My Opinion of fifty Shades

After reading this series a couple times (because I have trouble putting a book down after reading once...), I have a few opinions to share.

Before I rip it apart, I want to make a point in saying that I DID enjoy the story and characters -- I am a sucker for a good ending. That said...

First, I am not impressed with the writing. At. All.
Fifty Shades of Grey by EL James was written very explicitly for adults, yet the writing suggests that the target audience is attending second grade.

This series is a fanfiction story from Twilight. I love to read fanfiction and there are many fanfiction stories available online for Fifty Shades fans that are MUCH better than this book in the writing style, vocabulary, and character development department. There were some large words written amongst the simple sentences, though it felt more like the author occasionally decided to flip through a dictionary, rather than writing with well thought-out intentions.

I was not very impressed with the writing/punctuation/sentence structure while reading the Twilight books; now after reading Fifty Shades, I returned to Twilight and decided that the writing by Stephenie Meyer is incredible by comparison!

My issue with my main character:
I am not going to go near the elusive Mr. Grey, though I am not sure who he should be compared to in the literacy world (hopefully not Mr. Darcy!). I have a few comments on the character development of Anastasia.

This book is from her point of view, and yet she has no clear ideas or unique thought patterns. She regularly repeats the need to "understand." Then she believes herself so in love with this man who has "done so much for her." My problem is that while she is trying so hard to figure out what she is thinking, she misses the fact that she is dealing with a messed-up relationship giving and giving herself, and then receiving nothing. Material items do not count. What exactly did he do to change her? I fail to see any change in her other than her notion of 'love'.

Yes, I know, I am harsh. Though I notice that none of the good fanfiction using the EL James characters are portraying Anastasia with such a dense, uncomplicated persona; she is supposed to be a strong, independant woman.

I have seen the movie.
Yes, I am looking forward to the rest of the movies.
Did I like it?
Yes, though I did not think that Dornan fulfilled the roll as the sexy, tall billionaire when his suits did not appear to be tailored to fit him. I did think it was tastefully done. In all actuality, the filming of the movie is what prompted me to read the books in the first place.

Unfortunately this review is not very complimentary toward our society or the books that publishers are allowing young people (or adults!) to read. Why are books written so elementary, targeted to a nearly-illiterate audience, becoming soooo darn popular? No wonder the next generation cannot write and have no interest in reading... I will gladly stay in my own Austenland, believing in chivalry and happy endings after reading the intricate weaving of pretty language that sparks the imagination. (which does not include books written by EL James...)

Disclaimer: I am not an author. I am in the process of writing a few stories, however I am not an author - yet. I am, however, an avid reader. 

While We’re Far Apart by Lynn Austin

I was excited to read this one the moment I downloaded it. I have read many WW2 stories, but most were from the viewpoint of a person experiencing it in Europe. This story follows a couple people in New York and also the landlord’s son in Hungry. There are so many entwined plots!

-       The girl who gets confidence

-       The kids and landlord who learn to heal after losing a loved one.

-       Family reuniting

-       The family in Hungry praying for their lives

-       The Jews in America who are fundraising

-       Renewed faith

-       A little romance

I could probably add even more to the list. I tried to explain the story to my husband, but it was too complicated. It was a quick read. But very touching.

Book List

This list of books mentioned in The Gillmore Girls is circulating around the Web and so I thought I would also add my input. I really liked the show and was sad to see it end, but I think Hollywood took it places that it shouldn’t have. I have separated this list into ‘Read’ and ‘Haven’t Read’ categories. It really is a good jumping point for people who don’t care what they read, as long as they do. =D

I would like to read most of the books in the unread category, but there are some that I am really not interested in. For example, some of the history and all of the horror. The closest I have gotten to Steven King is Anne Rice, and my opinion of those books: weird. Generally, the books on the ‘Read’ list were required in school – but not all of them.

