The Wild Water Walking Club by Claire Cook eBook edition

Wild Water Walking Club falls into the category of a great beach read.  This is the fourth Claire Cook title I have enjoyed, starting with Must Love Dogs and Summer Blowout.  She is an entertaining author who understands the complexities and inherent contradictions between love, good sense and human behavior.

One of the things I enjoy most about her books is that even though the usual heroines are middle aged women, there are always an eclectic blend of multi-generational characters.  These kids, young women, middle aged and seniors interact and create a comfortable mix,

Another aspect of her writing that I always enjoy is here ability to mix totally believable story lines with a couple that stretch credibility.  And yet they somehow work together.  Probably because you sense that she is more interested in the characters than in some carefully derived plot line.

I am a daily walker -- walk from 2 to 3 1/2 miles a day.  A more or less useless urban ritual to keep me fit and clears my head.  But all those miles never really seem to add up to anything tangible.  These women counted steps and miles and made them count for a concrete goal -- a trip across country.

I love the idea of walking to a goal.  The smell of lavender makes me happy.  But the whole clothesline thing seemed out of place and kind of lost me.  I admit, however, that it makes for a very funny urban guerilla scene later in the book.

I am seriously considering where I want to "walk" to this year.  I'll keep you posted.

Here is the publishers recap:

Just put one foot in front of the other. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But when Noreen Kelly takes a buyout from her job of eighteen years and gets dumped by her boyfriend in one fell swoop, she finds it hard to know what that next step is—never mind take it. At first Noreen thinks maybe her redundancy package could be an opportunity, a chance to figure out what to do with the rest of her life while her company foots the bill. Sure, she may have gotten high to “Witchy Woman” and grooved to “Sweet Baby James” back when James Taylor had hair, but she isn’t ready for her AARP card. Not yet.

But it’s the first time in a great many years that Noreen has time to herself—and she has no idea what to do with it. When she realizes that she’s mistaken her resume for her personality, Noreen knows that she has to get moving, so she puts on a new pair of sneakers and a seriously outdated pair of exercise pants, and walks. She doesn’t get very far at first—just to the end of her street, Wildwater Way—but she perseveres, and when she’s joined by her neighbors Tess and Rosie, Noreen realizes that walking is not an extreme sport. It can actually be fun.

As the Wildwater women walk and talk, and talk and walk, they tally their steps, share their secrets, and learn what women everywhere are finding out—that time flies and getting fit is actually fun when you’re walking with friends. Throw in a road trip to Seattle for a lavender festival, a career-coaching group that looks like a bad sequel to The Breakfast Club, a clothesline controversy that could only happen in the ’burbs, plenty of romantic twists and turns, and a quirky multigenerational cast of supporting characters, and the result is an experience that’s heartfelt, exuberant, and above all, real.

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You or Someone Like You by Chandler Burr

This is a fascinating book that explores the limits of culture and identity. It is a book that I wanted to like. In fact, tried very hard to like. But whether or not I liked it is almost beside the point. Because in the end this is a book that (if you persist to the end) will stick with you. It is one that you will find yourself thinking about for a long time to come.

Chandler Burr is an intelligent and skilled writer. His books on perfumes are informative, well-researched and interesting. When I heard that he had a new fiction title, I was curious to see if he could bring those qualities to fiction and still make the book work.

You or Someone Like You is a truly literary novel; informative, well-researched and interesting. Since I had an excellent British education I am familiar with most of the authors and many of the works written about. Many of them quite obscure and a lot of them poetry.

After a while it dawned on me that to really appreciated this book you need either a better memory than I have or a PhD in English literature. Yes, it is beautifully written, but it is hard work. Highly intellectual and quite enigmatic. Frankly I was almost stiff with boredom about half way through.

Fortunately I persisted -- the advantage of being stubborn, I guess. When Burr finally gets to the issues of religion, culture and identity the story once again engaged my interest and not just my intellect.

Read the synopsis below and if you interest is peaked, read a short excerpt and decide for yourself.

Anne Rosenbaum leads a life of quiet Los Angeles privilege, the wife of Hollywood executive Howard Rosenbaum and mother of their seventeen-year-old son, Sam. Years ago Anne and Howard met studying literature at Columbia-she, the daughter of a British diplomat from London, he a boy from an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn. Now on sleek blue California evenings, Anne attends halogen-lit movie premieres on the arm of her powerful husband. But her private life is lived in the world of her garden, reading books.

