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Monday, July 29, 2013

top beginnings and endings



The Broke and the Bookish want to know our Top Ten Favorite Beginnings and Endings.  Right now, I could only think of SIX!  Looking forward to having my memory jogged by what you have liked! With endings, it's a little harder, because you don't want to give the story away. 



Beginnings:

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.” Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen.

Zane accidentally kills Death in Piers Anthony’s On a Pale Horse, which is the start to a great fantasy series on The Immortals (back before it was 'cool'!).

"If Singletree’s only florist didn’t deliver her posies half-drunk, I might still be married to that floor-licking, scum-sucking, receptionist-nailing hack-accountant, Mike Terwilliger." …And One Last Thing by Molly Harper (hilarious!)

“Day 5994… I wake up….The body is the easiest thing to adjust to, if you’re used to waking up in a new one each morning. It’s the life, the context of the body, that can be hard to grasp.” Every Day by David Leviathan captured my attention completely with his writing style and premise.

When June has an accident where her passenger dies, she begins to complete a list of “20 Things to do before I turn 25,” in honor of Marissa. The Next Thing on My List by Jill Smolinski is a poignant book about a lady trying to discover herself through someone else's list of things to do.

Endings:

I don’t want to say what it is, but the ending of Emily and Einstein by Linda Francis Lee is bittersweet and heartwarming at the same time.  One of those books you just hug to your chest when you finish, as you are wiping away the tears.

Don't forget our Lazy Days of Summer GiveAway!

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Lazy Days of Summer Giveaway



Being that it's bloody hot outside....

...and that summer is almost over for some of us....


Colorimetry and I am a Reader, Not a Writer are hosting a
Lazy Days of Summer *Spontaneous* Hop!  
Make sure to check out the other sites so you can enter to win other great prizes.

Here at Musings, we are giving away a new copy of



Rick Yancey's The 5th Wave

The Passage meets Ender’s Game in an epic new series from award-winning author Rick Yancey.

After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother—or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up.




Fill out the Rafflecopter, and may the odds be ever in your favor! 

Open to US residents only, as I am shipping it direct to you!

a Rafflecopter giveaway  

Here are the other blogs that are Hoppin! during these Lazy Days of Summer!
 

Sunday, July 14, 2013

i H8 Crappy Endings!




I don’t know about you, but the ending is usually what makes or breaks a rating that I give a book.  I could be enjoying the book all along, really excited to find time to read it, and then BAM!   

You get hit with a super crappy ending!  What is it?  Does the publisher breathe down the author’s back and DEMAND the book right now, whether or not it’s been finished?


What do I mean by crappy endings?!

It’s rushed
It just doesn’t fit
It almost seems like someone else wrote it

You know the ones.  You almost feel let down when you finish the story.  And you want your time back!  Unfortunately, it seems that there are more ‘bad endings’ out there than good ones.  Even Nicholas Sparks (bless his soul, I think he is learning!) has endings that rip your heart out, but at least you have an emotion other than “What just happened?

The last two fiction books I have read thoroughly disappointed me with their endings.  It almost makes me want to stick with non-fiction, as they really don’t have endings to begin with!  But I would really like to understand why this happens.   

Does the author just not know how to finish it?  
 Did they end up in the hospital and the editor had to find someone to wrap up a well-developed story? 

And that’s the thing… The story is going well until the end!  The author is obviously creative enough because they sucked me in, in the first place!  There are books that I have cried at the end (Nicholas Sparks, aside), and those books weren’t considered, in my book, books with bad endings.  Things didn’t necessarily go as planned, but it made sense and it fit and it wasn’t rushed!

Let me know which books you felt were bad endings and why … So I can avoid reading them!

Monday, July 8, 2013

July Reviews

photo credit

Hoping everyone had a wonderful Fourth!

Everyone must be at the beach, reading like crazy, as we didn't have ONE review for June!  Hopefully you will have some reviews for this month.  

Don't forget, post your Name with the Number of the category you read.  I look forward to reading your reviews, and I hope you check out different reviews yourself.  It's a great way to feed your TBR pile!



