Tuesday, January 28, 2014

The String Diaries by Stephen Lloyd Jones


The String DiariesA jumble of entries, written in different hands, different languages, and different times. They tell of a rumour. A shadow. A killer.

The only interest that Oxford Professor Charles Meredith has in the diaries is as a record of Hungarian folklore ... until he comes face to face with a myth.

For Hannah Wilde, the diaries are a survival guide that taught her the three rules she lives by: verify everyone, trust no one, and if in any doubt, run.

But Hannah knows that if her daughter is ever going to be safe, she will have to stop running and face the terror that has hunted her family for five generations.

And nothing in the diaries can prepare her for that.

A novel of historical suspense that merges with the present day, I really enjoyed the majority of this story.
The pacing at the beginning is phenomenal, catching the reader’s attention from the very first line. The story develops slowly and carefully throughout the book’s first half, which is why the second half, especially the last few chapters is a disappointment. The last half feels very rushed compared to the rest of the writing, making the climactic sections lose the impact they might have had.
The characters are fine, though they are not as developed as they could be. The author, understandably, spends most of the time making sure the plot points are tightly connected, to the detriment of characterization. Some of the characters, like Gabriel, Sebastien, and Eva, deserved a bit more filling out to really connect to the rest of the story.
All in all, this book had a really great beginning which deserved a better ending, but I would still recommend it to people who like a good thriller with a touch of history within it.


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Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!
The Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle: A Biography
From The Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle by Russell Miller


"His aquiline profile, with deerstalker and pipe, is instantly recognizable, even in countries where people have the greatest difficulty pronouncing his name. It is picked out in ceramic tiles on the walls of Baker Street Underground station in London."


(Can you guess who he's talking about?}




P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!


Monday, January 27, 2014

Musing Mondays

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• What book are you currently desperate to get your hands on? Tell us about it! 
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.
• Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us!
• Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!?


The Adventures of Arthur Conan Doyle: A Biography



Anyone who knows me knows that I am fanatic, and I mean that in the strongest way possible, of Sherlock Holmes stories. I started reading them when I was nine and they've stayed with me since then. I reread them every few years and I love them more each time. All of this to say that I started reading The Adventures of  Arthur Conan Doyle by Russell Miller, a biography of Sherlock Holmes' fabulous author. So far, it is wonderful biography, though I tend to be biased with anything related to Conan Doyle.












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Friday, January 24, 2014

Follow Friday

What books are you looking forward to reading in 2014?




Kinder than Solitude by Yiyung Li
Thirty Girls by Susan Minot
Sleep Donation by Karen Russell
All the Birds, Singing by Evie Wyld
The Painter by Peter Heller








P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!


Evernight Teen Anniversary Bash and Giveaway!











To celebrate the first year anniversary of Evernight Teen, which has worked so hard to get my best friend's book published, I am hosting a spotlight on her book and helping spread the word about this publishing company.


This is an excerpt from The Tearings by V.C Repetto, published by Evernight Teen:






1


 


The guy sitting at the next table coughed. It was an ugly, wet sound that made me look up from the exam sheet in front of me.


 


Fabulous. Last thing I needed was to get sick before the swim match.


 


He sniffed and wiped his nose with his stiff, already less-than-fresh sleeve, then lowered his hand back to his pencil and paper. Too bad for the person who’d have to pick that particular test sheet up.


 


Okay, back to the nonsense that would decide if I passed sophomore year or if I had to have “loser” tattooed to my forehead.


 


Sighing, I looked at the word problem. It was a geometry question, one of those that made no real sense except in the wonky world of math and I’d already read it through at least three times. It still sounded like gibberish.


 


I glanced up at the rest of the sophomores, all bent over their own papers. Even Lisa, a row ahead of me, looked like she was trying to disarm an atomic bomb.


 


Standardized tests on a Friday morning, when all anyone could think of was being free to drool on our pillows until Saturday afternoon, at the earliest, was an interesting form of torture.


 


I glanced down my Scantron. I hadn’t bubbled in a B for a while.


 


Ms. Cadiz’s voice rang in my head, admonishing about the horrors of guessing, about the complicated fractions of point subtractions. Whatever. If I left it blank, I might forget and bubble everything wrong.