When one of Howard's friends, the head of a studio, asks Anne to make a reading list, she casually agrees-though, as a director reminds her, "no one reads in Hollywood." To her surprise, they begin calling: screen-writers; producers, from their bungalows; and agents, from their plush offices on Wilshire and Beverly. Soon Anne finds herself leading an exclusive book club for the industry elite. Emerging gradually from her seclusion, she guides her readers into the ideas and beauties of Donne, Yeats, Auden, and Mamet, with her brilliant and increasingly bold opinions.

But when a crisis of identity unexpectedly turns an anguished Howard back toward the Orthodoxy he left behind as a young man, Anne must set out to save what she values above all else: her husband's love. At once fiercely intelligent and emotionally gripping, You or Someone Like You confronts the fault lines between inherited faith and personal creed, and, through the surprising transformation of one exceptional, unforgettable woman, illuminates literature's power to change our lives.

Heat Lightning by John Sandford eBook edition

There are two things that I always enjoy about the writing of John Sandford:

• His characters all seem to have some likable characteristics, even the bad guys.
• His plots are based not so much on the hidden denouement as on the ending that satisfies the need for the good guys to win.

 Heat Lightning is no exception.

I won’t tell you the story, the book is worth reading., You should buy it if you want to spend a day with people you will probably like more than most of the people in the real world. And if you ever spent any time in Minnesota you will especially like Sandford’s brightly drawn word pictures of the lakes and woods that dominate the scenery there.

Let it suffice to say that the book’s ending is as satisfying as its beginning and the parts in between are fun and engaging. Sandford is developing a character in Virgil Flowers that wears well. His highly developed world of laid back Minnesota natives and scenic beauty has the underlying themes of greed, stupidity, vengeance and political ambition that make this novel interesting as a mystery.

Beyond that he seems to be exploring the prospects of literary advancement from the bounds of a strictly genre writer in this new series. His characters are taking on more form and substance and his comments on and allusions to the uber society outside of Minnesota are growing sharper and more defined.

I can heartily recommend this book to any of you who like characters that live lives we can all imagine but seldom experience. I can also recommend his prior works as worthy of reading for those of you who might not have discovered him as yet. His name is among the top ten in my pantheon of writers that have never failed to fulfill my burst of happiness when I find a new title written by them.

Here's the official stuff:

Fresh from his "spectacular" (Cleveland Plain Dealer) debut in Dark of the Moon, investigator Virgil Flowers takes on a puzzling-and most alarming-case, in the new book from the #1 bestselling author.

John Sandford's introduction of Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension investigator Virgil Flowers was an immediate critical and popular success: "laser-sharp characters and a plot that's fast and surprising" (Cleveland Plain Dealer); "an idiosyncratic, thoroughly ingratiating hero" (Booklist).

Flowers is only in his late thirties, but he's been around the block a few times, and he doesn't think much can surprise him anymore. He's wrong. It's a hot, humid summer night in Minnesota, and Flowers is in bed with one of his ex-wives (the second one, if you're keeping count), when the phone rings. It's Lucas Davenport. There's a body in Stillwater-two shots to the head, found near a veteran's memorial. And the victim has a lemon in his mouth. Exactly like the body they found last week.

The more Flowers works the murders, the more convinced he is that someone's keeping a list, and that the list could have a lot more names on it. If he could only find out what connects them all . . . and then he does, and he's almost sorry he did. Because if it's true, then this whole thing leads down a lot more trails than he thought-and every one of them is booby-trapped.

Filled with the audacious plotting, rich characters, and brilliant suspense that have always made his books "compulsively readable" (Los Angeles Times), this is vintage Sandford.

 

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eBook Discount: Take an EXTRA 20% Discount on all New York Times Best Selling Fiction!

Summer is here!

For those of us in the US it is a long Independence Day holiday weekend. 

As far as I can tell, the VERY BEST holiday weekend imaginable will be spent on the beach with a good book.

So -- here is your chance to get as many of these NY Times best selling Fiction titles for 20% off.

Use Coupon Code J408 at checkout to get your discount!

New York Times Best Sellers are always discounted 10% and with coupon you will get a full 30% off on these great titles!

Happy Reading!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Wednesday Sisters eBook edition

The Wednesday Sisters by Meg Clayton is as close to a perfect beach read as you can get.

It is a rare book that has one smart, engaging and has a well rounded and believable woman character. Never mind five of them! This is the story of five women living conventional lives in unconventional times.

From a purely technical point of view, Clayton has pulled off an impressive feat. She manages to make each one of these five women real and full character who all get equal time and equal voice.

The story starts with the assassination of Bobby Kennedy and traces these women's lives through roughly 10 years. Those ten years include the Apollo space flights and burning bras; peace marches and Miss America contests, the birth of modern Silicon Valley and the first New York Marathon.

The story is about women and friendship. As the world around them changes these women are busy building relationships with each other and with books.

