Skelton's Book Tree

This Is Not A Test

2012-02-07T09:04:00.001-06:00

This Is Not a Test by Courtney Summers
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
From Goodreads

It’s the end of the world. Six students have taken cover in Cortege High but shelter is little comfort when the dead outside won’t stop pounding on the doors. One bite is all it takes to kill a person and bring them back as a monstrous version of their former self. To Sloane Price, that doesn’t sound so bad. Six months ago, her world collapsed and since then, she’s failed to find a reason to keep going. Now seems like the perfect time to give up. As Sloane eagerly waits for the barricades to fall, she’s forced to witness the apocalypse through the eyes of five people who actually want to live. But as the days crawl by, the motivations for survival change in startling ways and soon the group’s fate is determined less and less by what’s happening outside and more and more by the unpredictable and violent bids for life—and death—inside. When everything is gone, what do you hold on to?

This book isn't just about zombies. This book is about what would REALLY happen if there actually were a zombie apocalypse. We're not talking about guns blazing and hatchets swinging. This is what I imagine would really "go down" if zombies came to my town.

The story is told from Sloan's point of view. Her life is already a living nightmare and she's ready to check out. Her last thread of hope slipped quietly away in the night driving a beat-up old Volkswagen. She's now considering a desperate alternative and then a scream outside her house changes everything. What happens next is a fusion of personalities thrust together for the fight of their lives.

After the initial relief of finding a safe place to hide out from the zombies the tension builds among the cast of characters. Trust doesn't come easy and confrontations are inevitable. The five teens who come together have many flaws. You can't help but grieve for them because you might see someone you know...a brother, a daughter, or your best friend.

This is Not a Test isn't about the shambling dead outside. It's about the scared teenagers trapped inside and they're still dealing with all the issues that make being a teenager difficult...without the living dead.

Don't expect to feel good at the end of this story. This novel is gritty and raw and it will leave you holding your breath thinking "wow, someone should have warned me!" I loved it! Even though the living dead don't make many appearances the ending just blew me away. Up until this moment Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth was my favorite young adult zombie novel. Courtney's, This is Not a Test is without a doubt my other favorite. I received this copy for review and I'm so thankful for that opportunity. This is the first novel I've read of Courtney's but it won't be the last.

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Circus of the Dead

2012-01-24T18:50:00.001-06:00

I don't know about you but nothing chills my blood more than the thought of zombies and a circus! Circus of the Dead is a free book on Barnes and Noble for the Nook. I stumbled across this one while checking out a friend's Lend Me books. We both have a morbid taste in zombie lit and I just couldn't pass it up. Here's what Goodreads has to say:

Circus of the Dead
by Seth Blackburn
3.43 · rating details · 21 ratings · 4 reviews
Twenty years ago, the dead destroyed the world of the living. The survivors scattered in the wake of the Scourge, erecting small towns in the worlds' most sparsely populated areas.

For young Gabriel, the walking dead are merely the memories that haunt the eyes of those old enough and lucky enough to have survived. He is more concerned with his hard life in America's desert, where his chores keep him busy and the husks of books stashed beneath the cellar of the library are his only freedom.

Until the circus comes to town.

"Circus of the Dead" is a novelette of approximately 10,748 words

Do clowns scare you? They sure as heck scare me...especially the Stephen King kind from IT. I will follow up with a full and complete review on this. It's a short one- just 64 pages on my Nook:-)

Where Darkness Dwells

2012-01-22T12:03:00.000-06:00

Where Darkness Dwells by Glen Krisch
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

From Goodreads

During a hot summer night in 1934, tragedy strikes when two local boys search for the truth behind a local legend. They stumble upon the Underground, a network of uncharted caverns just below the surface of Coal Hollow. Time holds no sway in the Underground. People no longer age and their wounds heal as if by magic. By morning, one boy is murdered, while the other never returns home.

As a fan of the zombie genre I was delighted for the opportunity to read a new tale about the undead. After reading the summary I could hardly wait to sink my teeth into Where Darkness Dwells. It did not disappoint! Underneath Coal Hollow there's a network of tunnels leading to a paradise for the dark hearts of men. Two boys in search of adventure stumble across something so sinister it will leave one family heartbroken and the other searching for the truth.

Ellie and Jacob are such memorable characters. Their innocence and perseverance was refreshing. They know the pain of loss and disappointment yet they still reach out and connect with those who can offer them hope. It's been awhile since I cared so much about the characters in a novel. Ellie and Jacob kept me racing to the end, holding my breath, needing to know their fate- good or bad.

Having read so many zombie novels I've started to look for concepts that make a novel stand out from the rest. I often wonder if the next author will bring something to the table that hasn't been done before and will they be able to convince me it could really happen! Glen Krisch did just that. Where Darkness Dwells is a new spin on the zombie genre or to be more accurate- the undead and the cost of immortality.

I would highly recommend this novel to those who enjoy dark tales and sinister small towns. As a side note...I'm from Illinois and my great grandfather was a coal miner. I was delighted to see local towns I've been to mentioned throughout the story. I have every intention of reading more written by this author and have my sites set on his novella Loss.

I received this e-book for review and boy am I glad Glen Krisch stumbled across my little universe in cyberspace!

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The Borrower

2012-01-15T12:43:00.000-06:00

The Borrower: A Novel by Rebecca Makkai
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

From Goodreads

Lucy Hull, a young children's librarian in Hannibal, Missouri, finds herself both a kidnapper and kidnapped when her favorite patron, ten- year-old Ian Drake, runs away from home. The precocious Ian is addicted to reading, but needs Lucy's help to smuggle books past his overbearing mother, who has enrolled Ian in weekly antigay classes with celebrity Pastor Bob. Lucy stumbles into a moral dilemma when she finds Ian camped out in the library after hours with a knapsack of provisions and an escape plan. Desperate to save him from Pastor Bob and the Drakes, Lucy allows herself to be hijacked by Ian. The odd pair embarks on a crazy road trip from Missouri to Vermont, with ferrets, an inconvenient boyfriend, and upsetting family history thrown in their path. But is it just Ian who is running away? Who is the man who seems to be on their tail? And should Lucy be trying to save a boy from his own parents?

What a fun little book. I enjoyed the adventures of Lucy and Ian "on the lamb" and constantly wondered how this whole mess would turn out. There were some laugh out loud moments- "we're Ferret-Glo twins!" The ending was a little hard to swallow but it was satisfying nonetheless. I encourage those who love libraries and the joy of reading to pick this one up.

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The Hunger Games Trailer!

2012-01-15T10:46:00.002-06:00

Love this series! I can't believe I'm going to say this but I think the movie is going to be (almost) better than the book. Watch this trailer and tell me what you think...

Am I right?!?!?

As an added note- where have I been? Just realized that's Lenny Kravitz as Cinna! Woo hoo! My anticipation just went up several notches.

11/22/63

2012-01-02T12:55:00.000-06:00

11/22/63 by Stephen King
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

From Goodreads

November 22nd, 1963 was a rapid-fire sequence of indelible moments: Shots ring out; a president slumped over; a race to the Dallas hospital; an announcement, blood still fresh on the First Lady's dress. But what if President John F. Kennedy didn't have to die; if somehow his assassin could have been thwarted? For Maine schoolteacher Jake Epping, those hypothetical what if's become real possibilities when he walks through a portal to the past. Without special skills and still unfamiliar with his new/old surroundings, he struggles to discover a way to change the history he left. Like its Under the Dome predecessor, Stephen King's 960-page novel shows that this master of suspense is back at the top of his game.

I really enjoyed this book. I can't say that I was dying to read it...it wasn't exactly horror but it was a dark story at times. I always watch out for those Stephen King "threads" from his other novels. He didn't disappoint- the "Losers Club" from IT made an appearance. The ending was a little "Back to the Future" for me but I'm o.k. with it. SK could have made this novel a little shorter. I admit I skimmed a lot towards the end- I really wanted to know who the heck "the yellow card man" was! I think most Stephen King fans will enjoy this novel and JFK enthusiasts (especially those who like conspiracy theories) will too.

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Yet Another Zombie Book

2012-01-02T10:08:00.000-06:00

Bits of the Dead by Keith Gouveia

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

From Goodreads

They live. They die. They return. Zombies. 38 authors. 38 gut-wrenching tales. Flash fiction at its finest, all illustrated by underground favorite Sean Simmans and edited by Keith Gouveia. Stories by Piers Anthony, Robert Appleton, Joel Arnold, Drew Brown, Adam-Troy Castro, Nick Cato, C.M. Clifton, Christopher Allan Death, Ed Dempster, J.G. Faherty, Paul A. Freeman, Charles A. Gramlich, J.H. Hobson, M.M. Johnson, Michael Josef, Kiernan Kelly, Nancy Kilpatrick, Michael Laimo, Catherine MacLeod, James Newman, Kurt Newton, Jeff Parish, Matthew John Peters, Jeffrey C. Pettengill, Daniel Pyle, Gina Ranalli, Steven Savile, Julia Sevin, R.J. Sevin, Nate Southard, Jeff Strand, Simon Strantzas, Marcie Lynn Tentchoff, Lee Thomas, William T. Vandemark, Steve Vernon, Tim Waggoner, John Weagly Bits of the Dead is a hard-hitting, pulse-pounding collection of zombie tales that'll have you ripping through the pages faster than a ghoul through a warm body.

Junk food for the brain....these are entertaining little "bites" of zombie fiction. Great price for zombie fiction fans:-)

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Nook Color Review

2011-04-03T11:07:00.000-05:00

     It's been 3 months since I became a Nook Color owner and the results are in. I love it! I'm also a Kindle owner so I have something I can compare the NC to. I'm sure you're asking the question, "why buy another e-reader when you already own one?" Reason A- I'm a gadget nerd. Reason B- color and a touch screen. Reason C-magazines in full color.

The shopping experience on the Kindle left something to be desired. I usually did the shopping for new books on my laptop and sent the book to my Kindle. You could barley see the covers, no color to entice me, and constantly having to hit the back button to get back to the list of books. Shopping on the Nook Color is a joy:-) Colorful covers, ease of reading reviews and book details, and navigating the store is just a better experience. Recently my local library started loaning e-books and now I can check out books to download to my NC (something I am unable to do on the Kindle). PDF files, Microsoft Word files, and photos are all easily viewed on the NC and there's even an SD card slot to store more stuff. I like it that I can read the NC in the dark without having to attach an external night light. The brightness of the screen can be turned up or down.

      Wait! There's more! Coming this April, NC will be receiving a software update that will turn the NC into a more tablet-like gadget:-) Barnes and Noble will be adding an app store and it's rumored they will have an Angry Birds app (for those who like that kind of thing). To me, the apps are like icing on the cake. I purchased the NC color because I'm an avid reader and I wanted a gadget that was tailored to the reading experience. If I had wanted a tablet I would have bought an iPad.

     With all the above said...I think the Kindle is a good e-reader too. I recommend it to people who experience eyestrain from a backlit screen. The Kindle is much more portable as it is very light (especially the latest Kindle 3). The battery life is far better than the NC ...my number one complaint. Barnes and Noble claim 8 hours on the NC but I disagree.

     I'm hoping with the NC software update some improvements will be made. I would very much like the ability to delete books and samples directly from the device. I would like the ability to password protect certain shelves in the library. I would also like to see "book picks" from someone new once in awhile instead of Sessalee month after month. Those of you who already own a NC know what I mean:-)

Countdown to The Dark and Hollow Places

2011-03-18T16:34:00.000-05:00

I don't know whether to be happy or sad that the final book in Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth series is due out March 22nd. This series has been hands down my favorite in zombie literature. I wish it didn't have to end but have heard through the grapevine that one more short story will be released and it will be set in the time after "The Return." The short story collection is entitled Enthralled: Paranormal Diversions and is due out in September. For now, I have The Dark and Hollow Places pre-ordered on my Nook Color and can't wait to see it on my Nook homepage Wednesday morning!

The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan
Published March 22, 2011
ya, hardcover 384 pages

There are many things that Annah would like to forget: the look on her sister's face before Annah left her behind in the Forest of Hands and Teeth, her first glimpse of the Horde as they swarmed the Dark City, the sear of the barbed wire that would scar her for life. But most of all, Annah would like to forget the morning Elias left her for the Recruiters.
Annah's world stopped that day, and she's been waiting for Elias to come home ever since. Somehow, without him, her life doesn't feel much different than the dead that roam the wasted city around her. Until she meets Catcher, and everything feels alive again.
But Catcher has his own secrets. Dark, terrifying truths that link him to a past Annah has longed to forget, and to a future too deadly to consider. And now it's up to Annah: can she continue to live in a world covered in the blood of the living? Or is death the only escape from the Return's destruction?

From Goodreads

2011 YA Reading Challenge

2011-01-13T18:02:00.000-06:00

I didn't do too well with my 2010 reading Challenges but I met and exceeded the YA Reading Challenge so I decided to do this one again! Here are the rules:

1. Anyone can join. You don't need a blog to participate. Create a post about the challenge and link your challenge post up in the linky below.

--Non-Bloggers: Post your list of books in the comment section of the wrap-up post.

2. There are four levels:

--The Mini YA Reading Challenge – Read 12 Young Adult novels.

--The "Fun Size" YA Reading Challenge – Read 20 Young Adult novels.

--The Jumbo Size YA Reading Challenge – Read 40 Young Adult novels.

--The Mega size YA Reading Challenge – Read 50+ Young Adult novels.

3. Audio, eBooks, paper, re-reads all count.

4. No need to list your books in advance. You may select books as you go. Even if you list them now, you can change the list if needed.

5. The Challenge starts on January 1, 2011 and goes until December 31, 2011.

I'm doing the Fun Size...20 ya books!

If you would like to participate, head over to For the Love of YA and join in the fun!

Review: Pop by Gordon Korman

2010-12-23T10:06:00.002-06:00

Pop by Gordon Korman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

When Marcus moves to a new town, he doesn’t have any friends. While practicing football for impending tryouts, he strikes up an unlikely friendship with former NFL star Charlie Popovich, nicknamed “The King of Pop”. Charlie is a charismatic prankster, and the best football player Marcus has ever seen. But when his behavior starts getting more and more erratic, Marcus learns the secret that Charlie’s family is desperate to hide: Charlie is suffering from early onset Alzheimer’s from the concussions he sustained while playing professional football.

