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Hunting Season

March 8th, 2010

Our Book in Bloom this week uses the hunting metaphor for dating for a surprisingly entertaining and helpful read for the lady “hunters” out there. Even though I’ve caught my game so to speak, I enjoyed the read. The cutesie names such as Open Season, Bag’n'Tag and Trophy Hunt, might seem like eye-rollers at first glance, but they are pretty spot on in terms of valid, no-nonsense advice. I especially enjoyed the Seven Deadly Sins of Hunting. Looking for a buck, babes? Read on.

51AkXfhml0L._SL500_AA240_Hunting Season: A Field Guide to Targeting and Capturing the Perfect Man by Elle

From the publisher:
Tallyho! The Hunt is afoot!

Be a hunter—not road kill. April 1 marks the official opening of Hunting Season, when available women should be heading out into the rural, urban, and suburban wild to bag themselves a prize buck. You might not need a literal gun to bring down a good man—but you do need good technique, appropriate gear, and plenty of practice. Within these pages, successful hunter Elle shares the foolproof strategies she’s adapted from rules that have been polished and honed over many centuries for successful bagging of prize big game.

The Hunt can be exciting, exhilarating, and rewarding . . . if you do it right!

No matter what kind of modern man you’ve got in your sights—a Stag, a Tree Scratcher, or a 6-Point Buck—here are all the skills you need to bring him down.

Are you Trophy Hunting, or do you want to Bag ‘n’ Tag? Your strategies will be different depending on your goal—so define it before the season opens.

Never hunt with a posse. It’s no fun sharing a kill.

Stick to your Kill Zone. A wild buck’s movements can’t be controlled—so if he wanders let him roam. Another buck will put himself in your sights soon enough.

November 1-March 31 is Off-Season: A time for hibernation, emotional healing, and gun polishing.

About the Author
Elle works in hedge fund operations by day and hunts by night.

Get HUNTING SEASON here.

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Posted in Books in Bloom, Non-fic

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Pieces of Happily Ever After

March 5th, 2010

Our Book in Bloom feature a spunky little girl, her broken-hearted mama and a husband-stealing starlet. (So *that’s* why her husband turned in his six-pack for six-pack abs!)

The funny, well-written Hollywood tale is a great one for anyone who enjoys Jennifer Weiner and Beth Harbison.

40047184.JPGPIECES OF HAPPILY EVER AFTER by Irene Zutell

From the publisher:
What happens after “happily ever after”? Alice Hirsh is about to find out…

Alice, a former New Yorker who thought she’d never feel at home in the bizarre world of the San Fernando Valley, was adapting, raising her 5-year-old daughter while trying to keep her job and make her new house a home. When her attorney husband lands a trophy client – box-office queen Rose Maris – things begin to look up. Then Alex starts working late – a lot. He crunches his paunch into a six-pack and trades his Gap ensembles for Armani everything.

Soon, Rose and Alex’s affair blazes in the tabloids and Alice is plunged into trash-gossip hell. Her life crumbles around her as she navigates her newly single self through suburban LA –a place rife with porn stars, psycho soccer moms and nutty neighbors.

Is there a chance to wrest Alex from the Sexiest Woman Alive? And if so… would Alice want him back? And what about George–her college sweatheart? Or Johnny, a walking charm-bomb paparazzo? As Alice inventories the rubble of her life, she desperately searches for her bearings and is forced to ask herself what she really wants from life, love and herself.

About the Author
Irene Zutell began her career as a journalist. She has written for People, Us Weekly, The New York Times, the NY Daily News, Newsday, USA Today and others. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two children. You can visit her at www.irenezutell.com.

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Posted in Books in Bloom, Mainstream, Women's Fiction

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Wine + Book Pairing: A Top 10 for under 20

February 24th, 2010

To tie along with our Happiness Project, BE Babes thought it would be fun to show some adventure in our wine selection. We decided to feature wines UNDER $20 from the Wine Spectator Top 100 list of 2009 and pair them with a new book! Very cool. To kick things off, we’re starting with the wine that made #10 on the list: Brancaia Toscana Tre 2007, from Tuscany, Italy.