I've READ

1984 by George Orwell
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll 
Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Beowulf: A New Verse Translation by Seamus Heaney
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Bridgadoon by Alan Jay Lerner
The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
A Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare

The Complete Poems by Anne Sexton
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Crucible by Arthur Miller
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Tales & Poems by Edgar Allan Poe
Emma by Jane Austen

Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Alvin Granowsky
Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald – read
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Hamlet by William Shakespeare
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J. K. Rowling
Henry IV, part I by William Shakespeare
Henry IV, part II by William Shakespeare
Henry V by William Shakespeare

How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss

The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo

The Iliad by Homer

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan

Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Macbeth by William Shakespeare

The Merry Wives of Windsor by William Shakespeare
New Poems of Emily Dickinson by Emily Dickinson

Night by Elie Wiesel

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Othello by Shakespeare – read
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey

Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens

Out of Africa by Isac Dineson

The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare

A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
The Sonnets by William Shakespeare
Sonnets from the Portuegese by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The Story of My Life by Helen Keller

Stuart Little by E. B. White

Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

Tender Is The Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Sophie’s Choice by William Styron
To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
The Tragedy of Richard III by William Shakespeare
Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
Ulysses by James Joyce

Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray

Walden by Henry David Thoreau

Walt Disney’s Bambi by Felix Salten
The Wizard of Oz by Frank L. Baum
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

HAVEN’T READ

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Archidamian War by Donald Kagan
The Art of Fiction by Henry James
The Art of War by Sun Tzu
Atonement by Ian McEwan
Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy
The Awakening by Kate Chopin
Babe by Dick King-Smith
Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women by Susan Faludi
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

