Booking Through Thursday - Celebrity Memoirs

Suggested by Callista83:
Do you read celebrity memoirs? Which ones have you read or do you want to read? Which nonexistent celebrity memoirs would you like to see?

Not many, but I read one last year by Sandra Lee who does the Semi-Homemade show on Food Network. I loved her tablescapes and easy, realistic way to cook and thought it might be a fun read. Unfortunately it was more of a vehicle to slam her parents, especially her mom. It kind of ruined the show for me.

I read a biography on Cary Grant and a couple others but they always seem slanted with the author simultaneously idealizing and putting down the subject. I would love to read a good balanced memoir and/or biography so if someone has any suggestions let me know.

Booking Through Thursday - Fantasy and Sci-Fi

So! In my Official Capacity as a writer of science fiction and fantasy, I hereby proclaim June 23 Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Day! A day of celebration and wonder! A day for all of us readers of science fiction and fantasy to reach out and say thank you to our favorite writers. A day, perhaps, to blog about our favorite sf/f writers. A day to reflect upon how written science fiction and fantasy has changed your life.
So … what might you do on the 23rd to celebrate? Do you even read fantasy/sci-fi? Why? Why not?

I don't read alot of sci-fi and fantasy and am trying to remedy this. I have several new books on my TBR shelf and will look through them to have a post ready on the 23rd.

I started school this week and boy, oh boy I am out of practice! My counselor suggested I take Communications 1A as my summer class just to get my feet wet again. I took Debate over at San Jose State but the nursing program requires this specific class. I thought it would be a cakewalk because public speaking doesn't really bother me.

But oh my goodness the workload! In four days I had to write, practice, and deliver a 3 minute speech and take a test on the first two chapters in the book. Right after that we started on a strict expository speech for next week. Then a test on 3 chapters next Thursday! This is going on for 6 weeks! I'm so glad to only have one class.

Thank You!

A big thank you to Danielle over at A Work in Progress for this lovely bookmark. She was giving it away in a giveaway. She is such a nice person and does reviews on some really great books.

I have some more new books in my ever-growing TBR bookshelf. It used to be a single shelf, then a whole bookshelf, and now it has expanded to yet another bookshelf! Here they are:

Silent on the Moor - The third installment to the Lady Julia Grey series. A Victorian crime mystery, Lady Julia is a sassy young widow who seems to get in the middle of everything.

Afternoon of a Good Woman - The musings of a magistrate who is leaving her husband. I am trying to collect more Virago Modern Classics but they are a challenge to locate. This one was on Amazon but I may have to go straight to the publishing house for the rest.

The Sound of Butterflies - Rachael King's debut novel is about an amateur naturalist that goes to Brazil to find a type of butterfly and returns to his wife as a shell of his former self.

The House at Riverton - Another debut novel , this one by Kate Morton. It is about Grace, a serving girl to the crumbling estate of the Asbury family in the years of WWI.

Winter in Madrid - Danielle did a splendid review on this book which made me eager to read it. Called an atmospheric historical novel, it takes place just after the civil war in Spain.

In the Woods - another debut novel, this time a procedural crime drama about child murders, both past and present.

Right now I am reading Afternoon of a Good Woman and enjoying it immensely. It is suprisingly candid on some subjects. I'll be finished with it soon but I have not decided what to read next.

Booking Through Thursday - Niche

There are certain types of books that I more or less assume all readers read. (Novels, for example.)
But then there are books that only YOU read. Instructional manuals for fly-fishing. How-to books for spinning yarn. How to cook the perfect souffle. Rebuilding car engines in three easy steps. Dog training for dummies. Rewiring your house without electrocuting yourself. Tips on how to build a NASCAR course in your backyard. Stuff like that.
What niche books do YOU read?

I have alot of this sort of book in my house and for a while they rivaled my fiction books in number. A whole bookshelf in my kitchen is filled with cookbooks and the one in the living room has home decorating books. My craft room/library/exercise room has cross stitch, quilting, scrapbook, and sewing books.

