Last chance to win The Stolen Crown!!

Only 2 more days to enter my giveaway for a signed copy of The Stolen Crown by Susan Higginbotham!

Ends May 2.

Island of the Blue Dolphins - Scott O'Dell

Island of the Blue Dolphins
by Scott O'Dell

This is the only book that I read for the Shelf Discovery Challenge that was a reread and I saved it for last because I remembered loving it when I was little.  I was not disappointed reading it again!  I'm kind of in love with it, and really what's not to love?  You have a young girl alone on an island that is shaped like a dolphin fighting wild dogs while taming birds and otter and then you get to the author's note and find out it was based on a true story!!!  How did I not remember that?

It was a quick read but I loved every second.  It was strange to read the one part I remembered the most and how it was barely even a part of the story:

On the sixth day, when the storm had ended, I went to the place where the canoes had been hidden, and let myself down over the cliff.  This part of the shore was sheltered from the wind and I found the canoes just as they had been left.  The dried food was still good, but the water was stale, so I went back to the spring and filled a fresh basket.

The part that stuck with me was about the water.  Reading this in elementary was the moment that I found out water didn't last forever, it became stale.  This was such a shock to me that the image of the canoe with water baskets in it has stuck with me and it is what I think about anytime stale water comes up.  I'm ashamed to say that the image in my head did change over the years and without my realizing what happened I switched out the baskets for plastic water jugs...come on Jess there's no plastic on the Island of the Blue Dolphins!

Basically read this book.  It's like Snow White meets Hatchet, without prince charming or the creepy dead pilot in the plane that crashed in the water.  Okay so clearly you know what part of Hatchet has been burned into my skull, and I couldn't stop thinking about Snow White and the animals that constantly follow her around.  I'm not making this sound right, just read it. 

*I read this book as part of the Shelf Discovery Challenge.

**Source: I bought this book with my own sweet loot.

Flowers in the Attic - V.C. Andrews

Flowers in the Attic
by V.C. Andrews

I was and still am very confused by this book.  It has been a long time since I read V.C. Andrews and I thought this would be a good choice for the Shelf Discovery Challenge.  I mean come on, 4 kids locked in an attic...I was intrigued by what motives their captors could possibly have and what the outcome was.  Seriously though...390 pages of 4 kids in an attic, it got a bit old...fast.

Then, surprise! Part 2 is much better.  I finally cared what was going to happen to these kids and felt like there was something worth reading about.  There was danger and drama and a mouse named Mickey...how cute is that!  the problem was that throughout the entire book I just kept going back and forth between needing to know how it ends, to make sure revenge is had and then being bored enough to want to give up and move on to my next book.

The end finally became more steady with the intensity and after reading the last page I quickly flipped a few pages to the second book in the series (the book I bought includes the first 2).  The last chapter took on a kind of horror story feel (which I guess it kind of was but I didn't really feel it until then) and I really enjoyed that part.  My biggest issue was part of the storyline.  I read all kinds of books, true stories that have harsh details of all kinds, but I had a seriously hard time dealing with the way the relationship between Cindy and Chris played out  Maybe it's because I wasn't expecting it, but I was surprised at how much it bothered me, especially since it was fiction.  

Have you read Flowers in the Attic?  What did you think?

*I read this book as part of the Shelf Discovery Challenge.

**Source: I bought this book with my own sweet loot.

Anne of Green Gables, Avonlea, and the Island & LibriVox

I found an awesome new thing...well 2 new things...well more than 4 new things.  Okay I am getting ahead of myself.  A few months ago I discovered a website.  I was in desperate need of an audiobook to fill some time (this was before I became completely sold on the gloriousness that is audiobooks) and I came across something wonderful in iTunes, free podcasts of audiobooks.

Where do you find these you are surely asking?  LibriVox.org I say.  Check out the website to see all the books that you can listen to for free or you can search iTunes for LibriVox.

Okay now on to the wonderful new books I have listened to.  Anne of Green Gables!  I know, I have to be one of the last people in the world to read all about Anne but I have to admit I just never really cared.  When I was in college, my roommate owned the movies and I got about 10 minutes into the first one and decided it was a waste of time.  Oh was I ever wrong.  How have I gone so long without loving Anne.  Oh oh and Mrs. Rachel Lynde with her "that's what!" I love it all.

