Sunday, December 31, 2017

QUICK REVIEW: Rebel Queen by Michelle Moran

Synopsis

From the internationally bestselling author of Nefertiti and Cleopatra’s Daughter comes the breathtaking story of Queen Lakshmi—India’s Joan of Arc—who against all odds defied the mighty British invasion to defend her beloved kingdom.

When the British Empire sets its sights on India in the mid-nineteenth century, it expects a quick and easy conquest. India is fractured and divided into kingdoms, each independent and wary of one another, seemingly no match for the might of the English. But when they arrive in the Kingdom of Jhansi, the British army is met with a surprising challenge.

Instead of surrendering, Queen Lakshmi raises two armies—one male and one female—and rides into battle, determined to protect her country and her people. Although her soldiers may not appear at first to be formidable against superior British weaponry and training, Lakshmi refuses to back down from the empire determined to take away the land she loves.

Told from the unexpected perspective of Sita—Queen Lakshmi’s most favored companion and most trusted soldier in the all-female army—Rebel Queen shines a light on a time and place rarely explored in historical fiction. In the tradition of her bestselling novel, Nefertiti, and through her strong, independent heroines fighting to make their way in a male dominated world, Michelle Moran brings nineteenth-century India to rich, vibrant life.

Hardcover, 355 pages
Published March 3rd 2015 by Touchstone
ISBN 1476716358 (ISBN13: 9781476716350


About the Author

Michelle Moran is the international bestselling author of six historical novels, including Madame Tussaud, which was optioned for a mini-series in 2011. Her books have been translated into more than twenty languages.

A native of southern California, Michelle attended Pomona College, then earned a Masters Degree from the Claremont Graduate University. During her six years as a public high school teacher, she used her summers to travel around the world, and it was her experiences as a volunteer on archaeological digs that inspired her to write historical fiction.

In 2012 Michelle was married in India, inspiring her seventh book, Rebel Queen, which is set in the East. Her hobbies include hiking, traveling, and archaeology. She is also fascinated by archaeogenetics, particularly since her children's heritages are so mixed. But above all these things, Michelle is passionate about reading, and can often be found with her nose in a good book. A frequent traveler, she currently resides with her husband, son, and daughter in the US.


Check out the author's website
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My Thoughts

This is the tale of Queen Lakshmi and her all-female guard, and the trusted friendship she develops with her most skilled of soldiers Sita. Sita was a motherless child raised in poverty. Seeking a way out for her family and being the protector of her little sister, Sita trains to be a warrior, in hopes of being selected to join the Queen's army. And this is exactly what she does, going on to become a friend and confident to the Queen.

This story has a little of everything. Full of adventure, adversity and even a little romance, Sita is a heroine for today. The author always writes an engaging and easy-to-read story. While I enjoyed this story, it wasn't quite as good as her earlier novel Madame Tussaud. Nevertheless I would recommend this one.


Buy Now:

Simon and Schuster
Barnes and Noble
Amazon
IndieBound


My Rating:

 




The Cerebral Girl is a forty-something blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.

This book was the June 2017 selection for the Cape Coral Bookies, although I got this book from the author in exchange for my honest opinion.


 

QUICK REVIEW: The Mothers by Brit Bennett

Synopsis

A dazzling debut novel from an exciting new voice, The Mothers is a surprising story about young love, a big secret in a small community—and the things that ultimately haunt us most.

Set within a contemporary black community in Southern California, Brit Bennett's mesmerizing first novel is an emotionally perceptive story about community, love, and ambition. It begins with a secret.

"All good secrets have a taste before you tell them, and if we'd taken a moment to swish this one around our mouths, we might have noticed the sourness of an unripe secret, plucked too soon, stolen and passed around before its season."

It is the last season of high school life for Nadia Turner, a rebellious, grief-stricken, seventeen-year-old beauty. Mourning her own mother's recent suicide, she takes up with the local pastor's son. Luke Sheppard is twenty-one, a former football star whose injury has reduced him to waiting tables at a diner. They are young; it's not serious. But the pregnancy that results from this teen romance—and the subsequent cover-up—will have an impact that goes far beyond their youth. As Nadia hides her secret from everyone, including Aubrey, her God-fearing best friend, the years move quickly. Soon, Nadia, Luke, and Aubrey are full-fledged adults and still living in debt to the choices they made that one seaside summer, caught in a love triangle they must carefully maneuver, and dogged by the constant, nagging question: What if they had chosen differently? The possibilities of the road not taken are a relentless haunt.

In entrancing, lyrical prose, The Mothers asks whether a "what if" can be more powerful than an experience itself. If, as time passes, we must always live in servitude to the decisions of our younger selves, to the communities that have parented us, and to the decisions we make that shape our lives forever.


Hardcover, 288 pages
Published October 11th 2016 by Riverhead Books
ISBN 0399184511 (ISBN13: 9780399184512)



About the Author

Born and raised in Southern California, Brit Bennett graduated from Stanford University and later earned her MFA in fiction at the University of Michigan, where she won a Hopwood Award in Graduate Short Fiction as well as the 2014 Hurston/Wright Award for College Writers. Her work is featured in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The Paris Review, and Jezebel.

The Mothers is her first novel.
  


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My Thoughts

Unfortunately I did not write this review when the book was fresh in my mind. So I am hampered in my ability to thoroughly relay my feelings. However I did like the author's writing and the character development. What made my experience reading this book especially enjoyable was the fact that the book I purchased came with post-it notes written by the author marking certain passages throughout. It gave some great insight into the author's thoughts and intentions when writing the story, and it was really a great experience!

This is a great book for anyone who likes stories of family drama and gut punches, and people forced to make tough decisions.

