Book Review: Click: An Online Love Story by Lisa Becker

This is a sweet, fun story of a nice Jewish girl looking for love in a cyber world.
Click: An Online Love Story
by Lisa Becker

• File Size: 486 KB
• Print Length: 286 pages
• Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1460922638
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• ASIN: B004UI6IJ0

Genre: Contemporary Romance
My Rating: 4.25 of 5.0

Book Description
Publication Date: March 29, 2011
Fast approaching her 30th birthday and finding herself not married, not dating, and without even a prospect or a house full of cats, Renee Greene, the heroine of Click: An Online Love Story, reluctantly joins her best guy pal on a journey to find love online in Los Angeles. The story unfolds through a series of emails between Renee and her best friends (anal-compulsive Mark, the overly-judgmental Ashley and the over-sexed Shelley) as well as the gentlemen suitors she meets online. From the guy who starts every story with "My buddies and I were out drinking one night," to the egotistical "B" celebrity looking for someone to stroke his ego, Renee endures her share of hilarious and heinous cyber dates. Fraught with BCC's, FWD's and inadvertent Reply to All's, readers will root for Renee to "click" with the right man.

Review:
Renee is a bright, attractive Public Relations executive who is concerned that she will soon celebrate her 30th birthday and she has no love interest in her life. She broke up with her last boyfriend almost a year ago and hasn’t done much dating since. She is lamenting her situation, and the awkwardness of meeting the right kind of men in a big city, with her friends, Mark, Shelly and Ashley. Mark, an intense, compulsive individual who designs video games, convinces Renee to try an online dating service as a New Year attempt to find a mate.

Conservative Renee shares the details and progress with exuberant playgirl, Shelly, who has no problem sharing and joking about traits and nick names for her steady stream of one night stands. On the other hand Renee initially keeps her online dating arrangements secret from her judgmental, but long time friend, Ashley.

The story is told primarily through emails between the friends and the prospective dates. The dating choices range from dumb, awkward, pleasant and scary. Along the way there are laughs, embarrassments and disappointments. But there are some good prospects too and even a celebrity rocker who Renee met in person who is showing interest in her down to earth, friendly personality.

This was different because of the way it was written but it didn’t take long to get accustomed to the format of email chatting. I was able to relax and enjoy Renee’s pursuit for love. I liked the distinct differences in the personalities of her friends which made for entertaining interaction.  The pacing was good and there were plenty of conflicts to keep things interesting including a bit of a twist near the end. This is a sweet love story and I am looking forward to reading the next book.  I recommend this to romance lovers who are up for a light read in a unique format.

I received this ebook from the author for an honest review.

Audible Book Review: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

This is a really fun listen! If you have this one in your TBR pile I recommend you get to reading, or listening to, it -- then enjoy!

Ready Player One

     by Ernest Cline

     Narrated by Wil Wheaton 

    LENGTH      15 hrs and 46 mins
    RELEASE DATE      08-16-11
    PUBLISHER      Random House Audio
Genre: Futuristic Fantasy
My Rating: 5.0 of 5.0

Publisher's Summary
At once wildly original and stuffed with irresistible nostalgia, Ready Player One is a spectacularly genre-busting, ambitious, and charming debut—part quest novel, part love story, and part virtual space opera set in a universe where spell-slinging mages battle giant Japanese robots, entire planets are inspired by Blade Runner, and flying DeLoreans achieve light speed.
It’s the year 2044, and the real world is an ugly place.
Like most of humanity, Wade Watts escapes his grim surroundings by spending his waking hours jacked into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia that lets you be anything you want to be, a place where you can live and play and fall in love on any of 10,000 planets.
And like most of humanity, Wade dreams of being the one to discover the ultimate lottery ticket that lies concealed within this virtual world. For somewhere inside this giant networked playground, OASIS creator James Halliday has hidden a series of fiendish puzzles that will yield massive fortune—and remarkable power—to whoever can unlock them.
For years, millions have struggled fruitlessly to attain this prize, knowing only that Halliday’s riddles are based in the pop culture he loved—that of the late 20th century. And for years, millions have found in this quest another means of escape, retreating into happy, obsessive study of Halliday’s icons. Like many of his contemporaries, Wade is as comfortable debating the finer points of John Hughes’s oeuvre, playing Pac-Man, or reciting Devo lyrics as he is scrounging power to run his OASIS rig.
And then Wade stumbles upon the first puzzle.
Suddenly the whole world is watching, and thousands of competitors join the hunt—among them certain powerful players who are willing to commit very real murder to beat Wade to this prize. Now the only way for Wade to survive and preserve everything he knows is to win. But to do so, he may have to leave behind his oh-so-perfect virtual existence and face up to life—and love—in the real world he’s always been so desperate to escape.
A world at stake.
A quest for the ultimate prize.
Are you ready?

Review:
Wade is a teenager in 2044 where lives are lived primarily in a free virtual computer world known as The OASIS. Wade actually resides in the crowded ‘real’ world – on and off – with his Aunt and her boyfriend in a mobile home in the stacks, where mobile home units have been staked twenty-two high in a precarious community. But Wade actually spends more time in his personal hideout in an abandoned van. Since schools became too crowded, students even attend through the virtual world, being given the minimal gear and choice of an avatar for their id in the OASIS. Friends are made in the virtual world without ever knowing the real person behind the avatar.

