Night of the Living Deed and Goodnight, Irene!

Now that Hurricane Irene has moved on, the weather here is sunny and bright and it's almost hard to believe that just a few days ago we had tons of rain and damaging wind.  Of course, Irene left a few reminders of her little trip through Virginia.  Here's what she left at my apartment complex (although, not my particular apartment, thank God!):

Pretty amazing, huh?  Despite being a category 1, Irene packed quite a punch.  It's sad to see all the trees that she brought down in her wrath. 

We did lose power Saturday night a little before 8pm but were lucky enough to get it back by early morning Sunday.  Fortunately us readers do not fear power outages!  As long as we have some way to illuminate our current read than a little loss of electricity doesn't phase us much.  So I grabbed a flashlight and finished the book I was reading.

(this picture was taking the day before, when the sun was shining and Irene was still a few states away)

Night of the Living Deed

by E. J. Copperman

From Goodreads:

Newly divorced Alison Kerby wants a second chance for herself and her nine-year-old daughter. She's returned to her hometown on the Jersey Shore to transform a Victorian fixer-upper into a charming-and profitable-guest house. One small problem: the house is haunted, and the two ghosts insist Alison must find out who killed them

Night of the Living Deed was a fantastic cozy mystery read.  It's the first in a series, which I definitely plan on continuing to read.  It takes place on the Jersey Shore but I assure you there is zero mention of any Snooki type character.  I found Copperman's style very easy to read, and very funny, it was everything I've come to expect from a cozy.   Here's some quotes:

The woman could probably watch Old Yeller and not tear up.

Living with a nine year old can be like living with a combination of an investigative reporter and a district attorney.  There's always a question and you're usually under suspicion.

Yes, I was going to inflict guilt if possible.  I'm a mother.  It's not so much part of the job as a perk.

Night of the Living Deed gets a Midnight Book Rating of:

Currently I'm reading A Stolen Life by Jaycee Dugard and Shadowfires by Dean Koontz.

The Knife of Letting Go

It's happened.  I'm walking away from a book without finishing it.  Not because the book is poorly written and not because the characters and plot aren't interesting.  I'm walking away because the story is depressing the hell out of me. Here's the book I'm stepping away from:

The Knife of Never Letting Go
by Patrick Ness
From Goodreads:

Prentisstown isn't like other towns. Everyone can hear everyone else's thoughts in an overwhelming, never-ending stream of Noise. Just a month away from the birthday that will make him a man, Todd and his dog, Manchee -- whose thoughts Todd can hear too, whether he wants to or not -- stumble upon an area of complete silence. They find that in a town where privacy is impossible, something terrible has been hidden -- a secret so awful that Todd and Manchee must run for their lives.
But how do you escape when your pursuers can hear your every thought?

It makes me sad to walk away from this book, but reading it makes me sad.  And I usually really like dark, unhappy books.  Ness is a very capable writer and I think he came up with a very unique story- which is saying a lot considering that dystopian novels are all the rage in YA today.  But I've had to deal with almost 300 pages of poor Todd getting beat up constantly, and of course little Manchee getting put through the ringer.  It was hard enough for me to finish Deathly Hallows after Hedwig bought the farm, and reading about poor puppy Manchee getting kicked a half dozen times is just leaving me with a dark cloud of gloom.

I started the book Tuesday and got quite aways into it.  I didn't realize how awful I was feeling until I tried going to sleep that night.  I was actually a bit sick to my stomach.  I was determined to quit the book then and there, but today I had convinced myself that I was being silly and that the book hadn't made me feel that bad.  But within a chapter I was back to the doldrums. 

Here's the thing- there are characters worth rooting for, there are mysteries that I want the answers to.  I am not by any means suggesting that anyone not read this book (well, except you, Bittner- you, my tender hearted friend, should stay clear of this book).  I honestly don't know if there's some other reason this book is affecting me so much, but for now I just have to give myself a DNF on The Knife of Never Letting Go.   And in case Patrick Ness ever stumbles upon my blog, just know that I haven't given up on your future books- TKoNLG was a page turner and I'd definitely be willing to pick up another book by you.  In this case, it's really not you, it's me.

So, faithful and perhaps not so faithful readers, have you ever walked away from a book with regret?  And has a book ever depressed you so much while reading it?

Vacation Wrap Up

I am back from the beach, a little tanner, a little more rested, and a little sadder than 3 weeks ago.  I really need to move to the beach someday!  I got a little lazy about posting, but here's what I read in the final week of my vacation:

First I finished Curse of the Wolf Girl by Martin Millar.  It was a fairly thick book and not the quickest beach read, but it was still endlessly entertaining and I have high hopes that there will be more books in this series.  Plus I now love the name Decembrius.  Millar's characters are not stand up citizens, even for werewolves and fire elementals- they are selfish, they are shallow, more than a few are fashion obsessed.  There is much drinking of whiskey and taking of laudanum.  There are a lot of characters and Millar bounces back and forth, but not in a confusing way.  Would I recommend this book to everyone?  No, I learned my lesson, Millar's books are not for everyone (yes, Courtney, I do mean you and the Lux the Poet debacle),  but if weird and quirky and paranormal is your thing, then Millar's got the books for you.  Start with the first book, Lonely Werewolf Girl.

