Wow, what a book!

A friend gave me First Family by David Baldacci to read, wow! You are looking for a thriller, no wonder it's on the bestselling list, or it should be. It starts strong and just keeps going. Guess I'll have to look for more by that guy. It is really interesting to read and keeps you wondering and guessing.

So much more reading done, but not blogged about...

The last two books I finished were "Blood and Money" by Thomas Thompson, well, here is a book about a murder in 1969  in Houston and the aftermath. If you want to be spellbound by a story, here it is!

Read this excerpt from a blog critic, then link there and see the whole story!:

Perhaps on a handful of occasions, you come across a story that can paradoxically alter and reinforce your understanding of the human condition. A story so rich in complex and interesting characters, their lives narrated with such vivid detail and telling dialogue, they have to be real people and not the imagined composites of a novelist. A story set so perfectly in a place and time in history that you come away believing for a while that you lived there, traveled the streets, overheard conversations or had supper with the denizens.

Of the hundreds of books I have enjoyed reading, like an endless buffet of delicious meals, there are few and far between the luscious delicacies found in Thomas Thompson’s book, Blood and Money. This sumptuous feast requires slow, deliberate relish in order to luxuriate in every chapter like exquisitely prepared courses served in the finest restaurant. Before I had finished the first chapter of the book, I began to pace myself to allow the rare beauty and satisfying depth of this engrossing experience to linger like the afterglow of fulfilling lovemaking.

Now I am waiting to see the movie, and if I'll find the book the movie "Murder in Texas" is based on I guess I'll have to read that too :-) ("Prescription Murder" by Ann Kurth).

The next book I read was another one from the school library..."Don't judge a girl by her cover" by Ally Carter. It is the third in the "Gallagher Girls" series. Hey, I did read the other two and it is a good and quick read. I need to be ahead of the kids in school! :-)

I did read all 20 of the Texas Lone Star books and don't know if I wrote them all down. But hey, there are list around, you can find them all...

Now I am reading another 'grown-up' book my friend lend me. When I am finished I'll share it with you also!

I have been reading, just not posting!

Here is the latest title: Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire: The Methods andMadness Inside Room 56" by Rafe Esquith an actual classroom teacher! This is a non-fiction and one I had a hard time putting down, but to understand it all you have to take your sweet time, and maybe note taking would be good too. As I am not a classroom teacher, it was a bit much for me and I didn't take many notes, but I would love working with a teacher and have my child thought by a teacher such as this man. If you are a teacher you might just want to go out and by this book so you can make notes in it and keep going back to it. I just hope I can take some of it to heart during this next school year!

**Do click on above links and listen to NPRs interview and read all about the Hobart Shakespearens!

Finished two more Lone Stars :-)

This weeks readings were Evolution, Me & Ohter Freaks of Nature by Robin Brande you ought to read about her! She was a trial lawyer at one time, plus many other jobs! This was a very interesting book you are just going to have to read it yourself, or check out the above link!


The Great Wide Sea by M.H. Herlong, WOW! What a book and the authors first to boot!!! I didn't know what to expect about this one as the title says it has something to do with the Sea...but there is much more to this book. These were two very interesting books and I didn't want to put either one down! Read them both!

Finished...

...Antsy does time by Neal Shusterman interesting to read and the continuation of Neal's The Schwa was here.

From Neal's website:

Fueled by friendship and sympathy, Antsy Bonano signs a month of his life over to his "dying" classmate Gunnar Umlaut. Soon everyone at school follows suit, giving new meaning to the idea of "living on borrowed time." But does Gunnar really have six months to live, or is news of his imminent death greatly exaggerated? When a family member suffers a heart attack after donating two years to Gunnar, Antsy wonders if he has tempted fate by playing God. Fans of "the Schwa" will welcome favorite and new characters in this wholly fresh tale, which is as touchingly poignant as it is darkly comical.