As Marcus starts at his new school, he meets the starting quarterback: Troy Popovich. Right from the beginning, Marcus and Troy disagree — about football, about Troy’s ex-girlfriend Alyssa, but most of all, about what’s good for Charlie’s future. Marcus is betting that he knows what’s best for The King of Pop. And he will risk everything to help his friend.

I don't usually read books about sports but this was an exception...and boy am I glad I made an exception in this case. Yes, there's a lot of football talk and I mostly skimmed over those parts but this story is also about friendship, family, and compassion. Charlie has a secret but he doesn't really know it. His family tries their best to keep his secret from those who know him but Marcus is determined to find out "what's with this guy?" Most adults know how devastating the effects of Alzheimer's are on the family of those who are afflicted with it but I wonder how many young adults are aware of it. I think this story does well to show the progression of the disease and the heartbreak it is for those who know and love someone suffering with it. Pop made me laugh and cry...this is a story that will stay with you long after you read the last page.

View all my reviews

2010 Reading Challenges

2010-11-26T10:53:00.000-06:00

As the new year is approaching fast I took the time to review how I've done so far on reading challenges I'm participating in. I've concluded that I've failed miserably:-( I came really close on the 2010 Audio Book Challenge...only two left to go but I doubt I'll make it since It's not really my thing. If I commuted to work I would probably listen to more audio books but my drive is a very short one. I fell really short on the 2010 Support Your Local Library Challenge. I use my local library a lot I just don't read as fast as I used to. The same goes for the 2010 E-Book Reading Challenge. I'm happy to announce that I reached my goal for the 2010 Young Adult Reading Challenge (so I don't feel like a complete loser). I even read read 10 more than the required 12. This year when I sign up for 2011 challenges I think I'll be a little more realistic in setting my goals. What about you? How did everyone else do on their 2010 Challenges?

Success!

Book Blogger Hop: Nov. 26-29

2010-11-26T09:10:00.000-06:00

It's Friday and time for the Book Blogger Hop!

The Book Blogger Hop is a weekly event hosted over at Crazy-for-Books where book bloggers and readers can connect to find new blogs to read, make new friends, support each other, and generally just share our love of books! This is my first hop and I'm really excited to participate.

This week's question comes from Sarah who blogs at Writer, Reader, Dreamer:

"What is your favorite book cover?"

Recently I learned that Melissa Marr wrote her first novel for adults. It's release date is June 28, 2011 and it sounds fantastic! The cover alone makes me want to read this book...it looks so sinister. I've watched enough Criminal Minds to know that whatever is in that barn can't be good. The story has all the elements that make up one darn good scary book!

From Goodreads:

The New York Times bestselling author of the Wicked Lovely series delivers her first novel for adults, a story about the living, the dead, and a curse that binds them.

If you would like to join in the fun, here are the rules:

Your blog should have content related to books, including, but not limited to book reviews.

1. Enter your book blog link in the Linky List below
In your link, please state the main genre that you review: eclectic, contemp. fiction, ya, paranormal, mystery, non-fiction, etc.

Please do not list every genre you review - if you are review a variety, please put eclectic! The Hop gets jumbled up if the title is too long, so please limit to one genre. I will be limiting the number of characters in the title to ensure the Hop doesn't look messy! Thank you!

Example: Crazy-for-Books (eclectic adult fiction)

2. Post about the Hop on your blog. Spread the word about the book party! The more the merrier! In your blog post, answer the following question (new question each week!).

3. Visit other blogs in the Linky List! Make new friends! Follow new book bloggers! Talk about books! Rave about authors! Take the time to make a quality visit! Check out other posts and content, make a new friend! Don't randomly follow someone if you never intend on actually following them! No spamming please! (Please do not leave your link and not visit other blogs - it's just not cool and not in the spirit of the Hop!)
Heres the Mr. Linky

Stephen King Short Stories

2010-11-11T09:05:00.002-06:00

Stephen King's newest book is out... Full Dark, No Stars. What better way to spend my Thursday night than curled up on my couch diving into this new collection of short stories from the Master of Horror. I was surprised to learn that the e-book version is the same price as the hard back copy from Amazon and considered buying the hardback but alas I couldn't wait so I promptly downloaded. I've been reading great reviews and many reviewers are commenting that he has truly gotten back to his roots (Neil Gaiman's review). So far I would have to agree and I'm not even through the first story:-) On the subject of short stories I'm curious to know how many folks like to read them. I have mixed emotions on this subject. Short stories are good if you don't have a lot of time to invest in a novel. They're kind of like those mini Snickers bars- small but satisfying. On the other hand, if you really want to get lost in a book a short story can just leave you wanting more. In the case of Full Dark, No Stars the stories are really novellas...longer than a short story but shorter than a novel. I guess that's a happy middle:-) If you're a new Stephen King fan (or want a trip down memory lane) below are some of King's other short stories and novellas:

1978

Never trust your heart to the New York Times bestselling master of suspense, Stephen King. Especially with an anthology that features the classic stories "Children of the Corn," "The Lawnmower Man," "Graveyard Shift," "The Mangler," and "Sometimes They Come Back"-which were all made into hit horror films.

"Unbearable suspense." (Dallas Morning News)

From the depths of darkness, where hideous rats defend their empire, to dizzying heights, where a beautiful girl hangs by a hair above a hellish fate, this chilling collection of twenty short stories will plunge readers into the subterranean labyrinth of the most spine-tingling, eerie imagination of our time.

From Goodreads

1981

Different Seasons (1982) is a collection of four novellas, markedly different in tone & subject, each with a journey theme. The 1st is a nonhorrific tale about an innocent man who carefully nurtures hope & devises a wily scheme to escape from prison. The 2nd concerns a boy who discards his innocence by enticing an old man to travel with him into a reawakening of long-buried evil. In the 3rd, a writer looks back on the trek he took with three friends on the brink of adolescence to find another boy's corpse. The trip becomes a character-rich rite of passage from youth to maturity. These 1st three novellas have been made into movies: "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" into Frank Darabont's 1994 The Shawshank Redemption (available as a screenplay, a DVD & an audiocassette), "Apt Pupil" into Bryan Singer's 1998 film Apt Pupil (also released in 1998 on audiocassette), & "The Body" into Rob Reiner's Stand by Me (1986). The final novella, "Breathing Lessons," is a horror yarn told by a doctor, about a patient whose indomitable spirit keeps her baby alive under extraordinary circumstances. It's the tightest, most polished tale in the collection.--Fiona Webster

From Goodreads

1985

In the introduction to Skeleton Crew (1985), his second collection of stories, King pokes fun at his penchant for "literary elephantiasis," makes scatological jokes about his muse, confesses how much money he makes (gross and net), and tells a story about getting arrested one time when he was "suffused with the sort of towering, righteous rage that only drunk undergraduates can feel." He winds up with an invitation to a scary voyage: "Grab onto my arm now. Hold tight. We are going into a number of dark places, but I think I know the way."

And he sure does. Skeleton Crew contains a superb short novel ("The Mist") that alone is worth the price of admission, plus two forgettable poems and 20 short stories on such themes as an evil toy monkey, a human-eating water slick, a machine that avenges murder, and unnatural creatures that inhabit the thick woods near Castle Rock, Maine. The short tales range from simply enjoyable to surprisingly good.

In addition to "The Mist," the real standout is "The Reach," a beautifully subtle story about a great-grandmother who was born on a small island off the coast of Maine and has lived there her whole life. She has never been across "the Reach," the body of water between island and mainland. This is the story that King fans give to their friends who don't read horror in order to show them how literate, how charming a storyteller he can be. Don't miss it. --Fiona Webster

From Goodreads

1993

Many people who write about horror literature maintain that mood is its most important element. Stephen King disagrees: "My deeply held conviction is that story must be paramount.... All other considerations are secondary--theme, mood, even characterization and language."
These fine stories, each written in what King calls "a burst of faith, happiness, and optimism," prove his point. The theme, mood, characters, and language vary, but throughout, a sense of story reigns supreme. Nightmares & Dreamscapes contains 20 short tales--including several never before published--plus one teleplay, one poem, and one nonfiction piece about kids and baseball that appeared in the New Yorker. The subjects include vampires, zombies, an evil toy, man-eating frogs, the burial of a Cadillac, a disembodied finger, and a wicked stepfather. The style ranges from King's well-honed horror to a Ray Bradbury-like fantasy voice to an ambitious pastiche of Raymond Chandler and Ross MacDonald. And like a compact disc with a bonus track, the book ends with a charming little tale not listed in the table of contents--a parable called "The Beggar and the Diamond."--Fiona Webster

From Goodreads

2002

In his introduction to Everything's Eventual, horror author extraordinaire Stephen King describes how he used a deck of playing cards to select the order in which these 14 tales of the macabre would appear. Judging by the impact of these stories, from the first words of the darkly fascinating "Autopsy Room Four" to the haunting final pages of "Luckey Quarter," one can almost believe King truly is guided by forces from beyond.

His first collection of short stories since the release of Nightmares & Dreamscapes in 1993, Everything's Eventual represents King at his most undiluted. The short story format showcases King's ability to spook readers using the most mundane settings (a yard sale) and comfortable memories (a boyhood fishing excursion). The dark tales collected here are some of King's finest, including an O. Henry Prize winner and "Riding the Bullet," published originally as an e-book and at one time expected by some to be the death knell of the physical publishing world. True to form, each of these stories draws the reader into King's slightly off-center world from the first page, developing characters and atmosphere more fully in the span of 50 pages than many authors can in a full novel.

For most rabid King fans, chief among the tales in this volume will be "The Little Sisters of Eluria," a novella that first appeared in the fantasy collection Legends, set in King's ever-expanding Dark Tower universe. In this story, set prior to the first Dark Tower volume, the reader finds Gunslinger Roland of Gilead wounded and under the care of nurses with very dubious intentions. Also included in this collection are "That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French," the story of a woman's personal hell; "1408," in which a writer of haunted tour guides finally encounters the real thing; "Everything's Eventual," the title story, about a boy with a dream job that turns out to be more of a nightmare; and "L.T.'s Theory of Pets," a story of divorce with a bloody surprise ending.

King also includes an introductory essay on the lost art of short fiction and brief explanatory notes that give the reader background on his intentions and inspirations for each story. As with any occasion when King directly addresses his dear Constant Readers, his tone is that of a camp counselor who's almost apologetic for the scare his fireside tales are about to throw into his charges, yet unwilling to soften the blow. And any campers gathered around this author's fire would be wise to heed his warnings, for when King goes bump in the night, it's never just a branch on the window. --Benjamin Reese

From Goodreads

2008

Stephen King-who has written more than fifty books, dozens of number one New York Times bestsellers, and many unforgettable movies-delivers an astonishing collection of short stories, his first since Everything's Eventual six years ago. As guest editor of the bestselling Best American Short Stories 2007, King spent over a year reading hundreds of stories. His renewed passion for the form is evident on every page of Just After Sunset. The stories in this collection have appeared in The New Yorker, Playboy, McSweeney's, The Paris Review, Esquire and other publications.

Who but Stephen King would turn a Port-a-San into a slimy birth canal, or a roadside honky-tonk into a place for endless love? A book salesman with a grievance might pick up a mute hitchhiker, not knowing the silent man in the passenger seat listens altogether too well. Or an exercise routine on a stationary bicycle, begun to reduce bad cholesterol, might take its rider on a captivating-and then terrifying-journey. Set on a remote key in Florida, "The Gingerbread Girl" is a riveting tale featuring a young woman as vulnerable-and resourceful-as Audrey Hepburn's character in Wait Until Dark. In "Ayana," a blind girl works a miracle with a kiss and the touch of her hand. For King, the line between the living and the dead is often blurry, and the seams that hold our reality intact might tear apart at any moment. In one of the longer stories here, "N.," which recently broke new ground when it was adapted as a graphic digital entertainment, a psychiatric patient's irrational thinking might create an apocalyptic threat in the Maine countryside . . . or keep the world from falling victim to it.

Just After Sunset-call it dusk, call it twilight, it's a time when human intercourse takes on an unnatural cast, when nothing is quite as it appears, when the imagination begins to reach for shadows as they dissipate to darkness and living daylight can be scared right out of you. It's the perfect time for Stephen King.

From Goodreads

Short and Sweet Book Review: Three Little Words

2010-11-06T10:21:00.000-05:00

Three Little Words by Ashley Rhodes-Courter
Published January 8, 2008 by Atheneum
ya memoir, Hardcover 320 Pages

Literary awards:

Florida Teens Read Nominee (2009)

"Sunshine, you're my baby and I'm your only mother. You must mind the one taking care of you, but she's not your mama." Ashley Rhodes-Courter spent nine years of her life in fourteen different foster homes, living by those words. As her mother spirals out of control, Ashley is left clinging to an unpredictable, dissolving relationship, all the while getting pulled deeper and deeper into the foster care system.
Painful memories of being taken away from her home quickly become consumed by real-life horrors, where Ashley is juggled between caseworkers, shuffled from school to school, and forced to endure manipulative,humiliating treatment from a very abusive foster family. In this inspiring, unforgettable memoir, Ashley finds the courage to succeed - and in doing so, discovers the power of her own voice.

From Goodreads

I chose this book because I thought it would be a good read-a-like for those who had read A Child Called It by Dave Pelzer. While A Child Called It spoke of the horrors of child abuse at the hands of Dave's mother, Three Little Words described the ways in which child protective services many times fails children in the system. Ashley spent nine years of her life in fourteen different foster homes. By the time she was saved from this dismal existence, including one abusive foster home that would make the headlines, she had put up protective barriers that hardly let anyone in. She was always waiting for the next person to give up on her and send her on to places unknown. When Ashley finally found her forever home with the help of her Guardian ad Litem, Mary Miller, she describes her experience as this:

" I felt safe enough to allow sunlight to sweep the shadows from my life"

This is a book that will stick with me for a long time. It makes you want to go out and make a difference for kids who have suffered the atrocities of the foster care system. If you would like to read more about Ashley Rhodes-Courter, you can visit her website at http://rhodes-courter.com/.

If you're interested in reading more books on the topic of child abuse, check out my reviews of Lessons From a Dead Girl and House Rules.

"Waiting On" Wednesday: Slice of Cherry

2010-11-03T07:03:00.000-05:00

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week I'm waiting on....