Curse of the Wolf Girl gets a Midnight Book Rating of:

In order to feel like I actually read a book or two on vacation, my next read was Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan.

 I actually ended up liking this short, quick read more than I thought I would.  It tries a little too hard to be cool and all hipster, and Nick and Norah can be infinitely annoying at times, but overall it's a fun book.  What saves the book from being cliched is that Nick and Norah, while big on the music and club scene, aren't promiscuous drug users. They aren't lily white or vanilla, either.  It seems that sometimes in YA in order to feel real or gritty, authors tend to go to the extreme. Of course, they all do swear and all of them are having more sex than you are. ;)  I've only seen parts of this movie, but I really want to go back and watch it now.  While I enjoyed this book and would totally recommend it for a Readathon read, I don't know that I'll be checking out more by either of these authors.  I'm glad I rated this on Goodreads right after I read it, because it's already been downgraded a bit in my memory.  So I'll go with my first impression, because it really made for a good vacation read.  Plus it makes a reference to Heathers, which is so awesome and more books should have Heathers references.

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist gets a Midnight Book Rating of: 

The last book I actually finished at the beach was The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley.

This is actually my book club's current read, and we'll be discussing it on Saturday.  I don't want to say much about it here, other than to say that I'm very much looking forward to the next book in the series.  Any book that can make chemistry interesting is a winner in my eyes.  And while Flavia de Luce is not your average 11 year old, that's what makes her a compelling character, average 11 year olds are fairly boring in real life and would make very poor mc's for a mystery novel.  I was surprised by how engrossed I became in this book, making it a perfect beach read.

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie gets a Midnight Book Rating of:

 The last book of my vacation was Forever by Maggie Stiefvater.  It's the last in the Wolves of Mercy Falls series and I thought it was a good way to end it.  While I like this series, I've never really loved it, and waiting between books made it fade in my memory.  Sam and Grace are sweet, but a bit boring and Sam can be a major emo although he's got a cool job.  What kept me reading this series was Isabel and Cole, and while I'm okay with saying bye to Sam and Grace, I want more of Isabel and Cole although I know I should be a little troubled over their age difference.  Especially Cole. More Cole, Ms. Stiefvater, please!  I am interested in reading more books by her, although right now her only other books are about fairies, which I'm not particularly fond of, so I'll just wait for her future endeavors. I finished Forever after I got back from vacation, but technically I'm still off work until tomorrow so I'll count it as a vacation read.

Forever gets a Midnight Book Rating of:

 So now it's back to the real world and a daily routine that does not include eating ice cream every night and eating my weight in Pizza Tugos.  I did get a chance to visit lots of used books stores while at the beach and of course I had to bring some books home with me.  I have a post planned on some of the book stores the beach has to offer. 

I don't really know what I'll be reading next, although I do need to play catch up on the Gone With the Wind read-a-long.  Right now I'm waiting impatiently for my new cell phone (a HTC Inspire) and the first app I'm downloading will be the Kindle app!  And now that stores are bringing out the Halloween decor and candy, all I can think of is my October Readathon pile- so excited for it once again!    I'm ready for fall!

Vacation Post #4

Just a week and a half more of vacation!  I had a few good days of reading this week, but I've been doing a lot of running around here at the beach, so the book I'm reading now may take a few days to finish.  But here's what I've read recently:

Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs.

This actually made a perfect beach read, the chapters were short, the pictures were interesting- especially how Riggs fit them into the story line with varying degrees of success.  This book was not what I was expecting, I bought the book for the title and pics alone.  It was a nice change to read a YA book with a male main character.  I'm assuming that there will be a sequel, as the ending is a bit up in the air, and quite frankly I want more peculiars.

Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children gets a Midnight Book Rating of:

(an example of the pics inside the book- this one kind of reminds me of A Christmas Story)

The other book I finished was Obedience by Will Lavender (how awesome is that last name?)

I ordered this from Paperback Swap.  The plots intriguing- a Logic and Reasoning class is given six weeks to solve the disappearance of young woman named Polly.  If they don't find her, she will die.  It's all supposed to by hypothetical, but is it really?  The book is told from three of the student's viewpoint.  The plot is dark and twisty, and you never know what's real and what's not.  My only problem with the book is that I didn't connect as much with the characters as I wanted to, and while the ending is complete it left me wanting just a little more.  This is my first Will Lavender book, but I will most definitely be reading his books in the future because even though I didn't love Obedience, it was a fast paced, interesting read.

