Books Beside My Chair #21

This is for the week of May 18th-24th. I didn't read much this week. I read only 3 books which brings my yearly total to 112 books. These books totaled 825 pages. I just didn't feel like pushing myself to read. I just went with the flow. These are the books that I read.

 The first book of the week was an urban fantasy. At first I wasn't sure that I was going to like it but I ended up loving it. I gave it 4 stars. This actually surprised me by being a ghost story. I should have realized it by the back of the book but I try not to focus on what the synopsis says about the book because I don't want to be spoiled. This book mainly takes part in New York. The book starts in Kentucky and ends in Kentucky. It is about a young girl who dies before her time and she is slowly gaining time to her actual death date. There is a mystery involved dealing with witches and other ghost.

 This is a middle grade fantasy. I gave it 3 stars and do have the second book to this series. This book is a little hard to describe but it does deal with transfiguration. It is about twins who both change but into different creatures. One changes into a wolf and the other into a dragon. Wolves and dragons are enemy in this land.

I was really disappointed in this book. Again this book is a middle grade. It is also a Sci-Fi/Fantasy. This book also has ghost in it. (In the last two weeks I have read 4 books about ghost.) The girl is also a shape shifter. The girl is looking for her brother is lost and wants to find him. She has some interesting things that happen to her in her search.

I have been reading other books but haven't finished them. I am hoping to finish them in the up coming week. I am ahead of schedule for my reading goal so I am not worried.
If you have read any of these books let me know what you thought of them. Until next time keep reading.

Books Beside My Chair #20

This is for the week of May 11th -17th. I read 7 books which brings my reading total to 109 books. The total number of pages read is 2,616.

 This is a middle grade book that I gave 3 stars to.  This is a story about a boy who fell off a wagon is raised by a poor farmer. He becomes friends with a stranger and learns his story. This book tells how he learns about his pass. I have enjoyed her books but this one isn't up to her normal in my opinion.

 This is another middle grade that I again gave 3 stars to. It is about a group of young children who are search of a ghost at the hotel. It is a cute story but was lacking.

 I have had this book for awhile and finally got around to reading it. I really enjoyed this book and gave it 4 stars. It is taking place in Scotland. The girl has dead and was brought back to life by another ghost. She is learning why she is still alive and what she needs to do with her ability to see and hear ghost. I had a great time reading this book and I am hoping to get to the second book soon.

 This is a review book that I did for Net Galley. It is a YA book and I gave it 3 stars. To learn more about this book read my review.

 This is a heart warming and breaking book. I gave it 4 stars. It is a dual time going from 1970 to 2001/2013. I highly recommend that you read this book. I found myself not wanting to read it because I knew it was going to be heart breaking in some parts but then again I couldn't put the book down. It is about a woman whose baby will not survive if she is born in the 1970's because her baby has a heart condition. She is sent to the future to have a special surgery done to help her baby. Who sends her into the future? What happens to the baby and the woman? You will have to read the book.

 I wasn't sure I was going to like this book but I ended up giving it 4 stars. This is a mystery/ thriller.
It is about a young lady who loses her boyfriend to a car accident but everyone thinks he may have committed suicide. There is only one problem they can't find his body. There is a twist that I didn't even see and it brought up this 3 star read to a 4 star read.

This book has taken me almost five months to read. I of course only read it thirty minutes a day so that is why it took so long. Not only is it over 800 pages long but the writing is so tiny that in a 30minute period I could only read 8 pages. This is a nonfiction/biography of George Washington. I t was a complete history of his life and the time. I gave it 4 stars. 

These are the books that I finished for the week and still working on more. I will keep you posted when I finish them some of them will be this week. Until then keep reading and stay safe.

Spindle and Dagger Review

Spindle and Dagger

By; J. Anderson Coats

Candlewick Press

Candlewick

Teens and YA

Publish Date 10 March 2020

#SpindleAndDagger

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This book was okay. I gave it 3 stars. My copy of this book wasn't very good and it was hard to read. It isn't the authors fault. I had to spend a lot of time trying to figure out was going on. Otherwise the book was a quick read even with the copy that I received.

This book is based on events that happen in Wales. In the year 1000. I don't know a lot about this time period.

The main male character is not a nice person. He wanted to do what he wanted and wouldn't listen to anyone if it went against what he wanted.

The female main character was young and said anything to protect herself, which included a lot of lying.