Yes! Some more taken off the list :-)

I, Q: [Book One: Independence Hall] by Roland Smith. (Texas Lone Star) It's actually one that grows on you once you know where it's going. And now you wait for the sequel! It's another spy book, and I do like mystery spy books. And when it's for kids it's easy to read, but this one is in for some surprises! Enjoy it!

From the website: Thirteen-year-old Quest (Q for short) used to live with his mother, a singer, on a sailboat in Sausalito, California. Fifteen-year-old Angela lived with her father, a songwriter, in a loft in San Francisco. Now their parent are married and Q and Angela are on a luxury motor coach traveling around the country on tour with their parents' new band called Match. Their schoolwork for the year is a Web diary of their travels. Perfect… Q can practice his magic tricks and Angela can read her spy novels. What could go wrong?

 Suck it up... by Brian Meehl, yes another Texas Lone Star. This one is about vampires...thanks, have enough of them now!

From the website: The origin of Suck It Up? Teeth-grinding frustration.

When I was writing lots of kids TV for PBS back in the 90s I was often told by politically correct TV producers that I couldn't put such and such in a show because it might offend so-and-so. I couldn't put angels on a wedding cake because it was too Christian and might offend non-Christians. I couldn't write about birthday parties because Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe in celebrating birthdays because it's a celebration of self.

At some point, I became brainwashed by all this political correctness and had a eureka moment. The one minority that no one seemed to care about was our bloodsucking brothers and sisters: vampires. I mean, c'mon, they have special needs too. They're subjected to unfair stereotyping. They even suffer from a terrible hate-crime: staking.

So I found my cause. I was determined to write a story that would let everyone know that vampires are like everyone else. They just have a slight drinking problem--correction--they're diet-challenged.

The story started as a screenplay for a movie (with the likes of Jim Carry playing Morning McCobb). It was called "Don't Call Us Vampires – We're Undead Americans!" It even won a screenplay competition, taking 1st place in The New England Screenwriting Conference of 1998. The Conference gave me a wonderful staged reading of it. But the screenplay never sold and became a film.

After I finished Out of Patience, I decided to resurrect the screenplay as a YA novel. And that's how Suck It Up rose from the grave of a writer's trunk.

3 Willows: the sisterhood grows by Ann Brashares. Okay, never read any of the "Sisterhood" books, but came across this one and downloaded it to my MP3 player and listened to it every day. It's about 3 girls and how their lives during one summer suddenly changes (divorce, camp, job, love). I have to admit I did get kind of hooked on this one and if you listen to it their is an interview with the author at the end :-) (and this was not a Lone Star list book...)!

From Ann's website:
The new book from Ann Brashares, the bestselling author of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants.
Seeds
Polly has an idea that she can't stop thinking about, one that involves changing a few things about herself. She's setting her sights on a more glamorous life, but it's going to take all of her focus. At least that way she won't have to watch her friends moving so far ahead.
Roots
Jo is spending the summer at her family's beach house, working as a bus girl and bonding with the older, cooler girls she'll see at high school come September. She didn't count on a brief fling with a cute boy changing her entire summer. Or feeling embarrassed by her middle school friends. And she didn't count on her family at all. . .
Leaves
Ama is not an outdoorsy girl. She wanted to be at an academic camp, doing research in an air-conditioned library, earning A's. Instead her summer scholarship lands her on a wilderness trip full of flirting teenagers, blisters, impossible hiking trails, and a sad lack of hair products.
It is a new summer. And a new sisterhood. Come grow with them.

More Reading!

It is summer and reading is in full swing :-)

The Compound by S. A. Bodeen...is another Texas Lone Star selection which the kids ought to be reading when school starts again. I am not too happy about the list this year...don't like this book too much. But then if you like Science Fiction, you probably will like this one. Maybe I just don't like Science Fiction!

the dead & the gone: a novel by Susan Beth Pfeffer, hah that's the same genre, so here we go it's a bit better then the other book, but still not what I like for summer reading, and some kids might not get into it as they are just not muture enough. Oh, well, don't need a sequel to this one either (it doesn't help that Dan and I started watching a movie going right along this book -Impact, which will conclude tomorrow evening.

