Book Review - Invisible - Hugues de Montalembert

Title:  Invisible-A Memoir

Author: Hugues de Montalembert

Review:  This short book will make you think about life and how you are living it.  Are you waiting for something to happen before you actually get out there and live?  Blinded by two thieves this author learned to live his life to the fullest.  He had a full life before the blindness, but after he refused to let it change things.  He traveled and saw the world without the help of his eyes.  He met people who opened up to him because they couldn’t look into his eyes and see his judgments.  He learned that there are worse things that can happen in life then losing one’s sight.

Where do you fit in this world?  What do you have to give and what can others give you.  I loved this book and it took a bit over an hour to read.  My favorite few paragraphs are at the very end.  I don’t want to spoil it for you, but it made me think that life is full of people who need our compassion and help yet we don’t see them.  Who will see them if we don’t?  

Read this book, take an hour or two and really think about what the pages are saying.  This is a book for anyone and everyone.  This will change the way you see everyday life.  Beauty surrounds us, but do we really ever truly see it?  READ THIS BOOK!

Publisher: Atria Books (September 20, 2011) Paperback

ISBN: 1416593675

Copyright: 2010

Pages: 144

Quick Review: 5 stars (out of 5)

Why I Read It:  The publisher was looking for reviewers.

Where I Obtained the Book: Sent by the publisher.

Synopsis: Blinded in a senseless attack in his New York home in 1978, de Montalembert, then a filmmaker and painter, was violently forced out of his intensely visual world. In this raw memoir, more a brainstorming session than a narrative, he approaches his new life with stunning directness, navigating the environs of Manhattan and, not much later, Bali and Greenland, with precocious new confidence and ability. He's also painfully honest about the affects of his blindness, refusing the comfort of standard tropes about spirituality but finding wonder in the kindness of absolute strangers, isolation from those closest to him, and other un-thought-of moments of triumph and despair stemming from the way his condition affects his closest relationships. A French-born artist, de Montalembert will draw inevitable comparisons to Jean-Dominique Bauby (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly), and de Montalembert's effort is certainly a more challenging read, stylistically: broken, brief, at times like a prose poem. It depends on the reader whether this approach makes for a cumulative impact, or just gets tiring. Still, de Montalembert vital, determined voice is worth attending.

Author Biography:  Born in France, Hugues de Montalembert is a painter and photographer who was blinded during a violent assault while living in New York in 1978. He is the author of one previous book in English, ECLIPSE (1985). His story was also the basis of the acclaimed documentary film BLACK SUN (2007). He currently lives in Paris.

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Monday Musing - Writing Query Letters and Monday Mailbox

I need to write one of these and I have to say that I'm at a loss.

I've read all about them, but WOW its not that easy to actually sit down and do it.

I'm posting the 1st Chapter of a book I wrote, look for the page link on blog tabs.  Please help if you can.

Thanks I appreciate any assistance.  Lisa

Working on a title also.
Here's what I have for a Hook so far.
 Rebuilding a shattered life takes time.  After 12 years Jessica finally felt she  accomplished it, until an unexpected phone call brought the nightmare back.


Here are a few books we received this last week. 

Robert Cleghorn was a good soldier, so good that he was first selected to join the Special Forces and following a head injury, was recruited by the CIA. A second head injury hospitalized him and psychiatrists rebuilt his memories from what they could recover.
He escapes from the hospital where he was a virtual prisoner and goes to find the love of his life: his brother’s wife and a typically English rose. Always on a knife-edge, Robert quarrels with and kills his sibling.
Finding his brother was about to go to England, Robert assumes the other’s identity and heads for the UK. Blithely unaware that the memories of his beloved are artificial, unaware of the mayhem about to erupt and the very astute English copper soon to be seeking him and unaware, too, of the Americans dogging his footsteps, Robert soldiers on. The fun is about to start.  Sent for review.

#1 New York Times bestseller Kathy Reichs is back with her fourteenth novel featuring America's favorite forensic anthropologist, Tempe Brennan.  This one I requested on Goodreads bookswap.

If you were left out in the cold snow all by yourself, would you be mad? Of course you would! Well, this snowman is out for revenge, especially after he sees those kids in the nice warm house, eating cookies and drinking hot chocolate! So, let's see what happens in this delightful story, nicely flowing with rhymed verse, beautifully illustrated and quite humorous indeed. So loveable, it's sure to be an instant favorite and a timeless classic with "kids" of all ages.  Sent for review.

She serves him breakfast at her café every morning … but he never seems to notice her.

Carrie Carter’s small café in Seaside, New Jersey, is populated with a motley crew of locals … although Carrie only has eyes for Greg Barnes. He’s recovering from a vicious crime that three years ago took the lives of his wife and children—and from the year he tried to drink his reality away. While her heart does a happy Snoopy dance at the sight of him, he never seems to notice her, to Carrie’s chagrin.

When Carrie’s dishwasher is killed and her young waitress disappears, Greg finds himself drawn into helping Carrie solve the mysteries … and into her life. But when Carrie’s own painful past becomes all to present, her carefully constructed world begins to sink.