Slice of Cherry by Dia Reeves (web site)
Published Jan. 4, 2011 by Simon Pulse
Hardcover 512 pages

Happiness is a bloody knife.

Kit and Fancy Cordelle are sisters of the best kind: best friends, best confidantes, and best accomplices. The daughters of the infamous Bonesaw Killer, Kit and Fancy are used to feeling like outsiders, and that’s just the way they like it. But in Portero, where the weird and wild run rampant, the Cordelle sisters are hardly the oddest or most dangerous creatures around.

It’s no surprise when Kit and Fancy start to give in to their deepest desire—the desire to kill. What starts as a fascination with slicing open and stitching up quickly spirals into a gratifying murder spree. Of course, the sisters aren’t killing just anyone, only the people who truly deserve it. But the girls have learned from the mistakes of their father, and know that a shred of evidence could get them caught. So when Fancy stumbles upon a mysterious and invisible doorway to another world, she opens a door to endless possibilities....

From Goodreads

Looks like some good stuff! Happy reading this week:-)

In My Mailbox

2010-10-31T08:31:00.000-05:00

In My Mailbox is a fun meme hosted at The Story Siren where we share what books we received this week.

Here's what I got...

Paper Towns by John Green

ya, hardcover 305 pages

Published October 4, 2008

When Margo Roth Spiegelman beckons Quentin Jacobsen in the middle of the night—dressed like a ninja and plotting an ingenious campaign of revenge—he follows her. Margo’s always planned extravagantly, and, until now, she’s always planned solo. After a lifetime of loving Margo from afar, things are finally looking up for Q . . . until day breaks and she has vanished. Always an enigma, Margo has now become a mystery. But there are clues. And they’re for Q.

Printz Medalist John Green returns with the trademark brilliant wit and heart-stopping emotional honesty that have inspired a new generation of readers.

From Goodreads

I've been wanting to read this one for awhile so I had a chance to borrow it from the school's reading teacher. So far I really like it:-)

Top Five "Books That Haunt You" and New Blog Design

2010-10-29T17:37:00.003-05:00

Happy Halloween to everyone in blog land! I don't know about you but this is my favorite time of the year...scary movies on t.v., candy, leaves are falling, and of course the time to read good old spooky stories:-) Danny at Dreamy Blog Designs just installed my new blog design and it's absolutely gorgeous! I wanted something that would reflect my love of horror literature (in particular zombies) and she didn't disappoint. I just love the little girl with the striped leggings!

Danny also has a fabulous blog at Bewitched Bookworms that she runs with four of her friends. There you will find great reviews of ya novels and fun contests/giveaways. Please stop by her blogs when you have a chance and consider her when shopping for a blog makeover:-)

In honor of Halloween I decided to do a post on my top five "Books That Haunt You". I got the idea from Audible.com.

Number 5
From Goodreads:

"What of the penetrating cold terror of an old hotel, a haunted place of seductive evil with a malevolent will of its own--and a five-year-old boy of innocent beauty whose mind mirrors the nightmarish secrets of its past?

Behind every door of the Overlook's 110 empty rooms there is a chamber of horror. Little Danny knows of these things because he has the terrible power--

Number 4
From Goodreads:

Swan Song is rich with such characters as an ex-wrestler named Black Frankenstein, a New York City bag lady who feels power coursing from a weird glass ring, a boy who claws his way out of a destroyed survivalist compound. They gather their followers and travel toward each other, all bent on saving a blonde girl named Swan from the Man of Many Faces. Swan Song is often compared to Stephen King's The Stand, and for the most part, readers who enjoy one of the two novels, will enjoy the other. Like The Stand, it's an end-of-the-world novel, with epic sweep, apocalyptic drama, and a cast of vividly realized characters. But the tone is somewhat different: The good is sweeter, the evil is more sadistic, and the setting is harsher, because it's the world after a nuclear holocaust. Swan Song won a 1988 Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel. It's a monster of a horror book, brimming over with stories and violence and terrific imagery--God and the Devil, the whole works.

Number 3
From Goodreads:

A national bestseller — 7 million copies sold. Prosecuting attorney in the Manson trial, Vincent Bugliosi held a unique insider's position in one of the most baffling and horrifying cases of the twentieth century: the cold-blooded Tate-LaBianca murders carried out by Charles Manson and four of his followers. What motivated Manson in his seemingly mindless selection of victims, and what was his hold over the young women who obeyed his orders? Here is the gripping story of this famous and haunting crime.

Number 2
From Goodreads:

In Mary's world there are simple truths.

The Sisterhood always knows best.
The Guardians will protect and serve.
The Unconsecrated will never relent.
And you must always mind the fence that surrounds the village; the fence that protects the village from the Forest of Hands and Teeth.

But, slowly, Mary's truths are failing her. She's learning things she never wanted to know about the Sisterhood and its secrets, and the Guardians and their power, and about the Unconsecrated and their relentlessness. When the fence is breached and her world is thrown into chaos, she must choose between her village and her future-between the one she loves and the one who loves her.

And she must face the truth about the Forest of Hands and Teeth. Could there be life outside a world surrounded in so much death?

And the number 1 is...
From Goodreads:

A haunting and powerful collection of stories from one of America's finest writers, with a new Introduction by Patrick McGrath.
Eerie, unforgettable, and by turns terrifying and hilarious, Shirley Jackson's collection of stories plunges us into a unique, brilliantly etched world where the uncanny lurks in the everyday and where nothing is quite what it seems. In "The Lottery," Jackson's most famous work and one of the greatest—and scariest—stories of the twentieth century, a small town gathers for an annual ritual that culminates in a terrible event. In "The Daemon Lover," a woman waits, then searches, for the man she is to marry that day, only to find that he has disappeared as completely as if he had never existed. In "Trial by Combat," a shy woman confronts her kleptomaniac neighbor, and in "Pillar of Salt," a tourist in New York is gradually paralyzed by a city grown nightmarish. Throughout these twenty-five tales, we move through a variety of emotional landscapes full of loneliness and humor, oddity and cruelty, banality and terror, and searing psychological insight. No reader will come away unaffected.
The only collection to appear during Jackson's lifetime, The Lottery and Other Stories reveals the full breadth and power of this truly original writer.

And there you have it, my top five "Books That Haunt You." It was difficult to pick a number one from so many good horror books but The Lottery has always stood out to me. I find it even creepier that when it was first published people thought it was based on a real town and wanted to know where so that they could go and watch. The Hunger Games seemed to be based on the same idea which is probably why I liked that series so much.

Happy Halloween!

Follow My Book Blog Friday

2010-10-22T06:13:00.002-05:00

Today is Friday and you know what that means! Time to visit and discover new blogs. Please leave a comment and let me know if you are a new follower and I will do the same:-)

This week's question: what are you currently reading?Basically what book is that?

I'm reading Zombies vs Unicorns!

Follow My Book Blog Friday is hosted by Parajunkee's View.

This week I have a guest blogger who is kicking off my "Fright Knight" feature, Stephen King related posts. Lone Wolf at Unscripted is reviewing Stephen King's novel IT. I am inviting the Friday Followers to check out her review here and her talented and original, writing here.

To join the fun and make new book blogger friends, just follow these simple rules:

Follow the Follow My Book Blog Friday Host { Parajunkee.com } and any one else you want to follow on the list
Follow our Featured Bloggers - What Book is That
Put your Blog name and URL in the Linky thing.
Grab the button up there and place it in a post, this post is for people to find a place to say hi in your comments
Follow Follow Follow as many as you can
If someone comments and says they are following you, be a dear and follow back. Spread the Love...and the followers
If you want to show the link list, just follow the link below the entries and copy and paste it within your post!

Guest Blogger Review: IT

2010-10-21T06:30:00.000-05:00

Let me introduce to you, constant readers, a talented young lady and a very dear friend of mine... Lone Wolf. She's the brains behind my new feature "Fright Knight", Stephen King related posts. She's also responsible for my new tagline (coming soon with my new blog design). We were discussing blogging and books when she told me had just read IT. My heart went aflutter when I realized she is now a Stephen King fan too! I asked her to be a guest reviewer for my blog and after reading her thoughts on IT, she made me want to read it all over again. Below is her review. Be sure to stop by her blog Unscripted to read some of her original writings too. She's a gem on the web!

IT by Stephen King
Genre: Adult fiction, horror
Published September 15 1986
Hardcover 1138 pages

From Goodreads:

They were seven teenagers when they first stumbled upon the horror. Now they were grown-up men and women who had gone out into the big world to gain success and happiness. But none of them could withstand the force that drew them back to Derry, Maine to face the nightmare without an end, and the evil without a name. What was it? Read It and find out...if you dare!

IT awaits the seven with unease, trembling while it feeds. The seven are strong it knows but It does not feel real fear. Why should it? The seven are weak, gone are their childhood days. Forgotten are the Barren's of play and with that hopes rays are dulled. They could be herded down to the faded light, down to where everybody does the dead man float. It enjoys this thought, and with it terror blooms. This time there is no hope because the seven have grown, they haven't any room stored away for imagination, thus no power. IT isn't wrong in its assurance it tells itself. So, it kills on. Twenty-seven years IT has been at rest. Twenty-seven years of refused mayhem and gore, now IT feels a new thing... What is IT? Suddenly, IT knows, IT remembers and It must have; Vengeance. With that need IT calls their watchmen, (Micheal Handlen) and to its own agent of hell: ( Henry Bowers) Stephen King's IT sets free all phantoms fathomed with a no nonsense edge. As IT changes form to breed fear into a small town, your fascination is fueled by a variety of characters and story-lines connected by a common shadow of a traumatic past. IT, takes you in farther with off beat layers of humor; you'll never feel this good laughing in the face of evil. This story is guaranteed to bring out the child in you while mirroring the once chilling, thrilling, and most fulfilling wonders of youth. I invite you to follow these seven children, to share in all their delight and fright... "Won't you join the circle?"

A Lone Wolf production all credit reserved to Kim Skelton.
Thank you Kim for allowing me the great honor of being your
friend and guest book review author.
To your avid readers:
Happy hunting.

"Waiting On" Wednesday: Full Dark, No Stars

2010-10-19T20:09:00.000-05:00

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week I'm waiting on....

Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King

Published: November 9 2010

Hardcover 352 pages

From Goodreads:

A new collection of four never-before-published stories from Stephen King.

1922
The story opens with the confession of Wilfred James to the murder of his wife, Arlette, following their move to Hemingford, Nebraska onto land willed to Arlette by her father.

Big Driver
Mystery writer, Tess, has been supplementing her writing income for years by doing speaking engagements with no problems. But following a last-minute invitation to a book club 60 miles away, she takes a shortcut home with dire consequences.

Fair Extension
Harry Streeter, who is suffering from cancer, decides to make a deal with the devil but, as always, there is a price to pay.

A Good Marriage
Darcy Anderson learns more about her husband of over twenty years than she would have liked to know when she stumbles literally upon a box under a worktable in their garage. -www.stephenking.com

I've been a Stephen King fan since I can remember. Stephen King has gotten back to his roots with Under the Dome and I'm expecting great things with this short story collection.

In My Mailbox

2010-10-17T08:37:00.001-05:00

In My Mailbox is a fun meme hosted at The Story Siren where we share what books we received this week.

Here's what I got...

Zombies vs Unicorns by Holly Black

Hardcover 432 pages

September 21, 2010

From Goodreads:

It's a question as old as time itself: which is better, the zombie or the unicorn? In this anthology, edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier (unicorn and zombie, respectively), strong arguments are made for both sides in the form of short stories. Half of the stories portray the strengths--for good and evil--of unicorns and half show the good (and really, really bad-ass) side of zombies. Contributors include many bestselling teen authors, including Cassandra Clare, Libba Bray, Maureen Johnson, Meg Cabot, Scott Westerfeld, and Margo Lanagan. This anthology will have everyone asking: Team Zombie or Team Unicorn?

Another trophy to add to my Carrie Ryan Collection, her short story Bougainvillea. Can't wait to read this little beauty! I'm also very excited to read Libba Bray's Prom Night. I thoroughly enjoyed Going Bovine and am very curious to see how her zombie tale plays out. Even though I am firmly on Team Zombie, I believe The Care and Feeding of Your Baby Killer Unicorn by Diana Peterfreund has definite possibilities. I considered getting this book on the Kindle but would have missed out on the awesome cover, fun fonts, and little zombie and unicorn graphics.

Read A-Likes and Review

2010-10-11T10:09:00.000-05:00

This wasn't the way it was supposed to go.

You're just a typical fifteen-year-old sophomore, an average guy named Kyle Chase. This can't be happening to you. But then, how do you explain all the blood? How do you explain how you got here in the first place?

There had to have been signs, had to have been some clues it was coming. Did you miss them, or ignore them?

Maybe if you can figure out where it all went wrong, you can still make it right. Or is it already too late?

Think fast, Kyle. Time's running out. How did this happen?

In his stunning young-adult debut, Charles Benoit mixes riveting tension with an insightful—and unsettling—portrait of an ordinary teen in a tale that is taut, powerful, and shattering.

High school senior Tyler Miller used to be the kind of guy who faded into the background—average student, average looks, average dysfunctional family. But since he got busted for doing graffiti on the school, and spent the summer doing outdoor work to pay for it, he stands out like you wouldn’t believe. His new physique attracts the attention of queen bee Bethany Milbury, who just so happens to be his father’s boss’s daughter, the sister of his biggest enemy—and Tyler’s secret crush. And that sets off a string of events and changes that have Tyler questioning his place in the school, in his family, and in the world.

In Twisted, the acclaimed Laurie Halse Anderson tackles a very controversial subject: what it means to be a man today. Fans and new readers alike will be captured by Tyler’s pitchperfect, funny voice, the surprising narrative arc, and the thoughtful moral dilemmas that are at the heart of all of the author’s award-winning, widely read work.

