Review #96: Hide by Jeff Foxworthy (Children's Book)

Hide !!! Jeff Foxworthy

Genre: Children's Book, ages 4-8

Publisher: Beaufort Books

(Copy compliments of publisher. Thank you!)

Description from Amazon:

On a Saturday morning
Like many before
The kids were all restless.
In fact, they were bored.

It had finally stopped raining
After nearly a week
Then they had an idea,
"Let's play hide-and-seek!"

Comedian Jeff Foxworthy tells the story of a neighborhood hide-and-seek game and invites readers to join in! With vivid illustrations and a hearty dose of silliness, each page includes a hidden child, a seeker, and other objects for kids to find.

Can you help Rachel Green find Sue, along with one raccoon, two spoons, three mops, four flip flops?

Hide!!! is guaranteed to charm readers of all ages.

My Thoughts:

When the opportunity comes up to review a children's book, I usually jump at the chance. Having at toddler who loves to read stories, I am always looking for new stories to read at night time.

Though this one was cute and colorful, I would not recommend it for a bedtime read. There is a lot of activity going on on each page and it requires a bit of attention and collaboration on the part of the reader. It was a little over the head of my two year old though we did scale it down a bit and he did enjoy it. I liked the seek and find on each page. That was fun. I like the colorful illustrations and the neighborhood feel of friends and community.

Rating: 4 stars/6 stars

Definitely for a bit older reader like it says. 4 years to maybe 6 years, in my opinion. When I saw the picture book format, I automatically assumed it would be a "story" to read instead of seek and find. Still fun, however. It will keep an interested child entertained!

Happy Reading and as always, thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child

Evita

Over the weekend I had the pleasure of seeing Evita on the stage. Minneapolis/St.Paul is fortunate to have many theaters that host fantastic shows each and every month. Unfortunately I can not afford to go see very many these days but I do try to make it to atleast a few each year.

Spring Awakening was my first choice because it was such a limited run but when I saw Evita was here, I jumped on that one! Tickets were only $40 , I could not say no.

I went with my theater buddy, Kari who also saw A Streetcar Named Desire with me this summer. We had table seats off to the side and it was absolutely lovely!

She was a good date! (wink)

My experience with Evita was only from the movie of the same name with Madonna as Eva Peron. I loved the music and the history and the politics of it all. The more "popular" songs were always on the Andrew Lloyd Webber compilations I had as a teen.

Here's a brief synopsis from Wikipedia:

Evita is a musical production, with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice. It concentrates on the life of Argentine political leader Eva Perón, the second wife of Argentinian president Juan Perón. The story follows Evita's early life, rise to power, charity work, and eventual death.

Evita began as a rock opera concept album released in 1976. Its success led to productions inLondon's West End in 1978, and on Broadway a year later, both of which enjoyed considerable success. A major 1996 film of the musical was made, starring Madonna and Antonio Banderas. The musical was revived in London in 2006. Evita has been given numerous professional tours and worldwide productions, and numerous cast albums have been recorded.

and a video clip from the movie.

Madonna in Evita

All in all, a lovely way to spend an evening! Highly recommended.

Thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child

I was so happy to finally see it on the stage.

Review #95: Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson

Genre: Young Adult

Publisher: Penguin

1999 National Book Award Finalist

Price/Pages: $8.99/198

My Thoughts:

Back in May when I returned from New York and BEA, I changed the genres that I would be reviewing on this blog. Up until that point I had been reviewing everything I was reading and that included many different genres. I felt my blog was a bit all over the place and my reading was getting a little busy with review requests. My TBR pile of books I was dying to read was growing and sadly being ignored. So I decided to stick to focusing on my three favorite genres. I've mentioned them before; they are literary fiction, mystery/thrillers and memoirs.

Though I do love Young Adult novels, I decided there were plenty of YA blogs out there who were doing that genre some serious justice.

I would continue reading but I would not review on this blog.

And, of course, this is my blog and I can change my mind at any time, right?

Right?

Well, just for today I am making an exception in posting a review for Speak, the marvelous novel by Laurie Halse Anderson.

I should have read this years ago and admittedly I picked it up because of the controversy surrounding it during Banned Books Week. Here is an article at the Huffington Post explaining it all. Like any other banned book, this ticks me off. Especially with the recent rash of teen suicides happening, we need books like this that speak the truth of what is happening or could happen to our kids.