Buy Now:

Barnes and Noble
Amazon
IndieBound

My Rating:






The Cerebral Girl is a forty-something blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.

This book was the March 2017 selection for the Cape Coral Bookies.

Sunday, October 22, 2017

READATHON October 2017: End-Event Survey







Closing Survey! (add your link or comment below)
1. Which hour was most daunting for you? Well, after a day working on hurricane cleanup I was so tired and exhausted that I only lasted a couple of hours before passing out. But since my whole body hurts today and I'll be taking it easy, I'm going to try to continue my reading today on my own.
2. Tell us ALLLLL the books you read! I'm still working on the very long The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne
3. Which books would you recommend to other Read-a-thoners?
4. What’s a really rad thing we could do during the next Read-a-thon that would make you smile?
5. How likely are you to participate in the Read-a-thon again? Would you be interested in volunteering to help organize and prep? I always try to participate.

Saturday, October 21, 2017

READATHON October 2017: Getting my drink on


I'm finally ready. Settling down with a mug of tea and finally reading after a day of hard and exhausting work.

READATHON October 2017: Mid-Event Meme


Halfway through the readathon, and I haven't really been able to participate yet. Today is when everyone decided to help me with hurricane cleanup, and you have to jump at the opportunity when you have it! So today was spent on roof repairs and landscape cleanup. Now I am showered and exhausted and barely able to move. Perfect time to curl up in a chair with a pot of tea to finally get some reading done!

Mid-Event Survey:
1. What are you reading right now? The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne
2. How many books have you read so far? zero
3. What book are you most looking forward to for the second half of the Read-a-thon? Same book. It's a long book.
4. Have you had many interruptions? How did you deal with those? Today has been nothing but interruptions. I'm hoping to have tonight to settle down and get some reading done.
5. What surprises you most about the Read-a-thon, so far? Nada

READATHON October 2017: Book and a Beverage Challenge


The Book Monsters are asking readathon participants to post a pic of their beverage and book. Well, I already finished my Spiced Pumpkin Frappe!

I'm currently back to just water, but will put on a pot of tea later this afternoon!

READATHON October 2017: 10 Years, 10 Books Challenge


As a readathon challenge, we are being "challenged" to recommend one book published in each year of the readathon. This is my list, all of which I've personally read and recommend except for the first two, both of which are on my TBR.

2007:

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah


2008:

People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks


2009:

Under This Unbroken Sky by Shandi Mitchell


2010:

The Passage by Justin Cronin


2011:

Rules of Civility by Amor Towles


2012:

Wilderness by Lance Weller


2013:

A Dual Inheritance by Joanna Hershon


2014:

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra


2015:

The Soul of an Octopus by Sy Montgomery


2016:

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood


2017:

The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne

READATHON October 2017: Opening Meme



I'm getting a late start this morning. I've been running errands to get them out of the way and free me up a bit, but I still have obligations to see to. We are still going through hurricane cleanup down here in south Florida, and I have a family friend coming over today to replace some missing shingles on the roof and I have some landscaping to attend to. But I will be working at getting some reading done this weekend!

1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today? South Florida
2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to? The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne
3) Which snack are you most looking forward to? I'm drinking a Pumpkin Spice Frappe right now, and planning on making chili later!
4) Tell us a little something about yourself! I'm a nearing 50 divorced woman with a ZooCrew of 3 dogs and 5 cats (and a sixth cat at work that will be coming home with me one of these days). I work in the software industry, and I just went through Hurricane Irma and am still cleaning up the after effects. I have a video of the hurricane as the eye closed in on us (I spent most of the storm outside recording).
5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? If this is your first read-a-thon, what are you most looking forward to? I think I started with the readathon when it was one or two years old, so it's been awhile now. And I'm a bit older now. I don't think I was even 40 years old when I did my first readathon. So I don't have the same endurance that I used to have, and just take it easy now. I don't try to stay awake the 24 hours, and my goal these days is to just read as much as I can.

I've been in a bit of a reading slump, and I'm hoping maybe the readathon will help jump start my reading genes again. Let's get to it!

Thursday, August 31, 2017

TLC BOOK TOURS and REVIEW: The Good Daughter by Karin Slaughter

Synopsis

Two girls are forced into the woods at gunpoint. One runs for her life. One is left behind…

Twenty-eight years ago, Charlotte and Samantha Quinn's happy small-town family life was torn apart by a terrifying attack on their family home. It left their mother dead. It left their father — Pikeville's notorious defense attorney — devastated. And it left the family fractured beyond repair, consumed by secrets from that terrible night.

Twenty-eight years later, and Charlie has followed in her father's footsteps to become a lawyer herself — the ideal good daughter. But when violence comes to Pikeville again — and a shocking tragedy leaves the whole town traumatized — Charlie is plunged into a nightmare. Not only is she the first witness on the scene, but it's a case that unleashes the terrible memories she's spent so long trying to suppress. Because the shocking truth about the crime that destroyed her family nearly thirty years ago won't stay buried forever…


Packed with twists and turns, brimming with emotion and heart, The Good Daughter is fiction at its most thrilling. 

Hardcover, 528 pages
Published August 8th 2017 by William Morrow
ISBN 0062430246 (ISBN13: 9780062430243)



About the Author

Karin Slaughter is one of the world’s most popular and acclaimed storytellers. Published in 36 languages, with more than 35 million copies sold across the globe, her sixteen novels include the Grant County and Will Trent books, as well as the Edgar-nominated Cop Town and the instant New York Times bestselling novel Pretty Girls. A native of Georgia, Karin currently lives in Atlanta. Her Will Trent series, Grant County series, and standalone novel Cop Town are all in development for film and television.