 


Without another thought, I shadowed in B and moved on to the next wordy nightmare.


 


 


 


“How was it?”


 


I grabbed my gym bag from my locker. “Evil. That’s how it was.”


 


“Yeah, there were some questions I left blank,” Lisa said.


 


“I just hope I passed. My mom will have a stroke if I don’t.” Slinging the bag over my shoulder, I leaned against the cool locker door, feeling the aluminum like a sheet of ice against my back.


 


“Well, she did try to get you that tutor.”


 


“I don’t think anything would have prepared me for some of those questions. I’m pretty sure I got the test that was in Russian or something.”


 


She smiled. “You can tell your mom that. I’m sure she’ll believe it.”


 


“No, but I really was distracted. There was a guy coughing up a hairball next to me.”


 


“Ew!”


 


“It’s probably whatever is going around the school, the flu, or something, but I don’t want to even think of getting sick.” I grabbed Lisa’s arm and started to lead the two of us to the gym. There was a large crowd of students still exiting the cafeteria where we’d had the exam, each one with varying levels of fear sketched on their faces.


 


“You can still swim if you’re sick.”


 


“Not at a state championship. Mr. Grason will never let me even get on the bus.”


 


“It was just a kid coughing, will you stop worrying? You’ll be fine.”


 


I arched an eyebrow at her. “You’re a fortune teller now?”


 


“No, I just know you have paranoid tendencies.”


 


I laughed and pulled the gym door open. “I hope you’re right. Otherwise I’m coughing all over your lunch tray.”


 


“You’re so gross,” she muttered, following me into the sweet and tangy smell of the school gym.


 


“If I can’t go to the match, you can’t, either.”


 


 


 


Mom was waiting at the kitchen table when I finally made it home enveloped in a chlorinated cloud. It was so much the norm for me that I barely smelled it anymore, but I knew it could curl unprepared noses.


 


There were so many questions on her face and she was pulling on her shirt like she did when she was about to leap out of her skin.


 


“It was fine,” I said, before she exploded with anxiety.


 


“Do you think you passed? No, I don’t know if I want to know. If you’re held up a year, then you’ll have trouble getting scholarships and−”


 


“Mom, chill. Geez, I love the faith you have in me.”


 


“Maya, you and I both know math is not your forte.”


 


“Okay, but it’s not like, kryptonite or something.”


 


Mom sighed and stood. “I know I’m exaggerating, but I want you to do well.”


 


I smiled. I really should have been used to this by now. After all, it’ll always been just the two of us, a household of semi-insane females.


 


“There’s eggplant lasagna in the oven; it’ll be ready in a few minutes.”


 


“Yum. It’s completely vegetarian?”


 


“Yes, Maya. I was really tempted to get the beef one, though, and pass it off as meat-free.”


 


“Mom!”


 


“I didn’t. This one is the nice, boring vegetable variety.”


 


Putting my back-pack and gym bag down, I grabbed two placemats and dropped them on the kitchen table, a rickety, ancient thing that was small enough for us to have to squeeze our glasses in between our plates. We’d tried eating at the dining room, but it felt strange in there, with so much space around us we actually lost the salt shaker once. Actually lost it in the tablecloth dunes.


 


Okay, mom wasn’t the only one who had a penchant for exaggeration.


 


“How was work?”


 


“Oh, it was glorious. Norman was out sick so the office was so quiet! He really should be sick more often.”


 


I snorted. “As a social worker, aren’t you supposed to have, like, compassion for your fellow human beings? You can’t just walk around wishing people sick.”


 


“Norman’s a pain.”


 


Laughing, I set the rest of the table.


 


“Actually, there’s something going around, I think.” Her face tightened. “Are you taking your vitamin C tablets? Your Echinacea?”


 


“Yes, mom. I’m taking them all. You’ll probably find me one of these days sprawled on the floor, yellow and dead from a vitamin C overdose.”


 


“It keeps you healthy. We also should get your flu shot one of these days before the season starts.”


 


I shook my head. “It’s tested on animals.”


 


“It is not.”