In a broad sense It is about family. The ones we come from and the ones we create. It is about the frailty and fortitude. It is about awaking, change and growth.

It is also laugh out loud funny and tear-jerkingly sad. I mean really, how can you resist a book that starts out:

"That's us, there in the photograph. Yes, that's me-in one of my chubbier phases, though I suppose one of these days I'll have to face up to the fact that it's the thinner me that's the "phase," not the chubbier one. And going left to right, that's Linda (her hair loose and combed, but then she brought the camera, she was the only one who knew we'd be taking a photograph). Next to her is Ally, pale as ever, and then Kath. And the one in the white gloves in front-the one in the coffin-that's Brett."

I was hooked from the first paragraph.

So grab your suntan lotion, your favorite drink and a bag of chips, sit in your favorite lounge chair and prepare to enjoy!

Here's the publishers synopsis:

Friendship, loyalty, and love lie at the heart of Meg Waite Clayton’s beautifully written, poignant, and sweeping novel of five women who, over the course of four decades, come to redefine what it means to be family. For thirty-five years, Frankie, Linda, Kath, Brett, and Ally have met every Wednesday at the park near their homes in Palo Alto, California. Defined when they first meet by what their husbands do, the young homemakers and mothers are far removed from the Summer of Love that has enveloped most of the Bay Area in 1967. These “Wednesday Sisters” seem to have little in common: Frankie is a timid transplant from Chicago, brutally blunt Linda is a remarkable athlete, Kath is a Kentucky debutante, quiet Ally has a secret, and quirky, ultra-intelligent Brett wears little white gloves with her miniskirts. But they are bonded by a shared love of both literature–Fitzgerald, Eliot, Austen, du Maurier, Plath, and Dickens–and the Miss America Pageant, which they watch together every year. As the years roll on and their children grow, the quintet forms a writers circle to express their hopes and dreams through poems, stories, and, eventually, books. Along the way, they experience history in the making: Vietnam, the race for the moon, and a women’s movement that challenges everything they have ever thought about themselves, while at the same time supporting one another through changes in their personal lives brought on by infidelity, longing, illness, failure, and success. Humorous and moving, The Wednesday Sisters is a literary feast for book lovers that earns a place among those popular works that honor the joyful, mysterious, unbreakable bonds between friends.

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All We Ever Wanted Was Everything eBook Edition

If you are interested in a study on how secrets warp relationships and families, this is your book. 

If you want to feel the pain of privilege, by all means read this book.

If you enjoy reading about addiction, denial and keeping up with appearance, then this book was written just for you.

If you want sharp social commentary with a little humor, find another author.

All we Ever Wanted Was Everything is an exercise in wretched excess.  From the multi-million dollar high tech executive's wife to the humorless feminist daughter, the characters are excessive, shallow and unsympathetic. 

I really wanted to like this book. From the blurb it sounded like great fun.  Unfortunately, it was pretty much torture to read.  The writer is about as humorless as the feminist daughter. 

Tell me doesn't sound like a great summer beach read:

 When Paul Miller’s pharmaceutical company goes public, making his family IPO millionaires, his wife, Janice, is sure this is the windfall she’s been waiting years for — until she learns, via messengered letter, that her husband is divorcing her (for her tennis partner!) and cutting her out of the new fortune. Meanwhile, four hundred miles south in Los Angeles, the Millers’ older daughter, Margaret, has been dumped by her newly famous actor boyfriend and left in the lurch by an investor who promised to revive her fledgling post-feminist magazine, Snatch. Sliding toward bankruptcy and dogged by creditors, she flees for home where her younger sister Lizzie, 14, is struggling with problems of her own. Formerly chubby, Lizzie has been enjoying her newfound popularity until some bathroom graffiti alerts her to the fact that she’s become the school slut.

The three Miller women retreat behind the walls of their Georgian colonial to wage battle with divorce lawyers, debt collectors, drug-dealing pool boys, mean girls, country club ladies, evangelical neighbors, their own demons, and each other, and in the process they become achingly sympathetic characters we can’t help but root for, even as the world they live in epitomizes everything wrong with the American Dream. Exhilarating, addictive, and superbly accomplished, All We Ever Wanted Was Everything crackles with energy and intelligence and marks the debut of a knowing and very funny novelist, wise beyond her years.

You'd think you would have to love a feminist who actually names here 'zine Snatch.

You'd think that drug dealing pool boys, country club ladies and evangelical neighbors would add (at the very least) great color and a few laughs.

You'd think that a novel about women pulling together would end up being a "feel good" reading adventure.

In all cases you would be wrong.

Obviously, I hated this book!

