Currently Reading

Feeling like my reading mojo is coming back has helped me to keep turning those pages. I wasn't feeling up to doing anything the past few weeks, if I'm to be honest. Sometimes I just have to push myself. In the end, I usually feel better afterwards. Other times it allows me to know my limits.

Nearly finished with another book on this list. I feel bad that it's taking so long to get through the printed books. They're just as valuable to me as the digital versions. I love all versions of the written word. My goal is to knock these off by the end of the year. All of them will be read, reviewed and loved.


Itching to get back to these books;
Jackfish Reborn by Rejean Giguere
Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen
Say You Will (Summerhill Book 1) by Kate Perry
Prince Lestat by Anne Rice
Trail of the Torean (Saga of the God-Touched Mage #2) by Ron Collins
Near Death by Glenn Cooper


So sad to see these go on the shelf;
My Life in a Nutshell: A Novel by Tanya J. Peterson
The Devil Will Come: A Thriller by Glenn Cooper


What do you do when feel less than able to complete a task? Do you push through or wait until a better time? Let me know in the comments below.

Until next time,
Kay B

My Life in a Nutshell: A Novel by Tanya J. Peterson

Release Date: June 1, 2014
Publisher: Inkwater Press
Author Website:  http://www.tanyajpeterson.com

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Synopsis:
Brian Cunningham knew he was the worst of everything - the worst employee, the worst son, the worst pet owner, the person alive on the planet. Whenever he attempted a simple task such as a five minute conversation with a coworker, his world tilted, chest tightened and his heart nearly beat out of chest. Working as a night shift janitor as a local school allowed him the freedom to ready the classrooms with pride but without all the interactions.

Without warning his whole world shifted. His best (and only) friend in the world left him. New management at the school watched his every move and added responsibilities were placed upon his shoulders. As the walls close in and left him floundering, a small hand pulled him from the edge. Can a child with so many problems of her own help Brian with any of his? Will he be able to save her at the moment she needed it most?

Review:
This book was one of those chance findings when I was looking through the various selections offered at NetGalley. I don't know exactly what pulled me toward this book, but I was glad I ended up reading it. Maybe it was because I identified with the main character to a certain degree. Maybe it was because I wished to see someone triumph over adversity. Whatever the reason, I can say with certainty that I was definitely intrigued and couldn't wait to discover what awaited me between the book's cover.

Told through Brian's eyes and experiences, the author gave a voice to all the worrying and the character's  anxious thought processes as he encountered various situations. From the very first chapter the high level of anxiety that Brian experienced on a daily basis was front and center. I could tell right away that he was painfully shy on top of all the other worries he admitted to within the first chapter. The bombardment of his thoughts could be off-putting for some readers. I can understand that as they were almost too much for me to continue reading because I could emphasize with Brian. So much so that I felt the anxiety and sadness roll off his character in waves. As the story continued and more characters were introduced, an increase in anxiety was evident and expected. For Brian the only reason to get up in the morning despite the exhaustive panic attacks he endured was a little girl who seemed more lost than he was.

The rest of the characters were well fleshed-out, giving a voice to different concerns and misconceptions as the story unraveled. In fact their behavior or dialogue affected the pace of the story. During some of Brian's panic attacks, the pace was fast and bordering on frantic. When other characters appeared with a calming presence, the pace slowed to allow time to breathe and process what happened. I could guess some of the events to be uncovered by the way Brian and his coworkers reacted, but I was also pleasantly surprised when a few didn't go the way I thought they would. My heart ached when pieces of Abigail's story came to light. She was the little girl who captured everyone's attention with her bright eyes, desire to fit in and the gut-wrenching history. Her small voice broke through defenses of many characters and brought needed change in all their lives. One character really annoyed me by her treatment of Brian despite the fact that she professed to do it out of love.

All in all, this book wasn't something I was looking for, but was one I needed to read. Anyone experiencing anxiety or other such disorders will be able to relate to what Brian's going through. In fact much of the book stayed with me long after I finished the final chapter. The whole journey felt overwhelming in the beginning. By the time I reached the end, I felt hope and happiness as some issues were completely resolved. Others needed more time, but I have no doubt they would be resolved as well. The author tapped into something that I think many people in today's world felt at one time or another. Even with technology connecting the world, people feel more alone and lost than ever before. If you're looking for a book with characters to root for or something that wraps its words around you and doesn't let go, this is a book you need to have on your list.

My Life in a Nutshell: A Novel by Tanya J. Peterson is currently available at a number of online retailers and local bookstores. This book can be purchased in either paperback or digital (Kindle) versions. Below is a link to the Amazon page for the book.
My Life in a Nutshell: A Novel by Tanya J. Peterson

June's Hopes and Dreams

Welcome to June, everyone!