Obedience gets a Midnight Book Rating of: 

Current Beach Read:

Curse of the Wolf Girl by Martin Millar

This is a sequel to Millar's Lonely Werewolf Girl, which I loved.  And this has more werewolves, more fire element's fashion crisis, more laudanum addiction and more cross dressing Thanes, so it's safe to say that I'm loving this one too!

Vacation Post #3

This past few days have been fail when it comes to reading, but win when it comes to beach time and playing wiffle ball with the family in the street.  I finally finished World War Z by Max Brooks this morning.  I'm sure it would have been a much faster read had I been at home.  There's too much distraction here- way too many kids and noise and what was that?  It's time for ice cream again?  So reading time is a bit hard to find.

I woke up early the other morning and commenced reading on the porch.  I've been waking up before most of my family so that's pretty much been my only reading time.  Beach reading is hard to do since my two year old niece has a tendency to run, and run fast, down the beach. 

World War Z is a history of a zombie war- a bunch of different interviews from survivors all over the world and covers the beginning, middle and "end" of the war.  It was a very engrossing read, but I wish I had saved it for home.  There is a lot of information, so it's best read when there aren't a lot of distractions around.  Still, I enjoyed it and I really feel it's helped me prepare for the inevitable zombie uprising.

World War Z gets a Midnight Book Rating of :

Now onto my next beach read- Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children!  Happy Friday Reads!

Vacation Post #2

Hit the beach early this morning and managed to finish my first official vacation read, Dog On It by Spencer Quinn.

It was a great beach read, full of mystery and told from the viewpoint of Chet the dog, faithful canine partner to Bernie, his PI owner.  I read this as part of my Stephen King Summer Reading List Self-Challenge, and once again I was rewarded with a good read.  There's an awesome dog narrator (again, it can't be said enough, it's totally Bunnicula for the over 30 club), there's a young girl who may or may not be a runaway, several suspicious Russians, and lots of food mentioned.  Even a little tiny hint of romance- for Bernie, not Chet.

Dog On It gets a Midnight Book Rating of:

Started today: World War Z  by Max Brooks

I doubt there will be much reading done tonight because my nieces are here and there are  already screams and giggles.  Although that may be the ideal background noise while reading a zombie book...

Vacation Post #1

Arrived at the beach yesterday afternoon, and much thanks to the beach gods as the temperature is actually nice and not overwhelming hot like back home.  The Hubs isn't coming down to the end of this week, but I'm down here for the full 3 weeks.  :)

I actually got quite a bit of reading done last night- finishing up Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire- I forgot that Fleur briefly meets Bill in this book and shows some interest in him.  I really love how layered J.K. Rowling's books are- the end of book 4 looms large in how book 7 plays out.  I am just so in awe of Rowling's writing.  Cedric's death in GoF is so much more tragic in the book, and Fudge goes from preening politician to obstinate ass in just a few pages.  Which of course sets up book 5 and the introduction of the villain I dislike the most- Delores Umbridge. 

Also started Dog On It last night, and I'm probably about half way done since I was the first one up this morning.  Is there anything better than reading in the ocean breeze?  So far I'm really enjoying the book, which is told from Chet the dog's perspective.  It's a bit Bunnicula for the adult crowd- and I still read that series, usually adding one to my Readathon Pile O' Books.

Should be hitting the beach in a bit, and then I need to take a nap so I can stay up late to try to get into Pottermore.  I know, I'm a nerd.  I'm especially a Harry Potter nerd.  I have made peace with this.

Ocean City Reads

 Ocean City, here I come!  Well, not right this second.  Right this second I'm packing.  I don't actually leave for the beach until Saturday, but today (which is Wednesday but this won't post until tomorrow) is the day I'm packing since I'll be traveling to Northern Virginia on Friday to travel to the beach with my Mom. 


The fun part of packing is picking out what books I'll be taking to the beach. Although I have a Kindle and a Nook, I like to take lots of print books since I won't take my ereaders on the beach, and around the house leaving them laying about is dangerous because my nieces and nephews, while varying degrees of cute, are miniature and not so miniature creatures of MASS Destruction. Seriously, had George Bush found them in Iraq he would have been instantly vindicated.

So here's the library books I'm taking:
Forever by Maggie Stiefvater
World War Z by Max Brooks
Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist by Cohn and Levithan
The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown (which I totally plan on telling my niece Kerry that's it's about her and her sisters and which she'll totally believe before saying "Hey! That's not nice!" And then I will simply remind her that she's pretty. And she'll ask why I always say that to her, and I'll just smile and pat her on the head).