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The Scandal Plan: Or: How to Win the Presidency by Cheating on Your Wife (eBook edition)

I admit it. . . I am (or at least I used to be) something of a political junkie.  A regular watcher of CNN, MSNBC,CNBC and Comedy Central (Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert). 

This year has been something else!  Almost in spite of myself, I ended up watching all of the debates; both Democratic and Republican.  I am pretty sure I watched election night coverage for every primary. I even watched Hillary's concession speech on Saturday.  At this point, I am pretty well burned out on politics.

So if I am so sick of politics, why did I pick up The Scandal Plan by Bill Folman?  Probably because I couldn't help myself.

Satire appeals to my sense of the absurd and I am always a sucker for a good farce.  OK, I know it is hard to believe that anything could be more farcical then this year's election process; but actually this particular book is! 

Folman pokes fun at the American obsession with image and political correctness.  We want our candidates to be perfect; but not too perfect.  We want them to be Statesmen; but we want to sit down and have a beer with them.  We want them to be authentic; but we are unforgiving of any slips of the tongue or small gaffes.

Folman also has a little fun with the media.  He pokes fun at the 24 hour news cycle and the silliness of over reporting.  He points out how really easy it is to create a news story out of nothing.

The book is an easy read and it is tempting to pass it off as silly and overly cynical.  But I found it to be surprisingly insightful.  Folman takes dead aim at the current political landscape and almost always hits his marks. If nothing else it is a great morality tale on the unintended consequences of a lie. 

The Scandal Plan is highly entertaining; the perfect answer to political burnout and a great beach read!

The publisher says:

Senator Ben Phillips is the perfect man for the presidency. If only he weren't such a straight arrow. He's getting battered in the polls, and with only a few months until Election Day, his staff is growing desperate. Enter Thomas Campman, political guru. On a sudden inspiration, the eccentric Campman is convinced he can revitalize the candidate's image by creating a fake sex scandal for him. Nothing too over-the-top—just a little scandal to make Phillips seem more human. Maybe even cool.

Though it takes some convincing, Phillips gives Campman the green light. The plan is set in motion, and, right on schedule, a phony former mistress steps forward to accuse the senator of infidelity. But scandals—even the premeditated kind—rarely go as planned. Before long, Campman's scheme snowballs into a three-ring circus complete with a linguistically challenged Mexican chauffeur who thinks he's James Bond, a highly sexed middle-aged woman who's convinced she'll never land one of the really good guys, and a political cub reporter for TeenVibe magazine who's sure he's on the trail of the biggest story since Watergate.

For those too well acquainted with politics-as-usual, The Scandal Plan is the perfect antidote. It's a witty political farce in the tradition of Jon Stewart and Dave Barry that will have readers—and even candidates—laughing all the way to the polls.

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Discounted eBooks - May 15, 2008

Women, Diets and Astrology are the non-fiction favorites. Vampires and romance top fiction. Great selection and great choices to keep you reading! To get these discounts use coupon A9JG4 at checkout

Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon--And the Journey of a Generation eBook edition by Weller, Sheila groundbreaking and irresistible biography of three of America's most important musical artists -- Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Carly Simon -- charts their lives as women at a magical moment in time. Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Carly Simon remain among the most enduring and important women in popular music. Each woman is distinct. Their stories trace the arc of the now mythic sixties generation -- female version -- but in a bracingly specific and deeply recalled way, far from cliché. The history of the women of that generation has never been written -- until now, More Info List Price : $17.99 Your price $14.57 (Using your 10% discount and $ .73 points in eBook Reward points)

Dark Needs eBook Edition by: Cole, Kresley Bestselling author Kresley Cole continues her seductive Immortals After Dark series with this tale of a vampire shunned even by his own kind and a beautiful phantom, bound together by a passion they cannot resist. A RAVEN-HAIRED TEMPTRESS OF THE DARK... Néomi Laress, a famous ballerina from a past century, became a phantom the night she was murdered. Imbued with otherworldly powers but invisible to the living, she haunts her beloved home, scaring away trespassers -- until More Info List Price : $6.99 Your price $5.38 (Using your 10% discount and $ .28 iin eBook Reward points)

The Hot Latin Diet eBook edition by: Alverez, Manny M.D. More than just a diet plan, The Hot Latin Diet offers a new outlook on what it means to live well, feel great, and look fabulous. Dr. Manny introduces the 7 Latin power foods and reveals how incorporating these savory and satisfying cuisines to their diet can help women stay slim and maintain those sexy, natural curves More Info List Price : $23.95 Your price $20.48 (Using your 10% discount and $1.08 in eBook Reward points)