I decided to write a Read-Alike post about these two books since they were both so similar. Kyle and Tyler are both on the "outside" looking in. They both wish for the attentions of a girl they think they aren't worthy of. They each make decisions that will alter their life in very significant ways. Kyle is a hoodie. He tries to give the impression he doesn't care about much including grades and what his teachers think of him. He scoots through life attempting to be invisible except to the girl he cares about most. What's most interesting about this story is that it is written in second person point of view. It's as if you are the one going through the life of Kyle and experiencing his life firsthand. The other interesting aspect of You is the beginning starts out with the ending. The reader learns right from the start how this is all going to end...tragically. I like to read books that have unconventional methods and this one didn't disappoint. I will say that the hype about this book didn't exactly live up to my expectations though. It was still a good example of how difficult it is to fit in and that high school isn't a positive experience for everyone. I would have liked to have seen Kyle's relationship with his family explored a little more though. Twisted, on the other hand, did demonstrate the family dynamics in a much more in depth way. Tyler didn't fit in at school either but not for the same reasons as Kyle. Kyle had his fellow hoodies to commiserate with while Tyler was a loner until the change in his physical appearance attracted the attentions of the most popular girl in school, Bethany. Bethany wouldn't have given Tyler a second look until he shows up at school his senior year tan and muscular from the all the physical labor over the summer. He also gained bad boy status when he committed a crime and had to serve probation. Gaining the attentions of Bethany started a chain of events that would result in Tyler having to make very drastic decisions about how he wanted to live his life and what it means to be a man. As I mentioned earlier, Tyler's relationship with his family was very central to the story. They weren't unlike many families who do the best they can and sometimes make mistakes in the process. I am giving twisted a 5 star rating. I really felt like the author had a good handle on the emotions of all of the characters and really felt their struggles and pain. I'm giving You four stars because I had a more difficult time getting to know the characters on an emotional level. And finally, I would like to add that Laurie Halse Anderson has become another favorite author of mine. The next book I would like to read of her's is Wintergirls...a story of grief, guilt, and the devastating effects of anorexia.

Short and Sweet Book Review: Lessons From a Dead Girl

2010-09-24T18:14:00.000-05:00

Lessons from a Dead Girl by Jo Knowles

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Leah Greene is dead. For Laine, knowing what really happened and the awful feeling that she is, in some way, responsible set her on a journey of painful self-discovery. Yes, she wished for this. She hated Leah that much. Hated her for all the times in the closet, when Leah made her do those things. They were just practicing, Leah said. But why did Leah choose her? Was she special, or just easy to control? And why didn’t Laine make it stop sooner? In the aftermath of the tragedy, Laine is left to explore the devastating lessons Leah taught her, find some meaning in them, and decide whether she can forgive Leah and, ultimately, herself.

In my quest to read books that have been challenged or banned, in honor of Banned Books Week, this book was second on my list. My first was Laurie Halse Anderson's, Speak. The theme of this book was very difficult to read about-sexual abuse made even more difficult to read by the fact that it was a child who sexually abused another child. It really opened my eyes to how some who are abused go on to become abusers. At times it was difficult to feel sorry for Leah as she was so cruel and manipulative of Laine. Then you realize how tortured and in pain Leah was and what ultimately leads to her untimely demise. What was most heartbreaking for me was the fact that Laine's childhood seemed stolen and what a tragedy that would be. While I was so happy for Laine that she made some true friends, it was disheartening to see her (and her friends) rely so heavily on alcohol use to have a good time. I would recommend this book for an older teen for that reason.

View all my reviews

September Zombies!

2010-09-22T20:45:00.001-05:00

Oh my goodness! How could I have forgotten that September is Zombie Appreciation month?!?!? vvB32 has been celebrating zombies all month and is having a giveaway for Zombie vs Unicorns. I'm "dying" to read this one as it has a story from my favorite author, Carrie Ryan. I'm supposed to convince you, the reader, to see things my way and join team zombie...

Carrie Ryan and The Forest of Hands and Teeth series!

What an amazing series and what sparked my interest in "zombie lit." I've always enjoyed reading post apocalyptic books...my all time favorite, Stephen King's The Stand. When I read about Carrie's first book, The Forest of Hands and Teeth I just knew I had to read it. I was hooked and would "kill" to have an ARC of her upcoming third book, The Dark and Hollow Places. To tide me over in the meantime I read Carrie's short story in the anthology Kiss Me Deadly: 13 Tales of Paranormal Romance. Hare Moon gives readers a little look into Sister Tabitha's world and how she came to be the seemingly cold-hearted Sister she is in TFHT.

If I haven't convinced you so far, check out the trailer for Carrie's second book The Dead-Tossed Waves.

If you want to join in the fun just go here and do the following:

1. Sign guestbook (if you haven't already).

2. Read each team captain's post (links are below) and leave them a comment.

3. Pick a team.

4. Grab the team badge of your choice below and create a blog post with your team preference and link it back to this post ( http://vvb32reads.blogspot.com/2009/02/zombies-vs-unicorns-challenge.html). Make a persuasive statement for your team so that your followers will be compelled to vote for your team too.

Note: all commenters of your post will be eligible to win this book too!

Don't forget to include your post link in comments on this post.

Offer ends Sept. 30, so hurry!

Book Review: The Reapers Are the Angels

2010-09-18T17:05:00.000-05:00

The Reapers Are the Angels by Alden Bell

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

From Goodreads:

Zombies have infested a fallen America. A young girl named Temple is on the run. Haunted by her past and pursued by a killer, Temple is surrounded by death and danger, hoping to be set free.

For twenty-five years, civilization has survived in meager enclaves, guarded against a plague of the dead. Temple wanders this blighted landscape, keeping to herself and keeping her demons inside her heart. She can't remember a time before the zombies, but she does remember an old man who took her in and the younger brother she cared for until the tragedy that set her on a personal journey toward redemption. Moving back and forth between the insulated remnants of society and the brutal frontier beyond, Temple must decide where ultimately to make a home and find the salvation she seeks.

I read this book because it received good reviews here on Goodreads and because I'm a huge fan of "Zombie Lit." I was hoping it would be similar to The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan and while it didn't disappoint it was a very different book. Temple is a tough as nails character who is near and dear to my heart now. I wished she had let people into her heart a little more but I understand why she didn't. She had lost too much and didn't have a very high opinion of herself. The relationship between she and her nemesis was a very interesting one indeed. I would have liked to have seen it end on a little more hopeful note but then again, I don't really like endings that are all tied up in a neat little bow.

View all my reviews

Ban This!

2010-09-18T12:24:00.001-05:00

In honor of Banned Books Week (September 25-October 2), Bites and Steph Su are celebrating the freedom to read by having a month long celebration. If you have a blog you too can participate in the fun by creating a post about banned books then adding your post to Mr. Linky here. In honor of this important event, I read Laurie Halse Anderson's book Speak which has been challenged in school libraries. You can read a post on Laurie's blog about a particular challenge to her book here.

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson (web site)
Published April 23, 2001 by Puffin
Genre: Young Adult
Paperback 198 pages
Literary Awards: National Book Award Nominee for Young People's Literature (1999), Golden Kite Award for Fiction (1999), Horn Book Fanfare Best Book (2000), BCCB Blue Ribbon Book (1999), Edgar Award Nominee for Best Young Adult (2000) Edgar Award Nominee for Best Young Adult (2000), Printz Honor (2000), South Carolina Book Award for Young Adult Book Award (2002), ALA's Top Ten Best Books for Young Adults (2000)

From Goodreads:

Melinda Sordino busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops. Now her old friends won't talk to her, and people she doesn't even know hate her from a distance. The safest place to be is alone, inside her own head. But even that's not safe. Because there's something she's trying not to think about, something about the night of the party that, if she let it in, would blow her carefully constructed disguise to smithereens. And then she would have to speak the truth.

What a powerful book this was to read. It's been awhile since a book brought me to tears...a lump remained in my throat long after I closed the book. As a parent I know how clueless we can be sometimes but I was especially distressed to see how Melinda's parents couldn't see that there was something much deeper beneath the surface of their daughter. I would encourage parents to read this thoughtful story. Sometimes we forget how difficult it is to be a teenager on an average day let alone how it must feel to deal with such a traumatizing event such as rape. I felt the story was completely appropriate for a young adults to read and for those who wish to keep this compelling story out of hands of young adults are living in a fantasy world. We simply cannot shelter our children from all of the perils of the world. Writers like Laurie give a voice to teenagers and hope that anyone can survive the atrocities they might encounter in life. I've heard the phrase from parents that certain books are just too deep for someone so young however they are kidding themselves if they don't acknowledge that our kids are dealing with these "deep" issues now. I've added two other books written by this author, Twisted and Wintergirls. I will also be reading Lessons From a Dead Girl by Jo Knowles since it made the 2009/2010 Banned and/or Challenged book list. If you're interested in seeing this list and others check out Banned Books Week at the ALA site. While you're there check out the Banned Books map to see where in the world these books have been banned or challenged.

And Finally I will be wearing my "I'm With The Banned" t-shirt on Monday to celebrate this worthy cause!

You can buy your own at Upstart!

Short and Sweet Book Review: The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake

2010-09-05T11:33:00.001-05:00

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender (web site)
Publisher: Doubleday, June 1st 2010
Hardcover 293 pages, ya

From Goodreads:

The wondrous Aimee Bender conjures the lush and moving story of a girl whose magical gift is really a devastating curse.

On the eve of her ninth birthday, unassuming Rose Edelstein, a girl at the periphery of schoolyard games and her distracted parents’ attention, bites into her mother’s homemade lemon-chocolate cake and discovers she has a magical gift: she can taste her mother’s emotions in the cake. She discovers this gift to her horror, for her mother—her cheerful, good-with-crafts, can-do mother—tastes of despair and desperation. Suddenly, and for the rest of her life, food becomes a peril and a threat to Rose.

The curse her gift has bestowed is the secret knowledge all families keep hidden—her mother’s life outside the home, her father’s detachment, her brother’s clash with the world. Yet as Rose grows up she learns to harness her gift and becomes aware that there are secrets even her taste buds cannot discern.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake is a luminous tale about the enormous difficulty of loving someone fully when you know too much about them. It is heartbreaking and funny, wise and sad, and confirms Aimee Bender’s place as “a writer who makes you grateful for the very existence of language”

On the day I bought this book I was looking for a good Chick Lit book like Good Grief by Lolly Winston. I noticed The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake on the Bestseller list at Amazon and decided to give it a try. What a gem of a book this was. What grabbed my attention from the description was "loving someone fully when you know too much about them." Rose's gift (or curse) allowed her to feel the feelings of others in the food that they prepare. Rose learns more about her mother than she would have liked to have known when she eats the lemon cake her mother baked for Rose's ninth birthday. What a burden that would be to realize your parent's deepest fears and regrets...especially at such a young age. I really enjoyed this book even though it was a bit of a downer. Her brother's story is a bit tragic and at times the mother and son's relationship made me feel a little uncomfortable. What I loved most about Rose is that she isn't your typical teen, some reviews pegged her as an underachiever but I saw Rose as someone who didn't have the same concerns as many teens and was happy with the little things in life. Her sense of humor had me laughing out loud at times. The end of the book was a bit puzzling to me and I had to Google other readers thoughts on what actually happened. I would recommend this book to young adults...especially those who enjoy something a little quirky (best word I could find to describe).

In My Mailbox

2010-09-05T08:57:00.000-05:00

In My Mailbox is a fun meme hosted at The Story Siren where we share what books we received this week.

Here's what I got...

You by Charles Benoit
Aug. 24, 2010 by Harper Teen
233 pages

This wasn't the way it was supposed to go.

You're just a typical fifteen-year-old sophomore, an average guy named Kyle Chase. This can't be happening to you. But then, how do you explain all the blood? How do you explain how you got here in the first place?

There had to have been signs, had to have been some clues it was coming. Did you miss them, or ignore them?

Maybe if you can figure out where it all went wrong, you can still make it right. Or is it already too late?

Think fast, Kyle. Time's running out. How did this happen?

In his stunning young-adult debut, Charles Benoit mixes riveting tension with an insightful—and unsettling—portrait of an ordinary teen in a tale that is taut, powerful, and shattering.

Reading Teen Back to School Giveaway Bash

2010-09-04T10:51:00.002-05:00

I discovered this contest this morning and it looks awesome! You choose one book from a collection of highly anticipated books to help with the depression (or elation) of back to school month. If there is enough interest there will be a second winner! Check out this post at readingteen.net for information on how to win. I'm hoping to win Dark Song by Gail Giles-looks awesome!

Ends September 24th, 2010

August Wrap Up

2010-09-04T09:54:00.000-05:00

Well...I've been missing in action for the month of August. We went on vacation to Tennessee, I've started a new job, and now I have a terrible summer cold. I didn't get a lot of reading done but what I read, I really enjoyed. Sadly I didn't complete the Dystopian challenge. I hoping that I meet my goals for the other challenges I've been participating in!

The highly anticipated book Kiss Me Deadly came in the mail. I read and loved Hare Moon by Carrie Ryan. It was fascinating to finally read Sister Tabitha's story and learn how she came to be the person she is in The Forest of Hands and Teeth. I haven't read any of the other short stories yet but the reviews I've seen on the internet are good.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake Was a sweet and strange story. I was looking for something quirky and funny. I wouldn't exactly call it funny but it was quirky.

Still Missing is an Adult Fiction book that I wouldn't recommend for young adults. I chose this one because I had been reading good reviews on it. It was highly disturbing at times and had a great twist at the end- I love twists!

I won a book from Goodreads and another blog which I haven't gotten to yet. My TBR pile is huge!

Win an ARC of Scorch Trials

2010-08-02T16:53:00.001-05:00

I have been eagerly awaiting the book and here is a chance to win an ARC!

All you have to do to enter is visit this post at Dashner Dude's blog and leave a comment about a good deed you have done this week or are going to do. Simple huh?

Short and Sweet Book Review: Between Here and April

2010-07-25T09:37:00.002-05:00

Between Here and April by Deborah Kogan (web site)
Genre: adult fiction
Publisher: Algonquin, Sept. 30, 2008
Hardcover 288 pages

From Goodreads:

When a deep-seated memory suddenly surfaces, Elizabeth Burns becomes obsessed with the long-ago disappearance of her childhood friend April Cassidy. Driven to investigate, Elizabeth discovers a thirty-five-year-old newspaper article revealing the details that had been hidden from her as a child-shocking revelations about April's mother, Adele.

Elizabeth, now herself a mother, seeks out anyone who might help piece together the final months, days, and hours of this troubled woman's life, but the answers yield only more questions. And those questions lead back to Elizabeth's own life: her own compromised marriage, her increasing self-doubt and dissatisfaction, and finally, a fearsome reckoning with what it means to be a wife and mother.