Here, the days grow warmer as the days last longer before handing over control to the night. If I'm to be honest, I'm not looking forward to the really hot days that will appear later in the month. I will have to find a way to adapt to them once again so that I can enjoy a bit of sunshine in the mornings.

The good thing about the summer is that I usually get a lot of reading done. I am positive the trend will continue as I've been able to conquer nearly half of the books I've been behind in reading. It makes me feel bad when I see them sitting quietly in their corner, covers pleading to be opened and the words waiting to be devoured. The anxiety an author feels while waiting for reviews - I've been on both sides of the coin. So, I try my best to finish them as soon as I can.

Setting aside my community projects for the month, I'm devoting more time to my writing. I've been having a lot of ideas and partial beginnings float around in this brain of mine. It's my goal to get them on paper and see where they take me at the very least. If I'm able to have a great month, I am going to do that and finishing editing a few pieces. A few contests have caught my attention. I might give them a chance. Never know unless I try, right?

What's your summer reading list looking like this year?  Romance? Action?  Let me know in the comments below.

Until next time,
Kay B

Dark Prayer by Natasha Mostert

Release Date: October 16, 2014
Publisher: Portable Magic, Ltd.
Author Website: http://www.natashamostert.com/

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Synopsis:
Eloise Blake knew someone was after her, but couldn't explain the weird things happening to her. She saw phantom figures, heard whispered conversations that made no sense to her and saw rows upon rows of numbers again and again. Whatever meaning they hold, she needed answers without the help of man who claimed to know her as someone else.

Jack Simonetti was your average trust-fund baby, a guy who played hard and loose with his father's money, until he was caught on camera for the umpteenth time. As punishment he must travel to England and help his father's friend find someone. Along the way he discovered people are sometimes the cruelest to those they profess to love.

Review:
Finding this in the Mystery & Thriller section at NetGalley, I wondered how a young rich playboy could be a good detective if he had no such skills. I mean, he didn't do much at all except make his father angry at his antics. How did that translate into being a super sleuth and finding the lost person? Not to mention the fact I was intrigued by Eloise's plight. The poor woman felt like she was going crazy from all of the weird things happening. These separate lines coming together was something I needed to read for myself.

Much of the book focused on the two characters mentioned above. In a way both of them were trying to find their true selves, but Eloise's condition worsened to the point that it became the primary focus. Several secondary characters moved the story forward and cemented their places in the action as their skill set became needed. I liked the fact that each character remained independent of one another despite sharing some similarities. Case in point, Jack's father and a group of friends began a secret society which they talk about in the first few chapters of the book. Every member of this society had his or her own specific field of study and yet, some of the areas overlapped. To keep the members from becoming muddled, each of them have distinct characteristics such as physical singularities, mannerisms or merely the way they pronounce their words. All of these things made it easy to believe that they could have been real people in a present day situation - though that would be a terrible reality for a person if it were true.

Once the story began, the pace was steady and consistent. There was a sense of urgency and need lying barely below the surface and initiated a lot of the character's actions. Of course, the lingering feeling that someone was out to stop Jack and Eloise from discovering the truth helped as well. I thought it interesting how Jack's initial feelings about Eloise shifted from something akin to annoyance into a sense of protection as he delved deeper into the reason behind her current state of mind. As everything unraveled and revealed who all had ownership in the horrible deed, I knew a few of the answers that the duo would find, but not everything. There was a factor that I didn't see coming until it was right in front of me. That was a pretty pleasant surprise, but I was also repulsed that the deed was even conceived in the first place. No, I won't be more specific. This is a spoiler-free zone!

Overall, I really liked this book. There were several different elements that came together and created an interesting and intelligent story that wasn't weighed down by lots of scientific terms that I couldn't understand. The author inserted the necessary information and explained the complicated matters through her characters in such a way that I thought it was simply a part of a conversation or a bit of book left open to the right page. The story had a bit of everything to take me on a thrill ride and a few surprises that left me happy at the end. From action sequences to sinister motives, there's a lot of ground for the book to cover, but it does it well. If you're looking for a book with a twisted mind, devious friends and soul-shattering revelations, then pick this book up!

Dark Prayer by Natasha Mostert is currently available for purchase at many online retailers in hardcover, paperback or digital (Kindle) editions. The following is a link for the book's Amazon page.
Dark Prayer by Natasha Mostert

Currently Reading

Days have a way of becoming routine. No matter how you switch the order of activities, they still feel like the same old thing. That's one of the reasons I love this blog so much. All these books allow me the chance to slip away from the routine and enter into the skin of someone else, experience their day and come back to my world when I need to do something else. With the season shifting into summer, I'll be spending more time inside than I'd like. Perfect way to escape is to crawl inside these books.

