Welcome to It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? This is a great way to plan out your reading week and see what others are currently reading as well… you never know where that next “must read” book will come from!
I love being a part of this and I hope you do too! As part of this weekly meme I love to encourage you all to go and visit the others participating in this meme. I offer a weekly contest for those who visit 10 or more of the Monday Meme participants and leave a comment telling me how many you visited. **You do not have to have a blog to participate! You receive one entry for every 10 comments, just come back here and tell me how many in the comment area.
BLKosiner’s Book Blog
**PS I am a little (ok a lot) late on getting winners out as of late. I hope to get all packages out this week.
WOO HOO!!!! Please choose an item out of the Reading Cafe Grab Shelves and email me your choice with your mailing address as well! journeythroughbooks@gmail.com
Coming in a little late with this post on Sunday evening… I had a busy day, floor hockey this evening and Amazing Race (had to watch it!) and then well… here I am. 😀
While my week had slowed down last week (thank you thank you!) I am still catching up on my reading. Here is what was accomplished this last week:
Thoughts on the Oscars and Angelina’s leg… 😛
Deal Breaker by Harlan Coben (audio)
Mental Floss The Book (a history of listory 😉 )
February Recap and Challenge Updates
Heartbreakers by Pamela Wells (YA audio)
I seem to be struggling a bit in the reading department… there is a book I am trying to get through but every time I pick it up I only manage a few pages. Normally I would just pass on the read, but this one if for a tour so I am determined to come up with something out of it. 😯
New for this week however is:
Gabriel McQueen has only just arrived home on holiday leave from the service when his county-sheriff father sends him back out again with new marching orders. A brewing ice storm, and a distant neighbor who’s fallen out of contact, have the local lawman concerned. So he enlists Gabriel to make the long haul to the middle of nowhere, and make sure Lolly Helton is safe and sound. It’s a trip the younger McQueen would rather not make given the bitter winter weather–and the icy conditions that have always existed between him and Lolly.
But there’s no talking back when your dad is the town’s top cop. And there’ s no turning back when night falls just as Gabriel arrives–and discovers that the weather outside isn’t the only thing that’s frightful. Spotting strangers in Lolly’ s home–one of them packing a weapon–is all it takes to kick Gabriel into combat mode. And his stealth training is all he needs to extract Lolly from the house without alerting her captors. But when the escape is discovered, the heat–and the hunt–are on. And the winter woods are nowhere to be once the ice storm touches down, dropping trees, blocking roads, and trapping the fleeing pair in the freezing dark.
I am almost through this on audio… and I have thoughts… lots of thoughts… and not necessarily good ones…
I’m pushing aside
the memory of my nightmare,
pushing aside thoughts of Alex,
pushing aside thoughts of Hana
and my old school,
push,
push,
push,
like Raven taught me to do.
The old life is dead.
But the old Lena is dead too.
I buried her.
I left her beyond a fence,
behind a wall of smoke and flame.OOH – I am craving Dystopia and this hot little number waits for me on the table!
In 1937, Shanghai is the Paris of Asia, a city of great wealth and glamour, the home of millionaires and beggars, gangsters and gamblers, patriots and revolutionaries, artists and warlords. Thanks to the financial security and material comforts provided by their father’s prosperous rickshaw business, twenty-one-year-old Pearl Chin and her younger sister, May, are having the time of their lives. Though both sisters wave off authority and tradition, they couldn’t be more different: Pearl is a Dragon sign, strong and stubborn, while May is a true Sheep, adorable and placid. Both are beautiful, modern, and carefree . . . until the day their father tells them that he has gambled away their wealth and that in order to repay his debts he must sell the girls as wives to suitors who have traveled from California to find Chinese brides.
As Japanese bombs fall on their beloved city, Pearl and May set out on the journey of a lifetime, one that will take them through the Chinese countryside, in and out of the clutch of brutal soldiers, and across the Pacific to the shores of America. In Los Angeles they begin a fresh chapter, trying to find love with the strangers they have married, brushing against the seduction of Hollywood, and striving to embrace American life even as they fight against discrimination, brave Communist witch hunts, and find themselves hemmed in by Chinatown’s old ways and rules.
At its heart, Shanghai Girls is a story of sisters: Pearl and May are inseparable best friends who share hopes, dreams, and a deep connection, but like sisters everywhere they also harbor petty jealousies and rivalries. They love each other, but each knows exactly where to drive the knife to hurt the other the most.
I read Lisa See earlier this year and really look forward to this one!
For twenty-five years, a reclusive American novelist has been writing at the desk she inherited from a young Chilean poet who disappeared at the hands of Pinochet’s secret police; one day a girl claiming to be the poet’s daughter arrives to take it away, sending the writer’s life reeling. Across the ocean, in the leafy suburbs of London, a man caring for his dying wife discovers, among her papers, a lock of hair that unravels a terrible secret. In Jerusalem, an antiques dealer slowly reassembles his father’s study, plundered by the Nazis in Budapest in 1944.
