TBR Intervention (15)

I am still working on the books I started for my last TBR--and my big lesson for this week is that 800 page books take a long time to read (you would think I knew that already right?).

This Week

If I can finish these books--my next book is going to be:


I have been focusing on making changes in my life to be healthier and to set a healthier example for my daughter.  This goal will not change all of the books I read--but periodically I want to read some that teach me something about living healthier.

Summary (from back):
Tired of dieting?  Are you eating nonfat and carb-free foods that don't satisfy?  Then stop!  You've been wrecking your metabolism with yo-yo fad diets and chemical-filled nonfoods.  Jillian Michaels is here to repair the damage and retrain your hormones and endocrine system.

Master Your Metabolism is a simple three-phase plan that amps up your weight-loss hormones and kicks those fat-storing hormones to the curb.  You'll learn how to:

• Remove antinutrients and toxins, which are slowing your metabolism.
• Restore natural whole foods to your diet--foods that will rally your fat-burning hormones.
• Rebalance your hormones by sleeping, dealing with stress, and exercising in ways that will manage them best.

Master Your Metabolism teaches you how to reach your optimum health and weight and transform your body into the ultimate healthy, fat-fighting machine. 

TBR Intervention (14)

I know it has been a while since I participated--but I wanted you to tell you all that I have missed being part of the intervention (and my TBR pile has grown exponentially too).  So I am not back and ready to get down to business!

But I also have a class that started last week and goes on for the next six weeks--so I won't be able to read as much as I used to in a week.  But even a little bit will make progress on my TBR, right?

Books I Am Committed To Read

My friends have been talking about this series so much that I just had to join in.  It has become our literary soap opera.

Summary (from Amazon):
Long ago, in a time forgotten, a preternatural event threw the seasons out of balance. In a land where summers can last decades and winters a lifetime, trouble is brewing. The cold is returning, and in the frozen wastes to the north of Winterfell, sinister and supernatural forces are massing beyond the kingdom’s protective Wall. At the center of the conflict lie the Starks of Winterfell, a family as harsh and unyielding as the land they were born to. Sweeping from a land of brutal cold to a distant summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, here is a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens.

Here an enigmatic band of warriors bear swords of no human metal; a tribe of fierce wildlings carry men off into madness; a cruel young dragon prince barters his sister to win back his throne; and a determined woman undertakes the most treacherous of journeys. Amid plots and counterplots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, the fate of the Starks, their allies, and their enemies hangs perilously in the balance, as each endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones.

My friend read this book and said that it may help me as I am learning to move forward (if you do not know what I am referring to please read taking a break).  I also saw that this book is full of shorter stories which means I do not need to focus on reading the whole thing straight through but can pick through the stories.

Summary (from Amazon):
This Is Not the Life I Ordered is for anyone who has ever felt overworked, overwhelmed, or just plain unlucky (and, who hasn't?!). Through this collection of stories, wisdom, and practical advice, readers will meet four ordinary women who have faced extraordinary life challenges. Together, they have a history of six marriages, ten children, four stepchildren, six dogs, two miscarriages, two cats, a failed adoption, and foster parenthood. Two have lived through the death of their spouses and one was shot and left for dead on a tarmac in Guyana -- which is documented in "Jonestown" airing on PBS' American Experience. T

his book started simply with four friends getting together for "kitchen-table coaching sessions" to talk about their lives. Week by week and story by story, they realized their great advice to each other could help other women struggling with life's myriad issues of work, family, and love, as well as the big questions of life and death. For over a decade, the power and strength of their collective friendship enabled these women not only to survive but to thrive. They invite readers to join them to learn how they, too, can turn "misfortunate" events into joy-filled opportunities. Readers will want to share this book with every woman in their lives!

I got out of the habit of listening to my audiobooks and I have missed them, so I am going to make it a goal to get back into the habit again.  And what is better than Jim Dale to get me back?

Summary (from Amazon):
The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night.