Here's the synopsis from the back cover:

"Melinda Sordino busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops, so her old friends won't talk to her, and people she doesn't know hate her from a distance. The safest place to be is alone, inside her own head. But even that's not safe. Because there's something she's trying not to think about, something about the night of the party that, if she let it in, would blow her carefully constructed disguise to smithereens. And then she would have to speak the truth."

I will give away a spoiler. That "something" is a rape.

The thing that I liked about this book was how it played out. You don't really find out what happened to Melinda until the end. It flows during the course of her first year in high school and it's written in short paragraphs. You see high school through her eyes and her observations are dead on. I haven't been in high school for (cough) some time now but boy does Anderson capture the mind of a teenage girl beautifully. The insecurity, the emotion, the apathy, the sweetness, the hope. It was extraordinary to read such a vivid, real portrait of the the teenage mind.

Here are just a few lines that really blew me away and my reactions after reading them.

"Gym should be illegal. It is humiliating" (pg. 18)

Uh, yeah...I was the skinny kid with the heart condition no one ever picked for their team. .

"I have been dropped like a hot Pop Tart on a cold kitchen floor." (pg.21)

A teenage girl can cut another girl down in an instant.

"They call me Me-no-linda for the rest of the period. This is how terrorists get started, this kind of harmless fun." (pg. 42)

It's like kicking puppies. If you are a bully as a child, chances are you will grow into a bullying adult. Not always but I do agree with bad behavior starts somewhere and it doesn't always develop into good.

"You never think about the mall being closed. It's always supposed to be there, like milk in the refrigerator or God. " (pg.98)

This just made me laugh because as a teen I had no awareness for how the real world worked. If I wanted to go some where, wasn't it just supposed to be opened and ready for me?

I could post 100s of lines and my book got so full they kept falling out so I am not including a bunch. You will just have to read it and discover its power.

I believe Anderson has written a must read for all teenagers, girls especially. Yes, it has to with rape. Do young girls get raped by teenage boys? yes. Yes, it's about bullying and peer pressure. Does that happen? Um, yes. Yes, it's about dysfunctional families. Are those out there? Yep!

Rating: 6 stars/ 6 stars

The voice of this book is so vivid and raw and honest and sincere that I felt so much while reading it. It spoke to me in the way Are you there God, it's me Margaret? (though that was a tad lighter). I applaud Laurie Halse Anderson for writing such a real account of a teenager.

This should not be banned (nor should any book but that's another post).

It's so easy for you to go inward when you are a teen. Sometimes it's a book, or music, or a movie that pulls teens out of their shell. We need books like this to Speak out about the real life of our teens.

Highly recommended.

Author Website:

www.writerlady.com

Happy reading and as always, thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child

Review #94: The Debutante by Kathleen Tessaro (BLOG TOUR)

The Debutante by Kathleen Tessaro

Genre: Fiction

Publisher: Avon

Price/Pages: $13.99/379

My thoughts:

Crumbling estate: check

Tortured sisters: check

Secretive protaganist: check

Secrets items hidden in old bookshelf: check

London setting: check

Okay, so you got me. It doesn't take much more to convince me to read a book if you have the above items involved. Thank you to TLC Book Tours for introducing this book and this author to me.

Cate is a young woman artist running from a horrible past. She flees to London to work for her aunt. Her assignment is to help her aunt's assistant, Jack, inventory all of the items going to auction at an old estate called Endsleigh House. The house was owned by the Blythe sisters; Diana (also called Baby) and Irene. Though they were born poor their mother married a very rich man in her second marriage and the Blythe sisters were thrown into the fashionable debutante society of London in the 1930s. Irene was the reserved, mature one; Baby was the wild card whom everyone loved.

Sound like a familiar plot line? Well, yes but I enjoyed it anyway. Cate eventually finds some interesting items hidden away in a locked room. She steals them and becomes a bit obsessed with tracking down the owners and the mystery behind these sisters. Turns out, Baby disappeared and no one knows what happened to her.

On top of this story, you also get Cate's drama and the past she is running from or I should say, the man she is running from. She begins a friendship with Jack and they go back and forth with their fondness for one another. Both have pain from their past and both are unsure of what to do with the other but they have a delicious dialogue that I really enjoyed reading. Witty, charming, sweet and full of promise.