Check out the author's website
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My Thoughts
Samantha Quinn felt the stinging of a thousand hornets inside her legs as she ran down the long, forlorn driveway toward the farmhouse.
Two young sisters share a horrible experience as teenagers, and are left motherless, battered and broken. Jump forward 28 years to little sister Charlie-- the "good daughter" who followed in her father's footsteps to become a lawyer and stayed close to home. But she's hit a bad stretch in life, estranged from her husband and caught in the center of a local tragedy. Her past is nipping at her heels once again, demanding to be confronted.

I became a fan of the author with her best selling novel Pretty Girls. I learned then just how good the author is at writing multi-dimensional characters with which you can really identify, and she understands the complexities of familial and romantic relationships. Her characters are very human and flawed. You see both the good and the bad in them, and find yourself rooting for them to work it all out.

My biggest complaint with the author is that she will throw in some twists and turns that push the limits of feasibility, and it can cause me to be pulled out of the story as I think, "Hmmm...that seems a little unrealistic."
I would like to thank TLC Book Tours for including me on this tour. Check out the website for the full tour schedule:

Tuesday, August 22nd: No More Grumpy Bookseller
Wednesday, August 23rd: Read-Love-Blog
Thursday, August 24th: Readaholic Zone
Friday, August 25th: The Book Chick
Monday, August 28th: A Wondrous Bookshelf
Tuesday, August 29th: StephTheBookworm
Wednesday, August 30th: Mom’s Small Victories
Thursday, August 31st: Cerebral Girl in a Redneck World
Monday, September 4th: Always With a Book
Tuesday, September 5th: Kritters Ramblings
Wednesday, September 6th: Booked on a Feeling
Thursday, September 7th: Diary of a Stay at Home Mom
Monday, September 11th: she treads softly
Tuesday, September 12th: Kahakai Kitchen

My final word: While there are moments in her stories that stretch the boundaries of my ability to "suspend disbelief", overall I really enjoy this author. Her writing is very "readable", but her stories aren't too simplistic or dumbed-down. Her characters have depth, the storyline in this story has some twists and turns and can keep you guessing. There is some humor to make you smile, sentimentality to bring tears, a roller-coaster of emotions. The author writes fallible characters, and she offers strong female leads who are yet still human and flawed. Her books make for good beach reads, or with which to curl up in a comfy chair this winter.

Buy Now: 
HarperCollins
Barnes and Noble
Amazon
IndieBound

My Rating:




 

The Cerebral Girl is a forty-something blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.

I received a copy of this book to review through TLC Book Tours and the publisher, in exchange for my honest opinion. I was not financially compensated in any way, and the opinions expressed are my own and based on my observations while reading this novel. 

Wednesday, July 12, 2017

TLC BOOK TOURS and REVIEW: The Almost Sisters by Joshilyn Jackson

Synopsis

With empathy, grace, humor, and piercing insight, the author of gods in Alabama pens a powerful, emotionally resonant novel of the South that confronts the truth about privilege, family, and the distinctions between perception and reality---the stories we tell ourselves about our origins and who we really are.

Superheroes have always been Leia Birch Briggs' weakness. One tequila-soaked night at a comics convention, the usually level-headed graphic novelist is swept off her barstool by a handsome and anonymous Batman.

It turns out the caped crusader has left her with more than just a nice, fuzzy memory. She's having a baby boy--an unexpected but not unhappy development in the thirty-eight year-old's life. But before Leia can break the news of her impending single-motherhood (including the fact that her baby is biracial) to her conventional, Southern family, her step-sister Rachel's marriage implodes. Worse, she learns her beloved ninety-year-old grandmother, Birchie, is losing her mind, and she's been hiding her dementia with the help of Wattie, her best friend since girlhood.

Leia returns to Alabama to put her grandmother's affairs in order, clean out the big Victorian that has been in the Birch family for generations, and tell her family that she's pregnant. Yet just when Leia thinks she's got it all under control, she learns that illness is not the only thing Birchie's been hiding. Tucked in the attic is a dangerous secret with roots that reach all the way back to the Civil War. Its exposure threatens the family's freedom and future, and it will change everything about how Leia sees herself and her sister, her son and his missing father, and the world she thinks she knows.



About the Author

Joshilyn Jackson is the New York Times bestselling author of seven novels, including gods in Alabama and A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty. Her books have been translated into a dozen languages. A former actor, Jackson is also an award-winning audiobook narrator. She lives in Decatur, Georgia, with her husband and their two children. 

Check out the author's website
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My Thoughts
My son, Digby, began at exactly 3:02 in the morning on the first Friday in June. 
Leia (gotta love the name for a character who straddles the geek world) is a top-knotch graphic artist who has a one-night stand with a costumed attendee at a type of Comic Con convention. She doesn't know his name or really know what he looks like, other than the fact that he was black and had a nice smile and gentle eyes, but she is shocked (and later finds she is pleased) to discover that her reckless one-night stand has left her "in the family way". At 38 and single, she recognizes that this may be her last chance for children, so she happily embraces the situation.

As a little girl, Leia's father died and left her mother to raise her alone until her remarried. Her stepfather Keith was a good father to her and Leia loves him, and with their marriage she also gained a step-sister. Rachel was her same age, and they were close as sisters growing up.

So, of course, when it comes time to tell someone about her pregnancy, Rachel is the first person she tries to share the news with. However when she arrives at Rachel's house, she discovers Rachel in the midst of her own personal crisis, causing leia to squash her news for the time being. Then Leia gets news that her paternal grandmother is ill and has her small town in an uproar. Leia leaves to see her grandmother, taking her niece Lavender with her to save her from the unrest going on in her home.

