And the Stars Aligned!

Please excuse any part of this post that doesn't make sense, I am slightly light-headed right now.

I was checking in with Kristin Cashore's blog This Is My Secret because her next book Bitterblue is about to come out and I read the most wonderful, amazing thing.  Seriously, I am getting kinda nauseous just thinking about it and part of me is scared that the moment I put it down something terrible is going to happen I'll find out this was all a joke or a mistake and all my happiness is going to be gone. 

She is coming!!!!

There is a list...a beautiful and yet heartbreakingly short list of her tour dates.  I wanted to care about the others but lets be realistic, I scrolled down until I saw CA.  Seattle, WA...getting close...CA! Only one location...I stared at that CA, refusing to move my eyes a centimeter to the left and see the city until I had willed it to be some place close.  Some place...not LA.  And it said...Sebastopol.  Huh, is there another Sebastopol in CA?  Because grew up in Sebastopol.  It's like...right over there.  In fact I was there last weekend for the annual parade with my mom and we walked past their lovely bookstore Copperfiled's.  What's the bookstore for the book tour?  Copperfield's.  Copperfield's.  COPPERFIELD'S!!!

Oh shit!!  Hard to breathe...vision blurry...must sit down...already sitting down...

AreyoukiddingmerightnowthatsheiscomingtoonlyonecityinCAanditisSEBASTOPOL!  (ps to anyone who cares, it is really hard to type without using the spacebar!)

Reality check, I work.  What's the date on this thing cuz I don't want to feel guilty and call in sick.  Thursday, May 10.  THURSDAY!  That's my day off!  DAY...lightheaded...OFF....blurred vision.

The stars have aligned!  I am cashing in my good karma! 

I just pulled up Copperfield's website and verified it is true!

Please excuse me a moment while I have a giddy scream....

Ok...better now. 

So yes, I am excited about this.  I was getting ready to post about my rereads of her 2 previous books and this is just the icing on the cake of the glass half full.

I'm so happy!!

I Love...

I love books (which contain words) and I love nail polish so of course I love....

Found myself some Sally Hansen awesomeness!

Book of Lost Fragrances - Guest Post

Tuesday I had the pleasure of reviewing The Book of Lost Fragrances by M.J. Rose and today I am lucky enough to have a guest post from the author.

 M.J. Rose says:

I've been fascinated with lost fragrances since long before I started writing The Book of Lost Fragrances... since I found a bottle of perfume on my great grandmother's dresser that had belonged to her mother in Russia. Here is one of those lost fragrances that stirs the senses and the imagination... (researched and described with the help of the perfume writer Dimitrios Dimitriadis)

GUERLAIN - ATUANA

With a name resembling that of the island in the South Pacific inhabited by French painter Paul Gauguin, Atuona; Atuana was a Jacques Guerlain creation that launched in 1952. Said to embrace the colour, liveliness and strength of the primitive cultures Gauguin encountered there, Atuana is an exotic perfume based around summery florals of neroli, rose, iris and jasmine. A feeling of equatorial warmth lay apparent just below the surface, furnished by accords of rich leather and amber which added infinite depth and character. Originally released in sparkling Baccarat flacons, Atuana sadly vanished from circulation only a handful of years later, and has never resurfaced since.

AUTHOR BIO:

M.J. Rose is the international best selling author of eleven novels and two non-fiction books on marketing. Her next novel THE BOOK OF LOST FRAGRANCES (Atria/S&S) will be published in March 2012.  Her fiction and non-fiction has appeared in many magazines and reviews including Oprah Magazine. She has been featured in the New York Times, Newsweek, Time, USA Today and on the Today Show, and NPR radio.  Rose graduated from Syracuse University, spent the '80s in advertising, has a commercial in the Museum of Modern Art in NYC and since 2005 has run the first marketing company for authors - Authorbuzz.com.  The television series PAST LIFE, was based on Rose's novels in the Renincarnationist series. She is one of the founding board members of International Thriller Writers and runs the blog- Buzz, Balls & Hype.  She is also the co-founder of Peroozal.com and BookTrib.com.

Rose lives in CT with her husband the musician and composer, Doug Scofield, and their very spoiled and often photographed dog, Winka.

For more information on M.J. Rose and her novels, please visit her WEBSITE. You can also find her on Facebook.

For more information on the book and the blog tour check out: 
My review 
The tour schedule
Twitter Hashtag: #LostFragrancesVirtualBookTour 

The Book of Lost Fragrances - M.J. Rose

 

The Book of Lost Fragrances 

By M.J. Rose 

When I opened this book, I knew it would have some romance and I hoped Rose would do justice to the fragrance part of the story but I was surprised by how much suspense played a part in the storyline. It actually concerned me a bit when I realized how central a mystery was to the story. Well, there was absolutely no need to be concerned. Rose delivers to all the senses. I was captivated by the story and all the layers to it. 

The extensive research Rose did was obvious in the details and emotional trials. From a lost Dalai Lama and a fragrance that is believed to unlock memories of past lives to an old love and an assassin, the multiple story lines pulled me in and left me completely satisfied when they came crashing together and the end. And the end, oh the end. Without giving anything away I will say that in general terms, under normal circumstances, I don’t like stories that have the kind of ending this one did, but here it was so perfectly fitting that I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. 

