Category: Books Read-2008

Review: We Interrupt This Broadcast

Posted on by Cindy

TITLE: We Interrupt This Broadcast
AUTHOR: Joe Garner
ISBN:978-1-4022-1319-9
PUB DATE: October 2008

I have to say a big Thank You to Danielle at SourceBooks for sending me this book to read/listen and review for my blog.

This edition features 3 audio CDs with actual broadcasts and includes a new afterword from NBC’s Brian Williams. It is narrated by a veteran journalist, Bill Kurtis.

There is over 2 hours worth of rare original broadcasts. The book is about 46 events that have happened in our history, from the Hindenburg Explosion to Virginia Tech Massacre. Each of the stories made an impact in our lives and history in some way or another.

Anything before President Regan was shot I read in history books so being able to hear the actual broadcasts was really interesting. I loved hearing the old broadcasts and hearing the raw emotion in some of the stories. I have to admit that hearing certain news stories again was rough and I had tears in my eyes. From the death of Princess Diana to the tragedy in the schools to 9-11. I relived all those moments again.

This is a great book and I was really happy to be able to read and review it. A great book to have on ones shelf.

copyright 2010, Cindy (Cindy’s Love Of Books)
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Review: Songs of The Missing

Posted on by Cindy

TITLE: Songs of the Missing
AUTHOR: Stewart O’Nan
PUB DATE: November 2008
ISBN: 978-0-670-02032-4
PUB: Viking

This is Stewart’s 12 fiction book. This is my first time reading Stewart O’Nan’s work. I throughly enjoyed the book and I am looking forward to reading his other books.

The books is about the Larsen family, the friends and a small town community dealing with the disappereance of the Larsen’s 18 year old daughter Kim. Kim is a popular and happy go lucky kind of girl. She is a recent high school graduate who is leaving in a few weeks to go to college in the midwest. Kim disappears on her way to work one evening without a trace. There is very little to go on and nothing turns up.

The family is doing everything in their power to find Kim. Fran is doing media, handing out buttons, passing out flyers and seeks out donations to help in the search for her daughter. Ed is getting people involved in search parties. Finally with no leads or nothing to go on the media is no longer interested and the family is having to deal with their loss of Kim not returning home. The family continues to search and keep their hopes alive that they will find her.

Will their efforts pay off?

copyright 2010, Cindy (Cindy’s Love Of Books)
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Review: Somebody Else’s Daughter

Posted on by Cindy

 

TITLE: Somebody Else’s Daughter
AUTHOR: Elizabeth Brundage
PUB DATE: July 2008

I have to say a big THANK YOU to Elizabeth Brundage for sending me this book to read and review. I really enjoyed it and had a hard time putting it down. This is Elizabeth’s second novel. Its about failing marriages, affairs, love, adoption, drugs, death and murder.

The book starts out with Nate, the drug addicted father and Cat, the even more addicted mother and girlfriend. Cat gives birth to Willa. When she is a few months old they realize that can’t care for her even though they love her. They are both young and addicted to drugs. They decide to give Willa up for private adoption. As one of the conditions to the adoption they drive Willa from San Francisco to Massachusettes. The couple is the Goldings and they are a wealthy couple. Shortly after handing Willa over to them Cat dies of Aids in their driveway.

After handing Willa over and dealing with Cat’s death Nate sits in the car and writes a leter to Willa in hopes that the Goldings will give to her on her 16th birthday.

The book picks up sixteen years later in the same town, Berkshire. All the families are connected to the prep school, Pioneer. Nate who has turned is live around has returned to Berkshire as the new teacher and struggling writer. He discovers Willa is in his writting class.

We discover that the Goldings are a wealthy family who have built their fortune on a secret profession. The head master jack Heath lives a dangerous life. All the characters lives start to come together in this small town and slowly all the secrets are revealed. Some of the secrets are good and some prove to be deadly.

copyright 2010, Cindy (Cindy’s Love Of Books)
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Review: The Mighty Queens of Freeville

Posted on by Cindy

TITLE: The Mighty Queens of Freeville
AUTHOR: Amy Dickinson
PUB DATE: February 3,2009

I received this book from Barnes & Noble as the book club read. It was an okay book for me.

Five years ago after the death of Ann Landers there was a nationwide search for someone to take over. The Chicago Tribune announced that Amy Dickinson would be the next Ann Landers.

Amy has a column called “Ask Amy” and it appears in over 150 newspapers nationwide daily and read by over 22 million people.

The book is about Amy’s life. She writes about all the mistakes she has made. Amy talks about her daughter Emily and her family. Her family helped them out when her husband suddenly leaves her in London. She talks about how all the women in her family are all single parents. Even her own mother was a single mother.