Ever since Brook Shields went public about her postpartum depression, the world really learned how devastating this disorder can be (the world also learned what a jerk Tom Cruise is). If Brook had been a mother in the 1970s, it's likely her story might have ended up like Adele's. This book explores the disorder and sheds some light on the progression of mental illness and the link between depression and family history of depression. It also illustrates the lack of understanding of postpartum depression in the 1970s and thus the failure to treat it appropriately. The book started out good and kept me interested however it took a turn I didn't expect. I understand why the author chose the path she took but it didn't really work for me. This is a an adult fiction book and I wouldn't recommend it for young adults due to the sexual content.

Book Giveaway: Hidden Wives

2010-07-24T13:33:00.001-05:00

Crazy For Books is having a book giveaway!

From Goodreads:

Fifteen-year-old Sara and her beautiful sister, Rachel, are too young to legally drive a car—but are approaching spinsterhood in Utah’s secret Blo...more Fifteen-year-old Sara and her beautiful sister, Rachel, are too young to legally drive a car—but are approaching spinsterhood in Utah’s secret Blood of the Lamb polygamist community. Having long since reached the “age of preparedness,” they will soon be married off to much older men selected by the hidden sect’s revered Prophet. As Sara, chosen to become her uncle’s fifth wife, grows more distraught over her impending incestuous marriage, she begins to scrutinize the faith she has followed blindly her entire life. But for Rachel, who will be married to one of the many powerful community leaders vying for her hand, disobeying the Prophet means eternal damnation. Her friendship with the newest member of the community, the young and handsome Luke, starts as an attempt to save his agnostic soul, but ends with the pair falling helplessly in love. When Rachel is forbidden to see him, her absolute faith in the Prophet is severely tested. When Rachel’s future husband is finally announced, violence erupts, and the girls must find the strength to escape the only life they have ever known…before it’s too late.

Hurry on over to Crazy For Books to enter this giveaway, it ends Aug. 1 and there will be three winners!

Short and Sweet Book Review: Crossing

2010-07-24T13:17:00.000-05:00

Crossing by Andrew Fukuda (web site)
Genre: mystery/suspense, ya
Publisher: AmazonEncore, April 27, 2010
Paperback 217 pages

From Goodreads:

A loner in his all-white high school, Chinese-born Xing (pronounced “Shing”) is a wallflower longing for acceptance. His isolation is intensified by his increasingly awkward and undeniable crush on his only friend, the beautiful and brilliant Naomi Lee. Xing’s quiet adolescent existence is rattled when a series of disappearances rock his high school and fear ripples through the blue collar community in which he lives. Amidst the chaos surrounding him, only Xing, alone on the sidelines of life, takes notice of some peculiar sightings around town. He begins to investigate with the hope that if he can help put an end to the disappearances, he will finally win the acceptance for which he has longed. However, as Xing draws closer to unveiling the identity of the abductor, he senses a noose of suspicion tightening around his own neck. While Xing races to solve the mystery and clear his name, Crossing hurtles readers towards a chilling climax.

I became interested in this book when I saw it advertised on Goodreads with the description-creepy. Oh how I love a creepy book! When I finished this book I was really left with the feeling of "how tragic!" Xing is truly an outsider in his own town. No one really knows him except his best friend, and fellow Chinese immigrant, Naomi. When it came right down to it, Naomi didn't really know Xing the way she thought she did. Most people who came in contact with Xing didn't even realize he could speak English. Throughout the story you could feel his contempt towards his town and school. At times you might even dislike him. It's hard enough to fit in when you're a teenager but for Xing this problem is even further complicated by his ethnicity. Another reviewer of this book commented that the prologue gave the impression that the ending would be different than the final outcome-I must agree. This is a dark story...the ending will leave you feeling distraught and pondering the whole mess. I recommend this book if you're in the mood for a brooding, dark mystery. Due to some crude language this book would be appropriate for an older teen.

Follow My Book Blog Friday

2010-07-23T08:44:00.001-05:00

Today is Friday and you know what that means! Time to visit and discover new blogs. Please leave a comment and let me know if you are a new follower and I will do the same:-)

Follow My Book Blog Friday is hosted by Parajunkee's View.

This week I won Picture the Dead by Adele Griffin from Dark Faerie Tales!
I can't wait to read it.

To join the fun and make now book blogger friends, just follow these simple rules:

Follow the Follow My Book Blog Friday Host { Parajunkee.com } and any one else you want to follow on the list
Follow our Featured Bloggers - toreadornottoread-vampangel.blogspot.com/
Put your Blog name & URL in the Linky thing.
Grab the button up there and place it in a post, this post is for people to find a place to say hi in your comments
Follow Follow Follow as many as you can
If someone comments and says they are following you, be a dear and follow back. Spread the Love...and the followers
If you want to show the link list, just follow the link below the entries and copy and paste it within your post!

Create- A- Cover

2010-07-22T13:06:00.001-05:00

Activity #10 for the Summer Break Reading Challenge is to create a fake cover and write a short synopsis. I think is is my favorite activity to date! I've seen this done before on Karin's blog but this is the first time I've participated. For directions for this activity go here.

Modify by Wand J. Martin

In a sport dominated by men, Cassie knows she has what it takes to be a world class motocross racer. So why is she dressed up as a Rockstar Girl passing out trophies to the likes of arrogant Shep Barnes, three time motocross national champion?

When Travis Pastrana comes to town a chance meeting sets the wheels in motion for Cassie to realize her dreams. But can they pull it off?

Everyone at the local dirt track will be in shock and awe when a mysterious new racer shows up out of the blue one day. None more so than Shep who, up until now, was the track's sensation. He makes it his personal mission to discover who the stranger is hiding behind the dark helmet.

Find out what happens when Cassie starts shifting gears and kicking rears!

For fun I'm posting the cover before my edits!

before edits

When I'm Not Reading

2010-07-22T08:22:00.000-05:00

I just discovered this fun meme at The Unread Reader. The point of this meme is to spotlight something we do when we're not...ahem, reading.

About three years ago, I discovered the joys of Photoshop Elements. I already knew how to do the simple stuff like basic color correcting and cropping but that was pretty much it. Now I've taught myself to do minor photo restoration, digital scrapbook pages, and some cool photo effects. It's rather time consuming (like blogging) and tough to pull yourself away from the computer.lol

A photo restoration

Digital scrapbook page of my dog Harley

Another digital page of my son when he was a baby

Photo effect: day to night with fireworks

A great web site for learning Photoshop Elements is
Adobe Photoshop Elements Techniques

What do you do when you're not reading?
To find out more about the When I'm Not Reading meme, check here!

Short & Sweet Book Review: Going Bovine

2010-07-21T10:56:00.001-05:00

Going Bovine by Libba Bray (web site)
Genre: young adult
Publisher: Delacorte Sept. 22, 2009
Hardcover 480 pages

From Goodreads:

Cameron Smith, 16, is slumming through high school, overshadowed by a sister “pre-majoring in perfection,” while working (ineptly) at the Buddha Burger. Then something happens to make him the focus of his family's attention: he contracts mad cow disease. What takes place after he is hospitalized is either that a gorgeous angel persuades him to search for a cure that will also save the world, or that he has a vivid hallucination brought on by the disease. Either way, what readers have is an absurdist comedy in which Cameron, Gonzo (a neurotic dwarf) and Balder (a Norse god cursed to appear as a yard gnome) go on a quixotic road trip during which they learn about string theory, wormholes and true love en route to Disney World. Bray's surreal humor may surprise fans of her historical fantasies about Gemma Doyle, as she trains her satirical eye on modern education, American materialism and religious cults (the smoothie-drinking members of the Church of Everlasting Satisfaction and Snack 'N' Bowl). Offer this to fans of Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy seeking more inspired lunacy.

When I learned Going Bovine won the Printz award I decided I needed to read it to see what all the fuss was about.This book is one of the most quote-worthy books I've ever read...I was laughing out loud throughout the story!

The revolution at CESSNAB:

"My Happiness wants your happiness to go to hell"

Gonzo's tattoo in the shape of a Buddha cow:

"How now mad cow?"

Balder's justification for taking a frat boys drug money:

"His wealth is ill-gotten. And once he dressed me as a "Hootchie Mama" and posted Internet pictures on a fetish site called Naughty Gnomes. I cannot adequately convey the trauma of it."

Knowing Cameron had a terminal disease and that the closer I got to the end of the book meant the closer I got to his death was difficult. I liked this kid and wanted to see a different outcome for him. I'm a mom to a 16 year old boy and can't even imagine such a young life being cut so short. With that said, I think every parent of a teenage boy (and every teenage boy) should read this book. It offers insight for a parent who might wonder "what the heck is going on in my kid's head", and it's full of teenage mayhem that every teenage boy would love. Simply put, it's the road-trip of a lifetime:-)

I highly recommend this book and think that you will fall in love with the characters! It's difficult to pick just one but if I had to I would chose Balder the noble gnome:-)

p.s. Check out my post "My Book in Pictures" of Going Bovine

My Book in Pictures: Going Bovine by Libba Bray

2010-07-19T09:54:00.003-05:00

For the Summer Break Reading Challenge activity #9 our task was to create a blog post using pictures to tell the story we are currently reading or have recently read. I knew I had to use Going Bovine as I just finished listening to it on an audio book. This was by far my favorite book to listen to. I actually started out reading it and then downloaded the free audio version from my library's web site. I know I won't be able to do this book justice (you should read this book), but here goes...

Sixteen year old Cameron Smith is kind of a Slacker. His motto is "No expectations equals no failed expectations equals no hurt feelings. Everything's cool." Everything changes when he learns he has Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, the human form of Mad Cow Disease.

Cameron is visited in the hospital by a punk angel named Dulcie. She tells him there's a cure for his disease but he has to find Dr. X...oh and he has to save the universe too.

Cameron sets off on a wild road trip with his sidekick Gonzo to find Dr. X. Along the way he they must battle the forces of evil.

"Who's your Caddy"
A side note here- this book is filled with "udder" teenage mayhem and hilarious laugh out loud quotes. Every parent of a teenage boy (and every teenage boy) should read this book!

Enter Balder, the Viking god (yard gnome). He's had a rough go of it...being toted around and humiliated by some frat boys. He joins up with Gonzo and Cameron and offers his great Norse wisdom too.

Cameron's adventures are actually the result of his diseased brain however his trip (no pun intended) is significant in finding out who he really is. The message spoke loud and clear to me that it's never too late to become the person you were meant to be...

Going Bovine was the 2010 Printz award winner.

In My Mailbox

2010-07-18T08:54:00.002-05:00

In My Mailbox is a fun meme hosted at The Story Siren where we share what books we received this week.

Here's what I got...

Crossing by Andrew Xia Fukuda (Web Site)

From Goodreads:

A loner in his all-white high school, Chinese-born Xing (pronounced “Shing”) is a wallflower longing for acceptance. His isolation is intensified by his increasingly awkward and undeniable crush on his only friend, the beautiful and brilliant Naomi Lee. Xing’s quiet adolescent existence is rattled when a series of disappearances rock his high school and fear ripples through the blue collar community in which he lives. Amidst the chaos surrounding him, only Xing, alone on the sidelines of life, takes notice of some peculiar sightings around town. He begins to investigate with the hope that if he can help put an end to the disappearances, he will finally win the acceptance for which he has longed. However, as Xing draws closer to unveiling the identity of the abductor, he senses a noose of suspicion tightening around his own neck. While Xing races to solve the mystery and clear his name, Crossing hurtles readers towards a chilling climax.

I've seen the reviews for this one and it looks awesome!

Book Review: The Passage

2010-07-16T09:11:00.001-05:00

The Passage by Justin Cronin (web site)
Genre: horror, apcocalyptic
Publisher: Ballantine, June 8, 2010
Hardcover 766 pages

From Goodreads:

"It happened fast. Thirty-two minutes for one world to die, another to be born."

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. He is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors. But for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—towards the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.
From the Publisher (Random House)

So my first thoughts on this novel are what a great read this was! It's the first time in awhile that I've lost myself in a story. I found myself caring deeply for the characters and praying for their salvation (though you know some of them are gonna die along the way). This book has frequently been compared to Stephen King's The Stand and I'm going to have to strongly agree here. Two comparisons that immediately come to mind are...shared dreams/visions and a wise, old, woman. The Passage's Auntie reminded me so much of Mother Abigail ("I'm 106 years old, and I still makes my own bread."). Like other great apocalyptic reads, there is that desire to know what is still left of the world. In the case of Mary (The Forest of Hands and Teeth) and Peter (The Passage), they want to know about the ocean. Their desire to discover the unknown, even at the risk of losing their lives, is all consuming.

I like the way Cronin drops clues along the journey. I have my own theories of the significance of Amy's Peter the Rabbit...it can't be coincidence.

My only true complaint with The Passage is the confusion I felt when the book jumps ahead about 100 years into the future and describes life in the survivor's colony. The book goes into a lot of detail on the rules of the new society and the roles of the inhabitants. It was the one time I wished I hadn't been reading it on a Kindle, as I would have been flipping back and forth trying to refresh my memory on who was who and from what family they came from.

Another awesome novel that ranks right up there with The Passage and The Stand is Robert McCammon's The Swan Song. What sets this book apart from the other two is that the world ends with a nuclear disaster ...the world is a wasteland. If you've read The Road by Cormac McCarthy then you know what I mean.

I've been reading on the internet that The Passage is the first book in a trilogy-wow, that's pretty ambitious considering the whopping size of this one! With that said, the book ends with somewhat of a cliff-hanger but it's still a satisfying conclusion. I'm really looking forward to his second installment.

"Waiting On" Wednesday:Banished

2010-07-14T08:13:00.001-05:00

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week I'm waiting on....

Banished by Sophie Littlefield
Genre: Fiction, Young Adult
Publisher: Delacorte, Oct. 12 2010

From Goodreads:

Sixteen-year-old Hailey Tarbell can’t wait for the day she’ll leave Gypsum, Missouri, far behind, taking only four-year-old Chub, the developmentally-delayed little boy her cruel drug-dealing grandmother fosters for the state money. But when a freak accident in gym class leaves a girl in critical condition, Hailey feels drawn to lay her hands on the injured girl and an astonishing healing takes place. Before Hailey can understand her new powers, a beautiful stranger shows up…just in time to save her and Chub from hired killers. A desperate race begins, with Hailey as the ultimate prize: there are those who will stop at nothing to harness her gifts to create an undefeatable army of the undead. Now it is up to Hailey and a small but determined family of healers to stand up to the unbelievable and face the unthinkable.

