Book Blog Hop and Follow Friday (10-7-11)

Happy Friday, everyone! I hope that everyone is enjoying the October weather ... here in Pittsburgh, the rain has finally gone away and brought back sun and wonderful temperatures! The leaves are gorgeous, the air crisp, and it's absolutely wonderful. Now onto the Friday fun ...

Jen at Crazy For Books asks:

“It’s time to spread some love beyond the borders of the Book Blogger Hop! This week, we aren’t answering a question. We are spotlighting our fellow bloggers. Find your favorite(s) author interview(s), guest post(s), book review(s), or bookish article(s) that ANOTHER BOOK BLOGGER featured on their site recently and tell us why you love it/them! As an additional challenge, find your favorite one of EACH of the categories above and spotlight all 4 (interview, guest post, review, article).”

Well, I definitely won't be able to get all four (my brain is just about done for the week), but I will say that Jessica Lawlor's review of Always Something There to Remind Me had me going to my library's website to request it immediately! Like me, she just discovered audiobooks, so reading her review made me want to try it out. 

Parajunkee asks:

If you could pick one character in a book, movie, or television show to swap places with, who would it be?

From a book, hands down, it would be Elizabeth Bennett from Pride and Prejudice. I love who she is as a person, and she ends up Mr. Darcy. From a TV show, it would be Blair Waldorf from Gossip Girl. I LOVE her clothes, shoes, handbags, make-up ... her whole life, really. I would love to be Blair!

So, what have you seen around the blogosphere that you liked? And who would you swap places with? Let me know ... and have a great weekend!

Fall Into Reading 2011: Question #2

Fall Into Reading Challenge is hosted by Callapidder Days. Each Wednesday, she will post a different question. This week's question:

How often do you re-read books? What does it take to 

make you re-read?

I reread books every so often. It really depends what kind of mood I am in. A really great book is like an old friend: it's always there for you, whenever you need it. There are times when I just want to reread one of my favorites, to get lost in that story with those characters. It's comforting to return to those books.

For me to reread a book, it has to appeal to me on so many levels. Not only does it need to have a great story, but the characters have to be realistic and people that I can relate to, and the setting amazing and lifelike. If it has these three things, then the chances are high that I will return to it in the future.

What does it take for you to want to reread a book? And how often do you reread those books? Let me know!

Waiting on Wednesday (10-5-11)

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly feature hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. Each week, you highlight an upcoming release that you are eagerly awaiting. This week, my pick is: Lucky Break by Esther Freud (expected publication date: October 25, 2011).

Synopsis (from goodreads.com): It is their first day at Drama Arts, and the nervous students huddled in a circle are told in no uncertain terms that here, unlike at any other drama school, they will be taught to Act. To Be. To exist in their own world on the stage. But outside is the real world-a pitiless, alluring place in which each of them in their most fervent dreams hopes to flourish and excel. Nell, insecure and dumpy, wonders if she will ever be cast as anything other than the maid. She'll never compete, she knows, with the multitude of confident, long-legged beauties thronging the profession- most notably Charlie, whose effortless ascendance is nothing less than she expects. Meanwhile, Dan, ambitious and serious, has his sights fixed on the role of Hamlet, as well as on fiery, rebellious Jemma. Over the following decade, these young actors grapple with haphazard tours, illogical auditions, unobtainable agents, deluxe trailers, rocky relationships, and red-carpet premieres. This dazzling new novel from Esther Freud uncovers a world of ruthless ambition, uncertain alliances, and the many-sided holy grail of Success.

So, what are you waiting on this Wednesday?

Top Ten Tuesday (10-4-11)

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by The Broke and The Bookish. Each week, they post a different topic and you create your very own top ten list. This week's topic might be a little hard for me, but I will try my hardest:

Book Endings That Left Me With My Mouth Hanging Open

1) The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larsson - it is set up perfectly to lead you into the second book, which I did not have at the time, so I was in shock that I was going to have to wait to find out what would happen next.

2) Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by JK Rowling - just a very emotional book since I love this series so much.

3) The Girl Who Played With Fire by Steig Larsson - just like his first book, this one is set up to lead you into the thrid and final book of the trilogy. And you would have thought I might have learned my lesson after reading the first book, but once again, I had to wait to get my hands on a copy.

4) Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince  by JK Rowling - I was in tears at the end of this novel. But for those of us who love Harry Potter, who wasn't?

5) A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan - this book was alright, and then I got to the last chapter, and I didn't know what was going on. Has anyone else read this book? I 

would love to know what other people thought of it and what you thought of the ending!

6) Faith by Jennifer Haigh - it was a surprising ending (to me at least), but one that was so fitting for the book.


7) Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand - to be honest, my mouth was hanging open for this entire book. To read what Louie lived through, it is truly shocking and uplifting.


8) One Day by David Nicholls - I know a lot of bloggers found the ending predictable and saw it coming from a mile away, I was so swept up in this love story that I was shocked.

That's all I could think of this week. What books left you with your mouth hanging open? Let me know!

Review: Moonlight on Linoleum

Moonlight on Linoleum
Author: Terry Helwig
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Expected Publication Date: October 4, 2011
ARC: 220 pages
Source: won on GoodReads.com


My Rating: 4 stars


Synopsis (from goodreads.com): Terry Helwig and her five sisters were raised by their charismatic, troubled, and very young mother, Carola, who struggled with loneliness and infidelity. Because of their stepfather’s roving job in the oil fields, the family moved frequently from town to town in the American West. The girls were often separated and left behind with relatives, never knowing what their unstable mother would do next. Yet, even in the face of adversity, Terry found beauty in the small moments: resting in the boughs of her favorite oak tree, savoring the freedom she found on her grandparents’ farm, and gleefully discovering the joys of dating and dancing.