And Jason wanted me to read a book he likes Storm Front: book one of the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher, does Jason know I don't care about vampire books. Well, I read it and will be reading the next one also (well, I'll listen to it on CD as he gave that to me also). Actually the book is about Harry a wizzard and detective who gets to work with the police on paranormal murders.

Oh, my, I almost forgot about this Texas Lone Star book I have read: 

Gym Candy by Carl Deuker hmm, what to say. He writes books about sports and this one is just like it. Love football, love the book...well...anyways, the book is about this boy who's father didn't make it big in football because he wasn't doing what he should have done, hides all he's done from his son and is treating his son to become a big football star. With all the pressure he succumbs to the 'gym candy', so there's the message!

Okay, that's all I have read this week, reading a book at work, listening to a book during workouts, and am starting a new book now (then I'll also start listening to Jason's CD in the car...I'll be having 4 books going at once...might have to change the one I am going to read as it looks as though I have picked another SciFi one :-()

It is time to update this post again...

I have been reading!
Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace...One School at a Time by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. If you want to read about Pakistan and Afghanistans school children this is the book for you. It started out very slow for me, but once I knew what it was all about it became a lot clearer. I do recommend this book, it is hard to read with all these customs we are not used too, but I think it is interesting and I believe Greg Mortenson has his heart in the right place.

Diamond Willow by Helen Frost, this is a Texas Lone Star book and I read it for school. It actually is a pretty interesting book to read and gives you a bit of an inside into Alaska's wilderness. And if you want to know what a "Diamond Willow" is click here.

Waiting for Normal by Leslie Connor, another Texas Lone Star. This is about the saddest book I have read in a long time. But I do recommend this one. No wonder our students are so messed up. A mother who loves her children, or so she says, but is never around to watch what they do or take care of them. The two youngest end up with their father when the oldest has to take care of them all the time. But because the oldest is not his child he can not get custody of her...I won't tell you the ending, but there are some interesting caracters and friendships in this book.

Reading Gym Candy now. Will have to post update later when I am finished with it!

Rain and a book to read! In heaven!

Yes, it rained and was overcast yesterday, what a day to spend indoors curled up with a book I really wanted to finish! Uprising by Margaret Peteson Haddix! Wow! The book is about the Triangle Shirtwaist factory and the girls who worked there. All from the view of a few girls whose path crosses a few times and who end up becoming friends in dire circumstances. I knew a little about the factory, but this brought the plight of the workers, and their ages, to a different understanding. It is a fictional account, but neverless you can get into the story and start understanding what these girls had to live for - nothing! I would recommend this book as a Texas Lone Star book over some of the books that have been nominated and shouldn't have been. Hmmmm, maybe I will do just that!

Yes, two more finished :-)

I am Scout: the biography of Harper Lee by Charles J. Shields

Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird is the most widely read novel in American literature. Two-thirds of American public high schools include it in their curricula. Yet the author — who never published another novel— remains a mysterious figure, refusing since 1965 to give interviews or talk about her Pulitzer prize-winning novel.  I Am Scout is the first-ever comprehensive biography written for a young audience that tells the story of how Miss Lee struggled to become an author and created one of the most popular novels of the 20th century. It fills what has been an empty place on school and library shelves for almost 50 years.

"The text does an excellent job of conveying the facets of Lee's personality that made her a writing success, including her honesty, tenacity, sense of justice and adaptability of interpersonal style... Shields demonstrates Lee's critical role in the creation of longtime friend Truman's Capote's In Cold Blood. Prior knowledge of both works is not absolutely necessary, thanks to an absorbing and easy narrative style...." -Kirkus Reviews

 Description and Review from http://www.charlesjshields.com/ 

This was an interesting book to read, hard to follow at some points, but very interesting to find out why and how she wrote only this one book. Yes, I recomend this for reading. It was also a Junior Literary Guild selection. BTW,To kill a Mockingbird has it's 50th anniversary!