I love to read about "the undead"...this should be a good one:-)

Apocalyptic Read A-likes

2010-07-11T09:00:00.011-05:00

"It's the end of the world as we know it"-REM

For the Summer Break Reading Challenge activity #8 we were to make a Read A-Like list. Ever since reading Stephen King's The Stand I've been captivated by tales of the apocalypse. Currently I'm reading Justin Cronin's The Passage which is fast becoming my second favorite.

From Goodreads, The Passage by Justin Cronin:

"It happened fast. Thirty-two minutes for one world to die, another to be born."

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. He is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors. But for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—towards the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.
From the Publisher (Random House)

From Goodreads, Swan Song by Robert McCammon:

Swan Song is rich with such characters as an ex-wrestler named Black Frankenstein, a New York City bag lady who feels power coursing from a weird glass ring, a boy who claws his way out of a destroyed survivalist compound. They gather their followers and travel toward each other, all bent on saving a blonde girl named Swan from the Man of Many Faces. Swan Song is often compared to Stephen King's The Stand, and for the most part, readers who enjoy one of the two novels, will enjoy the other. Like The Stand, it's an end-of-the-world novel, with epic sweep, apocalyptic drama, and a cast of vividly realized characters. But the tone is somewhat different: The good is sweeter, the evil is more sadistic, and the setting is harsher, because it's the world after a nuclear holocaust. Swan Song won a 1988 Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel. It's a monster of a horror book, brimming over with stories and violence and terrific imagery--God and the Devil, the whole works.

From Goodreads, Into the Forest by Jean Hegland:

Set in the near-future, Into the Forest is a powerfully imagined novel that focuses on the relationship between two teenage sisters living alone in their Northern California forest home.

Over 30 miles from the nearest town, and several miles away from their nearest neighbor, Nell and Eva struggle to survive as society begins to decay and collapse around them. No single event precedes society's fall. There is talk of a war overseas and upheaval in Congress, but it still comes as a shock when the electricity runs out and gas is nowhere to be found. The sisters consume the resources left in the house, waiting for the power to return. Their arrival into adulthood, however, forces them to reexamine their place in the world and their relationship to the land and each other.

Reminiscent of Margaret Atwood's A Handmaid's Tale, Into the Forest is a mesmerizing and thought-provoking novel of hope and despair set in a frighteningly plausible near-future America.

From Goodreads, The Things That Keep us Here by Carla Buckley:

How far would you go to protect your family?

Ann Brooks never thought she’d have to answer that question. Then she found her limits tested by a crisis no one could prevent. Now, as her neighborhood descends into panic, she must make tough choices to protect everyone she loves from a threat she cannot even see. In this chillingly urgent novel, Carla Buckley confronts us with the terrifying decisions we are forced to make when ordinary life changes overnight.

A year ago, Ann and Peter Brooks were just another unhappily married couple trying–and failing–to keep their relationship together while they raised two young daughters. Now the world around them is about to be shaken as Peter, a university researcher, comes to a startling realization: A virulent pandemic has made the terrible leap across the ocean to America’s heartland.

And it is killing fifty out of every hundred people it touches.

As their town goes into lockdown, Peter is forced to return home–with his beautiful graduate assistant. But the Brookses’ safe suburban world is no longer the refuge it once was. Food grows scarce, and neighbor turns against neighbor in grocery stores and at gas pumps. And then a winter storm strikes, and the community is left huddling in the dark.

Trapped inside the house she once called home, Ann Brooks must make life-or-death decisions in an environment where opening a door to a neighbor could threaten all the things she holds dear.

Carla Buckley’s poignant debut raises important questions to which there are no easy answers, in an emotionally riveting tale of one family facing unimaginable stress.

From Goodreads, The Stand by Stephen King:

This is the way the world ends: with a nanosecond of computer error in a Defense Department laboratory and a million casual contacts that form the links in a chain letter of death.

And here is the bleak new world of the day after: a world stripped of its institutions and emptied of 99 percent of its people. A world in which a handful of panicky survivors choose sides -- or are chosen. A world in which good rides on the frail shoulders of the 108-year-old Mother Abigail -- and the worst nightmares of evil are embodied in a man with a lethal smile and unspeakable powers: Randall Flagg, the dark man.

From Goodreads, Life as We Knew it by Beth Pfeffer:

It's almost the end of Miranda's sophomore year in high school, and her journal reflects the busy life of a typical teenager: conversations with friends, fights with mom, and fervent hopes for a driver's license. When Miranda first begins hearing the reports of a meteor on a collision course with the moon, it hardly seems worth a mention in her diary. But after the meteor hits, pushing the moon off its axis and causing worldwide earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanoes, all the things Miranda used to take for granted begin to disappear. Food and gas shortages, along with extreme weather changes, come to her small Pennsylvania town; and Miranda's voice is by turns petulant, angry, and finally resigned, as her family is forced to make tough choices while they consider their increasingly limited options. Yet even as suspicious neighbors stockpile food in anticipation of a looming winter without heat or electricity, Miranda knows that that her future is still hers to decide even if life as she knew it is over.

Summer Break Reading Challenge #7

2010-07-09T08:46:00.002-05:00

This challenge is to give a "reading update" on our progress so far.

I've been a slow reader due to a busy summer. Here's what I got so far...
-I'm currently reading The Passage by Justin Cronin...love it
-I'm currently listening to on audio book Going Bovine by Libba Bray
-Next I am planning on reading Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins for the Dystopian Challenge
-So far I've read the following books

1. Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
2. House Rules by Rachael Sontag
3.Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things by by Randy O. Frost and Gail Steketee
4.The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf

-I'm eagerly awaiting Kiss Me Deadly: 13 Tales of Paranormal Romance (July 25)

Follow My Book Blog Friday

2010-07-09T07:30:00.002-05:00

Follow My Book Blog Friday is hosted by Parajunkee's View. This is my first one so let me introduce myself....

I started this book blog (this summer) when our school district had to make cuts and relocate people (thanks to the state of Illinois's budget crisis). Previously I worked in our middle school library and loved it! I enjoyed talking with my students about the books they loved and was reintroduced to the world of young adult literature. This blog is a way of staying connected to some of my former students and to stay current on the latest ya books. I'm meeting a lot of people and having fun developing my blog. If you haven't heard of Karin the Librarians Summer Break Reading Challenge...head over to the site and join in on the fun!

Summer Break Reading Challenge # 6

2010-07-06T09:33:00.008-05:00

Heart Throbs!

Activity # 6 for the Summer Break Reading challenge is to write about our literary heart throbs.

Stu Redman (East Texas)- Stu is a simple unassuming man in Stephen Kings's The Stand. He's the kind of guy you want on your side when a deadly plague hits your town. What impressed me most about his character was how gentle and loving he was to Frannie. I can almost hear that wonderful southern drawl....

Sam Roth from Shiver- What I liked about Sam was his sweet caring disposition. He wasn't controlling or overly "macho". He recognized Grace for the strong female character she was. Who couldn't fall in love with those gorgeous, intense eyes?!?!?

Peeta from The Hunger Games- A guy who can cook...enough said:-)

Now post about your literary heart throbs and add your link to Mr. Linky!

Review: House Rules

2010-07-06T09:00:00.001-05:00

House Rules by Rachel Sontag
Genre: Memoir
Publisher: Bond Street Books, April 1 2008
304 pages

From Goodreads:

A compelling, at times horrifying work that is impossible to put down, House Rules will stand beside Running With Scissors and The Glass Castle as a memoir that cracks open the shell of a desperately dysfunctional family with impressive grace and humour.
Rachel Sontag grew up the daughter of a well-liked doctor in an upper middle class suburb of Chicago. The view from outside couldn't have been more perfect. But within the walls of the family home, Rachel's life was controlled and indeed terrorized by her father's serious depression. In prose that is both precise and rich, Rachel's childhood experience unfolds in a chronological recounting that shows how her father became more and more disturbed as Rachel grew up.
A visceral and wrenching exploration of the impact of a damaged psyche on those nearest to him, House Rules will keep you reading even when you most wish you could look away.

When I saw this book in the young adult section of Barnes and Noble it caught my interest. Many of my students in the library often request A child Called It. I was expecting this to be similar but with more of a focus on mental/emotional abuse. Rachel Sontag's father was a sick man who regularly subjected his daughter to mental cruelty. What I found most interesting about this memoir was Rachel's mother's role in the dysfunctional home. Mrs. Sontag clearly saw what was going on in her house and the fact that Rachel was her husband's regular target of abuse. Her mother wasn't just a bystander watching the train wreck that was her daughter and husband's relationship. Rachel's mother lashed out at her daughter too. A memorable moment in the book was when divorce papers arrived in the mail and Rachel's mother attacked her brutally when she arrived home. Rachael often relied on her quick wit when in the midst of her father's abuse...if the situation hadn't been so sickening you would have laughed at the things she said. I wouldn't consider this memoir a young adult book...there was too much language and sexual content. I think it would be appropriate for an older high school student. After reading this book I've decided I would like to read Because I am Furniture by Thalia Chaltas. It's a fiction, young adult book about a girl who lives in a physically abusive house by isn't the one to receive the physical abuse. It should be an interesting perspective.

In My Mailbox

2010-07-06T08:08:00.004-05:00

In My Mailbox is a fun meme hosted at The Story Siren where we share what books we received this week.

Here's what I got...

The Passage by Justin Cronin
Genre: fiction, horror
Publisher: Ballantine, June 8, 2010
Hardcover, 766 pages

From Goodreads:

"It happened fast. Thirty-two minutes for one world to die, another to be born."

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. He is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors. But for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—towards the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.

I bought this one on my Kindle due to the behemoth size. I wanted to be able to tote it around without spraining my wrist. I am officially 50% through and can't put it down! I would recommend this book to fans of Stephen King's The Stand. Another great book like this one is Robert McCammon's Swan Song...love it!

Contest at Dark Faerie Tales

2010-07-05T10:33:00.005-05:00

I just found this contest at Dark Faerie Tales! The book looks awesome:-) Ever since I watched the movie The Others, with Nicole Kidman, I have been fascinated with post-mortem photography (weird huh). If you would like to read more on that topic the check out the post at Dark Faerie Tales. This contest ends on July 13th...so hurry over for a chance to win this book.

Another book I've been wanting to read is We Hear the Dead by Dianne Salerni.

From Goodreads:

It started out as a harmless prank. But soon enough, spiritualism was the fastest growing movement of the nineteenth century, and Maggie Fox was trapped in a life of deceit.

Meticulously researched by the author, We Hear the Dead reveals the secret of how the Fox sisters faked their rapping sounds and their motives for inventing the séance and founding spiritualism.

Maggie:
I began the deception when I was too young to know right from wrong. No one suspected us of any trick, because we were such young children. We were led on by my sister purposely and by my mother unintentionally. Only with the passing of time did I come to understand the consequences of my actions. As Doctor wrote to me: "Weary, weary is the life by cold deceit oppressed."

Kate:
My sister has used the word "deception." I object to her use of that word, for I do not believe that I have ever intentionally deceived anyone. Maggie has a different understanding of all the events that have happened since that night in Hydesville forty years ago. To her the spirits were always a game. For my sister Leah, they were a means to an end. For my mother, a miracle. And for me, they were my life's calling. I have no regrets.

Review: Water for Elephants

2010-07-01T10:03:00.006-05:00

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Algonquin Books, April 9 2006
Paperback 335 pages

From Goodreads:

"Though he may not speak of them, the memories still dwell inside Jacob Jankowski's ninety-something-year-old mind. Memories of himself as a young man, tossed by fate onto a rickety train that was home to the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. Memories of a world filled with freaks and clowns, with wonder and pain and anger and passion; a world with its own narrow, irrational rules, its own way of life, and its own way of death. The world of the circus: to Jacob it was both salvation and a living hell." Jacob was there because his luck had run out - orphaned and penniless, he had no direction until he landed on this locomotive "ship of fools." It was the early part of the Great Depression, and everyone in this third-rate circus was lucky to have any job at all. Marlena, the star of the equestrian act, was there because she fell in love with the wrong man, a handsome circus boss with a wide mean streak. And Rosie the elephant was there because she was the great gray hope, the new act that was going to be the salvation of the circus; the only problem was, Rosie didn't have an act - in fact, she couldn't even follow instructions. The bond that grew among this unlikely trio was one of love and trust, and ultimately, it was their only hope for survival.

I really loved this story. It's about an elderly man who is living in a nursing home. When the circus comes to town, it triggers his memories of working for the Benzini Brothers circus, memories both good and bad. There are flashbacks between Jacob living in the nursing home and the circus, which I enjoyed. You'll fall in love with Rosie, the elephant! She's a real survivor and a character you won't soon forget. I hear there may be a movie in the works. Guess I'll Google that:-)

Last summer my son and I went on a fun vacation to the Wisconsin Dells. One of my favorite attractions was the Circus World Museum in Baraboo Wisconsin. For the admission fee of just $14.95, we enjoyed a large part of our day taking in a magic show, exploring the many exhibits, and marveling at the huge collection of circus wagons. Baraboo is the former winter quarters of the Ringling Brothers Circus. Many of the original buildings are still there. If we had time, we could have watched a one ring circus show and the Tiger Show. I highly recommend a visit to this historic site.

Summer Break Reading Challenge Activity #4

2010-06-30T08:34:00.011-05:00

Activity #4 is to explore the internet and find things on other blogs. This has been my favorite activity so far. I've discovered 2 blogs I like and am adding to my Google Reader and learned Stephen has a new book coming out-yay!

1. A blog that is new to you that focuses on the same type of literature you do (ex: I read YA so the blog would need to focus on YA).

YA Bliss
I love the header for her blog!