The books growing mold on my To Be Read Shelves that I'm taking:
Aunt Dimity's Death by Nancy Atherton
Haunting Jordan by P.J Alderman
The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse by Robert Rankin
Night of the Living Deed by E.J. Copperman
The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan
Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler
Obedience by Will Lavender
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
Dog On It by Spencer Quinn
Case Histories by Kate Atkinson
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley (for Book Club)
and Curse of the Wolf Girl by Martin Millar

Now do I honesty think I'll read all of these books? Heck, no! But I am going to the beach for three whole weeks. And while I love, love, love my crazy, loud, dramatic family, I will need lots of escape, and reading is always the best way to get away without physically running away. 

And I want choice in case any of the books start sucking. I refuse to waste my time reading sucky books. I plan on overcoming my insistence on finishing books despite their high level of suck, thus wasting hours on crappy books. No more!

Everyone knows the best part of vacation is reading! The one year I didn't read as much I spent an entire rainy day watching a Toddlers and Tiaras marathon. God knows how many brain cells I killed that day!  Even the worst book in all the world would have been better than that show.  I blame the fact that our culture is obsessed with watching car crashes and rubber necking on my ability to watch not one, but six or seven episodes of Toddlers and Tiaras back to back.  My brain was held hostage!  And, and... I made my family watch it too and refused to change the channel, but it only took a few minutes before their brains were held hostage too.  I am so ashamed.


So which books do you think would make prime beach reads?  If you had to choose from my list, what would you start with?  What is your most memorable beach read?

Waiting on Wednesday 7.27.11

Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine.

This should not come as a surprise, by my WoW pick is:

11/22/63
by Stephen King
From Goodreads:

On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas,
President Kennedy died, and the world changed.

If you had the chance to change history, would you?
Would the consequences be worth it?

Jake Epping is a thirty-five-year-old high school English teacher in Lisbon Falls, Maine, who makes extra money teaching adults in the GED program. He receives an essay from one of the students—a gruesome, harrowing first person story about the night 50 years ago when Harry Dunning’s father came home and killed his mother, his sister, and his brother with a hammer. Harry escaped with a smashed leg, as evidenced by his crooked walk.

Not much later, Jake’s friend Al, who runs the local diner, divulges a secret: his storeroom is a portal to 1958. He enlists Jake on an insane—and insanely possible—mission to try to prevent the Kennedy assassination. So begins Jake’s new life as George Amberson and his new world of Elvis and JFK, of big American cars and sock hops, of a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald and a beautiful high school librarian named Sadie Dunhill, who becomes the love of Jake’s life—a life that transgresses all the normal rules of time.

How awesome does this sound?  Now obviously I was not around during the JFK era, but it's hard not to wonder how things would have turned out had he not been assassinated.  Although, if truth be told, if I had the chance to go back in time and stop a Kennedy assassination I'd choose Bobby Kennedy- I think if any Kennedy actually came close to the mythology that's behind the Kennedy name then it's RFK.  There is something so sad about a life cut down by an assassin's bullet- how different would our world be if Martin Luther King, Jr, RFK, JFK, even John Lennon, not been assassinated?  I'm looking forward to King bringing the 60's to life, and I'm wondering how he's going to pull this story off!

Blog Hop and Follow 7.22

It's been awhile, but it's time to Hop!

Hosted by The Crazy Bookworm

Question of the Week: What’s the ONE GENRE that you wish you could get into, but just can’t?

This may sound weird, since I actually follow a LOT of blogs that pretty much specialize in this genre, but Paranormal Romance.  Now, I'm not talking about YA books like Twilight, but the steamy kind of Mermaid meets Sexy Werewolf with a bit of Half-Demon joining in.  I couldn't even handle the Anita Blake series, there was just too much sex and switching up partners for my simple (read prudish) tastes.  I feel like I probably miss out on some great books, but that's part of the reason I follow bloggers who read genres that I don't normally read.

 Hosted by Parajunkee

Question of the Week: Name 3 authors that you would love to sit down and spend an hour or a meal with just talking about either their books or get advice on writing from?

Okay, this is a fairly easy one.  Stephen King, first and foremost.  I don't even care if all he wants to talk about is baseball (a sport I dislike) or his various ache and pains. In fact I could just stop there, but you know I won't.  JK Rowling, because I really want to get all the little tidbits from her head that she didn't put in the books and to ask her if she'd be willing to write a story starring me and Oliver Wood (and if she doesn't agree to do this, then perhaps I can take a page from Stephen King's book Misery and MAKE her write me a story).  Thirdly, Maureen Johnson.  She is hilarious, and I certainly wouldn't have to worry about the awkward silence that may arise as I stare slacked jawed and adoringly at King and Rowling, because Maureen Johnson does not do silence.  And since I do like writing, and if I ever actually finish anything (like my NaNoWriMo project) then it'll be in the YA genre that Johnson writes so wonderfully for and I'm sure after spending an hour with me she'll invite me into her secret writer's club with John Green and Scott Westerfeld, among others.  Right?