2 Books

The Best of Times and A Far, Far Better Place. Both of these books are by Anita Stansfield. I grew up reading her books in high school. I'll admit that I do like her books, but feel like they are all the same in a way or carry the same type of story line. I thought these books were good.

Sorry for not putting pictures, I'm lazy today.

Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale

I really do like the Shannon Hale books. I have posted about some of her other books too:

The Goose Girl
Enna Burning
River Secrets
Forest Born
Princess Academy

I can't wait for Meg to be able to read these books so that I can read them again with her. I like books with happy endings and S. Hale doesn't disappoint. It another young reader so it is easy to get through.

When Dashti, a maid, and Lady Saren, her mistress, are shut in a tower for seven years because of Saren’s refusal to marry a man she despises, the two prepare for a very long and dark imprisonment.

As food runs low and the days go from broiling hot to freezing cold, it is all Dashti can do to keep them fed and comfortable. With the arrival outside the tower of Saren’s two suitors—one welcome, the other decidedly less so—the girls are confronted with both hope and great danger, and Dashti must make the desperate choices of a girl whose life is worth more than she knows.

With Shannon Hale’s lyrical language, this little-known classic fairy tale from the Brothers Grimm is reimagined and reset in a land inspired by the Asian steppes; it is a completely unique retelling filled with adventure and romance, drama and disguise.

Austenland by Shannon Hale

Brett did a job for a gal (Megan) and she is a book reader too, so she was nice enough to call me and we shared book recommendations. We have read a lot of the same books. She recommended this one. It was nice to read a book by Shannon Hale that was more of an adult book. I also love the BBC Pride and Prejudice - thank you Becca for the introduction to it as I am now a proud owner. I'm not obsessed with Colin Firth or Mr. Darcy like Jane is in this book; I just love the book and they did a great job on the movie.

This is a fun read, but now I feel like a need to read some of Austens' other books too, since I have only read Pride and Prejudice so far. Any suggestions on where to start?

Just Take My Heart by Mary Higgins Clark

I saw this book recommended on a blog I ran across. I don't like scary/thriller books because I am whimpy and then worry about those things happening to me, but this was a very mild book. I liked it, but probably won't read it again.

In her new thriller, America's #1 bestselling Queen of Suspense delves into a legal battle over the guilt or innocence of a man accused of murdering his wife. Woven into her plot is an eerie, little-understood but documented medical phenomenon -- the emergence of a donor's traits and memories in the recipient of a heart transplant.

Natalie Raines, one of Broadway's brightest stars, accidentally discovers who killed her former roommate and sets in motion a series of shocking events that puts more than one life in extreme peril.

While Natalie and her roommate, Jamie Evans, were both struggling young actresses, Jamie had been involved with a mysterious married man to whom she referred only by nickname. Natalie comes face to face with him years later and inadvertently addresses him by the nickname Jamie had used. A few days later, Natalie is found in her home in Closter, New Jersey, dying from a gunshot wound.

Immediately the police suspect Natalie's theatrical agent and soon-to-be-ex-husband, Gregg Aldrich. He had long been a "person of interest" and was known to have stalked Natalie to find out if she was seeing another man. But no charges are brought against him until two years later, when Jimmy Easton, a career criminal, suddenly comes forward to claim that Aldrich had tried to hire him to kill his wife. Easton knows details about the Aldrich home that only someone who had been there -- to plan a murder, for instance -- could possibly know.

The case is a plum assignment for Emily Wallace, an attractive thirty-two-year-old assistant prosecutor. As she spends increasingly long hours preparing for the trial, a seemingly well-meaning neighbor offers to take care of her dog in her absence. Unaware of his violent past, she gives him a key to her home...

As Aldrich's trial is making headlines, her boss warns Emily that this high-profile case will reveal personal matters about her, such as the fact that she had a heart transplant. And, during the trial, Emily experiences sentiments that defy all reason and continue after Gregg Aldrich's fate is decided by the jury.

In the meantime, she does not realize that her own life is now at risk.

A compelling novel that probes the mysteries of the human heart and mind, Just Take My Heart is Mary Higgins Clark's most spellbinding tale

Uglies

Ranay loaned me this book. It is similar to "The Hunger Games" in that civilization as we know it has changed or progressed. I like "The Hunger Games" better, but this was good and there are three or four more books in this series.

"Uglies"
"Pretties"
"Specials"

and there might be one more that I am forgetting.

The Star Garden by Nancy Turner

This is the third and final? book of the series. The author goes back to the journal type writing like she wrote in the first book "These is my Words." Although the 2nd and 3rd book of the series were good, I like the first book the best!

Sarah's Quilt

by Nancy Turner

It's the next book in the little series about Sarah Agnes Prine. I really liked how the first book - These is My Words - was written. It was written in a journal style that I really liked. This book was written as a normal novel, so I missed the other style of writing. I did enjoy this book, but the first remains my favorite so far.