Will the fragile relationship she’s built with Greg implode from the weight of the baggage they both carry?  Sent for review and I read it the day I got it.  Review already posted.

Book Review - The Burning Soul - John Connolly

Title: The Burning Soul

Author: John Connolly

Review: One of my favorite things in my reading life is picking up a new (to me) mystery writer and thoroughly enjoying the book. It is especially great when they are an established writer and I can go back and enjoy an extensive backlist. I keep up with about 50 authors right now and I always on the lookout for more. I just got up to date on John Sandford’s work and I am currently working my way through C.J. Box’s and Michael Connelly’s backlists. I can say now that John Connolly has been added to that list.

When I begin a series with book 10 I am looking for a few things:

• A writer who has mastered writing a tight story with detail in all the right places.
• A lead character(s) that feels real; well rounded.
• A cast of regular side characters that are fully developed and could carry a book by themselves.
• A story that occasionally refers back to past work without giving it all away.

The Burning Soul has all of those traits and I cannot wait to read more about Charlie Parker and company. Even the bad guys in this book were real people. I mean I would read a book about the life struggles of a pair of organized crime muscle as presented in this story. They were that well written.

Can an honest man ever be free from the wrongs he has done n his life? That is the overall question of the book. We all make mistakes but sometimes we are cruel, even evil, on purpose. I think we like to believe we can just leave it all behind and get on with our carefree lives, but the truth is we just can’t (unless you happen to be a sociopath). Charlie Parker is called in to help a victim of intimidation and blackmail. Of course being blackmailed means the victim has done something pretty vile in his life at one time.

The truth is he is tormented more by himself than anyone else. His prison was erected in his mind and even though he did his time, he has never been free. This makes me think of even larger issues involving PTSD and other reactions to highly stressful situations. Basically damage to the mind does not just go away on its own, or even heal correctly if we just “man” up and tough it out. If we broke our arm we wouldn’t just leave it to heal on its own, or at least we wouldn’t expect it to heal perfectly that way. 

So the client in this book is the same way, always trying to tough it out, always trying to out run the consequences; yet never truly healing. Cowardice made him commit the original crime and cowardice made him avoid the punishment. The irony being never facing his responsibilities actually made the consequences much worse. And isn’t that an universal truth for life?

Publisher: Atria Books

Copyright: 2011

Pages: 404

ISBN: 978-1-4391-6527-0

Quick Review: 4 Stars out of 5.

Why I Read it: Love mysteries

Where I Obtained the Book: The publisher sent it to me for review.

Synopsis: What's the worst thing you've ever done? "There are some truths so terrible that they should not be spoken aloud, so appalling that even to acknowledge them is to risk sacrificing a crucial part of one's humanity, to exist in a colder, crueler world than before." Randall Haight has a secret: He is a convicted murderer, a man with the blood of a young girl on his hands. He has built a new life for himself in the small Maine town of Pastor's Bay, but someone has discovered the truth about him. He is being tormented by anonymously sent reminders of his crime. He wants private detective Charlie Parker to make them go away. But another girl has gone missing, this time from Pastor's Bay itself, and her family has its own secrets to protect. Now, in a town built on blood and shadowed by old ghosts, Parker must unravel a twisted history of violence and deceit involving the police and the FBI, a doomed mobster and his enemies, and Randall Haight himself. Because Randall is telling lies. . . .

Author Biography: John Connolly is the author of "Every Dead Thing" which was a bestseller in Britain and Ireland. He is a regular contributor to "The Irish Times," and has traveled extensively in the United States. He lives in Dublin, Ireland.

Other Reviews:

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Throwing Books

FYI: Currently my copy is up on Goodreads Bookswap while it lasts.

Book Review - Shadows on the Sand - Gayle Roper

Title:      Shadows on the Sand

Author:  Gayle Roper

Review:  I had a bit of trouble getting into this book, I found there to be way too much dialog in the beginning.  Talking and discussions in the café really brought the flow to a halt.  Once the characters moved away from the café the conversations were less and the book flowed better and the story started to take shape.

I like the characters and the little seaside village they live in.  The residence of the village are sweet and each have their own little quirks.  The main characters are flawed and need help from each other to find their way and I think that is the way with everyone on the planet.  We all need someone to help gets us through the day and love us for us.  Greg had lost everything and Carrie had never had anything, the two were meant for each other.

The pacing improved after the first few chapter, and the book calls itself a Seaside Mystery, but it really is a Christian romance with scripture verses and loads of pray.  I liked the story and I think the author went a bit over board in God portions.  Yes he leads our lives and his time is his…but enoughs enough.   I have read several Christian romances and this one pushed it a bit more than the others I have really enjoyed, not to mention it said it was a mystery and there was not much in the mystery department.   A religious cult gone bad, really?  Which ones are good?   The mystery was pushed to the far side of the story and it is mainly a romance with Christian under tones.