I love science and have many books on space and astrophysics, all branches of the life sciences, and especially anatomy. I also just counted five math books on the shelf above my desk where I am sitting. My daughter is a pagan so in order to understand I have books on that, especially the tarot which is a specific interest of hers.

The Four Last Things

Andrew Taylor

Hyperion

4 stars

I have been reading alot of good books lately! This has been a great reading year and very different from last where I couldn't seem to find a good one to save my life. The Four Last Things is no exception. I usually steer clear of child kidnapping stories because they are just too disturbing for me but this one is very, very good and worth a read.

Sally and Michael Appleyard are going through a tough patch in their marriage. For police officer Michael, firm beliefs in a two-career marriage disintegrate once daughter Lucy is born while Sally, an ordained deacon, is having enough problems trying to get people to accept her unusual role. Both love little Lucy and the nightmare begins when she is snatched from the babysitters.

Eddie the kidnapper has an unusual story and it was fascinating in a sick sort of way to discover what kind of background creates a pedophile. Taylor skillfully uses both nature and nurture theories. We find that Eddie is non-violent and just a pawn in a much more terrifying game. The ending reveals a twist that leads to the second book of this Roth trilogy.

Taylor writes realistic, multi-layered characters and even our bad guy Eddie is not a one dimensional villain. Sally's character rang true to me and in the face of devastating loss her feelings of emptiness and loss of faith were genuine. The story bounces back and forth between past and present and mostly from Eddie to Sally. It builds to a very satisfying ending, leaving me excited to read the next two of the trilogy.

Green Darkness

Anya Seton

Chicago Review Press

4 1/2 stars

Celia and Richard Marsdon are having serious marital troubles. Richard is withdrawing into religion while Celia is having strange visions of an earlier period in history. It all comes to a head one weekend when friends join the couple on their estate. Amongst this cast of characters is the fascinating Dr. Akananda, a guru-like doctor who believes in reincarnation. He watches Celia with great interest and when a savage act of domestic violence threatens both marriage and Celia's life, he steps in. Convinced she must relive tragic outcomes of a former life, he guides her on a voyage of discovery and healing. We go back in time to just after Henry VIII dies and several relatives are fighting for the throne and control of England.

Seton is an amazing historian and is able to recount stories in great detail and from different angles. Reincarnation historical romances remind us that there is nothing new under the sun as there is heartbreak, betrayal, and just plain bad timing in every age. In Green Darkness, religious intolerance was the catalyst for most political intrigues and both Protestant and Catholic used their "one true faith" to gain control and power over the masses. A person's religion saturated everything in their lives for good or ill.

The love story of Celia and Brother Stephen was an interesting way to show the contrast between the sacred and the secular. As with religion in that time, there was ultimately no way to bring the two together in any meaningful way and it ended up destroying them both.

This story holds a warm place in my heart although Katherine is my favorite of Anya Seton's works. Both are highly recommended.

Sunday Salon

I'm writing a post very quickly before the internet goes down again. It was shut down for four days in our area for upgrades, worked for a couple hours Friday and went down again. Everytime this happens you have to wait for the little light to go on in the moden, then call Verizon, and they help you to reconnect. Oh the disadvantages of living in a small town.

I am doing quite a bit of reading and having a ball with it. Next week I start school and am so ready to begin this new adventure. I remember a couple years ago after a string of bad jobs and one sensational layoff, my husband said to stay home, relax, and enjoy myself. Read, do cross stitch, whatever I want. It was great for a while I have to admit. Then it wasn't. Not at all.

I just started A Breach of Promise and am not very far in. I still need to write reviews on Green Darkness and The Four Last Things but am waiting to see if the internet connection holds or if they need to do more tests and upgrades. Suffice it to say for now that I enjoyed both books very much.