Connecting these stories is a desk of many drawers that exerts a power over those who possess it or have given it away. As the narrators of Great House make their confessions, the desk takes on more and more meaning, and comes finally to stand for all that has been taken from them, and all that binds them to what has disappeared. Great House is a story haunted by questions: What do we pass on to our children and how do they absorb our dreams and losses? How do we respond to disappearance, destruction, and change?
I have always thought this one looked interesting!
So that’s the plan… and to catch up on the books. I hope you have some great books planned for this week! Please add your link to your Where Are You Reading post below where it says “click here”
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and those of you who read mainly childrens through YA reads – please also link your post here:
My copy of Pandemonium arrived last week–looking forward to it! 🙂
Mine too… I just need to get to it and that one stubborn book I am stuck on is cramping my style!
I’ve read Shanghai Girls. It was a great read! She has a follow up book to it but I just couldn’t get into it. I’ll try to read it again someday 😛
I did not know about the follow up Gina! 😀
Ha- I jumped off to look at some of your posts. 🙂 I think I would like to read the Oliver books. I have to get some dystopia soon. Need to cut back on other review books and give myself some room for pulling in things I want to read/listen too.
Have a great week.
I have to mix them too Martha… I was much better at it in January 😀
I am on a roll with the reading, which means I neglected the blog badly last week. This week is ready to go though! Good luck finishing the tour book!
I dont know what my problem is Jen, its just not flowing for me… 😀
I loved Delirium and can’t wait to read Pandemonium; hope it’s awesome! This week, life got in the way of reading and blogging, I got the bare minimum done.
Have a great week, happy reading and good luck with that pesky tour book 🙂
I seen you had some life stuff happening Sheree! I hope to have a good mix this week – yes I have life stuff, but I need to read a bit too… 😀
I’m dying to read Pandemonium too, I plan on getting to it soon! I think I want to reread Delirium first. Sooooo many books!
Hope you have a great week 🙂
I hope to read it this week – I want to bump it up behind this one I am struggling with 😀
Yes…. sooooo many books 😉
Shanghai Girls and Great House are the two I would like to see your reviews!
Thanks Mystica…. I just started SG last night… so far so good 😀
I’m reading Little big man by Thomas Berger. It’s my mum’s favorite book so I’m trying it out 🙂
Sounds interesting – and I love that you are reading it because it is your mums favorite! I wish I knew what my mom’s favorite book was!
You have fabulous books awaiting you this week! Good for you.
I think so too! Now to just read them 😀
The week that passed I read a book by Kate Morton “The Secret House riverton” and this week I am goingt to read “The Lord of the Flies” by William Golding.
🙂
Sounds like a good choice! Have fun!
Ice sounds really good. I haven’t read a Linda Howard book in a long time. Have a great week!
I haven’t read her in a long time either Yvonne… but this book – I would say is not the one to read….LOL, wait until you see my review 🙂
LOL – regarding Ice. It’s of course, very dangerously cold, and there’s probably a part where they’ll have to take off their clothes to share body heat, which will necessatate them having sex, to, y’know, Keep Warm! And Gabriel probably spends some time either angry or terse, because he’s forced to go rescue the girl.
I’ve enjoyed a few of Linda Howard’s books, though at times the events are predictable.
Shanghai Girls sounds very interesting.
Happy reading!
Oh my gosh Mardel – I am laughing here because the book was SO PREDICTABLE!!!! Annoyingly so! I am looking forward to reviewing it as it is going to be snarky! 😀
I loved Pandemonium and I can’t wait to read Shanghai Girls. I hope you enjoy your books and have a great week!
Thanks Christina – I think I will 😀
I’ve been wanting to read Pandemonium. Sometimes I hate having to wait in between books. Makes me want to wait until the series is done before starting if that makes sense. Enjoy your week!
I hear you Jill… now I am trying to remember what Delirium was about… no love right? Gah, or was that a different one….LOL
Oh, Shanghai Girls is one of my favorites, I hope you enjoy it!
Thanks Helen, so far it is a good one 😉
I had a book like that for book club recently. I had to set a goal of so many pages a day to get it done. Have a great week of reading – I bet Shanghai Girls is wonderful!
Ugh…. I am hoping it takes off soon Kathy 😀
A girl in my book club said that Shanghai Girls was better than Snowflower, and I really enjoyed Snowflower.
Enjoy your reads! Hope your reading time increases for you this week.
Great House is one that looks intriguing….
I thought so too Laurel although the synopsis sounds a littl heavy so I hope I am up for it 😀
My post-
http://blkosiner.blogspot.com/2012/03/its-monday-what-are-you-reading.html
YAY! So glad I won, thank you!