And just when you think that things can't get any tougher for this family, a mystery is unearthed at Leia's grandmother's house that begins a legal investigation involving the contents of a trunk found in the attic.

I don't believe I've read anything by this author before, although I was familiar with her name and previous books. But I've gotta say, I was really pleasantly surprised once I got going with the story. The author's writing is really easy-to-read and engaging. The characters are fleshed out. I got a real feel for their distinct personalities, their motivations and their needs and desires. Even the cadence of their voices came through loud and clear! I always know that a book has grabbed me if I can see the movie playing in my head, and this was one of those books!

I would like to thank TLC Book Tours for including me on this tour. Check out the website for the full tour schedule:

Tuesday, July 11th: Book by Book
Wednesday, July 12th: Cerebral Girl in a Redneck World
Thursday, July 13th: bookchickdi
Friday, July 14th: Time 2 Read
Monday, July 17th: Tina Says…
Tuesday, July 18th: StephTheBookworm
Wednesday, July 19th: BookNAround
Thursday, July 20th: The Book Diva’s Reads
Friday, July 21st: Bibliotica
Monday, July 24th: A Chick Who Reads
Tuesday, July 25th: Leigh Kramer
Wednesday, July 26th: Always With a Book
Thursday, July 27th: Ms. Nose in a Book
Thursday, July 27th: Wining Wife
Friday, July 28th: SJ2B House Of Books
Monday, July 31st: she treads softly


My final word:
I really loved this book! The author's writing is very approachable, and makes for a fast read. Even I, who is a very slow reader, could knock this book out in a few days. There is enough intrigue and enough twists and turns and drama to keep you wanting to read on and not put the book down, but there is also humor (I actually chuckled aloud at one point, which is very rare for me!) and sentimentality, and you'll likely find yourself tearing up more than once. I quite happily and heartily recommend this one as the perfect summer read!

Buy Now:

HarperCollins
Barnes and Noble
Amazon

My Rating:







The Cerebral Girl is a forty-something blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.

I received a copy of this book to review through TLC Book Tours and the publisher, in exchange for my honest opinion. I was not financially compensated in any way, and the opinions expressed are my own and based on my observations while reading this novel. The book that I received was an uncorrected proof, and quotes could differ from the final release.  

Monday, June 12, 2017

Mailbox Monday (6/12/17 edition)

 Image licensed from bigstockphoto.com
Copyright stands

Mailbox Monday is hosted here. I've received a few new books recently:


Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Pachinko follows one Korean family through the generations, beginning in early 1900s Korea with Sunja, the prized daughter of a poor yet proud family, whose unplanned pregnancy threatens to shame them all. Deserted by her lover, Sunja is saved when a young tubercular minister offers to marry and bring her to Japan.

So begins a sweeping saga of an exceptional family in exile from its homeland and caught in the indifferent arc of history. Through desperate struggles and hard-won triumphs, its members are bound together by deep roots as they face enduring questions of faith, family, and identity.



The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit by Michael Finkel

Many people dream of escaping modern life, but most will never act on it. This is the remarkable true story of a man who lived alone in the woods of Maine for 27 years, making this dream a reality--not out of anger at the world, but simply because he preferred to live on his own.

In 1986, a shy and intelligent twenty-year-old named Christopher Knight left his home in Massachusetts, drove to Maine, and disappeared into the forest. He would not have a conversation with another human being until nearly three decades later, when he was arrested for stealing food. Living in a tent even through brutal winters, he had survived by his wits and courage, developing ingenious ways to store edibles and water, and to avoid freezing to death. He broke into nearby cottages for food, clothing, reading material, and other provisions, taking only what he needed but terrifying a community never able to solve the mysterious burglaries. Based on extensive interviews with Knight himself, this is a vividly detailed account of his secluded life--why did he leave? what did he learn?--as well as the challenges he has faced since returning to the world. It is a gripping story of survival that asks fundamental questions about solitude, community, and what makes a good life, and a deeply moving portrait of a man who was determined to live his own way, and succeeded.




The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

From Taylor Jenkins Reid comes an unforgettable and sweeping novel about one classic film actress’s relentless rise to the top—the risks she took, the loves she lost, and the long-held secrets the public could never imagine.

Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one in the journalism community is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now?

Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband, David, has left her, and her career has stagnated. Regardless of why Evelyn has chosen her to write her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career.

Summoned to Evelyn’s Upper East Side apartment, Monique listens as Evelyn unfurls her story: from making her way to Los Angeles in the 1950s to her decision to leave show business in the late 80s, and, of course, the seven husbands along the way. As Evelyn’s life unfolds through the decades—revealing a ruthless ambition, an unexpected friendship, and a great forbidden love—Monique begins to feel a very a real connection to the actress. But as Evelyn’s story catches up with the present, it becomes clear that her life intersects with Monique’s own in tragic and irreversible ways.

Filled with emotional insight and written with Reid’s signature talent, this is a fascinating journey through the splendor of Old Hollywood into the harsh realities of the present day as two women struggle with what it means—and what it takes—to face the truth.
  




The Wolf Road by Beth Lewis

ELKA BARELY REMEMBERS a time before she knew Trapper. She was just seven years old, wandering lost and hungry in the wilderness, when the solitary hunter took her in. In the years since then, he's taught her how to survive in this desolate land where civilization has been destroyed and men are at the mercy of the elements and each other.
But the man Elka thought she knew has been harboring a terrible secret. He's a killer. A monster. And now that Elka knows the truth, she may be his next victim.
Armed with nothing but her knife and the hard lessons Trapper's drilled into her, Elka flees into the frozen north in search of her real parents. But judging by the trail of blood dogging her footsteps, she hasn't left Trapper behind--and he won't be letting his little girl go without a fight. If she's going to survive, Elka will have to turn and confront not just him, but the truth about the dark road she's been set on.
The Wolf Road is an intimate cat-and-mouse tale of revenge and redemption, played out against a vast, unforgiving landscape--told by an indomitable young heroine fighting to escape her past and rejoin humanity.