But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.

True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus per­formers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.

Written in rich, seductive prose, this spell-casting novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.

Now I cannot wait to see what you are reading this week!

TBR Intervention (13)

I was at a conference last weekend so I missed the TBR Intervention.  But I am back this week happy with my progress--even if I have missed some of my targets.

Last TBR Intervention

I finished this one and it was a lot more intriguing than I originally expected. My review will be out on March 19 and the author will have a guest post on his journey to becoming a published author on March 20.


I finished this one--review is coming soon.  I have to say that Charlaine Harris has brought me into her world.  I have not decided if I want to get the DVDs for the True Blood the television series.


I had read One for the Money once before and was not impressed.  After watching the movie, I gave it another chance--and I liked it so much better the second time.  I am excited to read the rest of the series now.

Next Week

Luckily, I got to renew this one from the library.  But I am determined to read this one this week!


I have been very excited to read this one as I hear it is a great dragon-focused book!

Summary (from inside flap):
Dragons Exist.  They're ferocious.  And they're smart: Before they were killed off by slayer-knights, they rendered a select group of eggs dormant, so their offspring would survive.  Only a handful of people know about this, let alone believe it.  These "Slayers" are descended from the original knights, and are now a diverse group of teens that includes Tori, a smart, but spoiled, senator's daughter who didn't sign up to save the world.

Now the dragon eggs have fallen into the wrong hands.  The Slayers must work together to stop the eggs from hatching.  They will fight, they will fall in love.  But will they survive? 


This book is the one I will be giving away as part of the World Book Night celebration. I wanted to re-read it before April 23.

Summary (from Amazon):
Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her slave ancestors, yet her cells—taken without her knowledge—became one of the most important tools in medicine. The first “immortal” human cells grown in culture, they are still alive today, though she has been dead for more than sixty years. If you could pile all HeLa cells ever grown onto a scale, they’d weigh more than 50 million metric tons—as much as a hundred Empire State Buildings. HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered secrets of cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb’s effects; helped lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the billions.

Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an unmarked grave.

Now Rebecca Skloot takes us on an extraordinary journey, from the “colored” ward of Johns Hopkins Hospital in the 1950s to stark white laboratories with freezers full of HeLa cells; from Henrietta’s small, dying hometown of Clover, Virginia—a land of wooden slave quarters, faith healings, and voodoo—to East Baltimore today, where her children and grandchildren live and struggle with the legacy of her cells.

Henrietta’s family did not learn of her “immortality” until more than twenty years after her death, when scientists investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in research without informed consent. And though the cells had launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks family—past and present—is inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we are made of.

Over the decade it took to uncover this story, Rebecca became enmeshed in the lives of the Lacks family—especially Henrietta’s daughter Deborah, who was devastated to learn about her mother’s cells. She was consumed with questions: Had scientists cloned her mother? Did it hurt her when researchers infected her cells with viruses and shot them into space? What happened to her sister, Elsie, who died in a mental institution at the age of fifteen? And if her mother was so important to medicine, why couldn’t her children afford health insurance?

Intimate in feeling, astonishing in scope, and impossible to put down, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks captures the beauty and drama of scientific discovery, as well as its human consequences.

What books do you plan to read this week?

TBR Intervention (12)

I am calling it a draw.  Some successes that I am proud of but I did not make my mark entirely.

Last Week

I finished this book. In some ways it is very different from her YA books but in other ways it is not. I really liked it and I hope Ellen Hopkins does more adult books in the near future!


In some ways I found this one to be more predictable than her first book--but I really do like Kinsey. I already have the next on reserve.


Here is my failure. Triangles took me longer to read than I expected (or maybe it is more accurate to say that I did not get as much uninterrupted reading time as I had planned), so I did not get this one started as early as I thought I would. But the opening has grabbed my attention!

This Week

First, I have to finish Best Seller.  I am definitely looking forward to this one. 