Last Rituals

Yrsa Sigurdardottir

Harper

3 Stars

Lawyer Thora Gudmundsdottir is surprised when she is contacted to investigate the murder of Harald Guntlieb, a German student who was the victim in a brutal slaying and postmortem mutilation. His well-to-do family is not convinced that the man in custody committed the crime and want her to check things out and act as translator for family associate Matthew Reich who is in Iceland to investigate.

As a student of medieval witchcraft, Harald the pair do not know if this is a personal attack or has something to do with his studies. The disappearance of a valuable document points the case in a certain direction, but nothing is as it seems as the two trudge through the freezing Icelandic weather to check out every clue.

Well crafted and creepy, this mystery is full of twists, turns, and red herrings before coming to a surprising ending. Sigurdardottir has certainly done her homework with Medieval Icelandic and Norse manuscript history. Woven into the story it was very interesting and educational. This is a great first book in a series and I already have plans to get her next one, My Soul To Take.

New Books!

I have been buying books left and right these past couple of months. My TBR shelf is groaning but I am happy. Historical fiction, mysteries, and a light but sweet romp through Austenland is the fare for today.

I found Austenland on the bargain table for a few dollars. I laughed out loud when I read the inside cover.

Jane Hayes is a seemingly normal young New Yorker but she has a secret. Her obsession with Mr. Darcy, as played by Colin Firth in the BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice is ruining her life. No real man can compare.

I actually know women who say this truthfully!

I talked about Green Darkness on my Sunday Salon post. I have started reading it and am being transported back to not only Celia's reincarnated life, but my own young adulthood. I am having a ball with it.

I am looking forward to Through a Glass Darkly by Karleen Koen who is a new author for me. It is set in 18Th century Paris and according to the back has the extravagance and scandal of a grand and glorious era.

American Gods

Neil Gaiman

Harper Perennial

Classics Challenge

5 Stars

Dark and atmospheric, this highly ambitious work brings the reader on an odyssey strewn with old myths and discarded gods. This odd journey through the backroads of America resonates on many levels as different cultures are cleverly revealed through ancient belief systems and how they morphed into the gods of today. The search for identity, both personal and cultural is mirrored in castoff belief systems and throwaway human beings.

Prison inmate Shadow is scheduled to be released on parole but is released early at the devastating news that his wife has been killed in a car crash. Strangely unemotional he meets Mr. Wednesday who seems to know everything about Shadow and wants to hire him as a sort of bodyguard/errand boy. With nowhere else to go he reluctantly accepts and is plunged into the strange world of gods first brought to America by immigrants and now live forgotton on the edges of society. Lacking believers and devotion they languish in purposelessness until Mr. Wednesday tells them of the great final battle prepared between them and the newer gods of today.

There is so much going on I don't want to give anything away. Suffice it to say that it is an amazing work. I looked through the discussion questions at the end and one in particular caught my eye. "Gaiman, who now lives in the U.S. is originally from England. How might his perspective as a relative outsider affect his view of America?"

I am actually quite impressed with his view of America which is arguably better than alot of ours. We as Americans often find ourselves at odds for our "melting pot" status. The entire spectrum runs between embracing our differences to shocking forms of bigotry and hatred. Gaiman understands the simple truth: everyone here came from somewhere else. Our entire culture has been created by differences in religions and traditions from countries around the world. Americans often forget just how unique we are.

It was interesting to try to guess which god Shadow was interacting with while being reminded again and again of the voracious appetite for blood in most ancient religions. American Gods is very dark at times as stories of poor immigrants, bond servants, and slaves are told in stark detail. The story of the twin slave children is particularly disturbing. Gaiman avoids all the appallingly familiar forms of American denial in his storytelling.

We have almost all of Gaiman's books in our home but for some reason this is the first one I have read. There are treasures sitting untouched on my bookshelves. Neverwhere is next on my Gaiman list.