Twenty Wishes eBook edition by: Macomber, Debbie Anne Marie Roche wants to find happiness again. At thirty-eight, her life's not what she'd expected--she's childless, a recent widow, alone. She owns a successful bookstore on Seattle's Blossom Street, but despite her accomplishments, there's a feeling of emptiness. On Valentine's Day, Anne Marie and several other widows get together to celebrate...what? Hope, possibility, the future. They each begin a list of twenty wishes, things they always wanted to do but never did. More Info List Price : $22.45 Your price $17.28 (Using your 10% discount and $.91 in eBook Reward points)

New Moon Astrology eBook edition by: Spiller, Jan A revolutionary approach to unlocking the transformative power of astrology! Get what you wish for in love ... happiness ... health ... career ... money ... and more! The Moon's influence on human destiny has been recognized since ancient times, but its potential for generating positive outcomes has often been ignored--until now. In this breakthrough book, master astrologer Jan Spiller reveals the secrets of harnessing the Moon's astonishing power to make your goals a reality! Not just another astrology book, New Moon Astrology provides practical, step-by-step instructions, based on ancient rites and philosophy as well as on Jan Spiller's own vast astrological experience, in framing your wishes in any area--love, career, family, or health. More Info List Price : $19.00 Your price $16.25 (Using your 10% discount and $ .86 in eBook Reward points)

Our guarantee: If you have bought one of these titles from eBooks About in the last 15 days -- we will gladly offer you a rebate on the book; just contact us.

Certain Girls (eBook Edition)

I loved Good in Bed. It is raw, funny, honest and wise. As a woman who has struggled with her body image, I certainly relate to Cannie Shaprio.  Most women can. 

Six months ago I read the advance review for the sequel, Certain Girls.  I could hardly wait to get my hands on it.  Usually that kind of anticipation is a set up for disappointment.  Happily, Certain Girls not only did not disappoint.  It actually surpassed my expectations.

In Certain Girls Jennifer Weiner beautifully captures the complexity, pain and joy of motherhood, daughterhood, sisterhood and marriage. 

At the heart of this story is the relationship between a teenage daughter and her mother.  This is arguably, the most difficult and intricate relationship on the planet.  It is exceedingly problematic even in the most "normal" family.  Cannie and Joy, however, most definitively do not have anything as bland as a normal family. 

Joy is a teenager who alternatively loves and hates her Mom.  Cannie is a Mom struggling to let her baby grow up.  The story line alternates between their points of view as they war over Cannie's (fictionalized) past, their daily interactions and Joy's upcoming Bat Mitzvah. 

Joy's Bat Mitzvah is the overarching and powerful symbol of Joy's entry into adulthood. As she makes the transition she is overcome with the need to make sense of her convoluted family tree.  She wants to know all about her Mom's and Dad's secrets, her biological Dad's new family and her very absent Grandfather.

Cannie is still working out the complicated relationships she has with her over the top lesbian Mom and ditzy but lovable little sister, Elle. And to complicate thing further, just as she is letting go of one child, her husband is lobbying for a baby. 

Weiner's ear for dialogue, her wit and compassion are all on display as she examines these complicated relationships and events.

Too often Weiner is categorized as just  a "chick-lit" writer.  The pink cover certainly reinforces that impression.   Don't be fooled.  This is not a fluffy, girly book. This is a nitty gritty account of coming to terms with the messy, complex web of family. 

The Publishers says:

Readers fell in love with Cannie Shapiro, the smart, sharp-tongued, bighearted heroine of Good in Bed who found her happy ending after her mother came out of the closet, her father fell out of her life, and her ex-boyfriend started chronicling their ex-sex life in the pages of a national magazine.

Now Cannie's back. After her debut novel -- a fictionalized (and highly sexualized) version of her life -- became an overnight bestseller, she dropped out of the public eye and turned to writing science fiction under a pseudonym. She's happily married to the tall, charming diet doctor Peter Krushelevansky and has settled into a life that she finds wonderfully predictable -- knitting in the front row of her daughter Joy's drama rehearsals, volunteering at the library, and taking over-forty yoga classes with her best friend Samantha.

As preparations for Joy's bat mitzvah begin, everything seems right in Cannie's world. Then Joy discovers the novel Cannie wrote years before and suddenly finds herself faced with what she thinks is the truth about her own conception -- the story her mother hid from her all her life. When Peter surprises his wife by saying he wants to have a baby, the family is forced to reconsider its history, its future, and what it means to be truly happy.

Radiantly funny and disarmingly tender, with Weiner's whip-smart dialogue and sharp observations of modern life, Certain Girls is an unforgettable story about love, loss, and the enduring bonds of family.

Highly recommended.