2. A book that is new to you that another blogger reviewed.
A Blue So Dark by Holly Schindler- Book Review (Book Smugglers)

3. A book set in Africa (in your preferred age category, if possible).
Little Bee by Chris Cleave: Book Review

4. A book about a human/animal bond (in your preferred age category, if
possible).
Listen by Stephanie Tolan

5. A book trailer for a book you want to read.
Saving CeeCee Honeycut

6. A book with a color in the title (in your preferred age category, if possible).
Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves

7. A blog that is new to you that is dedicated to a certain genre (ex: only books about vampires, only historical fiction, only urban fantasy, etc.)

The League of Extraordinary Writers- Dystopian

8. A book blog maintained by a librarian.
Carrie's YA Bookshelf

9. A book blog maintained by a teacher.
DeRaps Reads

10. The title of an upcoming book by an author you like (provide details - title, release date, synopsis).
Full Dark No Stars (short story collection) by Stephen King, November 9, 2010 From the Stephen King web site:

1922
The story opens with the confession of Wilfred James to the murder of his wife, Arlette, following their move to Hemingford, Nebraska onto land willed to Arlette by her father.

Big Driver
Mystery writer, Tess, has been supplementing her writing income for years by doing speaking engagements with no problems. But following a last-minute invitation to a book club 60 miles away, she takes a shortcut home with dire consequences.

Fair Extension
Harry Streeter, who is suffering from cancer, decides to make a deal with the devil but, as always, there is a price to pay.

A Good Marriage
Darcy Anderson learns more about her husband of over twenty years than she would have liked to know when she stumbles literally upon a box under a worktable in their garage.

Book Review: Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

2010-06-28T08:14:00.005-05:00

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
(web site)
Genre: Women's fiction
Publisher: Random House
269 pages

From Goodreads:

In nineteenth-century China, in a remote Hunan county, a girl named Lily, at the tender age of seven, is paired with a laotong, “old same,” in an emotional match that will last a lifetime. The laotong, Snow Flower, introduces herself by sending Lily a silk fan on which she’s painted a poem in nu shu, a unique language that Chinese women created in order to communicate in secret, away from the influence of men. As the years pass, Lily and Snow Flower send messages on fans, compose stories on handkerchiefs, reaching out of isolation to share their hopes, dreams, and accomplishments. Together, they endure the agony of foot-binding, and reflect upon their arranged marriages, shared loneliness, and the joys and tragedies of motherhood. The two find solace, developing a bond that keeps their spirits alive. But when a misunderstanding arises, their deep friendship suddenly threatens to tear apart.

I discovered this book on another book blog and knew I had to read it when I learned it depicted the tradition of foot binding. My previous concept of foot binding didn't even come close to the actual process....it is brutal. As you delve deeper into the story, you learn how critical this tradition is to the young girl's chances for a proper marriage. Marriage was for practical reasons and rarely resulted in emotional satisfaction. A laotong match would provide deep-heart love, something that would be lacking in Lily and Snow Flower's other relationships. This was a fascinating read about Chinese culture. It's very difficult to wrap your head around sometimes. If you've ever read an Amy Tan novel and enjoyed it I think you would like this one too. Due to the adult themes I wouldn't recommend this book for a middle schooler but think it would be appropriate for high school age. If you are interested in learning more about foot binding (as I was) I found a book blog with a review of this book in addition to photos of foot binding. Beware...the images may be disturbing to some so view at your own discretion. Lisa See has another book of interest to me, Shanghai Girls, that I'm adding to my TBR pile.

Summer Break Reading Challenge Activity #2

2010-06-27T08:59:00.007-05:00

This was a really fun activity. The directions were to make a Wordle from your favorite book or series -full directions can be found here. I chose the series, The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan...my favorite! I used the color palette from The-Dead Tossed Waves cover.

If you're into zombie gore with a little romance on the side, this is the series for you. Carrie's third book The Dark and Hollow Places will be released in the spring of 2011.

Summer Break Reading Challenge Activity #1

2010-06-25T10:40:00.014-05:00

Karin's first activity is to post about your summer reading goals.

My first goal is to finish up the Audio Book Reading Challenge. I only have three books left and I will have reached my goal. I just downloaded Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. I've been wanting to read this book for awhile.

My next goal is to read for the Dystopian Challenge. Since it ends s oon I don't think I will reach my goal however I still want to participate since this is my favorite genre. The books I've chosen so far are Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins and The Passage by Justin Cronin. The Passage is a whopping 766 pages so that one will take me awhile:-)

And finally...I joined the Read, Remember, and Recommend Teen Challenge . After purchasing the reading journal I've chosen a few books to read. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and Because I am Furniture by Thalia Chaltas. I've always planned to Read To Kill a Mockingbird so this is a must this summer and Because I am Furniture was recommended as a Child Called It read-alike in the reading journal.

Of course I have more books to read than the above titles but these are my "must reads".

The prize for this challenge is Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

Be sure to add your post to Mr. Linky!

Summer Break Reading Challenge

2010-06-25T10:05:00.004-05:00

I'm so excited that Karin is hosting a new challenge on her blog! If you haven't participated before now is the time. There are great prizes and lots of fun. Here are the details:

1. The Challenge will start today (June 23, 2010) and end toward the end of August.

2. You DO NOT have to participate in every activity - just pick and choose what you want to do.

3. Some activities will have a specific prize attached to them, but some you will be able to choose what you want from a list of available books.

4. Activity due dates will be listed in each post.

Any questions, feel free to email Karin at karinlibrarian@gmail.com.

Don't pity a shelter dog...adopt one!

2010-06-17T09:05:00.002-05:00

Two years ago March 1st we lost our beautiful boxer boy, Ollie, to cancer. Last December after receiving a phone call from our local vet that there was a boxer in need of a home, we adopted Harley. Harley is an 11 year old heart of gold and we feel so grateful to have him in our lives. Whenever I see the Pedigree commercial about adopting a shelter dog I get a huge lump in my throat just thinking about the three months Harley spent in shelters waiting for someone to give him a chance. If you've ever thought about opening your home up to a guy like Harley, be sure to visit Pedigree's Dog Adoption Drive web site for information.

That's How I Blog Internet Radio

2010-06-16T07:31:00.003-05:00

I just discovered That's How I Blog Internet Radio and I absolutely love it! Check this out if you would like to learn more about your favorite bloggers and to discover new bloggers. This week's show features Michelle from My Books. My Life. I wanted to listen to the shows on my Ipod so here's how I do it;

Underneath the program you wish to download, there is a download link-click on it

Save it to your music folder and you might want to change the name (it will say something like show_1084679) so you will remember which show you downloaded

Open Itunes and go to file-->Add file to library (it may put it into the unknown genre)

Highlight the file you just imported and type ctrl and i, this will bring up a window

Go to options and check remember playback position and skip when shuffling. This will enable you to pick up where you left off if you have to stop listening

If you would like the logo for That's How I Blog then right click-->save the image from the site, then go to art work (ctrl & i again) and add the image. Now it will show up on your Ipod

If you download several shows to load onto your Ipod, make a smart playlist then as you finish each show it will disappear from your Ipod

That's the best way I know how to set this up. If anyone has any other tips, feel free to comment on this post!

"Waiting On" Wednesday: Kiss Me Deadly: 13 Tales of Paranormal Love

2010-06-16T07:00:00.000-05:00

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

From Goodreads:

Full of dark seduction and modern romance, this short story collection presents a variety of talented voices sure to satisfy every werewolf, ghost, fallen angel, zombie, and shape-shifter’s dark desires.

I absolutely cannot wait for this book! Carrie Ryan has a short story about a teenage Sister Tabitha from The Forest of Hands and Teeth series. Other popular authors include: Becca Fitzpatrick, Maggie Stiefvater, and Diana Peterfreund. This book is due out July 27, 2010.

What's your "waiting on" pick this week?

Want to participate? Grab the logo, post your own WoW entry on your blog, and leave your link here!

Book Trailer

2010-06-15T11:21:00.000-05:00

After reading Dirty Little Secrets and Stuff, I decided to post this fantastic book trailer. This was made by fan Naomi Bates and was posted on C.J Omololu's web site.

In My Mailbox

2010-06-12T09:02:00.000-05:00

In My Mailbox is a fun meme hosted at The Story Siren where we share what books we received this week.

From the library I received Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See.

From Goodreads:

In nineteenth-century China, in a remote Hunan county, a girl named Lily, at the tender age of seven, is paired with a laotong, “old same,” in an emotional match that will last a lifetime. The laotong, Snow Flower, introduces herself by sending Lily a silk fan on which she’s painted a poem in nu shu, a unique language that Chinese women created in order to communicate in secret, away from the influence of men. As the years pass, Lily and Snow Flower send messages on fans, compose stories on handkerchiefs, reaching out of isolation to share their hopes, dreams, and accomplishments. Together, they endure the agony of foot-binding, and reflect upon their arranged marriages, shared loneliness, and the joys and tragedies of motherhood. The two find solace, developing a bond that keeps their spirits alive. But when a misunderstanding arises, their deep friendship suddenly threatens to tear apart.

I have really enjoyed many Amy Tan books so this one was right up my alley. I'm curious about the foot binding tradition though I understand it's quite graphic and painful. I can't even imagine...

Read, Remember, Recommend Teen Challenge

2010-06-11T09:27:00.001-05:00

Bibliobabe is hosting the Read, Remember, Recommend Teen Reading Challenge to celebrate the April 1st release of her new book.

Here are the details:

* Check out all the amazing books (thousands!) mentioned in Read, Remember, Recommend for Teens and plan your attack. Books do not need to be decided upon in advance. All books must be mentioned in the journal lists.
* Write a challenge sign-up post on your blog. In that post provide a link to the Read, Remember, Recommend Teen Reading Challenge post. Please feel free to use the Read, Remember, Recommend Teen Reading Challenge button in your post. If you do not have a blog, introduce yourself in a comment below.
* Add your name and the direct link to the sign-up post in the Mister Linky list below.
* Each time you read and review a book as part of this challenge, share this with other challenge participants by adding a direct link to your book review to the list in a comment at this post. If you do not have a blog, leave your review as a comment.

Rules:

* Read as many books from the Read, Remember, Recommend for Teens reading journal as you can in one year. Books read before April 1st, 2010 do not count. Overlaps with other challenges (including the Read, Remember, Recommend Fiction Reading Challenge) are acceptable – and encouraged!
* Rereading doesn’t count – have fun exploring new authors, awards and books!
* Audio, print, and e-books are all acceptable.
* Post your review or link to your review in a comment below.
* You can change your commitment level at anytime.

Levels:

* NE2N – Not Even to Newbery – 5 books
* CYA – Covering Your Assigments – 10 books
* LOL – Literature Over Love – 20 books
* BFF – Book Fiend Forever – 30 books

The Grand prize is an e-reader of your choice! Check out the other awesome prizes at bibliobabe.com. This challenge runs from April 1st 2010-April 1st 2011

I'm choosing BFF-Book Friend Forever-30 books

1. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.

Review: Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things

2010-06-11T08:09:00.000-05:00

Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things by Randy O. Frost and Gail Steketee
Genre: Non-fiction
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, April 20, 2010
304 pages

From Goodreads:

What possesses someone to save every scrap of paper that’s ever come into his home? What compulsions drive a woman like Irene, whose hoarding cost her her marriage? Or Ralph, whose imagined uses for castoff items like leaky old buckets almost lost him his house? Or Jerry and Alvin, wealthy twin bachelors who filled up matching luxury apartments with countless pieces of fine art, not even leaving themselves room to sleep? Randy Frost and Gail Steketee were the first to study hoarding when they began their work a decade ago; they expected to find a few sufferers but ended up treating hundreds of patients and fielding thousands of calls from the families of others. Now they explore the compulsion through a series of compelling case studies in the vein of Oliver Sacks.With vivid portraits that show us the traits by which you can identify a hoarder—piles on sofas and beds that make the furniture useless, houses that can be navigated only by following small paths called goat trails, vast piles of paper that the hoarders “churn” but never discard, even collections of animals and garbage—Frost and Steketee explain the causes and outline the often ineffective treatments for the disorder.They also illuminate the pull that possessions exert on all of us. Whether we’re savers, collectors, or compulsive cleaners, none of us is free of the impulses that drive hoarders to the extremes in which they live. For the six million sufferers, their relatives and friends, and all the rest of us with complicated relationships to our things, Stuff answers the question of what happens when our stuff starts to own us.

After reading Dirty Little Secrets by C.J. Omololu I wanted to read more on this strange but interesting disorder. Of most interest to me was the relationship of compulsive shopping and compulsive hoarding. Many sufferers of hoarding have gone deep into debt by buying "stuff" that literally fills their homes up...to the point of the home becoming uninhabitable. In Dirty Little Secrets, Lucy's mom buys an expensive mixer she isn't even able to use because her kitchen is packed with garbage. This is true for most hoarders. The books has chapters on animal hoarding, hoarding in children, and children of hoarders. OCD is also a common affliction omong hoarders. In one case study, Amy refuses to touch any doorknobs for fear of contamination. Another study, a boy refuses to use his birthday gifts because they are too special and by using them he will diminish their importance of his special day. After awhile the information became a little redundant and I found myself skipping parts to get to the end. If you know of someone who suffers from this disorder there is a great website with information and resources, Children of Compulsive Hoarders.

Dystopian Challange

2010-06-11T07:55:00.000-05:00

I think I was a little too ambitious when I chose level 3- 20 books for this challenge. There is no way I would be able to read 20 book in that time frame. I ended up choosing level 1, five books.

First on my list is The Passage by Justin Cronin. From Goodreads:

“It happened fast. Thirty-two minutes for one world to die, another to be born.”

First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.

As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he’s done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. He is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors. But for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—towards the time and place where she must finish what should never have begun.

With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterful prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.

This one is gonna take me awhile with 784 pages!

In My Mailbox

2010-06-06T10:35:00.000-05:00

In My Mailbox is a fun meme hosted at The Story Siren where we share what books we received this week.

This week I requested a book from the library:

A compelling, at times horrifying work that is impossible to put down, House Rules will stand beside Running With Scissors and The Glass Castle as a memoir that cracks open the shell of a desperately dysfunctional family with impressive grace and humour.
Rachel Sontag grew up the daughter of a well-liked doctor in an upper middle class suburb of Chicago. The view from outside couldn't have been more perfect. But within the walls of the family home, Rachel's life was controlled and indeed terrorized by her father's serious depression. In prose that is both precise and rich, Rachel's childhood experience unfolds in a chronological recounting that shows how her father became more and more disturbed as Rachel grew up.
A visceral and wrenching exploration of the impact of a damaged psyche on those nearest to him, House Rules will keep you reading even when you most wish you could look away. (from Goodreads)

I also received from Amazon: Read, Remember, Recommend for Teens: A Reading Journal for Book Lovers

What was in your mailbox this week?

