Sharing Beyond Books #7 July 30, 2011

It's Saturday night again - I had a pretty good week and hope you did too!  Thanks for all of your answers. :-)

The greater majority of the fourteen responders DO NOT take notes. A couple take notes for school books - to be expected. Only three of us consistently take notes. 

I enjoyed learning about the industries of our different home regions.  Surprisingly half of us live in states/regions that are known for tourism. Wouldn't it be fun if we could visit each other. *BG*

Only two of us give second chances to books... not counting classics as several said they would try to re-read a classic.  It sounded like most would try to finish a book they chose but some have that system of so many pages and if they aren't enjoying it - shut it goes.  The consensus seems to be "SO MANY BOOKS - TOO LITTLE TIME!"

The Winner from SBB #6 comments is: #7 LOUISA.  There are still 9 'love' books to pick from, 8 Christmas choices (I miscounted last week) and 5 Summer titles below. So Louisa - please choose a book from the remaining Love Books List for Giveaway or remaining Christmas Giveaway Books or the summer books and let me know your choice, your address and a choice of bookmarks by completing the WINNER FORM.

WEEK #7 Questions
 

Q1.  This is a follow up to one of last week's questions. One or two may have mentioned it but most did not. Will you give an AUTHOR a second chance if you didn't like one book?

I would like to say yes but I am slow to give that second chance. I enjoyed an audio book by a very popular romance author. Then about seven years ago I read a book where the heroine had no cell phone even though the story was set in 2000 and she had reason to need protection.  But what really bothered me was typos and one page where the character names were totally wrong and it seemed that half the page was from a different book.  It took five years for me to try the author again. I picked up one of her early works and that book read like a Peyton Place - ugh not my cup of tea.  I think I will try her again -sometime- but on one of the more current books.

Q2. How many are in  your 'close family'?

My Dad is still with us at 87, plus my stepmom.  I have two older brothers (5) and (3) and an older sister (8). The number in parenthesis is the total with their spouses and children.  My DH and I have four  children (two are his from first marriage and two are ours).  Our daughter makes 5 with hubby and 3 children and our son is now 2 with his new wife. YAY.  So counting those three generations (Grandparent, parent, child) and not including the great grand kids or grand nieces and nephews I have 30!  This picture was a get together in March for my Dad's birthday. It is most of the clan (including niece and nephew spouses and kids). Missing were my brother and his family (Californians), two nephews and my son who was in Texas at the time.  

Q3. This week Louisa asks:  Why did you start reading (and owning books) at a larger rate then people who don't love books as much as we do? And when?  [DO NOT TELL US FAVORITE AUTHORS/COLLECTIONS in this answer as that is a question for another day!]

I would say I started collecting books in college but because I moved often I only had one box of old romance and mysteries left when I got married in 1985. In 2001 (when my kids were old enough to be interested in their friends more than family) I started reading again and keeping a reading list. There were certain authors I really liked so I started collecting favorite authors. And of course I would buy books on sale at thrift shops - who can resist a book for $1.00 or better for $0.25!!! My collections have grown and grown. The number?  Definitely over 1000 although I haven't counted lately.

This is my primary bookshelf 

but I have boxes in my closet, my bedroom,
on two walls of the spare bedroom 

plus more in the office.

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I see some interesting questions coming up...some are multiple ?s and I may break them up.   Thanks! DON'T FORGET any of you might have good questions you'd like to ask. Input suggestions in this Suggested Question Form.  At the end of each month I will draw from the suggestions I used the month before and that person will get a book choice or GC.
Questions were provided in July by Jennifer, faith hope cherrytea, winnie and Louisa. Random.org chose #2 so faith hope cherrytea gets to pick a book from the Valentine, Christmas or Summer selections.

Your turn to share: 

1.  Do you give AUTHOR'S second chances?

2.  How many are in your 'close family'?

3.  Do you give books a second chance/what would make you give a book a second chance?

SBB Comment Winners can choose a selection from the remaining  Valentine and "Love" books or the remaining Christmas Giveaway Books - there are still about 17 books available to choose from plus 5 more
in the Summer titles to choose from:

Secrets of a Summer Night (The Wallflowers, Book 1)
The one I have is hardcover.

 

One Reckless Summer: A Destiny Novel

This book is brand new, but will be gently

read if I get to read it!

Under the Boardwalk: A Dazzling Collection of All-New Summertime Love Stories (Sonnet Books)

My paperback is from 1999 and
has a beach image.

The Days of Summer: A Novel

My copy is a paperback from 2006

with a different cover.

 The Summerhouse

 Hmmm - this has a bit of magic in the plot.

 

 A Summer Affair (Calhoun Chronicles) 

I love Susan Wiggs historicals!

Six choices additional choices.