After that, I have a book coming due to the library:

Summary (from inside flap):
Liesl lives in a tiny attic bedroom, locked away by her cruel stepmother.  Her only friends are the shadows and the mice--until one night a ghost appears from the darkness.  It is Po, who comes from the Other Side.  Both Liesl and Po are lonely, but together they are less alone.

That same night, an alchemist's apprentice, Will, bungles an important delivery.  He accidentally switches a box containing the most powerful magic in the world with one containing something decidedly less remarkable.

Will's mistake has tremendous consequences for Liesl and Po, and it draws the three of them together on an extraordinary journey.

From New York Times bestselling author Lauren Oliver comes a luminous and magnificent novel that glows with rare magic, ghostly wonders, and a true friendship that lights even the darkest of places.

For my audiobook--I have decided to start a series I have heard so much about by have not had a chance to start.  Better late than never, right

Summary (from Goodreads):
Sookie Stackhouse is a cocktail waitress in small-town Louisiana, but she keeps to herself and doesn't date much because of her "disability" to read minds. When she meets Bill, Sookie can't hear a word he's thinking. He's the type of guy she's waited for all of her life, but he has a disability, too--he's a vampire with a bad reputation. When one of Sookie's coworkers is killed, she fears she's next.

And because I always like to set my bar high, I am hoping to re-read (this time as an audiobook):

Summary (from Goodreads):
Welcome to Trenton, New Jersey, home to wiseguys, average Joes, and Stephanie Plum, who sports a big attitude and even bigger money problems (since losing her job as a lingerie buyer for a department store). Stephanie needs cash--fast--but times are tough, and soon she's forced to turn to the last resort of the truly desperate: family.

Stephanie lands a gig at her sleazy cousin Vinnie's bail bonding company. She's got no experience. But that doesn't matter. Neither does the fact that the bail jumper in question is local vice cop Joe Morelli. From the time he first looked up her dress to the time he first got into her pants to the time Steph hit him with her father's Buick, M-o-r-e-l-l-i has spelled t-r-o-u-b-l-e. And now the hot guy is in hot water--wanted for murder.

Abject poverty is a great motivator for learning new skills, but being trained in the school of hard knocks by people like psycho prizefighter Benito Ramirez isn't. Still, if Stephanie can nab Morelli in a week, she'll make a cool ten grand. All she has to do is become an expert bounty hunter overnight--and keep herself from getting killed before she gets her man.

So do you what do you want to read this week?

TBR Intervention (11)

I am calling this week a TBR success--and I am very proud of that. :)

Last Week

I finished this one. I am not 100% sure how I feel about it--so I am waiting until I can put my feelings into words before I write the review.


I have started this one but I am not done with it yet. It will be my first success of next week!


I was so excited to get reacquainted with Kinsley that I devoured this book in what felt like a second. I have the next one on reserve at the library!

This Week

I already told you about Triangles: A Novel but I am also committed to reading:

I am participating in a blog tour for this one in March--I am so excited to finish it and write my review.

Summary (from back cover):
Thirty-five year old fiction writer, Richard Rossi would do just about anything to get his manuscript published.  However, months of rejection and unanswered prayers have strained his capacity to hope.  Alone in New York City, he teeters on the brink of alcoholism, as his hope erodes into desperation.  His prayers are finally answered when a simple misdirected piece of mail spawns a chance encounter with an extraordinary man, Seth Volos, Publisher.  And while their unholy alliance thrusts Richard to the top of every Best Seller list in America, the horrifying outcome of the book's legions of fans is anything but a happy ending.

My audiobook focus for this week is: 

This is a re-read for me, but I am finding Lena to be a less charming character this time around.

Summary (from Amazon.com):
Ninety-five days, and then I’ll be safe.

I wonder whether the procedure will hurt.

I want to get it over with.

It’s hard to be patient.

It’s hard not to be afraid while I’m still uncured, though so far the deliria hasn’t touched me yet.

Still, I worry.

They say that in the old days, love drove people to madness.