You are welcome 😀
I really enjoyed Shanghai Girls. I’m sure you will too! Be ready to read the next one, though, because Shanghai Girls ends in a big of a cliffhanger.
I now have to investigate what the next one is Julie… I did not know until today that there was a second 😀
Great House is definitely on my to read list. Happy reading/listening!
Thanks Lisa – you too 🙂
I loved Shanghai Girls and can’t wait to hear what you think of it. Have a great week Sheila!
Thanks Jo Jo you too!!!
I’m dying to read Shanghai Girls! Also Pandemonium… I’ve seen it around a lot this week. Happy Reading! 🙂
Lisa @ Lost in Literature
My It’s Monday…
I am hoping it will be a really good reading week Lisa…. I just need to avoid distractions like TV…. 😀
I am chuckling and can’t wait for your thoughts on Ice. I can guess ;o). I want to get to Pandemonium, but have read mixed reviews, oh well. That second book in a series is always tricky. I am in a bit of dystopia withdrawal, need to get back!
LOL – yeah, if that is Linda Howard’s norm…. I will probably pass in the future 😀
Wow! Full reading plate!
I am currently reading GLAMOUR GIRL: HOW TO GET THE ULTIMATE MAKEOVER by Megan Mottley. It is a great book!
I like the sounds of the book you are reading Marie – enjoy 😀
Glad things slowed down a bit for you this week, Sheila. Looks like you have lots of good audios lined up for this week. I want to read a Lisa See book but haven’t gotten around to it yet.
Enjoy your books this week!
Sue
Oh me too Sue – I dont think I could have done another week like that back to back… somebody would have died….LOL 😀
Yes! Read Lisa See! This year! 🙂
I have Shanghai Girls on audio, can’t wait to read your thoughts! I’m saving it for a time when I’m less stressed and can focus. My librarian also suggested the follow up book Dreams of Joy.
I am enjoying it in my car Laurie and it is a calming audio if that makes sense… the narrator speaks at a nice even pace.
I bought Pandemonium last week too and I can’t wait to read it. I want to read Hana first though! I can’t wait to hear your thoughts on it 🙂
OOH Hana… what is that? You know I covet it now…..LOL 😛
You accomplished quite a bit for a slow week 🙂
I have visited 21 so far and my daughter called to have me watch my grandson. Can’t get everyone to understand how busy my Mondays are, then again they just think I sit at the computer or read all day.
Have a great week.
Squeezed in 10 more and he just got here. lol
LOL Lori – I chalk Mondays up to my “no, I am busy day”. When I take on blog tours I always tell them no Mondays. In a few weeks I will be back to Mondays off (currently working 8 -4)and then I can get back to the fun of commenting on all the posts 🙂 I miss that.
I think I will be waiting for Pandemonium in paperback (or if I spy it at the library) as I didn’t adore Delirium but would be interested to see how it carres on.
I think Delirium was different for me and I like different but I get the “none love:… I think I had a strong like. 😀
Oh! SHANGHAI GIRLS is on my TBR, too.. Enjoy all your reads, Sheila! And: thank you for hosting this meme! Have a lovely day!
Hi Irene 😀 Thank you for stopping by all cheery! Love that! 😀
I am so glad that I am back in the swing of blogging this week. Being sick threw me off and I missed it! I am jealous that you are reading Pandemonium! I can’t wait for my library to get a copy. I enjoyed Delirium very much.
This week on my blog I posted a review of The Lorax. I am kind of conflicted because of all the commercial tie-ins associated with this film.
I also started work on my new blog, No Drama Coaster Llamas.
Stop my blog if you have a moment to check it out!
http://deadtreesandsilverscreens.com
Welcome back – it does feel good when you are back in the blog swing doesn’t it? I feel like i am just returning as well 🙂
I hope Pandemonium satisfies your dystopian craving! They are fun books to read. Have a great week! 🙂
Me too! I do love the genre!
Good books, I loved Shanghai Girls, I have the follow up Dreams of Joy on my shelf to read soon.
I think I will need that one too 🙂
Have a great week!
Thank you Ryan = you too 😉
Ooh! I’m going to read Pandemonium too!
YAY!!! Hope you like it Laura!
I have read one Lisa See book, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, and it was very good, although somewhat depressing. I do want to read the rest of her books, though. I have not read Delirium yet, but I keep hearing about Pandemonium wherever I go on the blogosphere…that must mean I am missing out!
I have visited 10 sites so far!
I have read that one too Jenny and LOVED it!
Isn’t it nice we are all allowed the grace of being late?!? Janaa pointed out to me that I had forgotten to link – goodness!
http://imwritingtoo.blogspot.com/2012/03/what-are-you-reading.html
I have seen that happen before 🙂 Glad you came back! 😀
Need to go to bed. It was Jen who reminded me. Night night
LOL 😀
I read/commented on 10 blogs!