Musing Monday #41

Do you keep all the books you ever buy? Just the ones you love? Just collectibles? What do you do with the ones you don’t want to keep?

I do not keep very many of my books because I read so many. I keep classic and ones that I love and know I will read again. I will keep a series that I really enjoy but that is about it. I do not count my history books in that general area because they used to be for work 🙂 but I keep those as well.

The Sunday Salon #21

The Sunday Salon.com

I know my Sunday Salon is a little bit late today but I wanted to save this post till I got to do what I have been looking forward too all week, well really even longer than that. I was able to get together with my book friends from my book swap site. It has been so long since I was able to because I have been so sick, and it was fantastic to meet with them all!

I want to thank any of my friends who may see this post. THANK YOU THANK YOU so much for making today such a fantastic day for me. We talked about everything…books the Olympics my love of Thomas Jefferson (I swear someday they will think I am odd but not today!)

I brought The Tea House Fire (review coming soon) to trade in our game and I had to giggle a bit you see the person who had my book first stole another persons book but when the person who than had my book opened it she did a little darn cause she liked my book too. Well than someone else stole my book, lol she had been wanting it since she saw it in another swap and had it stolen twice from her. I have never had such a popular book! This one is worth it though!

So while most of my week was a little bit of a bummer my Sunday was fantastic. Moreover, it was all thanks to fellow book lovers. I am going to be carrying this day with me for a while.

Quotable Sunday #26

Mothers Day Gift Ideas

Sergei Bubka (Ukrainian pole vaulter, 1988 Summer Olympics)
The Olympics are always a special competition. It is very difficult to predict what will happen.

Noureddine Morceli (Algerian athlete, 1996 Summer Olympics, on his 2000m World record)
It was an extraterrestrial performance. It is very special to go below 4:50, but I believe I can do better.

Daley Thompson (British decathlete, 2-time winner at the Olympics):
When we stage the Olympics it will inspire kids all over the country. A kid in Scotland or Ireland will be encouraged to take up sport.

Mitch Gaylord (American gymnast, 1984 Summer Olympics)
The greatest memory for me of the 1984 Olympics was not the individual honors, but standing on the podium with my teammates to receive our team gold medal.

Noureddine Morceli (Algerian athlete, 1996 Summer Olympics)
I believe in God. He is the secret of my success. He gives people talent.

Mary Lou Retton (American gymnast, 1984 Summer Olympics)
There can be distractions, but if you’re isolated from the heart of the Games, the Olympics become just another competition.

Pierre de Coubertin (founder of modern Olympic Games)
The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not winning but taking part; the essential thing in life is not conquering but fighting well.

Cathy Freeman (Australian athlete, 2000 Summer Olympics)
The Athens Olympics will be meaningful even though I cannot participate as an athlete, since I can participate in the flame relay all over the world.

Peter Snell (New Zealand athlete, 3-time winner of Olympics)
I think I’ve seen the fastest miler ever. His name is Morceli.

Scott Hamilton (American figure skater, 1984 Winter Olympics)
The Olympics in ’80 was phenomenal. It was my favorite memory of all competitive events, because it was brand new and it was exciting


Friday Firsts #12

The first line can make or break a reader’s interest. Just how well did the author pull you in to the story with their first sentence? To participate in this weekly book meme is extremely easy.

Grab the book you are currently reading and open to the first page.
Write down the first sentence in the first paragraph.
Create a blog post with this information. (Make sure to include the title & author of the book you are using. Even an ISBN helps!)
Did this first sentence help draw you into the story? Why or why not?
Link back to Well-Read Reviews in your blog entry.
Come back to this blog post, hosted on WellReadReviews.com and add your direct link to Mr. Linky! ** Very important!

“Moon Glorious Moon.” Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay

I have wanted to read this book before even reading the first line because I love the Showtime Show Dexter. Nevertheless, when I read the first line it made me think directly of Dexter and beckons me to keep reading to find out what he is doing tonight.