 The story was sweet and fast to read.  The stuff about Twitter and other Social Media Sites was funny and I enjoyed that bit quite a lot.  If you enjoy Christian romance then you will enjoy this book.

Publisher: Published July 19th 2011 by The Doubleday Religious Publishing Group  

ISBN: 9781601420848

Copyright: 2011

Pages: 320

Quick Review: 3 stars (out of 5)

Why I Read It:  I belong to Blogging for Books and I thought this looked interesting.

Where I Obtained the Book: Sent by the publisher.

Synopsis: She serves him breakfast at her café every morning … but he never seems to notice her.

Carrie Carter’s small café in Seaside, New Jersey, is populated with a motley crew of locals … although Carrie only has eyes for Greg Barnes. He’s recovering from a vicious crime that three years ago took the lives of his wife and children—and from the year he tried to drink his reality away. While her heart does a happy Snoopy dance at the sight of him, he never seems to notice her, to Carrie’s chagrin.

When Carrie’s dishwasher is killed and her young waitress disappears, Greg finds himself drawn into helping Carrie solve the mysteries … and into her life. But when Carrie’s own painful past becomes all to present, her carefully constructed world begins to sink.

Will the fragile relationship she’s built with Greg implode from the weight of the baggage they both carry?

 

Author Biography:  GAYLE ROPER, a member of American Christian Fiction Writers and Romance Writers of America, is the multi-award-winning, best-selling author of Fatal Deduction and more than forty other books. She teaches and leads mentoring clinics at writers conferences across the country. Gayle lives in eastern Pennsylvania.

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Book Review - The Gathering Dead - Stephen Knight

Title:  The Gathering Dead

Author: Stephen Knight

Review:  For starts it is your typical zombie story, some unknown antigen is sent into the general population and only one person has the cure and the military is sent to save that person.

The book starts off with the epidemic that has already spread and the military is trying to stop it from spreading outside of New York City. The book has some graphic scenes and some strong language but again it is a Zombie book and if it wasn't graphic I would be very shocked. I have to admit the first few pages had me thinking what I would have done in that situation. I don't want to ruin the story for you.

 I really enjoyed the author pulling two elite military groups together and how they need to work together to survive and get the man who has a cure to safety.

 The author gives the two lead military men McDaniel’s and Gartrell a back story that follows them though out the book. The author makes the military guys a walking cliché but he made most of them likeable so it didn't annoy the reader. Like most Zombie stories the little band find themselves stuck at the top of a New York City Sky Scraper with danger lurking around every shadow in hopes of being rescued from the top instead of having to fight their way out on the streets of New York City where the dead walk\run.  Have you seen the way people run to a buffet?  That is how he makes the zombie see the living.

 The doctor who they are saving and his daughter, I personal hated and even though they have the cure I couldn't help but want one to get bitten to show a little humanity toward the walking dead.

The author added a interesting element to Zombies that I really quite enjoyed.  Most stories have the zombie only dead with the desire to eat but they cannot function unless food "the living" is nearby and for the most part they just wonder around looking for food.  He has zombies using the basic skills we all were taught or use every day like opening doors, using keys, shoot guns, and climbing.  I like that element because it makes the zombie a little more scary. 

Stephen Knight also wrote a Novella Left for dead that follow Gartrell and what happens after most everyone they were transporting is moving to a "safer facility." He is left in the city alone trying to find food and a way out when he meets up with a woman and her autistic son.  Again the author used the basic skills of life we learn from young age and gave them to the zombies to make it a bit more frightening.  It was a very quick read and it made me think IF it happened and the world was overrun with the dead would I want to survive even though every day would be a fight and my family would never be safe? Would I rather die peacefully if I could, yes.

Review by Guest Blogger Heidi…thanks Heidi for you input.

Publisher: Severed Press; First edition (May 31, 2011)

ISBN: 978-0987104427

Copyright: 2011

Pages: 276

Quick Review: 3 stars (out of 5) because it read like a Zombie movie.

Why I Read It:  Suggested to me by another Zombie lover.

Where I Obtained the Book: Bought it for the Kindle.

Synopsis: The Horde Is Always Hungry...

The zombie apocalypse has begun, and Major Cordell McDaniels is given the most important mission of his career: lead a Special Forces team into New York City to rescue the one man who can stop the ghastly virus that reanimates the dead.

But as a growing army of flesh-eating corpses takes over the streets and a violent storm renders airborne extraction impossible, McDaniels struggles to find a way out of the Big Apple. The odds of anyone getting out alive plummet further when slaughtered members of his own Special Forces team join the ranks of the gathering dead... with their military skills intact!

 

Author Biography:  Born in south Texas but raised in various cities across the United States, Stephen Knight has been writing commercial fiction for years. He is the son of a famous radio personality and a former local television producer. After almost a decade working with the U.S. Army, he now lives in the New York City metro area.

Other Reviews:

My Indie, my tea and me

Paul Salvett interview with the author here.

The Jarius Reddy Blog  interview with the author here also.