Nothing gets wrapped up quickly with this mystery or with their budding relationship. Tessaro weaves back and forth in time, sprinkles letters from Baby to Irene in the mix and by the end the mystery is solved and well...you see for yourself about the relationship. (no spoilers)

Rating: 4 stars/ 6 stars

This was a enjoyable, fast read. It had the potential to be a stellar, meaty novel but it wasn't. It did have the darkness throughout with the mystery of the sisters and the definite pain Cate was feeling throughout but it was written in a simple enough style that you didn't feel like you were reading an enormous character sketch.

I thought I would be a bit more harsh on this one because it sounds familiar to the story lines of Kate Morton but I wasn't. I enjoyed it. It had the drama but the humor and lightness of the relationship between Cate and Jack gave it a sweeter feel.

Recommended for fans of Adriana Triginai or Anita Shreve

Book Club Note:

It has a little fluff feel to it so I don't know how much discussion could come of it.

Still fun, though.

Author Info:

Kathleen Tessaro is the author of the novels Elegance, Innocence and The Flirt. She lives in Pennsylvania. She has worked in as an actress in films, television, and theater.

Thank you to TLC Book Tours

Here are the remaining stops on the tour:

Tuesday, October 26th: Write Meg

Wednesday, October 27th: Daydream Believer

Tuesday, November 2nd: Hospitable Pursuits

Wednesday, November 3rd: Confessions of a Bookaholic

Monday, November 8th: Bookstack

Tuesday, November 9th: Life in the Thumb

Happy Reading and as always, thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child

Review #93: Chosen by Chandra Hoffman

Chosen by Chandra Hoffman

Genre: Fiction

Publisher: Harper Collins

Price/Pages: $25.99/304

My Thoughts:

It may come as a surprise but I rarely have time to browse bookstores anymore. It's down to maybe once a month now and when I do, I rarely buy anything. Call it being poor, or having a massive TBR list or requesting lots from the library, but my buying habit has dried up a bit.

Even though rare, i still love to browse, coffee in hand and a pen and paper in the other.

I stumbled across this book at a Barnes and Noble while hanging with a friend (who bought 8 books that day so she made up for me!). It was on the new fiction display and admittedly the picture of the little kid holding the adult's hand caught my eye!

Seeing that it was about adoption I immediately thought, "this is a book I should read". I have a few friends who have gone through the adoption process and some that are still waiting. The topic is one that fascinates me.

This book was not a lengthy time consumer for me but it was heavy in it's material. I had to put it down a few times because the emotions were so raw and I felt I needed a little processing time.

Chloe Pinter is the director the Chosen Child's domestic adoption program. She has brought families together working with many biological and adoptive parents. Though stressful, she loves her job and works hard for her clients.

Chosen centers around not only Chloe but the lives of three of her clients.

The Novas are a well off couple who after years of working with Chloe they get pregnant on their own. Delighted to be parents finally, they come to struggle with the demands on their marriage.

The McAdoos are another couple, who have tried everything to become parents and after several unsuccessful adoption attempts, seem to have found the one. Frannie McAdoo is anxious, tenacious and vigilant about becoming a mother. She writes frantically on the message boards for adopted families hoping to finally have that story to tell, sharing the "Yes, we have a baby!" moment. Her husband John quietly stands quietly behind his wife and harbors a devastating secret.

And then we have Jason and Penny and the baby that is meant to be for the McAdoos. They are young, poor, uneducated, drug addicted ready to take any scrap they get; money, food, a way out.

Their intersecting stories play out a dramatic tale of hope and horror; loss and gain; anxiety and fear; right and wrong.

Like I said above, I had to put this one down a few times. Having a child, I could feel the desire in some of these characters in their anxiety to start a family. I could feel their frustration when they knew they had to completely leave it in the hands of strangers. I felt the immense anger at those who could easily conceive a child and then recklessly care for it and themselves.

The Author's note in the end summarizes that she did not want to paint a portrait of black and white, hero or villain but show the many sides of gray that the world of adoption creates.

This is her first novel and I would say she is off to a good start. Her past experience includes that of a director of a US Adoption program in Portland and you can see that she is very familiar with the politics behind it all.

Rating: 4 stars/ 6 stars

Because of its graphic nature and emotional story lines, I would rate this at a 4: Recommended but with caution. It combines a fair amount of a thriller/suspense feel with that of a solid novel. It will get you thinking about your role as a parent and what lengths you would go to for a child.