I'm grateful to the publisher for sending me this book. I only got half-way through it when I got it from Netgalley before it expired, so now I can finish it and do a real review!
 

From TLC Book Tours:

The Almost Sisters by Joshilyn Jackson


With empathy, grace, humor, and piercing insight, the author of gods in Alabama pens a powerful, emotionally resonant novel of the South that confronts the truth about privilege, family, and the distinctions between perception and reality---the stories we tell ourselves about our origins and who we really are.

Superheroes have always been Leia Birch Briggs' weakness. One tequila-soaked night at a comics convention, the usually level-headed graphic novelist is swept off her barstool by a handsome and anonymous Batman.

It turns out the caped crusader has left her with more than just a nice, fuzzy memory. She's having a baby boy--an unexpected but not unhappy development in the thirty-eight year-old's life. But before Leia can break the news of her impending single-motherhood (including the fact that her baby is biracial) to her conventional, Southern family, her step-sister Rachel's marriage implodes. Worse, she learns her beloved ninety-year-old grandmother, Birchie, is losing her mind, and she's been hiding her dementia with the help of Wattie, her best friend since girlhood.

Leia returns to Alabama to put her grandmother's affairs in order, clean out the big Victorian that has been in the Birch family for generations, and tell her family that she's pregnant. Yet just when Leia thinks she's got it all under control, she learns that illness is not the only thing Birchie's been hiding. Tucked in the attic is a dangerous secret with roots that reach all the way back to the Civil War. Its exposure threatens the family's freedom and future, and it will change everything about how Leia sees herself and her sister, her son and his missing father, and the world she thinks she knows.

Tuesday, May 30, 2017

TLC BOOK TOURS and REVIEW: A House Without Windows by Nadia Hashimi

Synopsis

A vivid, unforgettable story of an unlikely sisterhood—an emotionally powerful and haunting story of friendship that illuminates the plight of women in a traditional culture, from the author of the bestselling The Pearl That Broke Its Shell and When the Moon Is Low.

For two decades, Zeba was a loving wife, a patient mother, and a peaceful villager. But her quiet life is shattered when her husband, Kamal, is found brutally murdered with a hatchet in the courtyard of their home. Nearly catatonic with shock, Zeba is unable to account for her whereabouts at the time of his death. Her children swear their mother could not have committed such a heinous act. Kamal’s family is sure she did, and demands justice. Barely escaping a vengeful mob, Zeba is arrested and jailed.

Awaiting trial, she meets a group of women whose own misfortunes have led them to these bleak cells: eighteen-year-old Nafisa, imprisoned to protect her from an “honor killing”; twenty-five-year-old Latifa, a teen runaway who stays because it is safe shelter; twenty-year-old Mezghan, pregnant and unmarried, waiting for a court order to force her lover’s hand. Is Zeba a cold-blooded killer, these young women wonder, or has she been imprisoned, like them, for breaking some social rule? For these women, the prison is both a haven and a punishment; removed from the harsh and unforgiving world outside, they form a lively and indelible sisterhood.

Into this closed world comes Yusuf, Zeba’s Afghan-born, American-raised lawyer whose commitment to human rights and desire to help his homeland have brought him back. With the fate this seemingly ordinary housewife in his hands, Yusuf discovers that, like the Afghanistan itself, his client may not be at all what he imagines.

A moving look at the lives of modern Afghan women, The House with No Windows is astonishing, frightening, and triumphant.


Hardcover, 415 pages
Published August 16th 2016 by William Morrow (first published August 15th 2016)
ISBN 0062449680 (ISBN13: 9780062449689)



About the Author

Nadia Hashimi was born and raised in New York and New Jersey. Both her parents were born in Afghanistan and left in the early 1970s, before the Soviet invasion. In 2002, Nadia made her first trip to Afghanistan with her parents. She is a pediatrician and lives with her family in the Washington, DC, suburbs.

Check out the author's website
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My Thoughts
I suppose this bloody mess might partly be my fault.
Zeba has been a good wife, mother, daughter and neighbor (although, because she is the daughter of a sorceress, there is a wariness between her and the rest of her extended family), but her marriage has continued to degrade over the years. Her once doting husband has become abusive, neglectful of the family, drinking away their food money. Then one day Zeba is found over his dead body with no memory of what happened, and the village calls for her blood.

The chief of police arrests Zeba and quickly takes her to the women's prison for her own safety, knowing the villagers may come for justice. Zeba is roomed with three other women: Latifa, Nafisa and Mezhgan. Women are housed in this prison for all sorts of crimes, but many are there for "love crimes"-- adultery, falling in love with the wrong man, being caught alone with a man unsupervised, etc. Most have been found to have brought dishonor to their families. While Zeba awaits her trial, she befriends these women and becomes like a sister to them. She learns their stories, their likes and dislikes, their pain and fear, and their passions.

Yusuf was once an Afghan boy, his family having immigrated to America when he was about twelve. Now he is an attorney who has returned to his homeland and has been hired as Zeba's council. As if her case weren't difficult enough, Yusuf finds his hands tied by her refusal to share with him anything she remembers about the day her husband died, nor about their life together leading up to his death.

I was introduced to the author with her book When the Moon is Low, and I loved this one just as much as I did that one. The author has an engaging yet easy-to-read writing style.