Despite the hardships and the limitations of age, Terry rose above her circumstances to become an excellent and faithful caregiver to her five siblings. She finds power in bonding with her sisters, and they manage to thrive in the face of constant upheaval and uncertainty. A moving and motivating portrait of love and perseverance, Moonlight on Linoleum is a poignant tribute to the bonds of family and the tenacity of love.

My Thoughts: Reading the synopsis of this book, I didn't know what to expect. I didn't know if it would be a memoir with Terry complaining about her childhood or one that was constantly putting a positive spin on things. Fortunately, Terry Helwig does neither. She presents her story: a daughter who is the caregiver with a troubled mother as the matriarch of the family. Hearing Terry tell her story is incredible, not only because of what happened, but how she writes about it. She does it with feeling, but it's neither whining or uplifting. She presents the events as they happened, as she remembers it. She does so with such fluidity that it almost seems as if this is a police report. There is little feeling there, but there is a complete picture of what happened. I loved that Terry didn't turn it into a pity party. I did feel bad, but Terry did not make me feel that way. She leaves it up to the reader to decide whether the situations were sad or not. 

Terry Helwig's writing is superb and she tells her story with such clarity. Reading about her experience left me so grateful for my family and the way that I was raised. It would have been so easy for Terry to abandon her sisters to start her own life, but she made sure that they always kept in touch and were a part of each other's lives. If you enjoy memoirs such as The Glass Castle, then you will love this book. It's a moving story about a young girl's life and the bond between sisters, even when seperated by thousands of miles.

Monthly Wrap-Up: September 2011

Another month has come to an end, which I'm finding difficult to believe. Did this month fly by for anyone else? Seriously, I don't think Labor Day happened yet. I'm not sure where I was this month, but I did get a bit of reading done. Here is what my month looked like:

Number of books read: 11

Books Read (links go to my reviews; I have reviews done for all of these books and they are scheduled to go up within the next few weeks):

Clara and Mr. Tiffany by Susan Vreeland

You Don't Sweat Much For a Fat Girl by Celia Rivenbark

Dream When You're Feeling Blue by Elizabeth Berg

Call Me Irresistible by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

The New Yorkers by Cathleen Schine

Say When by Elizabeth Berg

A Race to Splendor by Ciji Ware

In Malice, Quite Close by Brandi Lynn Rivers

Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Weiner

Moonlight on Linoleum by Terry Helwig

The Man Who Couldn't Eat by Jon Reiner

Favorite Book: Call Me Irresistible

Least Favorite Book: The New Yorkers

All of my reviews that aren't up yet are all down and scheduled to be posted, so if you see something good, just check back to see my review! How was your month? Read anything good? Let me know ... I'm always looking for a few more books to add to the TBR pile!

Review: In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson

In the Garden of Beasts
Author: Erik Larson
Publisher: Crown
Published: May 10, 2011
Hardcover: 450 pages
Source: purchased from Borders


My Rating: 3 stars


Synopsis (from goodreads.com): Isaac's Storm, The Devil in the White City, and Thunderstruck have all proven Erik Larson's ability to adroitly craft multilayered nonfiction. In his new In The Garden of Beasts, he demonstrates that gift again as he unfolds the often startling story of William E. Dodd, the first American ambassador to Nazi Germany, and his family. History professor Dodd was an unlikely choice to represent the United States in Hitler's Berlin; indeed, he was FDR's fifth choice for the post. His on-the-job education in the barbarities of the "New Germany" sometimes contrasted with that of his romantic, impressionable, party-loving daughter Martha. Larson places these very personal stories within the context of the ever-worsening events.


My Thoughts: I love anything about World War II, so when I heard that Erik Larson's newest book would be set in Nazi Germany, I couldn't wait to get my hands on a copy! Covering William Dodd's tenure as the American Ambassador to Germany during the mid-1930s, Larson takes the readers into Nazi Germany to see what an American family witnessed firsthand. The Dodds (William, his wife Mattie, daughter Martha, and son William, Jr.) all moved to Berlin and were able to see the Nazi's rise to power. Instead of saying Hitler's rise to power, I say the Nazis, and Larson's book demonstrates how it wasn't Hitler who had absolute power. There were warring interests within the party and several Nazis who fought with one another of power (there were constant battles between the various police units and the leaders in Nazi regime).


I found this book fascinating for so many different reasons. One was that I had no idea about the various police units and how uncoordinated they all were. The SS, the Gestapo, the army. Each unit had different leaders who were out to take down the other leaders! This inside look at the Nazi regime shows how it was doomed to succeed; unfortunately, no one else could see these warring units, so no one knew of the dissention amongst the Nazis themselves. It was also fascinating how little Dodd knew about the current German politcal state. He wanted an ambassador post so he could focus on finishing his 4 volume compendium on the Civil War and believed that an ambassador post would still allow him to have an income while working on his book. It's astonishing that that was his primary motive for an ambassadorship! Also, he didn't really have a clue as to what was going on, and for his first few months, he believed that the Nazis were good for Germany.


Perhaps that most interesting part of this book is the chapters about Martha, Dodd's daughter. She was in her early twenties when they moved to Germany and she had already experienced one failed marriage. She was a modern girl and was romanced by the Nazis. She truly thought that what they were doing was great and was a sympathizer for her first year in Germany. Officals within the embassy were aware of her actions but did nothing to stop her. Her love life is well chronicled throughout this book (she dates a member of the Russian KGB, who is tasked with trying to sway her to the communist party). Martha was continually rumored to be a communist, but she maintains her love for her country.


I could go on about this book all day. It was a truly fascinating read, taking me into a world that I had no idea existed. And the fact that this is non-fiction makes it all the more incredible! If you are interested in WWII, then you need to read this book! It's something that any WWII junkie will love and want to tell everyone about.