The Bhagava Gita
The Bielski Brothers: The True Story of Three Men Who Defied the Nazis, Built a Village in the Forest, and Saved 1,200 Jews by Peter Duffy
Bitch in Praise of Difficult Women by Elizabeth Wurtzel
A Bolt from the Blue and Other Essays by Mary McCarthy
Brick Lane by Monica Ali
Candide by Voltaire 
Carrie by Stephen King
The Children’s Hour by Lillian Hellman
Christine by Stephen King
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
The Code of the Woosters by P.G. Wodehouse
The Collected Short Stories by Eudora Welty
The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty by Eudora Welty
Complete Novels by Dawn Powell
Complete Stories by Dorothy Parker
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas père
Cousin Bette by Honor’e de Balzac
The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber
Cujo by Stephen King
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon – read – 2009
Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
David and Lisa by Dr Theodore Issac Rubin M.D
Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol
Demons by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Deenie by Judy Blume
The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson
The Dirt: Confessions of the World’s Most Notorious Rock Band by Tommy Lee, Vince Neil, Mick Mars and Nikki Sixx
The Divine Comedy by Dante
The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells
Don Quijote by Cervantes
Driving Miss Daisy by Alfred Uhrv
Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
Eleanor Roosevelt by Blanche Wiesen Cook
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters by Mark Dunn
Eloise by Kay Thompson
Emily the Strange by Roger Reger
Empire Falls by Richard Russo
Encyclopedia Brown: Boy Detective by Donald J. Sobol
Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
Ethics by Spinoza
Europe through the Back Door, 2003 by Rick Steves
Eva Luna by Isabel Allende
Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
Extravagance by Gary Krist
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore
The Fall of the Athenian Empire by Donald Kagan
Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World by Greg Critser
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
The Fellowship of the Ring: Book 1 of The Lord of the Ring by J. R. R. Tolkien (TBR)
Fiddler on the Roof by Joseph Stein
The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom –
Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce
Fletch by Gregory McDonald
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem
The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Franny and Zooey by J. D. Salinger
Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers
Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut
Gender Trouble by Judith Butler
George W. Bushism: The Slate Book of the Accidental Wit and Wisdom of our 43rd President by Jacob Weisberg
Gidget by Fredrick Kohner
Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen
The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels
The Godfather: Book 1 by Mario Puzo
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
The Good Soldier by Ford Maddox Ford
The Gospel According to Judy Bloom
The Graduate by Charles Webb
The Group by Mary McCarthy
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders by Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry
High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
Holidays on Ice: Stories by David Sedaris
The Holy Barbarians by Lawrence Lipton
House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III
The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende
How to Breathe Underwater by Julie Orringer
How the Light Gets in by M. J. Hyland
Howl by Allen Gingsburg
I’m with the Band by Pamela des Barres
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
Inferno by Dante
Inherit the Wind by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee
Iron Weed by William J. Kennedy
It Takes a Village by Hillary Clinton
The Jumping Frog by Mark Twain
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
Just a Couple of Days by Tony Vigorito
The Kitchen Boy: A Novel of the Last Tsar by Robert Alexander
Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Lady Chatterleys’ Lover by D. H. Lawrence
The Last Empire: Essays 1992-2000 by Gore Vidal
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
The Legend of Bagger Vance by Steven Pressfield
Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis
Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them by Al Franken
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens
The Little Locksmith by Katharine Butler Hathaway
The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen
Living History by Hillary Rodham Clinton
The Lottery: And Other Stories by Shirley Jackson
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold – read
The Love Story by Erich Segal
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
The Manticore by Robertson Davies
Marathon Man by William Goldman
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter by Simone de Beauvoir
Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman by William Tecumseh Sherman
Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
The Meaning of Consuelo by Judith Ortiz Cofer
Mencken’s Chrestomathy by H. R. Mencken
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Miracle Worker by William Gibson
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The Mojo Collection: The Ultimate Music Companion by Jim Irvin
Moliere: A Biography by Hobart Chatfield Taylor
A Monetary History of the United States by Milton Friedman
Monsieur Proust by Celeste Albaret
A Month Of Sundays: Searching For The Spirit And My Sister by Julie Mars
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Mutiny on the Bounty by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall
My Lai 4: A Report on the Massacre and It’s Aftermath by Seymour M. Hersh
My Life as Author and Editor by H. R. Mencken
My Life in Orange: Growing Up with the Guru by Tim Guest
Myra Waldo’s Travel and Motoring Guide to Europe, 1978 by Myra Waldo
My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult
The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer
The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin
Nervous System: Or, Losing My Mind in Literature by Jan Lars Jensen
The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay
Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich
The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism by William E. Cain, Laurie A. Finke, Barbara E. Johnson, John P. McGowan
Novels 1930-1942: Dance Night/Come Back to Sorrento, Turn, Magic Wheel/Angels on Toast/A Time to be Born by Dawn Powell
Notes of a Dirty Old Man by Charles Bukowski
Old School by Tobias Wolff
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Opposite of Fate: Memories of a Writing Life by Amy Tan
Oracle Night by Paul Auster
Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
The Outbreak of the Peloponnesian War by Donald Kagan
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster
The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition by Donald Kagan
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Pigs at the Trough by Arianna Huffington
Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi
Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain
The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby 
The Portable Dorothy Parker by Dorothy Parker
The Portable Nietzche by Fredrich Nietzche
The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O’Neill by Ron Suskind
Property by Valerie Martin
Pushkin: A Biography by T. J. Binyon
Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw
Quattrocento by James Mckean
A Quiet Storm by Rachel Howzell Hall
Rapunzel by Grimm Brothers
The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham
Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm by Kate Douglas Wiggin
The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
Rescuing Patty Hearst: Memories From a Decade Gone Mad by Virginia Holman
The Return of the King: The Lord of the Rings Book 3 by J. R. R. Tolkien
R Is for Ricochet by Sue Grafton
Rita Hayworth by Stephen King
Robert’s Rules of Order by Henry Robert
Roman Holiday by Edith Wharton
A Room with a View by E. M. Forster
Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin
The Rough Guide to Europe, 2003 Edition
Sacred Time by Ursula Hegi
Sanctuary by William Faulkner
Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay by Nancy Milford
Say Goodbye to Daisy Miller by Henry James
The Scarecrow of Oz by Frank L. Baum
Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand
The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette by Judith Thurman
Selected Hotels of Europe
Selected Letters of Dawn Powell: 1913-1965 by Dawn Powell
A Separate Peace by John Knowles
Several Biographies of Winston Churchill
Sexus by Henry Miller
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
Shane by Jack Shaefer
The Shining by Stephen King
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
S Is for Silence by Sue Grafton
Slaughter-house Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Small Island by Andrea Levy
Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway
Snow White and Rose Red by Grimm Brothers
Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World by Barrington Moore
The Song of Names by Norman Lebrecht
Song of the Simple Truth: The Complete Poems of Julia de Burgos by Julia de Burgos
The Song Reader by Lisa Tucker
Songbook by Nick Hornby
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach
A Streetcar Named Desiree by Tennessee Williams
Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust
Swimming with Giants: My Encounters with Whales, Dolphins and Seals by Anne Collett
Sybil by Flora Rheta Schreiber
Term of Endearment by Larry McMurtry
Time and Again by Jack Finney
The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
The Trial by Franz Kafka
The True and Outstanding Adventures of the Hunt Sisters by Elisabeth Robinson
Truth & Beauty: A Friendship by Ann Patchett
The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath 1950-1962 by Sylvia Plath
Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
Unless by Carol Shields
Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann
The Vanishing Newspaper by Philip Meyers
Velvet Underground’s The Velvet Underground and Nico (Thirty Three and a Third series) by Joe Harvard
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
We Owe You Nothing – Punk Planet: The Collected Interviews edited by Daniel Sinker
What Colour is Your Parachute? 2005 by Richard Nelson Bolles
What Happened to Baby Jane by Henry Farrell
When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka
Who Moved My Cheese? Spencer Johnson
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee
Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire

The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

Magykal Books

I started this series by Angie Sage and cannot put it down. I was going to wait to write about it when I was finished with them all – but I am not a patient person. I downloaded Magyk several months ago. It took me a while to actually read it because I lost it in my digital library. But when it was found I promptly read it and realized that I had to read the others to find out what happens, so I headed to the library since the digital books are not offered at my library.

It’s an easy read. If you are looking for them at the library, I found them in the children’s section by Harry Potter. I enjoyed reading the Harry Potter books, but toward the end of that series they were not as light hearted. Don’t get me wrong, there is plenty of Darke magyk and Darke wizards & witches out to get Septimus Heap along with the Princess Jenna and whoever seems to be with them at the time. But I think it is not quite as intense as Harry Potter. I really like the magykal elements in the stories and how characters you are told about make an appearance in later books.

In Magyk, we learn who Septimus is: a seventh son of a seventh son who was thought to have died after childbirth the same day that Jenna is born and adopted by the Heaps. This book also introduces the ExtraOrdinary wizard and the length she will go to keep Jenna safe.

Flyte is the second book and is named after an ancient charm that allows a wizard to fly. In this book Septimus is apprenticed to the ExtraOrdinary Wizard, Marcia and learns about Magyk.

Although I have read more, I don’t want to give it away. But I am amazed that the author was able to come up with such a complex plot and story line within the fantasy world. Although Harry Potter lived in a complex magical world, the story itself was rather uncomplicated since there was only one conflict at a time.

The other books in the series include Physik, Queste, Syren, Darke, and then the Magical Papers. You must start this series from the beginning with Magyk if you are going to read them. It would be impossible to read them out of order because you would miss all the background information and the character developments.

 

 

If you visit http://www.septimusheap.com there is a game that follows the story with quizzes and such. If you go there to register and play, you will be entered into a sweepstakes.

Heather Huffman's titles

Heather Huffman

Throwaway, Suddenly a Spy, and Ties that Bind

I read each of these books by Heather Huffman. A perfect example of ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ because I had no idea what these books was about or that there was some world issues to be brought up. I must commend the author for taking a stance to inform readers of the reality that slavery still exists – also known as human trafficking.