Book Club Note:

I just had a lengthy conversation about the adoption process with my husband tonight over dinner so I think Book Clubs would have a fair amount to discuss. It brings up questions about so many things; what defines the role of a parent, the politics of "baby buying", and the financial investment of children.

Author Website:

Chandra Hoffman

Happy reading and as always, thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child

Review #92: Dewey's Nine LIves by Vicki Myron with Bret Witter

Dewey's Nine Lives by Vicki Myron with Bret Witter

Genre: Memoir

Publisher: Dutton (Penguin)

ISBN: 978-0-525-95186-5

Price/Pages: $19.95/ 320

My thoughts and description:

Honestly this is not the kind of book I normally read. I would not even classify it, so much, as a memoir but it does tell nine true life stories so...I'm calling it that!

For those of you new to the world of Dewey, let me give a little back story. Dewey was a kitten when he was abandoned in the book drop of a small town library in Iowa many years ago.

He was found by the head librarian, Vicki Myron when she came in to work the next day. No one knew how he got there; whether it was an act of kindness of someone's part and an attempt to rescue the little guy from the cold OR if it was a stinker wanting to hurt him.

Either way, Dewey became a huge presence in this little library and remained for over 20 years. He was loved, adored, cuddled, and admired by staff and patrons.

When he passed away, the community truly felt the loss, especially Vicki Myron who had essentially taken Dewey under her wing.

Along this time Dewey began to get some media attention; first a home town news piece, then international. Soon book offers came and

Dewey: the Small Town Library Cat Who Touched the World was written.

It became an enormous success and stayed on the bestseller lists for quite some time.

During the height of this success, I was fortunate enough to host an autograph signing event with Vicki Myron. She was pleasant, friendly, reserved and kind; a librarian all the way. (now that I work at one, I can safely say that without sounding weird!). She was a pleasure to host.

Long story short, when I was asked to review the new book I decided I'd give it a shot. I like the story of Dewey. I really liked Vicki Myron. I love cats. I went with it!

This book, though still vibrantly full of Dewey and his life, tells nine separate stories of people and their relationships with their cats. They were carefully selected by Vicki and all tell of not only a strong love for your pet but also the strength of the relationship between humans and pets.

Here's my own little cat story.

I am a huge animal lover. I have always had cats except for one very long year when I lived in a dorm at college. Every other year of my life, I've always had a cat around.

When I was 19 I went to the city pound with my pal and new roommate, Angie. We wanted to get a cat for each of us. We were ready to be adults and to give a cat a home.

We went to the saddest place on earth, the crusty, dirty city pound. There I found the biggest, fluffiest, dirtiest, loudest cat and paid my $25 and took him home!

I named him Jack Slyvester (because he was black and white) and he was mine for 10 years.

When he had to be put down, due to bladder cancer, I cremated him and put him in an urn which I still have in my room.

Our bond was special, noticeable to all around and missed greatly still to this day.

I now have two very loud, crazy cats which, well...could take up several posts!

But anyway, my point is that, this book is incredibly relatable to me and will be to many readers. I would not seek to read this type of book really ever again but I appreciate and support the emotion and love it brings.

Rating: 5 stars/6 stars

For the reason above, I rate it a 5, highly recommended. It's not necessary to read cover to cover all in one sitting. I did not. But if you want a heartwarming story to lift you up or to just feel sweet for a moment, then pick it up.

Book Club Note:

I don't know how much honest discussion this would bring regarding the actual novel but it will bring up your own pet story (you know you have one!). That could be fun but I would not recommend for a book club choice.

Dewey's website

Happy reading and as always, thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child

Another mention for Dogtown by Elyssa East

Last year around this time, I picked Dogtown to read as part of the R.I.P challenge. I wanted to throw something new in the mix and this story of a spooky New England Ghost town and the murder that happened there, seemed a perfect choice.

Well, it's now out in paperback and it has also been awarded the 2010 L.L Winship/ PEN New England Award for Nonfiction. Pretty exciting I think.

If you are looking for a different kind of ghost story this Halloween I would recommend it again! Here's my review from last year.

Also, at the bookstore I work at we are featured in our local news morning TV show. Every month or so, our manager goes on and talks about the new and cool books coming out that month. This month's theme is Spooky reads. I suggested this one, in addition to others I can't remember now. Hopefully it will bring it a little more attention!

Happy Reading and as always, thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child