 


“Yeah, it is. I’m not getting the shot.”


 


Mom rolled her eyes at me and plopped a serving of lasagna onto my plate. “You can be a real pain sometimes.”


 


“Oh, like Norman. One of these days you’ll be wishing I get sick so you don’t have to put up with me anymore.”


 


“Yup, that’s exactly right. Seventeen years with you is quite enough.”


 


I gasped in mock horror and flung a dinner roll at her, hitting her square on her forehead. My aim was definitely improving.


 


 


 


Monday rolled around and with it, the swim match.


 


The rain had started the night before and continued, flooding the school parking lot and making the ten of us, the half-asleep swim team, groan as our uniforms started to sag.


 


“I wasn’t planning on getting wet this early,” Lisa said as we climbed up the bus steps.


 


“Yeah, I already have a cold,” Trevor said with a sniff. “I’ll probably die in the water. Float right up to the top like a fish.”


 


“You’re sick? Does Coach Grason know?”


 


“Do you think I’m retarded? Of course he doesn’t know. And you better not tell him.”


 


I lowered my bag onto one of the fake leather seats. “I’m not going to say anything, but of you throw up in the pool...”


 


I grimaced as I sat down, hearing the seat’s wet squelch. Somehow, the rain had found its way inside.


 


“At least this pool’s one of those warm ones.” Rachael, the team captain, extended her legs along the aisle in a stretch.


 


“Yeah, the last one was so cold I thought they’d have to use an ice pick to get me out.”


 


“Which one was the last one?” Lisa asked.


 


“The one in Jackson High,” I said.


 


“Right. No, but this one is supposed to be one of those super fancy ones. I mean, it should be, from how annoying their swim team is. You’d think they trained in a gold-rimmed pool.”


 


Trevor laughed. The sound twisted into a hard cough that hurt my throat just from hearing it. “Do you want an aspirin?”


 


He shook his head. “I’ve already had four this morning.” He wiped his nose and leaned against the seat. Was it just the light, or were his cheeks flushed?


 


“Maybe it’s not a great for you to compete today. You’re not looking your best.”


 


“I’m fine. I just need, like, the largest cup of coffee on Earth.”


 


Lisa shrugged. “You’ll have to wait until we get back for that.”


 


Trevor nodded and closed his eyes. I watched him for a few more seconds, then sat back to wait for the bus to finally get going.


 


 

Based on this, would you keep reading?
 






a Rafflecopter giveaway





Thursday, January 23, 2014

The Deepest Secret by Carla Buckley


The Deepest Secret
Diagnosed with XP, a rare medical condition which makes him lethally sensitive to light, Tyler is a thirteen-year-old who desperately wants just one thing: to be normal. His mother Eve also wants just one thing: to protect her son. As Tyler begins roaming their cul-de-sac at night, cloaked in the safety of the darkness, he peers into the lives of the other families on the street-looking in on the things they most want hidden. Then, the young daughter of a neighbor suddenly vanishes, and Tyler may be the only one who can make sense of her disappearance…but what will happen when everyone's secrets are exposed to the light?
This novel surprised me. I didn’t expect it to have its feet planted so firmly on literary ground since it is described as a psychological thriller of sorts. It was a welcomed surprise to see that it, in fact, had layers and layers of depth to excavate.

The character development is what makes this story truly worth reading. All the characters change and grow in their individual ways as the novel progresses, which is very gratifying to see after reading too many books with flat characterizations. The plot, however, doesn’t drag one bit. It is kept crisps and quite fast-paced for the depth of character study, and I didn’t find myself bored a single moment.

The writing is straight-forward, so don’t expect to see lots of flowery descriptions and the like. I think this is the main reason why the story works so well. The narrative is dramatic enough that it doesn’t really require any added embellishments.

If you are looking for a psychological novel that really packs a punch and makes you ask yourself what you’d do, then this one is a great choice.




P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!



Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!


The String Diaries
From The String Diaries by Stephen Lloyd Jones


"It was ungracious, unbecoming, ungentlemanly. Rather than playing by the rules, you used the advantage of your position to get what you wanted."










P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!








