Saturday, May 16, 2015

California by Edin Lepucki

I tried. I really did.  The premise was certainly a wonderful thing. However, midway into the book I found it to be a bit less in creativity and promise. 

Cal a past student of a college where trade, farming and academic skills are a part of the school landscape. He meets an aloof student  there who is the brother of his future wife. After the "happening" and LA is a disaster zone,  Cal and Frida take off to a place in the dark northern woods to live in a cabin. Frida is pregnant and life is getting harder by they day with their survival. Soon they pack up and venture out to look for a community that ends up being a strange, dark, paranoid world.

I gave up by the time the reached the community. Cal and Frida's relationship has become frayed at the edges making life in a new cultish world less than reasonable separate and as a couple.

I found it to be a dystopian fugue-y kind of nightmare where you are running and not getting anywhere. 

Now, I read copious reviews on this book. I had to as when I do am not sure about a book (especially when I paid for it) I need to know if it was just me and I need to go back at a later date or I seriously need to put it down. Half loved it, half hated it. I was hard pressed to find the in betweenies like me.

I could have finished it, but I decided not to with twinges of guilt. 

Skip it but keep in mind you may like it, it's one of those books.

Summer Reads 2015


Everywhere you look magazines and online book blogs/news sites are screaming "FABULOUS BEACH READS THAT YOU NEED TO READ NOW!" Okay okay it's summer, lets get the party started but lets also make one thing clear. You do not have to classify a book with a lone woman standing in front of the shoreline looking forlorn or wrapped in a blanket as a beach read.

I promise. 

In gathering up beach/summer reads for my book group, I included all genres. I mean, I can't see my one friend who reads Fantasy basking in the Belmar sun while reading Castaway by Elin Helderbrand. No. So, that is the law here, every book has a spot on the beach this summer. Even that cold. damp, chilly Dickens has a place on a towel next to a bottle of sunscreen. 

Many of you are not near a beach. And I will tell you that living on the West side of Jersey forty-five mintues from the closest beach isn't what I do every day. I can be just as content reading on my deck in my favorite chair. Close to a bathroom and the fridge, it's all good.

You do not need a beach to read beach/summer reads to feel the power of summer reading.

I promise.

Here are some good reads for the summer: 

I can't wait to start this series by John J. Higgins.
Book One

Description from Amazon:

Even a match made in Heaven can go awry. THE ARCHANGEL JARAHMAEL AND THE WAR TO CONQUER HEAVEN is the epic three-part story of the Creation of the Universe, told from the perspective of the Angels themselves. The first book of the trilogy, "In the Beginning," describes the initial creation and the establishment of the Seven Heavens and the Nine Orders of Angels, but it also tells of the first Humans, Lillith and Adam. Although they are quite literally a match made in Heaven, free will wreaks havoc with destiny when Lillith falls in love with the Archangel Jarahmael. Can love, as the very essence of the almighty's Universe, survive free will? Or will love, when exposed to an untethered will, rip the Universe apart, pitting Good against Evil in a battle for all?



Lots of buzz on this book

Description from Amazon:

HER PERFECT LIFE IS A PERFECT LIE.

As a teenager at the prestigious Bradley School, Ani FaNelli endured a shocking, public humiliation that left her desperate to reinvent herself. Now, with a glamorous job, expensive wardrobe, and handsome blue blood fiancĂ©, she’s this close to living the perfect life she’s worked so hard to achieve.
But Ani has a secret.
There’s something else buried in her past that still haunts her, something private and painful that threatens to bubble to the surface and destroy everything.
With a singular voice and twists you won’t see coming, Luckiest Girl Alive explores the unbearable pressure that so many women feel to “have it all” and introduces a heroine whose sharp edges and cutthroat ambition have been protecting a scandalous truth, and a heart that's bigger than it first appears.
The question remains: will breaking her silence destroy all that she has worked for—or, will it at long last, set Ani free?



There is nothing like an Elin Hilderbrand book in the summer! My pick this year was Silver Girl (think Ponzi scheme by husband, he goes to jail, wife runs to Nantucket with an old best friend who is still mad at her from the mysterious past. So far I love it as much as I have loved all her books.

Description from Amazon:


Nantucket writer Madeline King couldn't have picked a worse time to have writer's block. Her deadline is looming, her bills are piling up, and inspiration is in short supply. Madeline's best friend Grace, is hard at work transforming her garden into the envy of the island with the help of a ruggedly handsome landscape architect. Before she realizes it, Grace is on the verge of a decision that will irrevocably change her life. Could Grace's crisis be Madeline's salvation? As the gossip escalates, and the summer's explosive events come to a head, Grace and Madeline try desperately to set the record straight--but the truth might be even worse than rumor has it. 

Enjoy your summer, book friends, start today! 

Starting a new blog.

Hello bookish friends!  I’ve decided to download this blog and move on. The next book blog will have the same name but a whole new vibe.  Af...