What I liked most about this book was the historical note at the end because it gave you information about the time period which made the story more understandable.

Book Haul

It is only May 13th and I already have 6 books to tell you about. Five of them are from Amazon and 1 is a book that I won from Good Reads giveaway.

 Jessica Whitworth knows she doesn't belong in her ex-boyfriend Caleb's room. But Caleb's mother asked her to pack up his things-even though she blames Jessa for his accident. How could she say no?
As Jessa begins to box up the pieces of Caleb's life, memories flood back that make Jessa realize their past relationship may not have been exactly as she's thought.
Each fragment of his life reveals a new clue that propels Jessa to search for the truth about Caleb's accident. What really happened on the storm-swept bridge? And did she ever Caleb at all?

 Mia and Jake have known each other their whole lives. They've endured summer vacations. Sunday brunches, even dentist visits together. Their mothers, who are best friends, are convinced that Mia and Jake would be the perfect couple, even though they can't stand to be in the same room together.
After Mia's mom scares away yet another cute boy, Mia and Jake decide they've had enough. Together, they hatch a plan to get their moms off their backs. Permanently. All they have to do is pretend to date and then stage the worst breakup of all time-and then they'ss be free.
It's the perfect plan-except that it turns out maybe Mia and Jake don't hate each other as much as they once thought...

 This is the third book of the series.  I won't say anything about it since it is the third book.

 Patricia Campbell's life has never felt smaller. Her husband is a workaholic, her teenage kids have their own lives, her senile mother-in-law needs constant care, and she's always a step behind on her endless to-do list. The only thing keeping her sane is her book club, a close-knit group of Charleston women united by their love of true crime. At these meetings they're as likely to talk about the Manson family as they are about their own families.
One evening after book club, Patricia is viciously attacked by an elderly neighbor, bringing the neighbor's handsome nephew, James Harris, into her life. James is well traveled and well read, and he makes Patricia feel things she hasn't felt in years. But when children on the other side of town go missing, their deaths written off by local police, Patricia has reason to believe James Harris is more of a Bundy than a Brad Pitt. The real problem? James is a monster of a different kind-and Patricia has already invited him in.
Little by little, James will insinuate himself into Patricia's life and try to take everything she took for granted-including the book club-but she won't surrender without a fight in this blood-soaked tale of neighborly kindness gone wrong.

 This is the second book in a series. Again I won't say anything about this book.

This is the book that I won from Good Reads give away. Every now and then I am able to receive a book from them. This is an ARC that will be released in July 2020.
In a matter of weeks, Massachusetts has been overrun by an insidious rabies-like virus that is spread by saliva. But unlike rabies, the disease has a terrifyingly short incubation period of an hour or less. Those infected quickly lose their minds and are driven to bite and infect as many others as they can before they inevitably succumb. Hospitals are inundated with the sick and dying, and hysteria has taken hold, To try to limit its spread, the commonwealth is under quarantine and curfew. But society is breaking down and the government's emergency protocols are faltering.
Dr. Ramoia "Rams" Sherman, a soft-spoken pediatrician in her mid-thirties, receives a frantic phone call from Natalie, a friend who is eight months pregnant. Natalie's husband has been killed-viciously attacked by an infected neighbor-and in a failed attempt to save him, Natalie, too, was bitten. Natalie's only chance of survival is to get to a hospital as quickly as possible to receive a rabies vaccine. The clock is ticking for her and for her unborn child.
Natalie's fight for life becomes a desperate odyssey as she and Rams make their way through a hostile landscape filled with dangers beyond their worst nightmares-terrifying, strange, and sometimes deadly challenges that push them to the brink.

Let me know if you have read any of these books. Until next time keep reading and stay safe.

Top Ten Tuesday #12

Today my topic will the ten classics I own and still need to read. I am trying to enjoy the classics but I haven't had much luck in this area. I haven't given up yet because every now and then I find one that I like. Now onto the classics. As I was trying to tell you about each of these books I discovered that the books didn't have a synopsis on them so I used Amazon.

 This isn't the copy that I own. The copy I own doesn't have a picture on the cover and when I took a photo you couldn't read it so I took this from Amazon. I will also use their synopsis.
This Side of Paradise is the debut novel of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Published in 1920, and taking its title from a line of the Rupert Brooke poem Tiare Tahiti, the book examines the lives and morality of post-World War I youth. Its protagonist, Amory Blaine, is an attractive Princeton University student who dabbles in literature. The novel explores the theme of love warped by greed and status-seeking.