A wide range of worlds await my arrival. From the straight-laced society of the 1800s to the wild unknowns of a world where magic still rules supreme, I'm able to escape the pain and monotony of my everyday life. Time to dust off these printed books, scour their every page and file them away on my bookshelf or lend to another home. My poor Kindle groans under the weight of so many books. I need to pay some attention to it as well.


Shading my eyes from the Summer sun are;
Jackfish Reborn by Rejean Giguere
Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen
Say You Will (Summerhill Book 1) by Kate Perry
Prince Lestat by Anne Rice
Trail of the Torean (Saga of the God-Touched Mage #2) by Ron Collins
My Life in a Nutshell: A Novel by Tanya J. Peterson


Resting beneath the shade trees are;
Ravensbruck: Life and Death in Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women by Sarah Helm
Dark Prayer by Natasha Mostert


Summer brings a vast number of possibilities with it. What are you looking forward to the most this year?

Until next time,
Kay B

Ravensbrück: Life and Death in Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women by Sarah Helm

Release Date: March 31, 2015
Publisher: Nan A. Talese (Doubleday Books)

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Synopsis:
Before the beginning of World War II, Heinrich Himmler created a concentration camp 50 miles north of Berlin to house female prisoners. Once the war was over, it came to light that more than 100,000 women passed through the gates of Ravensbruck - each of them from one of over twenty different nations. Much of the history of this camp was suppressed or erased all together because of the atrocities which took place behind its wired walls. However, many heroic women told the story of their lives inside the camp once they were freed.

Compiled from salvaged letters, mountains of declassified papers and interviews from the remaining survivors or their families, Sarah Helm has created a comprehensive history of the camp from the first brick laid until the last prisoner left the grounds. She explored the various methods used to keep the prisoners 'in line' as well as the many protests, large and small, that the prisoners attempted to better their living conditions. Giving a voice to the thousands of voiceless, the book granted a lasting memory of those who were lost behind the gates of Ravensbruck.

Review:
I stumbled upon this book while searching through the Nonfiction section at NetGalley. Something about the book caught my eye and I decided to give it a read. What I found between the covers was one of the hardest yet profound books that I have read to date. Remembering the history lessons covered by years in school in no way compared to the information that the author compiled into this book. This particular concentration camp wasn't as well known or talked about like Auschwitz or Dachau, but the same atrocities occurred within its walls to the thousands of women prisoners brought from all over Europe. Maybe the press didn't put as high a value on the female lives as on the males. Maybe because the Jewish prisoners made up a small percentage of the total camp population. There could be many reasons as to why it's taken so long to have an in-depth account of the events at Ravensbruck.

From the camp's creation, Himmler wanted a place where he could contain the women which he consider inferior - political protestors, prostitutes, and Jews as well as many other nationalities deemed a poison to the German population at that time. The book not only presented the accounts of the prisoners with details and thorough fact-checking, but it also examined many of the SS guards which controlled the camp in the beginning up to the final year before liberation happened. In the beginning it was easy to tell which side was which as the prisoners had their uniforms and the guards had a distinctive look to their own as well. By the end of the war, there was such a shortage of officers and guards in the ranks of the SS that many of the prisoners were assigned jobs such as running each barrack or a particular area of the camp. Because of this intermingling, it was difficult to determine who was and wasn't trustworthy. In truth some of the prisoners acting as guards, or blockovas, were more ruthless than the SS guards - a fact that even disturbed Himmler at times. Rules were strictly followed as the camp accepted its first prisoners. Near the end of the war, thousands upon thousands of women streamed into the camp and made it difficult to enforce any of the rules all of the time.

The author gathered information from living survivors as well as the families of some who were now gone. Declassified documents from several governments and letters smuggled out of the camp helped to shape the manuscript into a comprehensive history of the camp and its inhabitants. It was written in such a manner that the events of each chapter flowed almost seamlessly into the next without a lot of backtracking when new people were prominent in the writing. The author's writing style would've made this book a quick, interesting read. However, the details of the horrific abuse and heartbreaking realities that these women endured made it difficult to wade through. There was so much in each sentence of the book that I could not skim the paragraph or chapter without losing vital information about the camp, a particular prisoner or even a significant change within a guard. The author's style of writing also gave dimension to the people involved in each of the situations. Everything about them came through in the narrative, creating a running movie in my mind and giving them the respect of being actual people who lived and breathed instead of merely characters in a story.