I would like to thank TLC Book Tours for including me on this tour. Check out the website for the full tour schedule:

Wednesday, May 17th: Real Life Reading
Wednesday, May 17th: A Bookish Affair
Thursday, May 18th: Helen’s Book Blog
Friday, May 19th: Tina Says…
Monday, May 22nd: Reading is My Super Power
Tuesday, May 23rd: Girl Who Reads
Wednesday, May 24th: From the TBR Pile
Wednesday, May 24th: BookNAround
Thursday, May 25th: The Book Diva’s Reads
Friday, May 26th: Read Her Like an Open Book
Monday, May 29th: Based on a True Story
Tuesday, May 30th: Cerebral Girl in a Redneck World
Wednesday, May 31st: A Literary Vacation
Thursday, June 1st: G. Jacks Writes
Friday, June 2nd: Jenn’s Bookshelves
TBD: Book by Book


My final word: The author has a very "approachable" writing style which is very comfortable to read, like slipping into a pair of comfy PJs at the end of a hard day. She knows how to write well-fleshed characters of some depth that pull you into the story and keep you there. This story runs the gamut of happiness to melancholy, love to hate, fear of the present to dreams for the future.You care not only for Zeba and Yusuf and their futures, but for the lives of the other women who share Zeba's life in prison. A beautiful yet heart-wrenching tale that I recommend to anyone who loves to immerse themselves into another culture.

Buy Now:

HarperCollins
Barnes and Noble
Amazon
IndieBound

My Rating:




 


The Cerebral Girl is a forty-something blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.

I received a copy of this book to review through TLC Book Tours and the publisher, in exchange for my honest opinion. I was not financially compensated in any way, and the opinions expressed are my own and based on my observations while reading this novel.

Tuesday, May 23, 2017

TLC BOOK TOURS and REVIEW: All That is Solid Melts Into Air by Carole Giangrande

Synopsis

In the morning fog of the North Atlantic, Valerie hears the frenetic ticking of clocks. She's come from Toronto to hike on the French island of St. Pierre and to ponder her marriage to Gerard Lefevre, a Montrealer and a broadcast journalist whose passion for justice was ignited in his youth by the death of his lover in an airline bombing. He's a restless traveller (who she suspects is unfaithful) and she's the opposite: quiet, with an inner life she nurtures as a horticulturalist. Valerie's thinking about Gerard on assignment in her native New York City, where their son Andre works. In New York City, an airplane has plunged into a skyscraper, and in the short time before anyone understands the significance of this event, Valerie's mind begins to spiral in and out of the present moment, circling around her intense memories of her father's death, her youthful relationship with troubled Matthew, and her pregnancy with his child, the crisis that led to her marriage to Gerard, and her fears for the safety of her son Andre and his partner James. Unable to reach her loved ones, Valerie finds memory intruding on a surreal and dreamlike present until at last she connects with Gerard and the final horror of that day.

Praise

"With shattering grace Giangrande divines catastrophic grief, the redemptive power of ephemeral joys, and the interconnectedness of all things as past and present conflate in terrorism's chaos. Memory becomes balm as life, all life, is porous. Exquisite, devastating, this book is a bomb."

—Carol Bruneau, author of These Good Hands

"An elegy for lost innocence, All That Is Solid Melts Into Air is at once extremely sad and exquisitely hopeful. Its hopefulness resides mainly in the stubborn resonance of the quotidian, and in the kind hearts and good wills of those who refuse to accept evil, no matter how often it crashes into their lives. Carole Giandgrande has achieved a great deal in this short, beautiful book; confronting the incomprehensible without despair and describing profound grief without sentimentality."

—Susan Glickman, author of The Tale-Teller and Safe as Houses

"All That Is Solid Melts Into Air is above all a compassionate book. Carole Giangrande takes that horrifying day—September 11, 2001—and filters it though the consciousness of a woman, Valerie, whose loved ones are in Manhattan as the crisis unfolds. She doesn’t know whether they are dead or alive, and Giangrande is masterful in her expression of Valerie’s surreal state of mind. The book captures with gut-wrenching acuity the anxiety, fear and distress of not only that particular day but of our current social climate as well. No one is safe anymore—was anyone, ever?—and our perceptions rule us: “The truth was that everything you looked at had to pass through the lens of what you imagined you saw. It was up to you to decide what was real.” Timely words from a timely book."

—Eva Tihanyi, author of The Largeness of Rescue
 


Paperback, 200 pages
Published April 10th 2017 by Inanna Publications
ISBN 1771333618 (ISBN13: 9781771333610)


About the Author
Born and raised in the New York City area, Carole Giangrande is a Toronto-based novelist and author of nine books, including the award-winning novella A Gardener on the Moon, the novels An Ordinary Star and A Forest Burning, the short story collection, Missing Persons and the novellas Here Comes The Dreamer and Midsummer. Her third novel, All That Is Solid Melts Into Air will be published in Spring 2017. She's worked as a broadcast journalist for CBC Radio (Canada's public broadcaster) and her fiction, poetry, articles and reviews have appeared in Canada’s major journals and newspapers (Her essay "Goshawk" was Lyric Essay Award Winner in the Eastern Iowa Review, 2016). She's read her fiction at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre, at the Banff Centre for the Arts (as an Artist-in-Residence), the University of Toronto, on radio and at numerous public venues. She has recently completed another novel. 