The second book I just finished is The Possibilities of Sainthood  by Donna Freitas and here are the official Reviews from http://www.thepossibilitiesofsainthood.blogspot.com/ 

"Fresh and funny...[Antonia's] emails to the Vatican add flair to a coming-of-age novel already vivid for its warm portrayal of urban Italian-American family life...While getting at serious issues, Freitas wins readers over with a beautifully sustained light tough." -- Starred, Publishers Weekly

"First-time novelist Freitas hops into the romance genre and brightens and heightens it by providing characters who are anything but run-of-the-mill...Yes, it's kind of silly that Antonia thinks she has a shot at being the Patron Saint of the Kiss, but her first-person narrative is so smile-inducing, it's easy to go along with the premise. As Antonia sorts out her feelings for longtime crush Andy, as well as Michael, the boy who makes her blush, readers will be hard-pressed to decide what interests them most--make out sessions or marters." -- Starred, Booklist

It was a pretty funny book about a 15 year old girl who is not allowed to date. She goes to a catholic girl's school in NY, is from Italien descent and has a love of Saints. For more you just have to read the book for yourself, and remember, it's a teenager!

I'm a bit behind...

...my reading log, so here it is:
White Sands, Red Menace by Ellen Klages, the sequel to the Green Glass Sea. Yes, I enjoyed the sequel as much as the first one. Gave it to one of the kids who had read the first one and she was overjoyed getting to read it.

Just finished How not to be Popular by Jennifer Ziegler, oh my, what should I say about this book. Don't think it is one for our younger middle school kids...but it's a Texas Lone Star book selection this coming year...oh, my! But I got to read this one on the Kindle from Amazon. Not so keen on that...I think I rather have the book in my hand and see when the chapter is done, or how much more I have to read on the book! We'll see if I borrow it again.

Also listened to Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson Interesting book about the Civil War era from the view of a slave girl.

Have to think what else I have read this month :-)

'nother book read!

This weeks selection was The Green Glass Sea by Ellen Klages. Ever read about the a-bomb? Well, here we have a girl who's father works at the secret place in New Mexico and when her grandmother can't take care of her any more, she moves there with him. It is a secret place and no one knows about it, it is on no map. What is life going to be like until the final days, and where is she going to go?
Very interesting read and I am looking forward to the sequel. This book was  a Library Guild selection.

Took the trip and weekend to read...

...No Way to Treat a First Lady by Christopher Buckley. Interesting read. The President dies during the night after a fight with his wife with whom he had a fight. Now she has to defend herself in a murder trial. First she is helped by her ex-fiance, a layer, and then she has to fend for herself. Read it to get the details...and no, it is not a book we have at the library, sorry!

Book and CD

Okay, I read Red Moon at Sharpsburg by Rosemary Wells. (the review site for 'Red Moon' is good [although the reviewer doesn't like the book too much and I understand why], her homepage needs work as most books listed are her children's works!) I do recommend this one to whomever likes to read Historical Fiction. This was a good one about the Civil War and the people who lived where the fighting took place. I do believe you would like it.
Part of review on Amazon.com:
From School Library Journal
Starred Review. Grade 7 Up—One word describes 13-year-old India Moody—perseverance. She has heard of a college in Ohio that accepts women and is determined to go there, an unthinkable dream for a girl in 1862. She is tutored by her neighbor, Emory Trimble, an eccentric scientist who teaches her about biology and chemistry, and with whom she later forms a romantic relationship.

I also listened to a book on CD while driving around town... The Tin Collectors by Stephen Cannell, if you like 'Shane Scully' then this is for you. I ran across this while looking for a different book. And it is for adult reading.

