Hey there, folks. A few interviews that I did have just been put online. If you want to check them out visit these sites.
TheSuspenseZone.com
DeliaLatham.wordpress.com
Thanks so much to Susan and Delia for the fantastic interviews and kind words about The Kidnapping of Kenzie Thorn. It’s such a treat to get to know other book lovers. Thanks, ladies! 🙂
MizB of Should Be Reading hosts the Teaser Tuesdays weekly event
Here are the rules:
* Grab your current read
* Let the book fall open to a random page
* Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12
*You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given!
* Please avoid spoilers!
This week’s teaser is:
“For much too long a moment, Rachel and Jake both felt the inertness of the ship. Then the sea came aboard a second time and the well deck filled, and the port wing of the hurricane deck touched the lifting waves.”
pg. 135 – Where Honor Dwells by Gilbert Morris
– I think I’ve read this book 6 times, but it’s in one of my favorite Civil War series. I’m 50 pages into it again, and I can’t stop laughing. Morris breaks every rule of contemporary writing, and I’m still enjoying it. Funny how the rules don’t count when I know I love the story.
Saturday night Amy and I were housesitting for a friend. We thought it’d be fun to get some pizza, rent a movie, and 
kick back with our friend’s huge flat screen TV. So we hit the redbox and picked up Push, a sci fi flick about mutant-like people who have special abilities. These people are classified by their skills. Pushers can push thoughts into other people’s minds, making them believe things that aren’t true. Movers can … well, move things with their minds. Watchers see glimpses of the future. Bleeders scream really loudly and make everything in sound reach explode. And the classifications go on.
Push centers around Nick, a second-generation mover, who isn’t actually very good at it. He gambles, throws dice, and still can’t manage to win, even though he’s supposed to be able to move the dice with his mind. Nick’s dad died 10 years before, and the last thing he said to his son was that when a girl with a flower asks for his help, he needs to help her.
Said young woman shows up in the form of a teen Dakota Fanning (who knew the girl would actually grow up to be a pretty good actress?). She plays a 13-year-old watcher, who needs Nick’s help to save her mother, who is being held by the evil Division. The only way to get her mom (also a watcher) back is by stealing a drug that Division has been testing. The same drug that is killing everyone it is tried on.
Sound conveluted? It is. Throw is extra watchers, bleeders, and pushers, and it begins to not make much sense at all.
I love those movies that make me think, that don’t make sense until the very end. Case in point, The Prestige. I love how that movie just messes with my mind. But at the end it’s wrapped up so nicely that it all makes sense. It’s unbelievable, yet every piece of it fits so perfectly together that I don’t have to spend hours wondering what piece of the puzzle I was missing.
Push has an interesting premise, but the conclusion is so underwhelming that I just walked away feeling confused.
Worse … about half way through the movie, I thought I had figured out how Nick and Dakota’s character were connected. I was so convinced that that was how it should be that when it turned out worse than my imagined ending, I was even more let down. *shaking head* Bad move on my part.
So … I won’t be watching Push again, but that’s okay.
Looking for good movies until next time. -LJ
What is it about the summer months that makes ice cream sandwiches so wonderful? It’s like combining my two favorite foods: ice cream and cookies. I love all sorts of flavors of ice cream sandwiches, but the mint Skinny Cow ones are probably my favorite. They’re so soft and smooth and yummy!
While the winter months in Colorado aren’t quite conducive to a good ice cream sandwich, these summer months have been great. Especially since we don’t have air conditioning.
So what’s your favorite sweet treat for the summer?
Enjoying a treat in the heat until next time. -LJ
This week I had a terrible revelation! My books are piling up at an exponential rate. I’m having a terrible time keeping up with reading the books that I’m buying.
See, I like shopping. A lot. Call it therapy or just a way to support the economy. And as previously revealed, I especially enjoy using a good coupon–which usually requires me to buy more than one book. Before I know it, my room starts looking like this:
Piles abound, and the books–books that I really want to read–don’t get read. I just keep getting more books, and not reading them. At this moment, I think my current ratio is about 3:1. If I’m only reading 1 book of every 3 I’m buying, that’s not ideal. Mostly because I want to be reading them. But also because I’m feeling a little wasteful (even if a lot of the books I’m getting are being traded for on paperbackswap.com). I don’t want to be wasteful.
But also, I love books. I love being surrounded by them. Someone said something amazingly creative enough to get published, and even if I don’t know the words yet, there’s something thrilling about knowing they’re there, on the printed page, covering my floor.
But sometimes I think I need to only buy books that I’ll actually read, so I have a quality 1:1 ratio. But then … well, how will I know if I’m going to read every book that I get? And just because I haven’t read the books yet, doesn’ t mean that I don’t want to.
Which all leads me to the all-important question. What is the ideal ratio for book buying? Is it only 1:1? Or is it 3:2, so that you have some spares for next year or the next? Or is it 5:1 so you always have more books than you could possibly read?
Pondering the big questions until next time. -LJ
I know! It’s been forever since I shared any new news about Brandon, but the good news is that he has a new single out with Leeland called Follow You. It’s amazing! I just downloaded it on iTunes, and I have a terrible feeling it’s going to get worn out. I mean, I know it’s not a cassette or a record, but still … my iPod could get a mysterious shuffle right in the middle of it, if I’m not careful. 🙂
Anyway, check it out! Enjoy!
So I miss posting about random things. I got busy and haven’t been taking time lately to tell you about the really strange things goin on. But that stops today. Or more accurately, I’m stopping today. To share more than you ever wanted to know about me …
While I wish I had the beautiful skin of my 5-year-old niece, all perfect porcelain and adorable freckles, I do not wish I had the skin of a girl half my age. But last night, that’s exactly what I got, the skin of a 14-year-old. Pimples and all. Three pimples, to be exact. On my nose, on my cheek, and my chin.
It was the perfect trifecta of complexion bummer!
Per my norm, I was oversharing with Amy. She suggested I put some toothpaste on my “problem areas” to dry them out. Hmmm … I hadn’t heard of that. But I figured it couldn’t hurt, so before bed I plopped three dollops of Aquafresh on my nose, cheek, and chin.
No problem. Until I woke up to three large blobs of toothpaste on my pillow case.
That’s right! My dollops had morphed into blobs and spread all over my pillow. Turns out I may not be the most … hmm … demure sleeper. And I totally dirtied up my freshly laundered pillow case. Bummer.
Oh, well. No problem, right? I figured I’d just wash it off in the shower, right? Wrong. Even hot steamy water wasn’t washing off the crusted toothpaste. It took some seriously scrubbing to finally get a clean face, an unexpected side-effect.
And the worst part. My pimples? Oh, they’re totally still hanging around.
Seriously considering using windex to fix my face until next time. -LJ
MizB of Should Be Reading hosts the Teaser Tuesdays weekly event
Here are the rules:
* Grab your current read
* Let the book fall open to a random page
* Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12
*You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given!
* Please avoid spoilers!
This week’s teaser is:
“After I had bowed, I took her hand to kiss it and looked into her eyes … which looked straight back at me. And it was only then that I realized it was the girl.”
pg. 135 – A Constant Heart by Siri Mitchell
– Ten pages in, and I’m intrigued. It’s told through varying first person points of view. Highly unusual. Hmm … I think I like it already. Can’t wait to find out what happens.