TOP-10-09_10-braTre, the label’s third wine, is a blend of Sangiovese, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon from all three Brancaia vineyards. Retails for $20.

We think a blend like this would pair very well with a familial suspense/thriller like:

42434257.JPGTHE THINGS THAT KEEP US HERE by Carla Buckley

Product Description
How far would you go to protect your family?

Ann Brooks never thought she’d have to answer that question. Then she found her limits tested by a crisis no one could prevent. Now, as her neighborhood descends into panic, she must make tough choices to protect everyone she loves from a threat she cannot even see. In this chillingly urgent novel, Carla Buckley confronts us with the terrifying decisions we are forced to make when ordinary life changes overnight.

A year ago, Ann and Peter Brooks were just another unhappily married couple trying–and failing–to keep their relationship together while they raised two young daughters. Now the world around them is about to be shaken as Peter, a university researcher, comes to a startling realization: A virulent pandemic has made the terrible leap across the ocean to America’s heartland.

And it is killing fifty out of every hundred people it touches.

As their town goes into lockdown, Peter is forced to return home–with his beautiful graduate assistant. But the Brookses’ safe suburban world is no longer the refuge it once was. Food grows scarce, and neighbor turns against neighbor in grocery stores and at gas pumps. And then a winter storm strikes, and the community is left huddling in the dark.

Trapped inside the house she once called home, Ann Brooks must make life-or-death decisions in an environment where opening a door to a neighbor could threaten all the things she holds dear.

Carla Buckley’s poignant debut raises important questions to which there are no easy answers, in an emotionally riveting tale of one family facing unimaginable stress.

About the Author
Carla Buckley was born in Washington, D.C. She has worked in a variety of jobs, including a stint as an assistant press secretary for a U.S. senator, an analyst with the Smithsonian Institution, and a technical writer for a defense contractor. She currently lives in Ohio with her husband and children. The Things That Keep Us Here is her first novel. Bantam Dell will publish Buckley’s next novel in 2011.

Get THINGS here and read an excerpt.

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Posted in Books in Bloom, Mainstream, Wine Wednesdays

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Firsts

February 16th, 2010

Do you have a fascination with the origin of things? Knowledge of everyday things that can come in handy at the dinner table?

I do, which is why I was thrilled to get an e-mail from the author, Wilson Casey, “Trivia” Guinness World Record Holder about his new book, “Firsts: Origins of Everyday Things that Changed the World!”

image002We’ve made FIRSTS our Book in Bloom because I think it should be encouraged reading for your kids, who will be intrigued by so many of the items in the book, and would make a great topper to the guest bedroom nightstand or for a gift for the “smarty-pants” in your family. With mom’s and dad’s day just around the corner, Firsts would be a wise choice.

I fought for the “little guy”. Didn’t matter if you were black or white, Buddhist or Baptist,
male or female, from the US or elsewhere– if you were “first” you were “first”!

Product Description
For anyone who ever wanted to know the history of the chocolate chip cookie, earmuffs, and Daylight Savings…

Firsts-history through the milestones of human achievement-are fun. And Wilson Casey, trivia expert, has collected over 500 firsts in nearly every major category of culture: from fashion to food, politics to science, entertainment to art to architec ture. Each “first” is a full explanation of the topic at hand, written in a humorous yet authoritative style. It includes:

•The true history of the golf tee

•How a blind man came up with cruise control

•The myth behind the origins of the Caesar salad

•Why and how the first dieter dieted

About the Author
Wilson Casey is one of the country’s foremost trivia aficionados, with a syndicated column, numerous books, and an award-winning website, www.TriviaGuy.com. Since 2000 he has written a daily trivia column for numerous papers, including the Albuquerque Journal, Wilmington Star News (NC), and Spartanburg Herald-Journal (SC), and a weekly Bible Trivia column.

Buy FIRSTS here.

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Secrets of Eden

February 8th, 2010

I have never been disappointed by a single Shaye Areheart Book I’ve read. I know a lot of readers don’t pay attention to who publishes what, but when you read as much as I do, you find certain lines and certain publishers just seem to be your cup of tea. With SA, you know you are in for great writing and a good solid story well worth your time. This is my first read by Chris Bohjalian and I can’t wait! Happy to make it this week’s Book in Bloom.