So after Green Gables I moved on to Avonlea and finally Anne of the Island.  Here is where I come to my problem...I can't find the next audiobook anywhere!  It may actually be a good thing because now I have a good excuse to buy the whole book set.  The thing is that I would listen to it at the gym and I LOVED it.  so I am going to have to read Anne of Windy Poplars fast so I can get back to my audio.  I started and am just about finished with Tristan and Iseult by Joseph Bedier (not as good as the movie but still enjoyable).  I have a ton of audiobooks to choose from when I'm finished but I WANT ANNE BACK!!  I love her and I want more.  Who knew that I would fall in love with this sweet redheaded girl.  I thought she was blah and was convinced the books didn't have anything to interest me.  Clearly I was wrong.

Does this mean I should also read the Little House series?

Moral of the story:  Read Anne of Green Gables and check out LibriVox.org.

** I was not compensated in any way by LibriVox I just know an awesome deal for free stuff when I see it and wanted to pass it on.

The Stolen Crown - Susan Higginbotham

The Stolen Crown: The Secret Marriage that Forever Changed the Fate of England
By Susan Higginbotham

Let me just say that when you take the drama of the War of the Roses and the fascinating, easy story-telling of Susan Higginbotham, you can’t go wrong. I loved reading about the excitement that unfolded from the point-of-view of Harry Stafford, the person who betrayed a king but about whom little is actually known, as well as the perspective of his wife Kate Woodville who was the sister of the queen and to who history has not been the most kind.

I don’t know about you, but for me this is a very confusing time period. I’m not talking about keeping all the details straight (which, hello, is ridiculous to attempt during a cousin’s war) but oh my emotions, I couldn’t keep them in check. One chapter I am living this person and wanting them to succeed and the next chapter I am wishing them dead. I think the changing narrations between Kate and Harry also added to this effect and I loved it.

I also love the spunk that Higginbotham writes into her female characters when they are young. I think it makes them seem more real because I know if I was raised prim and proper (which of course I am) I would be doing absurd things whenever I could get away with it. Plus, it just makes the story that much more entertaining. It was quite amusing when I found young Harry to have similar qualities.

“I told Grandmother when she talked to me this morning that I thought you were too French,’ Harry said solemnly. ‘But she told me that I was being foolish, that when I was older I would be delighted with your French ways. She didn’t say why. Anyway, she told me that it was either you or the Earl of Warwick’s girls…she thought that I would enjoy marriage to you more. And she said that you would probably be a better bearer of children for me…So I said that I guessed that you would do, and Grandmother said that I was shaping up to be a man of sense after all.”

Please Harry, don’t hold back. The dialogue throughout the story is entertaining and it builds such fantastic chemistry between the characters. I know that there are many versions to every story but I like to believe it happened the way that Higginbotham tells it…full of drama and passion and betrayal and redemption.

If you want to check out this book (you know you do) I am giving away a signed copy.  Check out my post from last week to enter.


**Source: This book was purchased with my own sweet loot.

Quick update with a quote from Friends

I feel like I have been off in a far away land for a while where reading and blogging are at the bottom of my to-do list and at the top is me staring at my computer screen browsing...and browsing...and browsing.  What am I browsing?  Well I don't want to jinx anything because it is still early and uncertain but Monday night I bought a ticket to California, Wednesday I was on a plane, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday I was working (actually able to go into the office instead of work from home because it is located in CA) and looking at something... Sunday I flew back to NC and here I am now exhausted, overwhelmed and trying not to think about what I want to think about. 

Allow me to quote Friends with a clue:

Chandler: Come with us. You'll see how close it is to the city.
Joey: No, it's not close! You said it was in Escrow? I couldn't even find that on the map! 

That's it...that's all I can say for now. 

The good news is I am finally going to post my review for the Stolen Crown...tomorrow.  And don't forget to enter my giveaway for a signed copy.

I'll keep you updated if I move on to a place that Joey can find on the map. 

Mailbox Monday

Thank you to Marcia at The Printed Page for putting on the weekly Mailbox Monday, a place where I discover so many wonderful new books.

Check out her blog and post all the new books you acquired last week.