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My Thoughts
As she walked uphill on Rue Marechal Foch in the old town of Saint-Pierre, Valerie heard clocks.
Valerie and husband Gerard are adrift and unmoored and losing sight of one another when an airliner crashes into the Twin Towers on 9/11, leaving them shaken and grasping for anything to keep them from going under. The past blends with the present, one nearly indistinguishable from the other. 
Memory was too aggressive. It would root you out with a wild growl, sniffing and pawing at the ground. It would make you afraid.
This is one of those tough books to review, because I feel that just about anything I share will be too much. Other than flashbacks to the past, the bulk of the story only covers a couple of days. So I fear if I'm not careful, I'll ruin the story. But the story follows Valerie and her husband Gerard, her friend Matthew from the past, and Valerie and Gerard's son Andre. 
At eight forty-six a.m., Eastern Daylight Time, the watch stopped. 

I would like to thank TLC Book Tours and the publisher for including me on this tour. Check out the website for the full tour schedule:
Monday, May 15th: Readaholic Zone
Tuesday, May 16th: Tina Says…
Wednesday, May 17th: Literary Quicksand
Tuesday, May 23rd: Cerebral Girl in a Redneck World
Friday, May 26th: Books and Bindings
Thursday, May 25th: Girl Who Reads
Monday, May 29th: From the TBR Pile
Wednesday, May 31st: A Bookish Way of Life
Wednesday, May 31st: 5 Minutes For Books

My final word: This is a very slow-moving story. Cleverly derived, it's gentle and guttural-- primal even, like a gut-punch. It's a bit disjointed, with little snippets of dialogue and blips in time, and somewhat ethereal and mystical. The first half was almost too slow for me, but I really liked the second half of the story, and the last third was my favorite. At times quite powerful, this is a great story about acceptance, balance, and settling debts. The cyclic nature of life, and how everything comes back around again. A touching story.

Buy Now:

Inanna Publications
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

My Rating:







The Cerebral Girl is a forty-something blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.

I received a copy of this book to review through TLC Book Tours and the publisher, in exchange for my honest opinion. I was not financially compensated in any way, and the opinions expressed are my own and based on my observations while reading this novel. 

Sunday, April 30, 2017

READATHON April 2017: Closing Meme


Here we are at the end of the road once again. I was along for only part of the ride-- life is just too distracting these days.

1. Which hour was most daunting for you? They all are. I'm my own worst enemy.
2. Could you list a few high-interest books that you think could keep a reader engaged for next year? Nothing can hold my interest for long anymore. My attention-deficit just continues to worsen.
3. Do you have any suggestions for how to improve the Read-a-thon next season? Nope
4. What do you think worked really well in this year’s Read-a-thon? I didn't notice any drastic differences.
5. How many books did you read? I didn't complete anything. I read a little of two different books.
6. What were the names of the books you read? I had four books to select from, but mostly just read Rebel Queen by Michelle Moran and a little of All That Is Solid Melts Into Air by Carol Giangrande.
7. Which book did you enjoy most? Rebel Queen
8. Which did you enjoy least? Well, of the two that would leave All That Is Solid Melts Into Air, but I really just started to read it. I have a long way to go yet!
9. How likely are you to participate in the Read-a-thon again? What role would you be likely to take next time? I'll usually participate, and will always be a reader (when I can commit).

 So that would be it. I'm going to continue trying to get some reading in today, and I'll see you all back here in the fall.

Saturday, April 29, 2017

READATHON April 2017: Opening Meme


Here we are again, gathering together around the world to commit to a single goal-- READ. I will do what I can to get some real reading done, but I have mightily failed the last year or two. But this is a clean slate! So let's get this party started!

1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today? South Florida
2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to? Rebel Queen by Michelle Moran
3) Which snack are you most looking forward to? I didn't really stock up on snacks, as I'm trying to watch what I eat and not snack too much. However I do have some grapes in the fridge! And I have some tapioca pudding I may get to!
4) Tell us a little something about yourself! I'm a divorced woman working in the tech industry. I share my home with a passel of animals: Three dogs Tiki (13 year old Coton du Tulear), Zook (6 1/2 year old Chihuahua), and Roo (1 1/2 year old mix breed that DNA testing shows is mostly Chihuahua, Cattle Dog, and Chow), and five cats Momma (14 years), her son Simon (12 years), Shotsie (10 years), Izzy (2 years) and Gilly/Jellybean (1 year).
5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? If this is your first read-a-thon, what are you most looking forward to? Nothing. I always just endeavor to do more book-related stuff: read, blog, write reviews about recently read books, etc.

And with that, my friends, let's get to it! Enjoy!

Monday, April 17, 2017

TLC BOOK TOURS and REVIEW: Mississippi Blood by Greg Iles

Synopsis

The endgame is at hand for Penn Cage, his family, and the enemies bent on destroying them in this revelatory volume in the epic trilogy set in modern-day Natchez, Mississippi—Greg Iles’s epic tale of love and honor, hatred and revenge that explores how the sins of the past continue to haunt the present.

Shattered by grief and dreaming of vengeance, Penn Cage sees his family and his world collapsing around him. The woman he loves is gone, his principles have been irrevocably compromised, and his father, once a paragon of the community that Penn leads as mayor, is about to be tried for the murder of a former lover. Most terrifying of all, Dr. Cage seems bent on self-destruction. Despite Penn's experience as a prosecutor in major murder trials, his father has frozen him out of the trial preparations--preferring to risk dying in prison to revealing the truth of the crime to his son.