Amazon.com Review
Stephen J. Cannell has written and produced enough TV cop shows to give him plenty of inside know-how about the LAPD, and recent events in OJ-land make the plot of The Tin Collectors--conspiracy, corruption, and murder by the boys in blue--more than credible. The tin collectors are the internal affairs cops, and they're out to make police sergeant Shane Scully the fall guy after he kills his former partner, Ray Molnar, in the midst of a domestic dispute that was just a click away from ending in the murder of Ray's wife. Not so coincidentally, she was once Shane's lover, a fact the tin collectors seize upon as evidence that Scully wanted the highly regarded Molar dead. As the wrongfully accused but redoubtable cop fights to clear his name, he discovers Ray's secret life: his other wife, his luxurious Lake Arrowhead home, and the ladder of corruption that reaches all the way to the top in the City of Angels. It should come as no surprise that this has TV-treatment written all over it. Read it now before it comes to a small screen near you, as it surely will. And applaud Cannell's growing ability to flesh out his characters with enough subtext and complexity to make a prime-time series starring Shane a strong possibility. --Jane Adams --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Jinx by Meg Cabot

is the book I just finished. Hmmm...who wants to read about teenage witches? Well, if you do, then you ought to read this book Jinx I did like it and it has your romance, big city, country girl, and what happens when your cousin is a witch! Hope you will enjoy it :-) (oh, yeah, you might want to be a teenager to read it).

I have been reading, just not posting :-)

Here are the books I have finished lately:

If a Tree Falls at Lunch Period, by Gennifer Choldenko

Synopsis (from: http://www.choldenko.com/books/treefall/synopsis.html )

Two kids. Two lives.

For Kirsten the world is crumbling. Her parents are barely speaking to one another and her best friend has come under the spell of the queen bee Brianna. Only Kirsten’s younger science-geek sister is on her side.

For Walker the goal is to survive the new very white private school his mom has sent him to because she thinks he’s going to screw up like his cousin.

“Don’t have to worry, Momma, before I go bad I’ll let you know, send a Hallmark card ready made for the occasion...on the eve your son messes up.”

But Walk is a good kid. So is his new friend, Matteo, though no one knows why Matteo will do absolutely anything that hot blond Brianna asks of him.

Two worlds collide in one compelling story. Then suddenly Kirsten discovers something that shakes them to their core...

“You knew all along,” Walk says.

"No, I didn’t.”

“You’re lying. You found out and then you told the whole world...”

I have read her AlCapone does my shirts book a few years back, and it was pretty interesting, so when this one came across my desk I just had to read it too, after all the character is named after me :-) I liked it and can recommend it to our students.

  Peeled by Joan Bauer 

First paragraph of the TeenRead website: 

 Rumors of a haunted house ignite the curiosity of teen reporter Hildy Biddle. She starts investigating the story only to have her school newspaper shut down. What Hildy uncovers and how she overcomes the obstacles that would have her silenced are at the core of Joan Bauer's new book, PEELED.

Yes, I liked this book also. It goes along the lines of sensorship at a School Newspaper. Another one for the students to enjoy :-) 

Blue Flame, by K.M. Grant (Book one of the Perfect Fire Trilogy)

Review:(click for full review)

Cathars are surprisingly fashionable. You can date the rise in interest in them back to Emmanuel LeRoy Ladurie's Montaillou, a grisly account of a Cathar village and the Inquisition, published in the UK in 1978. But in the decades since, they've become unfairly associated with Dan Brown-esque plots about the Holy Grail such as Kate Mosse's Labyrinth.

So one might approach KM Grant's Blue Flame with caution on reading that the flame is a mysterious rallying symbol for Occitania, the area now known as the Languedoc, in the south of France. There is danger in seeing the middle ages through a modern lens, and the rather garish cover with its crenellated castle conjures up the 19th-century theme park that is Viollet-le-Duc's over-restored Carcassonne.

But I hope it won't put readers off, because there is much to enjoy and admire in this book. At its heart is a love story between Raimon, a weaver's son, and Yolanda, daughter of the Count of Castelneuf. They are nearly 14 and have grown up together, romping through the countryside round Castelneuf, swimming in the river, playing with Yolanda's large hound, Brees. 

As I have read the DeGranville Trilogy and How the Hangman lost his Heart by K.M. Grant, I just had to read this one also. It didn't disappoint either. Now I am curious for the next two in the series, and one is already out, but where? Have to check Amazon and see what is going on, the third, and final, book is coming out sometime this year (according to her website). The DeGranville books fly off our shelves so I assume this one will go also.