I was very glad that I read them in the order that they were listed on Barnes and Noble. I had no idea that the characters would be connected. (If you already read one in a different order, that’s ok; your understanding of the story does not depend on the order the books are written necessarily).

After reading one, I wasn’t sure if I would like the next book as much, but found myself getting swept up in the next story as well. I can say that I enjoyed each story equally. They are an easy, uncomplicated read, and very different stories that can easily stand together or alone. The characters were likeable. Each story had a great plot with suspense and a bit of romance.

You can check out her website to find out about her projects at http://www.heatherhuffman.net/. It looks like she has signed with a publisher, so we haven’t heard the last of her!

Law of the Lycans

When I post information about books, know that I will do my best not to give the entire book away. Then there would be no point in other people reading them… and I would rather excite people to read rather than give someone the cliff notes version, and besides that would take too much time. ;)

The Mating, The Keeping, & The Finding - By Nicky Charles

The Law of the Lycans series was a nice surprise! I downloaded them free and had trouble putting the book down to let life go on. According to the Nicky Charles’ website, she is still writing and looking to publish more stories in the series so I am really looking forward to reading them.

The twist on the “people” in these stories: Werewolves. The Werewolves live in peace among the humans, because most humans think it is just a myth. But in actuality they work very hard at keeping their identity (hence the name of the 2^nd book). Hunky men, mystery and action… my kind of read.

The great part of this series is that you really have to start at Book #1 to get all the information. Although each book switches main characters, the characterization of the characters begins to develop in the previous books.

The Mating

This was a fast passed book. The language through me off at the beginning since the verbs are the same for canines; (Mating, pups, pack, alpha, beta, etc.). But once I understood that they were not “human” there was no problem. This book is about Kane and Elise who had a politically arranged mating and end up caring deeply for each other. Besides dealing with bad werewolves and misunderstandings outside their relationship, they have to learn about each other.

The Keeping

This book fallows Kane’s ½ brother, Ryne’s, decision to move away from Washington and start his own pack.  The plots from The Mating carried over and so the whole werewolf world is worried about the reporter wandering around looking to interview Ryne. The question is if she is aware that werewolves exist.  There is a lot more information in this book about the background of werewolves and their laws.

The Finding

This book is about Byran’s search for Cassandra (who comes in at the very end of The Keeping). It turns out that some werewolves actually have royal blood, and the royal bunch have special abilities in addition to turning into a giant wolf. In this story Cassie has an interesting inner conflict because she doesn’t want to be a werewolf… of course no one can fight the inevitable – you are who you are. There is a good lesson – Be proud of who you are?

I personally enjoyed the first two books more than The Finding (but it was still a good story and worth reading!) I really hope Nicky Charles continues to offer her books. I am waiting for a new book soon…

Welcome to the My Bookshelf!

I am a huge fan of reading. When I get into a story, the world could pass by without my notice. I am really hoping that my love of reading rubs off on my kids (but not the ignoring the rest of the world ability). I have a bunch of books that I haven’t read yet and MANY that I like to reread over and over. I’m not involved in a book club, but wanted to add this page in case you wanted to hear about the books I’m reading or give me some suggestions.

I read them all. But I am mostly interested in fiction. Sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, historical… my only request is that it is well written and well thought out (I have been known to throw a book across the room if the end stinks – although since the eBook, that hasn’t been a danger).

I still prefer the feel of a physical book and magazine, BUT I LOVE MY NOOK! I have a ton of eBooks on it and it is much more practical to travel with my Nook rather than 4 thick, heavy novels. And if I forget to stash my Nook in my purse, then I have the app on my phone that I can read for a few minutes if I am waiting for school to let out or waiting at the DMV. I am a walking commercial. It is really funny that I end up advertising the advantages of an eReader whenever I am in public – there is always someone who wants to know if it’s worth it. YES!

Anyway, I want to take the opportunity to share my love of books here. Until I post …