Rules: a) Must be a follower; b) Share a comment on any (or all) of the three questions above.
Open internationally and an international winner may get a smaller book or a $5.00 GC if I decide the mailing is too much.
I will pick a Comment winner from all comments made by Friday, August 5 at 10PM central. 

Blogoversary Winners for Giveaways #19, #21 and #22 ended July 29

CONGRATULATIONS to Blogoversary Winners! 

Thank you again to all the sponsors and to everyone for your support and entries! Thanks for visiting the authors and commenting.
Here are winners from Giveaways #19, #21 and #22.  Four more giveaways Close tonight! :-)


19. Giveaway #19. Spotlight Author Judy Nickles/Gwyneth Greer eBook copy of The Showboat Affair. OPEN WORLDWIDE; print copy Open US and Canada. CLOSED.
eBook - Faith Hope and Cherrytea.
Print copy - KRYSTAL

21. Giveaway #21. Spotlight Author Karen Wiesner eBook copy of Glass Angels. OPEN WORLDWIDE. CLOSED.
 MARY H

22. Giveaway #22. Spotlight Author Lynda Coker Autographed copy of The Ocean Between. OPEN US ONLY. CLOSED.
KAREN P


All winners please fill in the Winner's Acceptance Form or email me to confirm your win. You may ignore the bookmarks section if your prize will be sent directly by the authors/publisher. I will share each winner's email with the author so watch for an email from the author.

Winner of ARC My Dangerous Pleasure

Thank you to all who entered.

Congratulations

to the Winner of the ARC

My Dangerous Pleasure

by Carolyn Jewel

 

elaing8 please fill in the Winner's Acceptance Form or email me to confirm your win, send your snail mail address information and bookmark choice.

Book Review and ARC Giveaway: A Gentleman Never Tells by Amelia Grey

This is a regency treat!

A Gentleman Never Tells by Amelia Grey

• Mass Market Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca; Original edition (July 1, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1402239750
• ISBN-13: 978-1402239755

Genre: Historical Romance
My Rating: 4.5 of 5.0

Product Description
When a lady is in a predicament...
Beautiful, clever and courageous Lady Gabrielle thwarts the shackles of her arranged betrothal by kissing a stranger in the park. But who is this man? Finding herself stuck in yet another forced engagement Gabrielle needs another strategy that isn’t so dangerous. A gentleman may find himself in deep trouble...
Viscount Brentwood is walking in the park early one morning when a beautiful, enchanting young lady walks out of the mist and into his arms. Now Brent has no choice but to marry the delightful Lady Gabrielle.
Unfortunately his intended bride has other ideas, and the determined Viscount finds himself plunging into one scandal after another.

Review: This book reminds me why I love Historical Romance: a little mystery, a lot of banter, a lot of humorous charm and a passionate romance.
Lady Gabrielle is the beautiful, kind and ‘good’ eldest daughter of a Duke.  She was prepared to enter the marriage her father arranged for her until one night a week before the wedding when she witnessed her fiancé in a passionate kiss with another woman. Gabrielle goes for a walk in the park with her faithful, elderly mastiff, Brutus, and runs into a handsome man who is walking a little Pomeranian type dog.

She recognizes that this man, Lord Brentwood, is kind and courteous. He is willing to walk his mother’s small dog, Prissy, at early hours of the morning and he expresses concern for her welfare in walking alone in the park. She also realizes that this is the first time she has been drawn to a man and on a sudden impulse she kisses him.  Brent gets lost in the kiss from this beauty of the mist until the angry voice of the Duke/father challenges him. With the Duke is another gentleman who turns out to be the father of the man that Lady Gabrielle is affianced to.  In the resulting confusion, Prissy disappears.

By the end of the day Brent finds himself coerced into agreeing to marry Lady Gabrielle. Brent is 30 years old and had been contemplating finding a suitable wife.  Although unhappy about being used, Brent determines that Lady Gabrielle may suit him just fine.

Gabrielle on the other hand has had quite enough of men determining her choices. She doesn’t want to be forced into marriage and she had not intended to trap Brentwood. It is quite fun to read all of the things Gabrielle tries to convince him that she would make a terrible wife. While their conflict continues they try to locate Prissy and some other small dogs who are suddenly going missing.

I felt the story fell short in resolving two areas. The elopement of Gabrielle’s ex-fiancé did not really make sense considering the attitude he expressed toward women. Also, the author missed a perfect opportunity in the end to correct Gabrielle’s fun misunderstanding of “golden orbs.”  Nonetheless, I completely enjoyed the romance that developed between Gabrielle and Brent and I enjoyed the mystery involving the dogs. This is a fast read with a heart for dogs and a lot of charm.

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Thank you to Sourcebooks for this book to read and review. This is a part of the Rogue's Dynasty series but there is little connection other than the heroes being rogues, which IMHO, Lord Brentwood really isn't.  So feel free to read this as a stand alone and not worry about the order of the series. See my reviews for two other stories by Amelia Grey.

