Wednesday, August 5, 2015

The Poldark Giveaway Ends on 8/10/15 - and now includes the miniseries on DVD!

The Poldark Tour Giveaway now includes a DVD of the new Poldark mini-series courtesy of PBS.  The updated prize list includes:
  • (1) DVD of season one of Poldark
  • (2 ) Old Britain Castles Pink Pottery Mugs by Johnson Brothers
  • (1) Twelve-inch Old Britain Castles Pink Pottery Plater by Johnson Brothers
  • (1) London Telephone Box Tin of Ahmad English Breakfast Tea
  • (1) Jar of Mrs. Bridges Marmalade
  • (1) Package of Duchy Originals Organic Oaten Biscuits
  • (2) Packets of Blue Boy Cornflower Seeds by Renee’s Garden Heirloom (1) Trade Paperback Copy of Ross Poldark & Demelza, by Winston Graham
 How do you win this wonderful prize package?  Leave a comment on any of the blog tour sites below by August 10th.  I've also put a link to all three of my tour stops on the sidebar.  Good luck!

 
UPDATED ROSS POLDARK BLOG TOUR LIST 

  • July 06          My Jane Austen Book Club (Preview) 
  • July 07          Booktalk & More (Excerpt) 
  • July 08          Reading, Writing, Working, Playing (Review) 
  • July 09          vvb32 Reads (Preview) 
  • July 10          The Paige Turner (Review)                             
  • July 10          My Kids Led Me Back To P & P (Excerpt)                           
  • July 11          Austenprose (Review)                                    
  • July 12          Laura’s Reviews (Preview)                                                 
  • July 13          Peeking Between the Pages (Review)                      
  • July 13          Reflections of a Book Addict (Preview)                                        
  • July 14          Living Read Girl (Review)                     
  • July 15          Confessions of a Book Addict (Review) 
  • July 16          vvb32 Reads (Review)                
  • July 17          Paige Turner (Review)                          
  • July 18          Truth, Beauty, Freedom & Books (Preview)                       
  • July 19          Marie Antoinette’s Gossip Guide (Excerpt)                        
  • July 20          Laura’s Reviews (Review)                    
  • July 20          The Calico Critic (Review)                                        
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Tuesday, August 4, 2015

Off the Voortrekker Road by Barbara Bleiman



Off the Voortrekker Road is a tale of South African lives and justice written in the same vein as one of my favorite novels, To Kill a Mockingbird.

Jack Neuberger is a young Jewish lawyer that has taken on a difficult case that no one else in his law firm wants.  Johannes van Heerden is a Dutch Reform minister with a loving wife, Laura. After Laura has a difficult birth with their last child, Johannes took over some of her charitable work and met Agnes Small.  Now many people are talking about Johannes and Agnes having an affair.  This would be bad enough as Johannes is a minister, but it’s also breaking a new law that condemns “immoral or indecent acts” with a “non-white.”  Jack has to get to the bottom of what is happening as well as ponder whether this law is a just law.

The novel also flashes back to Jack’s youth.  Jack had a hard life as a kid.  His parents had a very strained relationship, which often led to Jack’s mother leaving his father.  His one stability in life is his friendship with Terence Mostert.  Terence’s father is in a sanitarium for TB, but his mother May is a good person and runs their auto shop with the help of mechanic Walter.  As Jack grows older, he realizes that although May and Walter are both good people, as a white and non-white, talk of them being together is dangerous.

As the threads of the two stories reach a head, Jack has to decide what is right and good, and what the best course of action for the future is.  I read this novel quickly and I greatly enjoyed it.  I also like how it tied up the past and future storylines. I enjoyed the realistic look at relationships within this novel (parent to child, spouse to spouse, and friend to friend) as well as it being a coming of age novel for Jack. 

Overall, Off the Voortrekker Road is a great historical fiction novel that deals with issues of race, humanity, and coming of age.  I highly recommend this novel.  It would also be a great book club book as there is much to discuss.

Book Source:  Author Barbara Bleiman for Review - Thanks!
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Friday, July 31, 2015

Inside the O’Briens by Lisa Genova



Title: Inside the O’Briens
Author: Lisa Genova
Read by:  Skipp Sudduth
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Length: Approximately 10.5 hours (9 CDs)
Source:  Review Copy from Simon & Schuster – Thanks!

Inside the O’Briens lurks a hidden lethal genetic neurodegenerative diseases in their DNA.  Joe O’Brien is a proud Boston Police Officer.  He married Rosie, the love of his life at 18 and they had four kids in quick succession.  Now at 43, his kids are adults, but they live in apartments in their three story townhouse and all share Sunday dinner together.  Joe starts acting strange including temper outburst, involuntary movements, and problems with writing his police reports.  People think he’s drunk; after all, his mother Ruth was a drunk who died young.  After being confronted by his friends and Rosie, Joe goes to the doctor and discovers after testing that he has Huntington’s disease.  And worse, each of his children has a fifty percent chance of getting the disease.  Inside the O’Briens details Joe’s journey and the hard realities of learning to live with this disease.  It also goes into the viewpoint of Joe’s daughter Katie, a yoga instructor.  She also has to make the decision to get tested and what she should do with her life.  Joe has to show his entire family how to life with Huntington’s disease.

This book was very powerful.  The entire O’Brien family was written to be believable and real people.  I felt like I was a part of the family and I felt their pain.  Lisa Genova not only wrote believably real characters, and family dynamics, but she also did a great job of introducing the disease and how it could impact an entire family and the reality of living with it.  I not only enjoyed this book and getting to know this family, but I learned a lot about Huntington’s disease.  I also thought it was moving when Joe was able to piece together what he remembered of his mother and how after believing she had died an alcoholic, he finally realized she had died of Huntington’s disease and loved him all along.  This part of the story brought me to tears.
Skipp Sudduth had a great voice and sounded like a 43 year old Boston Cop.  It was a great book to listen to and kept me intrigued throughout.  I just felt like I was left hanging a bit at the end.  I understand why the author ended the book the way she did, but I felt like I really wanted to know the answer!

Overall, Inside the O’Briens is a moving audiobook about the reality of a genetic disease hitting a member of a family and the repercussions throughout the family.  It also was a great story of an Irish Catholic family in Boston and how life is changing with the times. I highly recommend this book.  It would also make a great book club book as there is so much to discuss in this novel.
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