51456980.JPGSECRETS OF EDEN by Chris Bohjalian (Hardback)

Product Description
From the bestselling author of The Double Bind, Midwives, and Skeletons at the Feast comes a novel of shattered faith, intimate secrets, and the delicate nature of sacrifice.

“There,” says Alice Hayward to Reverend Stephen Drew, just after her baptism, and just before going home to the husband who will kill her that evening and then shoot himself. Drew, tortured by the cryptic finality of that short utterance, feels his faith in God slipping away and is saved from despair only by a meeting with Heather Laurent, the author of wildly successful, inspirational books about . . . angels.

Heather survived a childhood that culminated in her own parents’ murder-suicide, so she identifies deeply with Alice’s daughter, Katie, offering herself as a mentor to the girl and a shoulder for Stephen – who flees the pulpit to be with Heather and see if there is anything to be salvaged from the spiritual wreckage around him.
But then the State’s Attorney begins to suspect that Alice’s husband may not have killed himself. . .and finds out that Alice had secrets only her minister knew.

Secrets of Eden is both a haunting literary thriller and a deeply evocative testament to the inner complexities that mark all of our lives. Once again Chris Bohjalian has given us a riveting page-turner in which nothing is precisely what it seems. As one character remarks, “Believe no one. Trust no one. Assume all of our stories are suspect.”

About the Author
CHRIS BOHJALIAN is the critically acclaimed author of twelve novels, including the New York Times bestsellers Skeletons at the Feast, The Double Bind, and Midwives. His novel, Midwives, was a number one New York Times bestseller and a selection of Oprah’s Book Club. His work has been translated into more than 25 languages and twice became movies (Midwives and Past the Bleachers). He lives in Vermont with his wife and daughter.

Visit him at www.ChrisBohjalian.com or on Facebook.

You can also read an excerpt of the first chapter, see a video with the author and buy the book with this link.

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Posted in Books in Bloom, Mainstream

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True Confections, Breaking Out of Bedlam

January 26th, 2010

Looking for a few more good reads? Books in Bloom features recently published books we think deserve your attention.

45479370.JPGTrue Confections by Katharine Weber

Product description:
Take chocolate candy, add a family business at war with itself, and stir with an outsider’s perspective. This is the recipe for True Confections, the irresistible new novel by Katharine Weber, a writer whose work has won accolades from Iris Murdoch, Madeleine L’Engle, Wally Lamb, and Kate Atkinson, to name a few.

Alice Tatnall Ziplinsky’s marriage into the Ziplinsky family has not been unanimously celebrated. Her greatest ambition is to belong, to feel truly entitled to the heritage she has tried so hard to earn. Which is why Zip’s Candies is much more to her than just a candy factory, where she has worked for most of her life. In True Confections, Alice has her reasons for telling the multigenerational saga of the family-owned-and-operated candy company, now in crisis.

Nobody is more devoted than Alice to delving into the truth of Zip’s history, starting with the rags-to-riches story of how Hungarian immigrant Eli Czaplinsky developed his famous candy lines, and how each of his candies, from Little Sammies to Mumbo Jumbos, was inspired by an element in a stolen library copy of Little Black Sambo, from which he taught himself English. Within Alice’s vivid and persuasive account (is her unreliability a tactic or a condition?) are the stories of a runaway slave from the cacao plantations of Côte d’Ivoire and the Third Reich’s failed plan to establish a colony on Madagascar for European Jews.

Richly informed, deeply moving, and spiked with Weber’s trademark wit, True Confections is, at its heart, a timeless and universal story of love, betrayal, and chocolate.
About the Author

KATHARINE WEBER is the author of the novels Triangle, The Little Women, The Music Lesson, and Objects in Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear. She lives in Connecticut with her husband, the cultural historian Nicholas Fox Weber, and is a thesis adviser in the graduate writing program at Columbia University.

Get the book here.