Even though Amy and her daughter have lived in different cities they always find a way back to Freeville. Amy’s family still live in Freeville and all within a 10 house radius of each other.

copyright 2010, Cindy (Cindy’s Love Of Books)
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Review: Testimony

Posted on by Cindy

TITLE: Testimony
AUTHOR: Anita Shreve
PUB DATE: Oct. 21,2008

Testimony is Anita Shreves 14th book. This is my second book of hers that I read. My first introduction to Anita’s work was The Pilots Wife. Which I loved. Reading Testimony I realized that this is an author I need to read more of.

Testimony is written in many different perspectives. The characters all narrate in different points of views. For example the students when they speak are in first person, when Rob’s mother Ellen speaks she does so in second person and when Mike speaks he does so in third person.

Testimony is about how one incident that happened in a private school affected the lives of the students, family, community and school. A reporter discovers that three boys have been arrested from the school and charged with sexual assault and he goes to investigate. Mike the headmaster has been trying to contain the scandal with in the school.

The story begins at Avery Academy which is located in New England. The headmaster has been handed a video cassette and when he watches it he realizes its a sex tape involving five students from his academy. He finds out who the three boys are. They are three 18 year old male students. The camera man is unknown and no on will say who the person is. He is devastated when he realizes that the female student is only fourteen years old.

The book is about love (giving into desires that might ruin you/your life)families (parents wishing they could protect their child) an affair (that you don’t see coming) and a death (which will shock you).

copyright 2010, Cindy (Cindy’s Love Of Books)
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Review: Bang Crunch

Posted on by Cindy

TITLE: Bang Crunch
AUTHOR: Neil Smith
DATE: January 2008

This is a collection of 9 short stories, which by the way is Neil Smith’s debut novel. He is a Canadian author living in Montreal, QC. The characters in all the short stories are all average people who end up in unexpected situations. The stories all vary in plot but the settings are all the same. The stories are all based around Montreal locations. (Its always nice to read books that take place in your city.)

The first story called Isolettes opens like this “Blue tube, green tube, clear tube, fat tube” The story is about An who has just had a premature baby with her gay friend Jacob. The details of the premature baby are so exact that you feel as though you are in the Nick U with the baby.

The story of Green Florescent protein is about a 17 year old boy, Max who is struggling to admit his attraction to his friend. There is also another story about Max’s mother Funny Weird or Funny Ha Ha. Where she talks about growing up watching reruns of I Love Lucy. She talks about her husband and how he died. She put his ashes in a curling stone.

The B9ers is about the struggle of a group of people trying to return to normal life after finding out they all have benign tumors. They don’t get the support they need since their tumors aren’t malignant.

The Bang Crunch is about Eepie a girl with Fred Hoyle’s Syndrome, which ages her a year a day until she reaches 80 and then she goes back in time.

Those are just a few examples of the stories that are in the book. I really enjoyed reading them. Its been awhile since I have read short stories. Looking forward to reading some more.

I got to see and listen to Neil speak tonight and what a pleasure it was. He talked about his book and that its being published in different languages. He doesn’t write full time yet just part time. He is in the process of working on his novel called Heaven Is a Place Where Nothing Ever Happens. That sounds really good. Looking forward to reading it when it comes out. To read the first five chapters click here.

Neil is actually quite tall. Okay I am just short I admit it LOL.

copyright 2010, Cindy (Cindy’s Love Of Books)
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Review: Remembering The Bones

Posted on by Cindy

TITLE: Remembering The Bones
AUTHOR: Frances Itani
DATE: December 2007

We are introduced to Georgie Danforth Whitley. She is a Canadian widow. Her Husband passed away 3 years ago. Georgie is getting ready to go to London, England. She has been invited to London for a celebratory luncheon honoring Queen Elizabeth’s 80th birthday. She shares the same birthday with the Queen. She is one of 99 commoners who have been invited. We discover that Georgie is fascinated with the Queen. (BTW most Canadians are fascinated with the royal family.) Through all Georgies careful planning she will not make it to the palace this time.

On the way to the local airport Georgie gets distracted and her car slips off the road, through the guard rail and flips twice down the hillside. Georgie is thrown from the car into the brush. There is no visible sign from the road that an accident ever occured.

Georgie is alone and helpless. When she was a little girl she dicovered her grandfathers 1901 Edition of Grays Anatomy. She memorized all the bones in a human body. Which you will discover that after the first chapter all the other chapters in the book are named after bones in the body. Each bone tells a story from her past.

copyright 2010, Cindy (Cindy’s Love Of Books)
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