Two more books :-)

The Fireman's Wife: A Memoir by Susan Farren. This comes recommended by me. I truly enjoyed reading this little book and it went fast. If you are looking for a good read, try it out!

Sugar Daddy by Lisa Kleypas Definitely an adult book...well, what did I expect...but it was an audiobook downloaded from the public library. It sounded good, but then it turned, still the story was interesting and with a little thinking the story was guessable from the beginning. Just watch out...

Finished two more books :-)

Dark Hours by Gudrun Pausewang, is a story about a girl and her family leaving their home for Dresden and getting separated during an Air Raid. World War II story and something to read and think about. (yes, another school book)

And I listened to audiobook also Secrets of a Shoe Addict by Beth Harbison a sassy book and nothing for kids...yes, I do read adult books also :-) So don't get sassy with me. LOL! This was a fun book to listen too, and now I found out it is kind of a sequel to Shoe addicts Annonymous, guess I'll have to go to the online library and find out what that is all about!

The Postcard (book) and Marley and Me (movie)

Okay, finished this one last night and I liked it. Mystery for kids...pretty good. And yes, another School reading.
The Postcard by Tony Abbott

Hmmm...did I talk about going to see Marley and Me? Saw it Jan. 1, 2009, first movie in the new year, and it is a great tear jerker. Of course I have read the book also and it is, as always, better then the movie, as it does have more info in it.

Finished...

...The Night Tourist by Katherine Marsh. Yep, it is another School reading, but one I ended up enjoying even though I could only read a bit at night before I fell asleep, but that seems to be a recuring theme lately anyway.
Following review is from Bookbrowse.com what an interesting site!

From the Jacket Jack Perdu, a shy, ninth-grade Classics prodigy, lives with his father on the Yale University campus. Smart and introverted, Jack spends most of his time alone, his nose buried in a book. But when Jack suffers a near fatal accident, his life is forever changed. His father sends him to a mysterious doctor in New York City -- a place Jack hasn’t been since his mother died there eight years ago. While in the city, Jack meets Euri, a young girl who offers to show him the secrets of Grand Central Station, the secrets only true urban explorers know about. Fifteen flights below the train station, however, Jack discovers more than just hidden tracks and mysterious staircases. He has stumbled upon New York’s ghostly underworld, which may provide Jack with a chance to see his mother again. But as secrets about Euri’s past are revealed, so are the true reasons for Jack’s visit to the underworld. Masterfully told, The Night Tourist weaves together New York City’s secret history and its modern-day landscape to create a highly vivid ghost world, full of magical adventure and page-turning action.

Media Reviews BookBrowse If you're familiar with the Orpheus myth, you'll have a good gist of how the story will progress, but not without some unexpected twists and turns, and an ending that, despite the odds, manages to surprise. A couple of times, convenience for the sake of the storyline takes the place of credibility (would Jack's father really have let him travel to New York by himself, especially knowing what he did about Jack?); but such contrivances are few, and overall Marsh stays true to the essence of the original story while putting a modern and very witty spin on the timeless themes of love, loss and longing. Full Review (members only, 968 words).  Children's Literature This novel has an unusual situation, but it may be hard for older middle school or high school readers to be patient and stick with the story.  Publishers Weekly Starred Review. [T]his intelligent and self-assured debut will compel readers from its outset, and leave them satisfied as it explores universal themes of love, loss and closure.  Kirkus Reviews Teenagers knowledgeable about mythology and appreciative of sophisticated wordplay will especially enjoy this intricate read.  The Washingtonian - Whitney Spivey Although Marsh eloquently combines her interests in ancient Greece and historical New York, The Night Tourist lacks depth in the fantasy realm. The author spins a colorful tale of an extraordinary underworld, yet she often uses the supernatural context to facilitate events that merit more explanation. Too often, events fall into place a little too easily.