This book was truly a hard one to read because of the abuse and neglectful conditions that the women lived through. It occurred at any of the camps that they were sent after being processed at Ravensbruck, but the first taste of hell for many was the moments they stepped off the trains onto the grounds of Ravensbruck. What struck me first was the fact that a large portion of the women sent to the camp in the beginning weren't Jewish. They were mainly political prisoners, dissenters or even Jehovah's Witnesses who refused to help Hitler's cause. Once the war was under way, the women of each town the Germans conquered were sent to the camp until there were over 21 different nationalities and ethnic backgrounds among the women. This included Americans or the spouses/relatives of Americans such as Virginia Lake, the sister of Mayor La Guardia of New York at the time. Many of the women showed strength and determination in the face of such horrors and death itself in order to ensure what was happening to them got to the world outside the camp. This book gave a voice to the voiceless and allowed a light to shine on one of the few remaining unknowns of Hitler's reign of terror during the war. If you are a lover of nonfiction or are emboldened by people who find strength and determination when all hope is supposedly lost, this book is a must read.

Ravensbruck: Life and Death in Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women by Sarah Helm is currently available at several online retailers and local bookstores. It can be purchased in either hardcover or digital (Kindle) formats at the book's Amazon page. The link is provided below.
Ravensbruck: Life and Death in Hitler's Concentration Camp for Women by Sarah Helm

We Regret to Inform You: Stories by Tim Fredrick

Release Date: March 31, 2015
Publisher: Tim Fredrick
Author Website:  http://www.timfredrick.com

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Synopsis:
A collection of short stories ranging from a few paragraphs to a constant stream of thought, Tim Fredrick offers up fourteen cases which explore the connection men have with the people in their lives. The stories hail from different genres and viewpoints to allow the read to see through a man's eyes. Not only is the connection explored, but everything that comes with it - anger, lust, happiness, disgust, fulfillment, love.

Come discover the boy who would break a world record, a father who slowly turned to stone, a cat's toy that finally finds its motivation and so much more. Each story presents a world in which someone either finds or loses that which is most important to them, leading us to shift how we think about our relationships with one another.

Review:
I used to think that short stories were a temporary fix when I didn't have a new novel to devour. Most were pure enjoyment without having to pay attention to every nuance of the story. Small vacations to other places or being swept up in an adventure for a few minutes appealed to me whenever I wasn't nose-deep into something longer. During a search of something new to read on NetGalley, I saw this offering by the author and wondered exactly how did a father turn to stone and what in the world did a cat toy want so much?

The fourteen stories in this collection focused on a man's part of a relationship. Whether it was as a parent, a friend, a lover or even catnip-filled mouse, the subjects of the stories tried to find a connection with another party. Many featured an one-on-one type of interaction between the main character and the object of their relationship. They were told from different vantage points as well. It was easy to find the overall theme in each of the stories, making this collection a more cohesive book. For me, there were a few characters that stood out for me. One was the cat toy which simply wanted to be an equal to his sister, the cat. It was interesting to see the toy have some of the same feelings and emotions that I've had in a few past relationships. Another was a male nurse in a futuristic hospice, caring for a recently thawed man from our century. His reactions to the thawed man's behavior and beliefs had me wondering what I would have done or said if I were in his place.

Each of these stories had their own pace. Some were quick reads that seemed to start and finish in a blink of an eye. One such story was called 'The Kind of Person'. This one struck a chord with me because I could relate to both people within that marriage. I understood their vantage points as well as that loneliness and frustration. The other selections in the book had a slower pace to them, but they moved forward that was enjoyable. My emotions rode the roller coaster that these stories provided. Not only did I laugh, cringe and smile at the events, I also cried when I read 'The Drawer'. I wasn't swept up by the story at first, but as the man at the heart of the story continued to do everything but go near that drawer, I was hooked. The last three paragraphs took my heart and ripped it. Such a sad situation for everyone involved.

All in all, I liked this collection a whole lot more than I anticipated. With so many different aspects to a relationship to explore, the author set a high bar for the collection to reach. However, I think he did a great job of hitting that bar. He imbued his characters with the flaws and failings that made it easy to relate to them. There was a little bit of the 'everyman' in each character. Their words and deeds could have easily been our own and that's what makes a great story last in our memories. If you're looking for a great collection of well-written stories to tide you over until your next novel fix, or simply enjoy connecting to the stories you read, this book should be on your list.

We Regret to Inform You: Stories by Tim Fredrick is currently available at many online retailers in either paperback or Kindle (digital) versions. Visit the following link to purchase from the book's Amazon page.
We Regret to Inform You: Stories by Tim Fredrick