41NPjG24MUL._SL500_AA240_BREAKING OUT OF BEDLAM by Leslie Larson

Product Description
Cora Sledge is horrified when her children, who doubt her ability to take care of herself, plot to remove her from her home. So what if her house is a shambles? Who cares when she last changed her clothes? If an eighty-two-year-old widow wants to live on junk food, pills, and cigarettes, hasn’t she earned the right? When her kids force her into The Palisades, an assisted living facility, Cora takes to her bed, planning to die as soon as possible. But life isn’t finished with her yet, not by a long shot.

Deciding that truth is the best revenge, Cora begins to write a tell-all journal that reveals once and for all the secret she has guarded since she was a young woman. In entries that are profane, profound, and gossipy, she chronicles her childhood in rural Missouri, her shotgun wedding, and the terrible event that changed the course of her life. Intermingled with her reminiscences is an account of the day-to-day dramas at The Palisades—her budding romance with a suave new resident, feuds with her tablemates, her rollicking camaraderie with the man who oversees her health care, and the sinister cloud of suspicion that descends as a series of petty crimes sets everyone on edge. The story builds to a powerful climax as Cora’s revelations about her past mesh with the unraveling intrigue in the present.

Cora is by turns outrageous, irreverent, and wickedly funny. Despite a life with more than its share of disappointment and struggle, she refuses to go gently into her twilight years, remaining intensely curious, disinclined to play it safe, and willing to start over. Breaking Out of Bedlam captures the loneliness and secrets that lurk within families, the hardscrabble reality facing women with limited resources, and the resilience of a woman who survives, despite all the odds, through an unlikely combination of passion, humor, and faith.

About the Author
LESLIE LARSON is the author of the novel Slipstream, which won the Astraea Award for Fiction. She lives in Berkeley, California.

Get the book here and read an excerpt.

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Up Close & Personal with Andrea Jones

January 21st, 2010

color1+smallerfileUp Close & Personal with Andrea Jones, author of Hook & Jill, available now

Favorite guilty pleasure: Captain Hook.

Writing crutch? My characters. I place them in a situation, and they show me what they’ll do.

Plotter or Pantser? Plotter, like the Captain!

Favorite movie snack: Cranberry juice, with a shot of rum.

Personal style: It doesn’t have to be in vogue; it just has to look good on ME.

Favorite time of day to write: 10 p.m. to 2 a.m.

Favorite writing spot: My fainting couch (see Captain Hook’s ship cabin furnishings, Chapter 10).

Favorite writing motivation: My dreams and daydreams. And, ironically, my real life.

Favorite weekend activity: Reading, by myself or to my children.

Favorite vacation spot: Achill Island, Ireland, closely followed by London, England, where Peter Pan came alive for J.M. Barrie.

Favorite writing tip: Don’t worry about writing chronologically. Write whatever chapter — beginning, middle, or end — is playing itself out in your heart at the moment.

cover w-award 800Finish these sentences:

When I was young, I… wanted to grow up.

When I grow old, I… am glad I did!

When I first fell in love, I… Believed in fairy tales.

I love to read because… Stories take me where I want to go, information teaches me what I need to know.

www.HookandJill.com

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The Murderer’s Daughter Release Day

January 19th, 2010

This week’s Book in Bloom features a novel compared to the likes of White Oleander and The Deep End of the Ocean. If you’re looking for am emotionally gripping tale, consider THE MURDERER’S DAUGHTERS by Randy Susan Meyer.

41gjyBJkUdL._SL500_AA240_ From the publisher:
A beautifully written, compulsively readable debut that deals with the aftermath of a shocking act of violence that leaves two young sisters with nothing but each other—in the tradition of White Oleander, this haunting novel is a testament to the power of family and the ties that bind us together, even as they threaten to tear us apart.

Mama was “no macaroni-necklace-wearing kind of mother.” She was a lipstick and perfume-wearing mother, a flirt whose estranged husband still hungered for her. After Mama threw him out, she warned the girls to never let Daddy in the house, an admonition that tears at ten-year-old Lulu whenever she thinks about the day she opened the door for her drunken father, and watched as he killed her mother, stabbed her five-year-old sister Merry and tried to take his own life.