Wade explains how James Halliday, the creator of the OASIS, set up a game in the system as a means to distribute his vast billions on his death.  The first player to collect the three keys, play through three gates and find the hidden Easter egg will inherit the entire fortune. Initially there is a system wide frenzy as the treasure game hunters, called Gunters, study Halliday’s favorite games and past-times trying to find the solution. Some people have formed ‘clans’ and there is a massive, villainous corporation, IOI, whose players are called the Sixers, who want to win and control the system. It is feared if IOI gets possession that they will charge everyone for use of the OASIS and change the world situation for the worse. Wade and his best friend, Aech, agree that they are independent players even though Wade struggles with minimal assets and experience.

It has been five years since Halliday died and the scoreboard has shown no progress. Then one day Wade, or his avatar, Parzival, stumbles upon the path to the first key! A new fervor ensues and others quickly begin to show up on the board. Second is a slick female character, Art3mis, on whom Wade has a crush, then Aech, then two Japanese who are believed to be brothers.  After them come the institutional IOI Sixers who basically block anyone behind them.

Now the race is on and the leaders of IOI are not beyond bribery or even murder to get the secrets and prevail in the hunt. As Wade/Parzival plays and searches he shares memories of the early games like D&D, PACman, and early game systems like Atari. The serious players also have to know classic movies that were Halliday’s favorites including Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, War Games, Monty Python’s Holy Grail and more. There is a huge battle to the end between the mega corporation and the young players who finally team together and get a little help just to hide and survive.

This was wonderful fun to listen to, recognizing that the players are computer geeks and this is the only life and hope they have. There are clues and puzzles that Wade must solve and I enjoyed the trip down memory lane hearing about computers, games and movies from the 1980s. I liked the positive messages that were shared with the good v evil set up and with the characters becoming friends through their personalities without meeting. I recommend this book for entertainment and special fun for those who lived through the ‘80s.

Audio Notes:  Wil Wheaton does a wonderful job portraying Wade, his pals and even the evil CEO. I got caught up in the story but it was certainly enhanced by the excellent narration.

I'm really glad I selected this was from my own Audible Library. I picked it for my July "Just For Fun" read.

Winner of MBS 2013 Lazy Days of Summer Giveaway

CONGRATULATIONS TO WINNER OF

Giveaway Ended 8/4/13


MBS 2013 Lazy Days of Summer Spontaneous Giveaway Hop

$10.00 Amazon Gift Card or PayPal Credit.

Winner: Dinda L

Notified and claimed. :-)

Sourcebooks Wants to See Your Wedding Dress - Chance to Win New Release!

I'm sharing this announcement from the great people at Sourcebooks:

Jade Lee’s anticipated release, What the Bride Wore, a PW Top Ten Romance Pick for Fall 2013, will be released on August 6^th! And we want to know…WHAT DID YOU WEAR? We want to see your wedding dress! We want to see the good, the bad and the questionable… J

On Tuesday August 6^th, please tweet a picture of your wedding dress using the hash tag #WhatTheBrideWore

We will be picking winners every hour and giving away lots of prizes throughout the day! We will also be re-tweeting some of the best ones from the @SourcebooksCasa Twitter account!

This hot new series is set in a daring, high-energy Regency world where deep longings, secret scandals, and the competition for social stature are all set against the glittering weddings of the season. Grant Benton, Earl of Crowle, finally has the funds he always pretended to have, and what he wants now is a woman. That woman is Lady Irene Knopp, who spends her days helping debutantes plan their weddings. A recent widow, Irene longs for love again, but she’s afraid to risk her heart, especially to the notorious Earl.

Mailbox Monday August 5, 2013

Welcome to Mailbox Monday.
For AUGUST: the Mailbox Monday Tour host is Penelope @ The Reading Fever. If Penelope doesn't post then the the link will be at Bermudaonion (thanks Kathy).
Mailbox Monday is a gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week and explore great book blogs.  This Meme started with Marcia at A Girl and Her Books (fka The Printed Page) but is now hosted at Mailbox Monday and through various blog hosts.

Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.

I received one ebook for review, one special free and I picked up the free audio titles from SYNC YA. 

Are your mailbox and TBR piles blooming?

Review Titles

I signed up for this tour through Random House at the end of June but forgot to list the title.

Besides, I just downloaded it from NetGalley.

A Most Devilish Rogue
Ashlyn Macnamara

Won

None.

Purchased

None

Free

I reviewed The Hero's Lot by Patrick W. Carr last week. I saw on Facebook that the first book in the series was free for Kindle and Nook so I picked it up! As of Sunday night it is still available free.

Cast of Stones, A (The Staff and the Sword Book #1)
Patrick W. Carr








Audios:

I downloaded this past week's free pair from SYNC YA August 1 – August 7, 2013:
Here is another good pair -- as they say -- It's Elementary!

Death Cloud
By Andrew Lane
Read by Dan Weyman
Published by Macmillan Audio
Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award
Available in the U.S. & Canada Only
“High praise is simply insufficient to do full justice to this outstanding work.” –AudioFile Magazine

Two dead bodies. One unforgettable hero. A teenage Sherlock solves his first murder mystery…and the legend begins.

and

The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
By Arthur Conan Doyle
Read by Ralph Cosham
Published by Blackstone Audiobooks
“Cosham captures the genius of Sherlock Holmes, the faithful friendship of Dr. Watson, the language of their time, and their zest for adventure.” –AudioFile Magazine
 A brilliant London-based “consulting detective,” the immortal Sherlock Holmes  is famous for his intellectual prowess and renowned for his skillful use of astute observation, deductive reasoning, and inference to solve difficult cases.

I downloaded a couple of free Kindle Titles this week
linked through Bookfun, Free Par-tay, Inspired Reads, Pixel of Ink or Kindle Review.