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Searching for Paradise in Parker, PA (eBook edition)

Last week my reading took me from Armageddon to Paradise.  That sentence comes close to encapsulating what I love about books!

After Armageddon in Retrospect I was ready for something light and fluffy.  You know, something without an ounce of reality that would take me to a land where everything was heavenly.  What better than Searching for Paradise in Parker, PA!

The good news is that this books is vintage Kris Radish.  It features  strong women, clueless guys and the requisite lesbian.  The bad news is that it is vintage Kris Radish.  It seems like I've read this all before.

I really wanted to love this book like I did Elegant Gathering of White Snows or Annie Freeman’s Fabulous Traveling Funeral.  Unfortunately, I can't say I did. 

The relationship between Addy and her sister, Hell, didn't ring true, too saccharine sweet even when you include their fight midway through the book.  And why name a character Hell??

The clueless men in a space a very few months were transformed from numskulls to sensitive new age kind of guys.  But then I guess this is fiction.  

Addy's friends, the Sweat-hers (really!) are cartoon women with amazing empathy and almost magical powers of feminine insight.

And for the plot to come close to working, the town would need to have about fifty citizens.

About half way through I just wanted the book to end, already.  But since I am close to incapable of not finishing a book I start, I more or less sped read to the end. 

This is probably a great beach read for the uninitiated Kris Radish reader; but even then, I would recommend either Elegant Gathering or Annie Freeman, first.

I hate writing and posting negative reviews. . . I mean after all the whole point of this blog is to get you interested in reading something that is recently released and fabulous, entertaining, informative or otherwise noteworthy,  This particular book is none of those things. . .  Unfortunately, it was the only book I managed to slog through last week so it is all I have (that is current/new).

Maybe I am too jaded; so check it out for yourself and let me know what you think.

Here is the publisher's information:

After twenty-eight years of marriage to her husband Lucky, Addy Lipton feels anything but happily married. In fact, just thinking of their garage, filled to the brim with Lucky’s useless junk collection, drives Addy dangerously close to plowing her car through it. But when Lucky wins a trip to paradise—aka Costa Rica—Addy has a faint hope they may be able to turn things around. Or maybe they won’t. Either way, Addy never gets the chance to find out.

On the morning of their departure, Lucky fractures his back tossing their luggage into his truck. Now, with the man she feels she barely knows anymore parked indefinitely on her couch, Addy can’t see their already shaky relationship surviving much longer. It’s time to make some big changes—and some drastic choices.

With the love and support of her devoutly single sister Hell and her workout friends, the Sweat-hers, Addy begins a crusade to revive her dreams—and she takes the women of Parker along for the ride. Soon the men will realize they’ll have to step up to the plate to keep their wives and lovers happy. And Addy will have to decide if the paradise she’s creating in Parker is big enough for two....

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The Spare Wife eBook edition

The Spare Wife by Alex Witchel is one of those books that I categorize as the perfect beach read.  Light and fluffy as a souffle and just about as substantial.

Of course I read every word.

It is an interesting quirk of the human psyche that we delight in reading about the folly of the ruling class. Thousand of pages are written (and read) each year about Princesses, Princes, Dukes, Ladies and Counts.  And most of us have never even seen one. 

In the US we have apparently substituted the ultra rich of New York as our own special brand of American aristocracy.  These thin, rich, powerful and presumably beautiful Upper East side denizen serve as the ruling class that we love to hate.  From The Great Gatsby to The Nanny Diaries we are alternatively amused and horrified by a rarified life style that has absolutely nothing to do with our daily lives. 

Most of us are not super thin, super rich or super connected, but for a few hours we can escape to a world that is exceedingly seductive. And there is something immensely satisfying in cutting them down to size.  After all, they may have all the advantages but, obliviously, they are deeply flawed.

Yes, the characters are self absorbed and shallow.  Yes, the the plot is trite and predictable.  So what? It is great fun. 

Take my word for it, this is a great read for a cold winter day!  You don't need to wait for summer.

The publisher tells all:

A sophisticated, witty, sexy story that exposes the world of upper-class New Yorkers and the media that perpetuate their myth. Ponce Morris is a beautiful, rich widow who's been dubbed "the spare wife" because she's the perfect companion to the wealthy, powerful couples she socializes with. She'll go to sports events with the husbands and throw elegant dinner parties and shop with the wives. She's cool and nonthreatening because the two things everyone knows for sure are that Ponce doesn't like sex and doesn't have a romantic bone in her body. Over the years, she has managed other people's lives--and her own--perfectly. Ponce has everything under control, exactly the way she likes it. Until...Babette Steele, an ambitious aspiring journalist, finds out that Ponce is having an affair with a socially prominent and very married man and decides to break the scandal in a juicy magazine piece.