 SYNOPSIS:

A sweeping and suspenseful tale of secrets, intrigue, and lovers separated by time, all connected through the mystical qualities of a perfume created in the days of Cleopatra--and lost for 2,000 years.

Jac L'Etoile has always been haunted by the past, her memories infused with the exotic scents that she grew up surrounded by as the heir to a storied French perfume company. In order to flee the pain of those remembrances--and of her mother's suicide--she moved to America. Now, fourteen years later she and her brother have inherited the company along with it's financial problems. But when Robbie hints at an earth-shattering discovery in the family archives and then suddenly goes missing--leaving a dead body in his wake--Jac is plunged into a world she thought she'd left behind.

Back in Paris to investigate her brother's disappearance, Jac becomes haunted by the legend the House of L'Etoile has been espousing since 1799. Is there a scent that can unlock the mystery of reincarnation - or is it just another dream infused perfume?

The Book of Lost Fragrances fuses history, passion, and suspense, moving from Cleopatra's Egypt and the terrors of revolutionary France to Tibet's battle with China and the glamour of modern-day Paris. Jac's quest for the ancient perfume someone is willing to kill for becomes the key to understanding her own troubled past.

Come back Friday, March 23 when I will have a guest post from M.J. Rose!

For more information on the book tour check out:

Link to tour schedule:  http://hfvirtualbooktours.blogspot.com/2012/02/mj-rose-on-tour-for-book-of-lost.html
Twitter Hashtag: #LostFragrancesVirtualBookTour

**Thank you Amy at Historical Fiction Virtual Book Tours for providing me with an ARC for review.

Childhood Book: My Side of the Mountain

Fridays Shelf Awareness referenced a study on children's picture books and the decline of nature in them.  It got me thinking about some of my favorite books when I was growing up.  Although the books that came to mind weren't picture books, they were important stepping stones out of the picture book age.  I can't imagine my childhood without books like Hatchet, Island of the Blue Dolphins, Incident at Hawk's Hill and My Side of the Mountain to stir my deep-seeded desire to run away and live off the land (yes, even now).

So, I decided to do something I have been planning on doing for a long time now, reread one of them.  I did actually reread Island of the Blue Dolphins back in 2010 and since I loved it as much as I remember I can't believe it has taken me so long to pick up another book from this list.  Luckily, I have been slowly buying books from my childhood so I only had to go as far as my bookshelf to find My Side of the Mountain.

Let me tell you guys...I still love this book!  In case you aren't familiar with the story, Sam runs away, lives in a tree (how freaking awesome!) and has a pet falcon named Frightful.  There is a moment in the book that really stuck with me the first time I read it in elementary school and over the years I think about it at the most random times.  Sam builds a fire in his tree and...

Then I noticed something dreadful.  Frightful was sitting on the bedpost, her head under her wings.  She was toppling.  She jerked her head out of her feathers.  Her eyes looked glassy.  She is sick, I said.  I picked her up and stroked her, and we both might have died there if I had not opened the tent flap to get her some water.  The cold night air revived her.  "Air," I said.  "The fireplace used up all the oxygen.  I've got to ventilate this place."
pg. 92-93

Ever since I imagined that sweet bird I was unable to get the image of her glassy eyes out of my mind.  

Moral of the story:
We need books about trees and animals and dirt and edible flowers.  Books set in natural environments.
Also, read books from your childhood.  It's amazing!

"Waiting On" Wednesday

Jill at Breaking the Spine hosts "Waiting on" Wednesday, a place where we can voice the books we are patiently - okay probably impatiently - waiting to be released.




Fever (Chemical Garden)
by Lauren DeStefano
Pub. date: February 21, 2012

From author's website:

Rhine and Gabriel have escaped the mansion, but they’re still in danger. Outside,
they find a world even more disquieting than the one they left behind. Determined to
get to Manhattan and to find Rhine’s twin brother Rowan, the two press forward,
amidst threats of being captured again . . . or worse.

The road they are on is long and perilous-and in a world where young women only live
to age 20 and men die at age 25, time is precious. In this sequel to Lauren
DeStefano’s harrowing Wither, Rhine must decide if freedom is worth the price-now
that she has more to lose than ever.

I got suckered in

So...I don't celebrate Valentine's Day.  I know, I know...please don't hate me for it.  It has nothing to do with relationship status, I was this way dating then single then dating then....well, you get the picture.  Every year my husband looks at me with his serious face and says "ok, I'm really not doing anything for Valentine's Day so this isn't just woman speak for 'I want you to surprise me' right?"  And I assure him I would like nothing more than for the day to pass without my even noticing it (which actually happened 2 years ago. Best. V-Day. Ever!)

What can I say, my mother was extremely vocal about her belief that if you love someone you should tell them every day not just the 14th of February (and yet she is the only one who gives me a Valentine every year).

However, this year I have been forced to play nice with the confetti slinging cupid.  Work is having a bake sale to benefit the Human Race.  Drat!  I can't argue with charity. So, I grabbed my wax lips, put on my smiley face and whipped up a batch of "just add milk" mini cheesecakes.  Then, I decided to add a strawberry heart topping and viola...I'm a step up from store bought red and pink sugar cookies.

Not too shabby for someone who hates this over-commercialized holiday thank you very much!