Effectively orphaned by their mother’s death and father’s imprisonment, Lulu and Merry, unwanted by family members and abandoned to a terrifying group home, spend their young lives carrying more than just the visible scars from the tragedy. Even as their plan to be taken in by a well-to-do foster family succeeds, they come to learn they’ll never really belong anywhere or to anyone—that all they have to hold onto is each other.

As they grow into women, Lulu holds fast to her anger, denies her father’s existence and forces Merry into a web of lies about his death that eventually ensnares her own husband and daughters. Merry, certain their safety rests on placating her needy father, dutifully visits him, seeking his approval and love at the expense of her own relationships. As they strive to carve lives of their own, the specter of their father, unrepentant and manipulative even from behind bars, haunts them. And when they learn he’s about to be paroled, the house of cards they’ve built their lives on teeters on the brink of collapse.

Buy the book here.

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Posted in Books in Bloom, Mainstream, Women's Fiction

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His Other Lover, Forever Waiting

December 31st, 2009

Time is running out on the year, but lucky for us we can still read ‘09 releases in 2010! Here are a couple we think deserve some attention, so without further ado, our new Books in Bloom…

40466577.JPGHIS OTHER LOVER by Lucy Dawson

From the publisher:
To Mia, the devastating proof is right there on her boyfriend’s cell phone. In the dead of night she discovers Pete—her lover, her soul mate, her future—is having an affair. Instead of waking him with accusations, Mia begins to look for answers. What woman wouldn’t want to know everything, after all? But her desperate search only begins a frightening series of lies and deceptions.

Everything important to Mia may be on the line, but she’s also about to cross it. Desperation, obsession, and heartache can only lead to catastrophe, and if the cold, hard truth is not what Mia imagines, pursuing it could be the worst mistake she has ever made.

Just how far is too far?
Get LOVER now.

47447967.JPGFOREVER WAITING by DeVa Gantt

From the publisher:
The gripping saga of the Duvoisins—an extraordinary American family both blessed and cursed—reaches a stunning conclusion. . .

In the wake of heartbreaking tragedy and volatile revelations, the once-great Duvoisin family of Virginia teeters on the brink of disintegration. And trusted governess, Charmaine Ryan, suffers with them.

Their world has exploded—and aging patriarch, Frederic Duvoisin, desperately tries to salvage what remains of his shattered family. His mercurial son John has left, vowing never to return, taking a piece of Charmaine’s heart with him. Paul, the roguish, illegitimate son and aspiring heir to the Duvoisin shipping empire, offers love to the vulnerable Charmaine. And Agatha, Frederic’s shrewish wife, plots to destroy anyone who stands in her way. Haunted by the past, John returns, inadvertently unearthing the most devastating scheme of all.

Buy FOREVER here.

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Posted in Books in Bloom, Historical Fiction, Mainstream

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Far From Home

December 14th, 2009

I know when I get an Avon A book that I’m getting solid writing and a great story, so I’m pleased to make FAR FROM HOME by Anne DeGrace this week’s Book in Bloom. As we gather ’round hearth and home over the next few weeks, this one looks like a good one to cuddle up with.

44548528.JPGFAR FROM HOME by Anne DeGrace

From the publisher:
After a shocking family betrayal and an unexpected pregnancy, Jo leaves home, college, and everything she knows. Far from home, she finds her way to Cass’s Roadside CafÉ, an isolated diner on a mountain pass. Cass’s seems as good a place as any for Jo to get her bearings, as near to nowhere as it is possible to be. Here, Jo finds a rough sort of kindness in diner regulars such as Archie, a long-haul trucker, and Bob, a cop with a secret. But Cass’s is also a way station through which an odd assortment of travelers blow: the water witcher, coming to terms with a talent he’d denied; the old woman who expected to die, and didn’t; and the hippie whose rule of the road is to let the wind blow him where it will. The stories of these strangers open Jo’s eyes to life lessons, and what it really means to follow your heart—and, ultimately, give Jo the strength to face her past, and find the direction she needs to step into her future.

About the Author
Anne DeGrace is a librarian, journalist, writer, illustrator, volunteer, mother, and multitasker. She lives in the mountains near Nelson, British Columbia.

Find out more here.

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