 
The Vanishing of Katharina Linden by Helen Grant (ARC from publishers via Shelf Awareness)

Not since The Elegance of the Hedgehog has a book arrived in America from Europe on such wings of critical praise and popularity. The Vanishing of Katharina Linden is an unforgettable debut—at once chilling and endearing, haunting and richly insightful—the story of one girl’s big heart and even bigger imagination, and of a world full of mystery, good, and evil.

It isn’t ten-year-old Pia’s fault that her grandmother dies in a freak accident. But tell that to the citizens of Pia’s little German hometown of Bad Münstereifel, or to the classmates who shun her. The only one who still wants to be her friend is StinkStefan, the most unpopular child in school.

But then something else captures the community’s attention: the vanishing of Katharina Linden. Katharina was last seen on a float in a parade, dressed as Snow White. Then, like a character in a Grimm’s fairy tale, she disappears. But, this being real life, she doesn’t return.

Pia and Stefan suspect that Katharina has been spirited away by the supernatural. Their investigation is inspired by the instructive—and cautionary—local legends told to them by their elderly friend Herr Schiller, tales such as that of Unshockable Hans, visited by witches in the form of cats, or of the knight whose son is doomed to hunt forever.

Then another girl disappears, and Pia is plunged into a new and unnerving place, one far away from fairy tales—and perilously close to adulthood.

Marvelously morbid, stunningly suspenseful, and exceptionally winning, The Vanishing of Katharina Linden is a new coming-of-age classic, and the most accomplished fiction debut in years.

The Tulip Virus by Danielle Hermans (From Marcia at The Printed Page as part of Read It Forward.  Thanks so much Marcia!!)

A gripping debut mystery set in contemporary London with roots in 17th century Holland and the mysterious tulip trade

In 1636 Alkmaar, Holland, Wouter Winckel’s brutally slaughtered body is found in the barroom of his inn, an antireligious pamphlet stuffed in his mouth. Winckel was a respected tulip-trader and owned the most beautiful collection of tulips in the United Republic of the Low Countries, including the most coveted and expensive bulb of them all, the Semper Augustus. But why did he have to die and who wanted him dead? 

In 2007 London, history seems to be repeating itself. Dutchman Frank Schoeller is found in his home by his nephew, Alec. Severely wounded, he is holding a 17th-century book about tulips, seemingly a reference to the reason for his death moments later. With the help of his friend Damien Vanlint, an antique dealer from Amsterdam, Alec tries to solve the mystery, but soon comes to realize that he and his friend’s own lives are now in danger.  

The Tulip Virus is a fast-paced, fascinating mystery based on the real-life events surrounding the collapse of the tulip bubble in 17th century Holland—the first such occurrence in history—a story that plunges readers deeply into questions of free will, science, and religion, while showing the dark fruits of greed, pride, and arrogance.

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet: A Novel by David Mitchell (ARC from publishers via Shelf Awareness)

In 2007, Time magazine named him one of the most influential novelists in the world. He has twice been short-listed for the Man Booker Prize. The New York Times Book Review called him simply “a genius.” Now David Mitchell lends fresh credence to The Guardian’s claim that “each of his books seems entirely different from that which preceded it.” The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet is a stunning departure for this brilliant, restless, and wildly ambitious author, a giant leap forward by even his own high standards. A bold and epic novel of a rarely visited point in history, it is a work as exquisitely rendered as it is irresistibly readable.

The year is 1799, the place Dejima in Nagasaki Harbor, the “high-walled, fan-shaped artificial island” that is the Japanese Empire’s single port and sole window onto the world, designed to keep the West at bay; the farthest outpost of the war-ravaged Dutch East Indies Company; and a de facto prison for the dozen foreigners permitted to live and work there. To this place of devious merchants, deceitful interpreters, costly courtesans, earthquakes, and typhoons comes Jacob de Zoet, a devout and resourceful young clerk who has five years in the East to earn a fortune of sufficient size to win the hand of his wealthy fiancée back in Holland.

But Jacob’s original intentions are eclipsed after a chance encounter with Orito Aibagawa, the disfigured daughter of a samurai doctor and midwife to the city’s powerful magistrate. The borders between propriety, profit, and pleasure blur until Jacob finds his vision clouded, one rash promise made and then fatefully broken. The consequences will extend beyond Jacob’s worst imaginings.  As one cynical colleague asks, “Who ain’t a gambler in the glorious Orient, with his very life?”