For Ponce's circle, day-to-day existence quickly becomes a complicated game of social and professional chicken--whoever outsmarts and outmanipulates the other will win. And there is a lot at stake, not only for Ponce but for her friends, all of whom are in the midst of crises of their own: a philandering novelist who hasn't been able to write since his breakout Wall Street best seller, an aging billionaire who can't seem to resist young women (the younger the better), a legendary news show producer on the decline, a big-name political journalist looking to rebound from his wife's death, and an editor at a glitzy magazine that covers the worlds of politics, fashion, and Hollywood. As Ponce's life threatens to come apart at the seams, the author takes us into a world she knows intimately: a dynamic Manhattan filled with opinion makers and social fakers.

This is a vibrant, trenchant novel about ambition, love, friendship, and the intoxicating allure of getting ahead...and trying to stay there.

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Literacy and eBooks on Cellphones

Over the last couple of weeks I have come across these interesting factiods:

• Half of the best selling novels in Japan last year were originally written on cellphones.   
• In the first eight months of last year Goma Books sold over 1,000,000 copies of it's two most popular titles: The Red Thread by Mei and If You Could by Rin. 

• The New York Times reports  that many cellphone novelists had never written fiction before, and many of their readers had never read novels before, according to publishers.
• According to the novelist Rin:  “They  (young Japanese readers) don’t read works by professional writers because their sentences are too difficult to understand, their expressions are intentionally wordy, and the stories are not familiar to them.”
• The CIA World Fact Book reports the rate of literacy in the US is 99%.
• The NEA reports that the percentage of 17-year-olds who read nothing at all for pleasure has doubled over a 20-year period. Yet the amount they read for school or homework (15 or fewer pages daily for 62% of students) has stayed the same.

I use the word literacy often but if you asked me to define it I would probably stumble around and make a vague statement that about reading. I really think about it vague and somewhat academic terms. 

On impulse I went to the dictionary and looked it up.  My Dad would be so proud!.  Here is what I found:  Literacy is the ability to read, write, communicate, and comprehend words. 

Interesting. 

I don't see one word about reading books in that definition.  What I see is that literacy is about communication. 

There are millions of teen who text message every day.  Even my aunt tells me that her eight year old granddaughter texts her so often that she has had to learn how text back. 

These messages are written communications using words.  If you think about it, the text messagers are  by definition literate.  Who knows, that might even be as literate as a PhD who writes a thousand page tome on Henry James. 

Which brings me to the conclusion that the problem for publishers is not reading ability or lack of it.  It is more simply a case that most of the books produced aren't doing the job of communicating.

Technorati Tags: ebooks,e-books,cell phones,literacy,ebooks writers,japan

Wife for Hire eBook edition

Stephanie Plum and I go back a long way; every since One for the Money, as a matter of fact.  Now, female bounty hunters are not exactly my thing, but Evanovich is an engaging and funny writer and Stephanie is a great companion for a rainy afternoon.

This at least helps to explain why I bought and read Wife for Hire.  To be fair (and accurate), I had several excuses for buying it.  I bought it because:

• I have enjoyed Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series over the years.
• It was raining in the desert (something we haven't seen in a VERY long time) and I wanted to sit by the fire and read.
• You can't always tell how good (or bad) a book will be by reading the synopsis.
• It is on the New York Times Best Seller list -- how bad could it be?

I am going to very carefully avoid the last question and try to to tell you the good things about this book.  It is  a very easy read.  Evanovich's sense of humor is alive and well. It is short -- about 2 hours worth.

Unfortunately, I can't help my self; I have keep going.  Basically I wonder why I wasted the time since this is an especially stupid and silly excuse for a novel.

The whole plot revolves around a man hiring a schoolteacher (who wants to be a novelist) to pose as his wife.  Within three pages he is in love and she's in heat; or maybe it is the other way around.  At any rate there is a lots of heavy breathing, a few kisses but no explicit sex.

I'll save you a couple of hours and tell you that I should have been warned by reading the publishers synopsis:

Hank Mallone knows he's in trouble when Maggie Toone agrees to pretend to be his wife in order to improve his rogue's reputation. Will his harebrained scheme to get a bank loan for his business backfire once Maggie arrives in his small Vermont town and lets the gossips take a look?

Maggie never expected her employer to be drop-dead handsome, but she's too intrigued by his offer to say no . . . and too eager to escape a life that made her feel trapped. The deal is strictly business, both agree, until Hank turns out to be every fantasy she ever had.

Call me old fashioned, but if I am going to read a "bodice ripper'" I want a few costumes, a castle or manor house and an occasional Lord or Lady thrown in.