The deadliest of all deadly things: It kills you both when you have it and when you don’t.

After I finish these books--I have so many options it is going to be hard to pick the next book.  Maybe you can help me.  Which book should I read next?

TBR Intervention (10)

Overall--I feel like I set very ambitious goals for last week, so I am calling this week a success even though I am not done with everything.

Last Week

I am 2/3 of the way done with this one.  I have been finding many of the same problems I find with a lot of second books in series--it drags a lot more than the first one did.  But in talking with my friend we learn a lot from this book that is very important in later books and we meet a lot of people who are important in later books.  So in other word it is very important as the series continues.  So I have been working through it, and now that I am in the last 100 pages I can feel it starting to pick up quite a bit!


I finished this one--and I loved it.  Well maybe love is not the right word.  I struggle with describing how I feel about Ellen Hopkins books--they are so well written but it is hard to say "love" with the topics that she covers.  They are gritty, dark, and hard.  But it affected me.  I felt it deeply as I finished it.  More to come in my review.


This one I can say I finished and I loved without hesitation! Although I do not necessarily think it was my favorite Sarah Dessen book--I did love it. I loved Ruby and Nate.  Review to come.

This Week

My first fail of the week is destined to be my first success next week!  I am going to start Fat Vampire as soon as I finish Kitty Goes To Washington.  I cannot read two fantasy books (both of which have a different vampire world created) at the same time.  But this one is going to be next--I promise!

And from the library (and coming due this week--eek!):

This is Ellen Hopkins first adult novel--and I have been so excited to read it.  I am very optimistic that the style that makes her so accessible and honest in YA will do wonders in an adult novel!

Summary (from Amazon):
THREE FEMALE FRIENDS FACE MIDLIFE CRISES IN A NO-HOLDS-BARRED EXPLORATION OF SEX, MARRIAGE, AND THE FRAGILITY OF LIFE.

Holly: Filled with regret for being a stay-athome mom, she sheds sixty pounds and loses herself in the world of extramarital sex. Will it bring the fulfillment she is searching for?

Andrea: A single mom and avowed celibate, she watches her friend Holly’s meltdown with a mixture of concern and contempt. Holly is throwing away what Andrea has spent her whole life searching for—a committed relationship with a decent guy. So what if Andrea picks up Holly’s castaway husband?

Marissa: She has more than her fair share of challenges—a gay, rebellious teenage son, a terminally ill daughter, and a husband who buries himself in his work rather than face the facts.

As one woman’s marriage unravels, another’s rekindles. As one woman’s family comes apart at the seams, another’s reconfigures into something bigger and better. In this story of connections and disconnections, one woman’s up is another one’s down, and all of them will learn the meaning of friendship, betrayal, and forgiveness.

Unflinchingly honest, emotionally powerful, surprisingly erotic, Triangles is the ultimate page-turner. Hopkins’s gorgeous, expertly honed poetic verse perfectly captures the inner lives of her characters. Sometimes it happens like that. Sometimes you just get lost.Get lost in the world of Triangles, where the lives of three unforgettable women intersect, and where there are no easy answers.

And because we all know that I cannot go anywhere without a book on my ipod, my audiobook this week is:

Although--I am listening to the unabridged version! I think that is very important to note.

Summary (from Amazon):
Finding wealthy Elaine Boldt seems like a quickie case to Kinsey Millhone. The flashy widow was last seen wearing a $12,000 lynx coat, leaving her condo in Santa Teresa for her condo in Boca Raton. But somewhere in between, she vanished. Kinsey's case goes from puzzling to sinister when a house is torched, an apartment is burgled of worthless papers, the lynx coat comes back without Elaine, and her bridge partner is found dead. Soon Kinsey's clues begin to form a capital M -- not for missing, but for murder: and plenty of it.

Winner of the 1985 Private Eye Writers of America Shamus Award and the 1985 Anthony Award for Best Novel.

What are you reading this week?