Here's a quick recap of the Categories:
  1. To the Screen
  2. Another Voice
  3. Opposites Attract
  4. Five Star Day
  5. XyZ pdQ
  6. It's My Birthday
  7. From One Place
  8. It's All about Me
  9. Visit an Old Friend
  10. Look at the Pretty Pictures
  11. She Made Me Do It
  12. I Couldn't Help Myself
  13. To Be or Not to Be
Happy Reading!

Here is the Challenge Rules and Info...

Link your Review!  Looking for good books to read!

Monday, July 1, 2013

review:The Wedding Beat



Title by Author: The Wedding Beat by Devan Sipher
Series (if applicable): none
Publisher: New American Library
Publication Date: 2012
Page Count:  254
Source: actually won it from “Chick Lit is Not Dead” blog.  Love those gals!
Blurb: Sometimes the best man isn't even in the wedding party...

Gavin Greene is a hopeless romantic. He's also a professional one: he writes the wedding column for a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper, covering spectacular parties from coast to coast. But there's a thin line between being a hotshot reporter on assignment...and being a single guy alone on a Saturday night at someone else's wedding.

Everything changes on New Year's when Gavin meets Melinda, a travel writer with enchanting dimples. A moonlit stroll across a Manhattan rooftop seals the deal. Until an Aussie with attitude swoops in and whisks her away before Gavin gets her number.

Gavin crisscrosses New York City to find her again. And he learns that there's something worse than losing the woman of his dreams: Having to write an article about her wedding.

My Interest in this book is: What an interesting premise…chick lit written by a guy!

My Review:
The author, Devan Sipher, was actually the “Vows” writer for the New York Times for five years.  One of my favorite movies happens to be “27 Dresses,” so this was a perfect fit.  It was a fun book that was well-written – and written by a guy.  This dude knows how to write Chick Lit!  It was fun, quirky and quickly-paced, and the ending (thank goodness) didn’t disappoint.

Gavin Greene is a writer for ‘the paper’ and he happens to write the wedding column every week.  He travels around the US to cover weddings and is just looking for “The One!” His best friend, Jill, invited him to a party on New Years Day – one she doesn’t show up to, but he did.  That’s where he sees her, and ends up completely tongue-tied…and she gets away.

No one seems to know who she is or how he can get in touch with her.  He left without getting her information, except her name, which is Melinda.  How many Melinda’s who are travel writers can there be in New York?!  More than he thought there would be.

Gavin is also helping his brother, who is decidedly not a romantic, plan a wedding to a gal he met and wants to marry.  His Jewish mother wants to see her baby boy settle down as well.  What’s a wedding writer to do?  Besides start getting tired of the over-the-top weddings he goes to every weekend, he wants to find his own princess – the kind that spends months in Tibet or some far-flung place donating her time to poor children.

One thing leads to another (and one more ‘date’ with the wrong Melinda) and Gavin is just about done trying to find his elusive soul mate, when he finds her in his next wedding to cover.  How can this be possible?!

Will fates conspire or converge to bring him together with the woman that he thinks he loves.  Is she really all that he remembers her to be?  You will have to read this fun book to find out!

The characters were well developed and you really start to feel for this guy who is seemingly chasing a dream.  I found myself laughing out loud several times throughout this story.  I also found myself pleasantly surprised that a guy could write Chick Lit so well!  It’s light-hearted and fun, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who wonders if guys can be romantics, too!

Favorite Quotes:
“A conversation with my parents was like living out a Dada manifesto.” (blogger’s note: if you have ever been to an art exhibit that features Dada – you would crack up!)

I had heard so many flowery vows about metaphoric trees, soaring birds and sunny skies. But Amy was acknowledging the darkness. The effort it takes every single day to pull yourself out of yourself. Who wouldn’t be grateful to have someone rooting for you and waiting for you? Someone willing to enter the darkness, Orpheus-like, and rescue you from yourself.

When I finished this book, I felt: Glad I had a chance to read this little gem!  Would definitely recommend it and it is the perfect beach read!
Rating: 4 Stars
Other books to read by this author or theme: looking forward to seeing if he writes another.  The Wedding Date” (by Elizabeth Young) is another great wedding themed one that I loved.  Book is so much better than the movie, IMHO.
Tag: chick-lit, weddings, guy’s perspective
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