Book Review: Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee

“Competence can be a curse.” So begins Min Jin Lee’s epic novel about class, society, and identity. Casey Han’s four years at Princeton have given her many things: “a refined diction, an enviable golf handicap, a popular white boyfriend, an agnostic’s closeted passion for reading the Bible, and a magna cum laude degree in economics. But no job and a number of bad habits.”
Casey’s parents, who live in Queens, are Korean immigrants working in a dry cleaner, desperately trying to hold onto their culture and identity. Their daughter, on the other hand, has entered into the upper echelon of rarified American society via scholarships. But after graduation, Casey’s trust-fund friends see only opportunity and choices while Casey sees the reality of having expensive habits without the means to sustain them. As Casey navigates Manhattan, we see her life and the lives of those around her: her sheltered mother, scarred father, her friend Ella who’s always been the good Korean girl, Ella’s ambitious Korean husband and his Caucasian mistress, Casey’s white fiancĂ©, and then her Korean boyfriend, all culminating in a portrait of New York City and its world of haves and have-nots.
FREE FOOD FOR MILLIONAIRES offers up a fresh exploration of the complex layers we inhabit both in society and within ourselves. Inspired by 19th century novels such as Vanity Fair and Middlemarch, Min Jin Lee examines maintaining identity within changing communities. This is a remarkably assured debut from a writer to watch.

I had to take some time on this review to digest this book and decide exactly what I thought about it.

Free food for Millionaires is very well written and the prose does paint a picture of New York and the lives of this family and the main member we follow Casey in a compelling way. That being said some of the story is sluggish and a little too detailed. Casey is a bright daughter of immigrant parents who just graduated from Princeton she has everything she could want but does not know it. She takes her family for granted, as well as many other things in her life.

All of Lee’s characters are flawed human beings, which makes for a realistic story. And while the story takes a lot of twists and turns and most you would not see coming, it really lacks that little bit of oomph that takes a book from good to great. While I finished the book, I felt that I had no real urge to read it. I would move to pick it up and than think of something else I could be working on and often times would pass the book over until later. For a novel to be truly great I feel you have to want to pick it up and to be thinking about when you will get to read it next. The narrative of the book can get a little confusing as she jumps from one perspective to the next in rapid succession.

With all of that said it is a book worth reading if you are willing to put the effort into it. The version I had came with a readers club guide for discussion and I can see this as being a very good reader’s club book. The way the story is laid out and the many different twists and characters will give a book club something to talk about.

Booking Through Thursday- Olympics

You may have noticed–the Winter Olympics are going on. Is that affecting your reading time? Have you read any Olympics-themed books? What do you think about the Olympics in general? Here’s your chance to discuss!

It has affected my reading time because I have been watching the Olympics. I am not a huge sports person but it seems when I am watching the Olympics I enjoy it and I cannot focus on much else. I have not read anything that is Olympic themed but I would be interested in finding a few books on the subject.

New over at Lady Ambrosia’s…

Well after a wait the first sets of Lady Ambrosia’s Scent infused Stationery is ready to go. There is a list of three fine Stationery’s from fantastic companies. Two kinds of Crane’s Stationery and one kind from Southworth. Price’s are very reasonable starting at just $5 for a bundle and working up from there. Please go to the Fine Scented Stationery Page and follow your links from there!

Scents that you will see:

Lavender
Ambrosia’s Roses
Ginger Peach
Very Sexy (Type)
Fuzzy Navel Orange
Organic Lemon
and
Misbehavin (sweet juicy candied apples and pomegranate, with nuances of fresh ivy and oak moss)

If there is a scent you would like to see us carry that is not listed, drop an email and let me know what you would like to see.


Teaser Tuesday #40

TEASER TUESDAYS asks you to: Grab your current read.Let the book fall open to a random page.Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given!Please avoid spoilers!

“I felt a sparkle of contentment knowing she’d be upstairs soon, and a splinter of despair: she could marry anytime, and than these would be lost to me, my nights in this room, inhaling beeswax and powdered tea, her curved back my horizon.” Pg. 167 The Tea House Fire by Ellis Avery

Musing Monday #40

Do you keep reference books on your shelves at home? What’s your first port of call when you need information – the internet or a book?

I do have reference books most of mine are history related, Renaissance, Medieval, Revolution ect ect. I also keep some reference books for vet care of Cats, and other Cat related books. I have some horse training reference books and some general horse related reference books. My first place that I go is my books and than the internet, if it is something I have books for if not, than the net it is.

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