Not everyone will agree with me, however, and if you are looking for a no-brainier or a cheap stocking stuffer this will do (barely). 

This is definitely not one of her better works!  If it had been my intro to Evanovich, I promise it would be my last attempt to read anything she has ever written. Fortunately she has grown as an author.

Wife for Hire is one of her early books that has been re-released for the holidays.  It is striking how much better Evanovich has gotten at her craft. The writing in the Stephanie Plum series is light years better than this!

If I were less of a cynic I would wonder why Harper Collins resurrected this early 90s Loveswept romance.  But then -- I bought it,  didn't I?

Design Flaws of the Human Condition

"Humans are an absolute miracle of design. We come in all these fun shapes and sizes and we can survive all sorts of hardship and mistreatment and be practically as good as new the next day - try pouring a bottle of bourbon down your toaster and see just how well it works the next day - but the design's not perfect. Nothing is. And just because you love somebody won't make them love you back."

That is my favorite quote from Design Flaws of the Human Condition which accurately describes the most glaring design flaw in all of us humans; our flawed capacity to love and be loved.

The classic example of a design flaw is the Ford Pinto; introduced in 1971 as the first Ford subcompact, it was small and peppy, fuel efficient and got great gas mileage. The flaw? A gas tank under the rear axle, which meant that it exploded on impact.

Thirty five years later, Paul Schmidtberger explores the theory of design flaws – those slight imperfections which with a little forethought might have been avoided – as applied to people (not machines) in the modern world. The result is hilarious.

The human condition is always a rich source of humor and pathos and Schmitberger captures both in this story of two quintessential New Yorkers who meet in an anger management course. Iris and Ken take us on a whirlwind tour of modern love, friendship, architecture, career woes, espionage techniques, loyalty and infidelity.

You may recall, I was in the middle of reading this when my Irex crashed. I was so involved in the character's lives that I actually contemplated going out and buying a paper copy! Fortunately, I came to my senses and loaded it on my Palm. Once it was loaded, I finished it in once sitting. Basically, I couldn't put it down.

There are some literary critics out there that say things like; 'the plot is contrived', 'the dialogue is trite', 'the situations are not all realistic' and blah, blah, blah. But I am a reader not a critic. And here is my bottom line: in the last three weeks I read 11 books and this was by far my favorite.

Design Flaws of the Human Condition is highly recommended. If nothing else, it is a great alternative to the standard summer reading of thrillers and chick-lit.

Here is the Publisher’s description:

As can only happen in New York, two strangers find themselves railroaded into an anger-management class, where they soon become fast friends. Iris is there because of an eminently justifiable meltdown on a crowded flight, whereas Ken got caught defacing library books with rude (but true!) messages about his former boyfriend. The boyfriend that he caught in bed with another man.

Needless to say, Iris and Ken were cosmically destined to be friends. What follows is a strikingly original comedy as Ken enlists Iris to infiltrate his ex-boyfriend’s life in the hope of discovering that he’s miserable. And Iris reciprocates, dispatching Ken to work himself into the confidence of her own boyfriend, whom she suspects of cheating. But what if Ken’s ex isn’t crying himself to sleep? What if he’s not the amoral fiend Ken wants to believe he is? And what should Iris do when her worst suspicions start to come true?

Exactly how perfect do we have the right to expect our fellow human beings to be? Anger, betrayal, loyalty, and friendship—Design Flaws of the Human Condition explores these universal themes with wisdom, compassion, and a wickedly irreverent sense of humor.

Reading -- Good for your health!

A good book will take you to faraway places with white sandy beaches andclear azure skies in the blink of an eye.

A good book will take you back in time to the days of prehistoric monsters or thrust you forward to the Big Brother world of tomorrow.

It can even fill your eyes with tears one moment and make you laugh out loud the next.

Reading a good novel or story will open a window to the world and give you a vision of things you never dreamed possible.

And the side benefit is, reading is one of the best ways to reduce your stress level. After all, reading is a great escape and a great way to relax. One of the best stress reliever is reading a good novel. It's the best medicine there is without the side effects of drugs.

eBooks About Fiction had a great selection of all kinds of fiction:

Action & Adventure Mystery & Detective Alternative History Occult Anthologies (multiple authors) Political Classics Psychological Epic Religious Fantasy Romantic Fiction General Sagas Ghost Science Fiction Historical Sea & Ocean Horror Short Stories Humorous Sports Interactive Suspense Legal Technological Lesbian Thrillers Literary Untranslated Fiction Medical Visionary & Metaphysical Men's Adventure War Movie-TV Tie-In Westerns Reading is taking a vacation of the mind -- but one that can be EXTREMELY inexpensive (that is like cheap).