Dystopian Challenge 2010

2010-06-05T12:22:00.001-05:00

I love to read dystopian fiction and have decided to join this awesome challenge. If you would like to read more about what makes dystopian fiction read this post at Parajunkee's View!

Here are the rules:

Open to everyone (if you do not have a blog, just state in the comments section that you read the book and on what date)
Any book format - Wiki list of dystopian lit
Books can be chosen throughout the year, but must have been read within the timeline. Just because your read Fahrenheit 451 in 7th grade doesn't mean it counts.
Sign-up below with Mr. Linky
Post your reviews in the comments area
Three Levels:

Level 1 - Experimental - 5 books
Level 2 - Addict - 10 books
Level 3 - Junkee - 20 books

Level 3 participants will get a dystopian button with their blog or name on it and entry into a contest to win The Hunger Games: Book 3.
Timeline: Jan. 1, 2010-Aug. 24, 2010

I'm going to choose level 1- Experimental-5 books

1. The Passage by Justin Cronin
2.
3.
4.
5.

Review: The Dead-Tossed Waves

2010-06-05T09:04:00.000-05:00

The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan (website)
Genre: Young adult, post apocalyptic, horror
Publisher: Delacorte, March 2010
407 pages

From Goodreads:

Gabry lives a quiet life, secure in her town next to the sea and behind the Barrier. She's content to let her friends dream of the Dark City up the coast while she watches from the top of her lighthouse. Home is all she's ever known and, and all she needs for happiness.

But life after the Return is never safe and there are threats even the Barrier can't hold back.

Gabry's mother thought she left her secrets behind in the Forest of Hands and Teeth, but, like the dead in their world, secrets don't stay buried. And now, Gabry's world is crumbling.

One night beyond the Barrier . . .
One boy Gabry's known forever and one veiled in mystery . . .
One reckless moment, and half of Gabry's generation is dead, the other half imprisoned.

Now Gabry knows only one thing: if she has any hope of a future, she must face the forest of her mother's past.

After reading Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth I became hooked on zombie literature. I already loved to read post apocalyptic novels...my favorites being The Stand by Stephen King and Swan Song by Robert McCammon. I couldn't wait to get my hands on the second book by Carrie and I didn't have to wait too long. I won a contest at Karin's Book Nook and received the ARC. This book didn't disappoint! I had so many questions from the first book which were answered in this one (namely why the heck was Gabrielle so darn fast). Still...some questions were left unanswered and that is why I am eagerly anticipating her third book. As I recommended this book to a friend I felt it my duty to explain that this book had, what I thought, was a very disturbing scene... the Soulers. For those of you who read it, you know what I mean. I still get the shivers when I think about it. This is what set this book apart from other zombie novels I've read, it makes you think and it isn't the usual fare for a zombie apocalypse. My only complaint would be that Gabry seemed to be a little whiny. I just wanted to tell her to make her mind up already. I guess a person is entitled to be a little whiny though when your world is surrounded by zombies and you have two intriguing young men to choose from. The third book, The Dark and Hollow Places is due out in the spring of 2011. In the meantime, be on the lookout for the anthology Kiss Me Deadly: 13 Tales of Paranormal Love which is due out July 27th, 2010. Carrie Ryan is contributing a story that focuses on teenage Sister Tabitha!

"Waiting On" Wednesday: Rot and Ruin

2010-06-02T10:49:00.000-05:00

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This is my first one!

Due to the fact that I'm a huge fan of zombie literature my pick this week is Rot and Ruin by Jonathan Maberry, release date- Oct. 5, 2010

From Goodreads:

A teenager grows up in a post-apocalypic, zombie-infested America in Jonathan
Maberry's Rot & Ruin.

The description leaves something to be desired but it's my understanding from reviews on Goodreads that there's a bit of a twist to this zombie novel!

What's your "waiting on" pick this week?

Want to participate? Grab the logo, post your own WoW entry on your blog, and leave your link here!

Review: Dirty Little Secrets by C.J. Omololu

2010-06-02T09:34:00.000-05:00

Title: Dirty Little Secrets
Author: C.J. Omololu (website)
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Walker Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: Feb. 2, 2010
Pages: 212

From Goodreads:

Everyone has secrets. Some are just bigger and dirtier than others.

For sixteen years, Lucy has kept her mother's hoarding a secret. She's had to -- nobody would understand the stacks of newspapers and mounds of garbage so high they touch the ceiling and the rotting smell that she's always worried would follow her out the house. After years of keeping people at a distance, she finally has a best friend and maybe even a boyfriend if she can play it right. As long as she can make them think she's normal.

When Lucy arrives home from a sleepover to find her mother dead under a stack of National Geographics, she starts to dial 911 in a panic, but pauses before she can connect. She barely notices the filth and trash anymore, but she knows the paramedics will. First the fire trucks, and then news cameras that will surely follow. No longer will they be remembered as the nice oncology nurse with the lovely children -- they'll turn into that garbage-hoarding freak family on Collier Avenue.

With a normal life finally within reach, Lucy has only minutes to make a critical decision. How far will she go to keep the family secrets safe?

First I have to say that the cover of this book really grabbed my attention! You can almost feel the anxiety of Lucy as she peers into the window of her home. I am fascinated by the topic of hoarding and have watched the t.v. series Hoarders and Hoarding many times. Usually the pervading thought is "how can a person live like this?" This book focuses more on how this disorder effects the lives of those who live unwillingly in this chaos. Lucy's siblings have moved out of the home and have the opportunities to start new lives but Lucy is trapped in her mother's world of garbage. You'll discover in this story though that their mother's hoarding is far reaching and continues to impact the lives of the two who flew the coop. What was also interesting to learn was not only the process of accumulating all of this stuff but how Lucy's mother viewed her treasures and became so emotionally distressed when anyone tried to interfere with her "collecting. I could not put this book down and was compelled to read more on this topic. If you are interested in reading more on this topic check out C.J. Omololu's blog where she also has information about an organization for children of hoarders. I was so inspired to read more that I purchased the book Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things. This is a non-fiction book in which you will learn the how and why people hoard. After reading a few chapters I swear that I'm inspired to go clean out a closet or clear away a stack of junk mail that has accumulated on my kitchen counter. Finally, I'm curious to know what other readers thought of the ending of Dirty Little Secrets... I didn't see it coming and wished Lucy had chosen another way out.

Book Trailer: Eat. Prey. Love

2010-06-01T20:45:00.000-05:00

Anyone who knows me knows that I enjoy a good zombie story. My absolute favorite zombie story is of course The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan. The Dead-Tossed Waves is the companion book with a third book coming out in the spring of 2011.

Awful Library Books

2010-05-31T13:07:00.000-05:00

After recently doing inventory in our middle school library (and weeding out some really awful library books), I learned about the Awful Library Book blog. The blog creators, Mary Kelly and Holly Hibner, regularly post about awful library books found on local shelves. If you need a little chuckle to your day, check this blog out (the photo on the left is just one example). If you're interested in a discussion about why libraries weed out books, check out the page WHY WE WEED. We're not talking about weeding out classic books but rather the kind that makes you cough and sneeze when you open them. After reading through some of the comments there seems to be some debate as to whether or not books should be weeded out or kept for historical value. If you're interested, here's an article about weeding library books.

2010 Audio Book Challenge

2010-05-31T12:19:00.002-05:00

Since I received a brand new purple Ipod this Christmas, I decided to join the Audio Book Challenge. This challenge is being hosted at the Royal Reviews. I've been enjoying listening to audio books on the Ipod while doing housework and driving in the car.

Here are the guidelines...

Challenge Guidelines:
1. Anyone can join. You don't need a blog to participate.
--Non-Bloggers: Include your information in the comment section.

2. There are four levels:

-- Curious – Listen to 3 Audio Books.

-- Fascinated – Listen to 6 Audio Books.

-- Addicted – Listen to 12 Audio Books.

-- Obsessed – Listen to 20 Audio Books.

3. Audio books only.

4. You can list your books in advance or just put them in a wrap up post. If you list them, feel free to change them as the mood takes you.

5. Challenge begins January 1st thru December, 2010. Only books started on January 1st count towards this challenge.

6. When you sign up under Mr. Linky, put the direct link to the post about the Audio Book Reading Challenge. Include the URL so that other participants can find join in and read your reviews and post.

I'm going to shoot for Addicted-12 books

1. Impossible by Nancy Werlin
2. Testimony by Anita Shreve
3. Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
4. The BoneMan's Daughters by Ted Dekker
5. UR by Stephen King
6. Yellow Star by Jennifer Roy
7. Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
8. If I Stay by Gayle Forman
9. The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf
10. Going Bovine by Libba Bray
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2010 Library Reading Challenge

2010-05-31T12:13:00.010-05:00

I'm joining a new reading challenge and this one should be an easy one for me since almost all of my books come from a library. I use the Rolling Prairie Library System and encourage my students to use it too. It's a great resource as most books can be found on it. Every now and then I am unable to find a copy of the book I'm looking for and then I "break down" and actually purchase a book. This reading challenge is hosted at J. Kaye's Book Blog. I'm going to pick the Just My Size- check out 50 library books.

1. Rescuing Sprite by Mark R. Levin
2. When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
3. The Magician's Elephant by Kate DiCamillo
4. Testimony by Anita Shreve
5. Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
6. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
7. Surviving Hitler by Andrea Warren
8. Little Bee by Chris Cleave
9. The Things That Keep Us Here by Carla Buckley
10. Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
11. Surviving the Angel of Death: The Story of a Mengele Twin in Auschwitz by Eva Kor
12. Husband and Wife by Leah Stewart
13. House Rules: A Memoir by Rachel Sontag
14. Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See
15. Going Bovine by Libba Bray
16. Between Here and April by Deborah Kogan
17. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
18. Lessons From a Dead Girl Jo Knowles
19. Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson
20. Pop by Gordon Korman
21. Love, Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli
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2010 Young Adult Reading Challenge

2010-05-31T12:01:00.011-05:00

The 2010 Young Adult Reading Challenge, hosted by J.Kaye, is all about exploring young adult novels. Here are the guidelines:

Anyone can join. You don’t need a blog to participate. –Non-Bloggers: Post your list of books in the comment section of the wrap-up post. To learn how to sign up without having a blog, click here.
There are four levels:

The Mini YA Reading Challenge – Read 12 Young Adult novels.
Just My Size YA Reading Challenge – Read 25 Young Adult novels.
Stepping It Up YA Reading Challenge – Read 50 Young Adult novels.
Super Size Me YA Reading Challenge – Read 75 Young Adult novels.

Audio, eBooks, paper all count.
No need to list your books in advance. You may select books as you go. Even if you list them now, you can change the list if needed.
Challenge begins January 1st thru December, 2010.
When you sign up under Mr. Linky, put the direct link to your post where your Young Adult novels will be listed. Include the URL so that other viewers can find this fun challenge. If you’d prefer to put your list in the sidebar of your blog, please leave your viewers the link to the sign up page. Again, so viewers can join the challenge too.

Sign up is at J. Kaye’s Book Blog! My list will be below — I’m choosing the Mini YA Reading Challenge option:

1. When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
2. Impossible by Nancy Werlin
3. The Magician's Elephant by Kate DiCamillo
4. The Maze Runner by James Dashner
5. Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
6. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
7. Surviving Hitler by Andrea Warren
8. Yellow Star by Jennifer Roy
9. Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
10. Surviving the Angel of Death: The story of a Mengele Twin in Auschwitz by Eva Mozes Kor
11. Dirty Little Secrets by C.J. Omololu
12. Going Bovine by Libba Bray
13. Crossing by Andrew Xia Fukuda
14. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
15. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
16. You by Charles Benoit
17. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
18. Lessons From a Dead Girl by Jo Knowles
19. Twisted by Laurie Halse Anderson
20. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
21. Paper Towns by John Green
22. Three Little Words by Ashley Rhodes-Couter
23. Protecting Marie by Kevin Henkes
24. After by Amy Efaw
25. Pop by Gordon Korman
26. Love, Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli

E-Book Reading Challenge

2010-05-31T11:56:00.008-05:00

For my birthday I purchased a Kindle! I love, love, love it! Probably my favorite perk of owning one is that I can download samples (free) of books I'm interested in and then decide whether to purchase the Kindle edition (for the right price) or request it from my local library. There are several free books offered on a regular basis and I subscribe to the blog, Free Kindle Books Plus a Few Other Tips, to keep updated. Subscribing to blogs on my Kindle is pretty cool too! With that said...I've joined another book challenge:

Challenge Guidelines:
1. Anyone can join. You don't need a blog to participate.
--Non-Bloggers: Include your information in the comment section.

2. There are four levels:

-- Curious – Read 3 E-Books.

-- Fascinated – Read 6 E-Books.

-- Addicted – Read 12 E-Books.

-- Obsessed – Read 20 E-Books.

3. Any genre counts.

4. You can list your books in advance or just put them in a wrap up post. If you list them, feel free to change them as the mood takes you.

5. Challenge begins January 1st thru December, 2010.

6. When you sign up under Mr. Linky, put the direct link to the post about the E-Book Reading Challenge. Include the URL so that other participants can find join in and read your reviews and post.

I chose-Obsessed- Read 20 E-Books

1. Pieces of Happily Ever After by Irene Zutell
2. Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay
3. Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things by Randy Frost and Gail Steketee
4. The Passage by Justin Cronin
5. Crossing by Andrew Xia Fukuda
6. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
7. Still Missing by Chevy Stevens
8. You by Charles Benoit
9. The Reapers Are the Angels by Alden Bell
10. Room by Emma Donoghue
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I Wanna be a Book Blogger

2010-05-31T10:59:00.000-05:00

Due to a lack of funding, the school district I work for was forced to make various cuts to staff. My current position as a middle school library clerk will be held by another staff member and I will be relocated to a new position. I loved my job in the library ( for 2 years) and during that time I've developed a love for young adult fiction. I've started this blog in order to continue sharing my love of books with others and to make new friends in the book blogging community. I discovered a great post about starting out as a book blogger at The Book Case. Be sure to check it out!