside English houses that were taken over by the army during the war. She based this on one a specific village called Tyneham.

Of course the story goes on to tell of the relationships the girl makes in England, the attachment she forms with the land and the house, and the worry she has over what's happening with her family that she left behind.... all of which make for a wonderful tale.

As mentioned last week, I loved the writing style, full and rich and easy. I loved the characters, I loved the setting... a place a could easily see myself falling in love with and want to stay at forever. And of course I also loved all the tragedy, since I seem to be a sucker for those kind of stories!

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS.... FULL OF SPOILERS... proceed with caution: 
(From our read along host:  Carrie at Books and Movies)

What is your opinion of where Mr. Rivers and Elise's relationship ends up?

I thought it was great, despite the age difference. But it hurt and I couldn't forget about poor Kit. Still, I think they both ended up having wonderful happy lives because they decided to say what the heck to social mores and go with their hearts.

As you see it, what events led to Tyneford's fate?

The war of course. I think no matter what else would have happened, the war is ultimately to blame.

What significance did Tyneford have to Elise, Kit, and Mr. Rivers?

As I've mentioned before, the setting should be considered a major character in this book. You really get a feel for its personality and its effect on everyone. I think the house permeated the very beings of all three of these characters....the Rivers men through birth and blood and Elise inherited it. It's the very essence of who they are. Which makes it all the sadder that things couldn't work out.

Can a place like Tyneford exist in today's world?

I would have to say, not in the sense that it did during the time this book was written, but I still believe that a place, or a house or a location can have a profound impact on people and can get under their skin and change who they are. I would say my grandma's farm in Idaho would be such a place for me.

Why do you think the novel in the viola blank?

Ah, good question! Why indeed? Did her father put it in there blank? Gosh, that seems like a lot of trouble! I like the speculation that it was so she would write her own story, but still. I don't know.

Anyway. I'm so glad I managed to fit this one in just in time to join the last bit of the read along! It makes me realize that I need to be sure and keep historical fiction in my reading line up. Why do I neglect it so?

Bottom line: I loved it!

Other Reviews:

Books and Movies
The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader
Devourer of Books
Wicked Little Pixie

April Reading Recap

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Well, only five books read this past month of April. Not sure why..... they weren't big or hard or anything. At this rate, the 100 book a year goal is totally silly. Time to pick it up!

Here's what I managed:

Froi of the Exiles by Melina Marchetta:  Froi is given a task to accomplish which takes a crazy twist and he ends up learning much more about himself than he ever would have imagined.

Return to Exile by E.J. Patten: Sky battles monsters in order to save his uncle and his parents.

The House at Tyneford by Natasha Solomons: Elise goes to work as a domestic servant in England during WWII and falls in love.

Supernaturally by Kiersten White: Evie meets a new friend and ends up working for the IPCA again even though she'd really rather not.

Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson: Every morning when she wakes up, Christine cannot remember her life or the people in it so she starts a journal to help her and then, oh boy... the things she learns!


Watership Down by Richard Adams: after reading about 130 pages, I gave up. :(


Actually in looking back at my goals for this month, I nearly accomplished them! So, maybe it wasn't all bad after all. Favorites of this month are Froi and The House at Tyneford, hands down, I loved them both.


Plans for May:

• Finally read A Wise Man's Fear, which I have started... one chapter in!
• Finish Precious Bane for book club, currently half way done on this one. Interesting so far.
• catch up on some challenges... a classic, a classic retelling and maybe an Odd Thomas
• maybe a Cassandra Clare book
• Insurgent, Delusions and Pandemonium..... all would be nice.

The month is wide open! I expect good things! I expect to knock off a bunch from the TBR pile! Here's hoping!