Monday, January 20, 2014

Musing Mondays

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• What book are you currently desperate to get your hands on? Tell us about it! 
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.
• Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us!
• Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!?


The String Diaries

I am reading The String Diaries by Stephen Lloyd Jones. It's a really fascinating supernatural story that has a modern gothic feel to it that I am really enjoying. It deals with a kind of demon curse that follows a family throughout different generations. Definitely one that I would recommend for any lovers of the supernatural genre who like their stories a bit on the dark side.










P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!







Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!


The String Diaries
From The String Diaries by Stephen Lloyd Jones


"It was only when Hannah Wilde reached the farmhouse shortly after midnight that she discovered how much blood her husband had lost."


pg. 1












P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!




Monday, January 13, 2014

Londoners by Craig Taylor


I use Grammarly's plagiarism check because saying things twice is redundant.

Five years in the making, Londoners is a fresh and compulsively readable view of one of the world's most fascinating cities—a vibrant narrative portrait of the London of our own time, featuring unforgettable stories told by the real people who make the city hum.

Acclaimed writer and editor Craig Taylor has spent years traversing every corner of the city, getting to know the most interesting Londoners, including the voice of the London Underground, a West End rickshaw driver, an East End nightclub doorperson, a mounted soldier of the Queen's Life Guard at Buckingham Palace, and a couple who fell in love at the Tower of London—and now live there. With candor and humor, this diverse cast—rich and poor, old and young, native and immigrant, men and women (and even a Sarah who used to be a George)—shares indelible tales that capture the city as never before.

Together, these voices paint a vivid, epic, and wholly original portrait of twenty-first-century London in all its breadth, from Notting Hill to Brixton, from Piccadilly Circus to Canary Wharf, from an airliner flying into London Heathrow Airport to Big Ben and Tower Bridge, and down to the deepest tunnels of the London Underground. Londoners is the autobiography of one of the world's greatest cities.

This was a wonderfully enlightening look at London and its people. For someone like me, who is planning a trip in the near future to this city, this is a great way of getting a taste of the place beforehand.

I loved that we get to see a bit of every section in London. From the high society, high tea, kind of people, to the funeral directors and even homeless people, we get a real sense of what London means for each of these people. What I found very interesting is the way the author captured each of their voices, so that none of them sound quite the same. This shows that he took the time to maintain their voices and personalities intact.

We get so much slang in the writing, especially through some of the younger narratives, that we do get a good, real sense of London and its people. I especially enjoyed learning about the Voice of the Underground, who is the woman whom you hear at every subway station. There are so many wonderful anecdotes, truthful and unique, that even the least positive of the bunch still make you feel like London is an absolute-must-see.


P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!




Friday, January 10, 2014

Follow Friday

Resolutions: Put together your blogger resolution list for all of us to see!


Well, since my debut novel, The Rose Master, is coming out in June, I really want to get all my followers involved in the release, providing some with review copies and all of that. I also would like to grow my mailing list, for this same reason (hint hint).
By the way, you can check out my author page here.










P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!



Tuesday, January 7, 2014

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
Grab your current read
Open to a random page
Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!


London
From London by Edward Rutherfurd


"It was his mother's reaction that was so mystifying. At first, while his father kissed them both and patted his son on the back, she said nothing, staring across the river as if the little reunion before her was not taking place."


















P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!




Monday, January 6, 2014

Musing Mondays

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• What book are you currently desperate to get your hands on? Tell us about it! 
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.
• Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us!
• Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!?
London
Since I am planning that trip to London, I've been reading up on lots of the history of the city and have started reading a great, fictionalized look at the entire history of London. From its beginning to now. It is fascinating, so far. It's called, of course, London by Edward Rutherfurd.













P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!









Friday, January 3, 2014

Follow Friday


What were your favorite books of 2013?

I really enjoyed:
The Tearings by V.C. Repetto
 Bellman and Black by Diane Setterfield
A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness
Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
In the House Upon the Dirt Between the Lake and the Woods by Matt Bell
We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver






P.S. Please don't forget to sign up for my brand new newsletter which is located right at the top of the page. It will be out once a week, featuring my exclusive stories, poetry, and even songs from my upcoming album! Don't miss out!