TO ENTER THIS GIVEAWAY:
1. Visit the Author's Website and tell me something of interest you found there. This is required for entry.

2.  For an extra entry, become a follower or tell me if you are already a follower.

3. For two entries, blog, facebook, tweet (any of those networks!) about this giveaway and tell me where you did.

It isn't necessary to use separate entries unless you want them in different chronological order.
(Four total entries possible.)

* This contest is only open to residents of US and Canada.

* No P.O. Boxes Please - for shipping reasons.

* Limit one win per household.

* This contest will close 10 PM (Central) on August 12, 2011.
The winner will be randomly selected from all entries.
WINNER WILL BE ANNOUNCED on AUGUST 13 and will have 72 hours to respond by email or the winners form linked in the announcement.

Book Review and Giveaway Package: The Fear of God by B.A. Chepaitis

I enjoyed the intense suspense in this series.

The Fear of God: Jaguar Series by B.A. Chepaitis

• Paperback: 218 pages
• Publisher: Wildside Press (March 15, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1434430731
• ISBN-13: 978-1434430731

    Genre: Sci Fi
    My Rating: 4.25 of 5.0

Product Description
On Planetoid Three, Jaguar Addams enters the minds of criminals. She lives in the shadows of their fears . . . and chases them into the light. The followers of the Revelation Sect are preparing for the Second Coming. Stockpiles of weapons were found when federal agents stormed the home of the fanatical leader, Sardis Malocco. Now Jaguar must resort to using a virtual reality environment of Heaven to get to the root of Sardis's fear of God-before Revelation's zealots unleash their own apocalypse upon the world . . .

Review: The author does a grand job of building suspense through the last pages.

Jaguar is trained to work with criminals on a penal planetoid. The goal is to discover their deepest fears, make the “patient” confront them and hopefully then begin to rehabilitate them to return to society as a productive citizen.  Jaguar is also an empath and she is often able to use her skills to reach the patien” when normal means are ineffective.  Because of her success rate, Jaguar’s superiors allow her some leeway although the public sentiment does not favor using or even acknowledging empathic skills.

Jaguar is assigned to address the case of Sardis, a cult leader who has already allowed members of her ‘family’ to blow themselves up with bombs on the children. Her superiors have determined that the best way to reach Sardis’ fear of God is to place her in a virtual reality (VR) Heaven.  Jaguar doesn’t like working with religious zealots and she doesn’t like working in the VR environment. However one of Jaguar’s close friends, Rachel, has been infected with an unknown toxin by Sardis’ collaborator, Philo.  Getting Sardis to reveal her secrets may be the only chance to save Rachel.

There are a lot of threads in this short but intense story. Sardis is a hard case as she is so lost in her self made delusions.  Philo has escaped and has the ability to mold his physical aspect to appear as another person so he is slipping around the system as one guard and then another. One of the FBI agents, Claire, who brought Sardis to the planet is seducing Jaguar’s boss, Alex. Meanwhile Claire has secretly, and against Alex’s instructions, placed monitors on the VR system.  The VR program begins to have problems and Jaguar has to cope with an infuriatingly obscure retrojection version of herself in order to get clues to peeling the layers into Sardis.

This is book two in the Jaguar series.  Although it can be read as a stand alone I think you get a better picture of the primary characters and the setting if you read the first book, The Fear Principle. The reader has to wade through a small amount of techno jargon but you can catch the gist an move on with the meat of the story.  I really liked how this book reveals more of the complexities of Jaguar’s intense personality, as well as the complexities of her relationships with Alex and Rachel.  I also appreciated the twists and high level of suspense that kept me moving to find out what happens in Jaguar’s race to stop the apocalypse plagues set up by Sardis.
Again, I would like to read more about Jaguar and Alex and I look forward to more books in the series.

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Thank you to Pump up Your Book and the author for this book to read and review.  Also I am pleased to host the Giveaway of one package of both books to a lucky US commenter.

TO ENTER THIS GIVEAWAY:
1. Visit the Author's Website and tell me something of interest you found there. This is required for entry.

2.  For an extra entry, become a follower or tell me if you are already a follower.

3. For two entries, blog, facebook, tweet (any of those networks!) about this giveaway and tell me where you did.

It isn't necessary to use separate entries unless you want them in different chronological order.
(Four total entries possible.)

* This contest is only open to residents of US.

* No P.O. Boxes Please - for shipping reasons.

* Limit one win per household.

* This contest will close 10 PM (Central) on August 12, 2011.
The winner will be randomly selected from all entries.
WINNER WILL BE ANNOUNCED on AUGUST 13 and will have 72 hours to respond by email or the winners form linked in the announcement.