During forty years practicing medicine, Tom Cage made himself the most respected and beloved physician in Natchez, Mississippi. But this revered Southern figure has secrets known only to himself and a handful of others. Among them, Tom has a second son, the product of an 1960s affair with his devoted African American nurse, Viola Turner. It is Viola who has been murdered, and her bitter son--Penn's half-brother--who sets in motion the murder case against his father. The resulting investigation exhumes dangerous ghosts from Mississippi's violent past. In some way that Penn cannot fathom, Viola Turner was a nexus point between his father and the Double Eagles, a savage splinter cell of the KKK. More troubling still, the long-buried secrets shared by Dr. Cage and the former Klansmen may hold the key to the most devastating assassinations of the 1960s. The surviving Double Eagles will stop at nothing to keep their past crimes buried, and with the help of some of the most influential men in the state, they seek to ensure that Dr. Cage either takes the fall for them, or takes his secrets to an early grave.

Tom Cage's murder trial sets a terrible clock in motion, and unless Penn can pierce the veil of the past and exonerate his father, his family will be destroyed. Unable to trust anyone around him--not even his own mother--Penn joins forces with Serenity Butler, a famous young black author who has come to Natchez to write about his father's case. Together, Penn and Serenity--a former soldier--battle to crack the Double Eagles and discover the secret history of the Cage family and the South itself, a desperate move that risks the only thing they have left to gamble: their lives.

Mississippi Blood is the enthralling conclusion to a breathtaking trilogy seven years in the making--one that has kept readers on the edge of their seats. With piercing insight, narrative prowess, and a masterful ability to blend history and imagination, New York Times bestselling author Greg Iles illuminates the brutal history of the American South in a highly atmospheric and suspenseful novel that delivers the shocking resolution his fans have eagerly awaited.

Paperback, 704 pages
Published March 21st 2017 by William Morrow
ISBN 0062642618 (ISBN13: 9780062642615)

About the Author
Greg Iles spent most of his youth in Natchez, Mississippi. His first novel, Spandau Phoenix, was the first of thirteen New York Times bestsellers, and his new trilogy continues the story of Penn Cage, protagonist of The Quiet Game, Turning Angel, and #1 New York Times bestseller The Devil’s Punchbowl. Iles’s novels have been made into films and published in more than thirty-five countries. He lives in Natchez with his wife and has two children.

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My Thoughts
Grief is the most solitary emotion; it makes islands of us all..
This is the final book in the Natchez Burning trilogy of the Penn Cage series. This series has covered the investigation into the actions of a white supremacist group in Mississippi called the Double Eagles. The trilogy started in Natchez Burning with the father of Penn Cage, Dr. Tom Cage, charged with the murder of his former nurse Viola Turner. In the process of investigating his father's case, Penn is dragged into the past and a torrent of ugly events involving the Double Eagles going as high up as the Kennedy assassination. In The Bone Tree, the story continued with Henry Sexton leading the investigation into the Double Eagles, and now in Mississippi Blood we sit in on the trial of Dr. Tom Cage as we learn more of the past.

I have really loved this trilogy, and Greg Iles has become an author that I trust. He can craft a great story, and knows how to build tension. He brings his characters to life and welcomes you into their story. You can feel the sticky heat of the south, smell the rich earth, hear the frogs croaking in the swamp, and see the "Old South" in your mind.

Penn Cage is a former prosecutor and current mayor of Natchez, Mississippi. His father has been the beloved town physician, well-respected among the black community for decades as a man who has always treated them with respect and compassion, understanding their plight as a person with dark skin in a southern town steeped deep in racism. The doctor has been charged with the death of his former nurse, a black woman whom he once had a brief affair decades earlier when such a relationship could bring a death sentence. A woman who has her own intimate history with the Double Eagles.

Penn's father is assisted by old family friend Quentin Avery, who is a well-respected attorney living in the shadow of the man he used to be, now confined to a wheelchair due to diabetes. And there is the unexpected inclusion of writer and ex-soldier Serenity Butler, who is interested in the story of the Cage family and that of Viola Turner.

I would like to thank HarperCollins and TLC Book Tours for including me on this tour. Check out the website for the full tour schedule:

Tuesday, March 21st: No More Grumpy Bookseller
Wednesday, March 22nd: Mama Reads Hazel Sleeps
Friday, March 24th: Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers
Monday, March 27th: Dreams, Etc.
Tuesday, March 28th: Tina Says…
Wednesday, March 29th: she treads softly
Thursday, March 30th: Hopelessly Devoted Bibliophile
Friday, March 31st: Art @ Home
Monday, April 3rd: Joyfully Retired
Tuesday, April 4th: Bewitched Bookworms
Wednesday, April 5th: Literary Quicksand
Thursday, April 6th: Patricia’s Wisdom
Monday, April 10th: Lit and Life
Tuesday, April 11th: A Bookworm’s World
Wednesday, April 12th: A Bookish Way of Life
Thursday, April 13th: The Book Diva’s Reads
Friday, April 14th: Ace and Hoser Blook
Monday, April 17th: Cerebral Girl in a Redneck World
Tuesday, April 18th: Bibliophiliac

My final word: Loved it! Iles is masterful in his use of suspense. I find my anticipations pulled taut as I wait to see what will happen next. The characters are so well-defined, the story descriptive without being flowery or heavy with description. Iles simply tells a "great yarn" that feels also like a history lesson exposing an ugly past. This final book in the Natchez Burning trilogy does a great job of bringing the trilogy to completion, and was just as enjoyable and satisfying as the first two. If you like mystery and suspense, I strongly and exuberantly urge you to this author a try!

Buy Now:

HarperCollins
Barnes & Noble
Amazon
Indiebound

Rating:






The Cerebral Girl is a forty-something blogger just digging her way out from under a mountain of books in the deep south of Florida.

I received a copy of this book to review through TLC Book Tours and the publisher, in exchange for my honest opinion. I was not financially compensated in any way, and the opinions expressed are my own and based on my observations while reading this novel. The book that I received was an uncorrected proof, and quotes could differ from the final release.