 Again I had to use a picture from Amazon because of the glare from my copy. I will also use Amazon for the synopsis.
The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today is a novel by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner first published in 1873. It satirizes greed and political corruption in post-Civil War America. Although not one of Twain's best-known works, it has appeared in more than 100 editions since its original publication. The book is remarkable for two reasons—it is the only novel Twain wrote with a collaborator, and its title very quickly became synonymous with graft, materialism, and corruption in public life. The novel gave the era its name: the period of U.S. history from the 1870s to about 1900 is now referred to as the Gilded Age. Although more than a century has passed since its publication, the novel's satirical observations of political and social life in Washington, D.C. are still pertinent.

 This is a play by Thornton Wilder. It is about a small village of Grover's Corners. That's all the book has to say about it.

 The book doesn't have a synopsis so I will be using Amazon again.
In the grand tradition of the epic novel, Boris Pasternak's masterpiece brings to life the drama and immensity of the Russian Revolution through the story of the gifted physician-poet, Zhivago; the revolutionary, Strelnikov; and Lara, the passionate woman they both love. Caught up in the great events of politics and war that eventually destroy him and millions of others, Zhivago clings to the private world of family life and love, embodied especially in the magical Lara. 

 I remember watching this movie in a history at school one year. I really didn't know that there was a book it so I want to give it try.
"Hailed by many as the greatest war novel of all time and publicly burned by the Nazis for being “degenerate,” Erich Maria Remarque’s masterpiece, All Quiet on the Western Front, is an elegant statement on a generation of men destroyed by war. Caught up by a romantic sense of patriotism and encouraged to enlist by authority figures who would not risk their lives to do the same, Paul Bäumer and his classmates join the fighting in the trenches of the Western Front in World War I. He is soon disenchanted by the constant bombardments and ruthless struggle to survive. Through years in battle, Paul and those he serves with become men defined by the violence around them, desperate to stay as decent as they can while growing more and more distant from the society for which they are fighting. This graphic novel recreates the classic story in vivid detail through meticulous research. The accurate depictions of uniforms, weapons, trenches, and death brings the horrors of the Western Front to life in a bold new way. "

 The only story I know from this collection is about Walden Pond and I watched a film about in school. I really didn't like the film so I am not expecting much from this book.
Henry David Thoreau was an American essayist, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, and historian. A leading transcendentalist, Thoreau is best known for his book Walden, a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, his essay "Civil Disobedience" (originally published as "Resistance to Civil Government"), an argument for disobedience to an unjust state, and Excursions. 

 Mike tried reading this book a few years ago and couldn't through so again I am not expecting much.
In 1937 Ernest Hemingway traveled to Spain to cover the civil war there for the North American Newspaper Alliance. Three years later he completed the greatest novel to emerge from "the good fight," For Whom the Bell Tolls.

The story of Robert Jordan, a young American in the International Brigades attached to an antifascist guerilla unit in the mountains of Spain, it tells of loyalty and courage, love and defeat, and the tragic death of an ideal. In his portrayal of Jordan's love for the beautiful Maria and his superb account of El Sordo's last stand, in his brilliant travesty of La Pasionaria and his unwillingness to believe in blind faith, Hemingway surpasses his achievement in The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms to create a work at once rare and beautiful, strong and brutal, compassionate, moving, and wise. "If the function of a writer is to reveal reality," Maxwell Perkins wrote Hemingway after reading the manuscript, "no one ever so completely performed it." Greater in power, broader in scope, and more intensely emotional than any of the author's previous works, it stands as one of the best war novels of all time.

 I know nothing about this book. I know it is classic and I heard about on You Tube and when I saw it at the thrift store I decided to pick it up.
Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman Faithfully Presented is a novel by Thomas Hardy. It initially appeared in a censored and serialised version, published by the British illustrated newspaper The Graphic in 1891 and in book form in 1892. Though now considered a major nineteenth-century English novel and possibly Hardy's masterpiece, Tess of the d'Urbervilles received mixed reviews when it first appeared, in part because it challenged the sexual morals of late Victorian England

 I have read one of her books before and really didn't like but I have been told this is a better book. I am willing to try one more time and hope it is good.

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, details a day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway in post-World War I England. Clarissa visits London in the morning, getting ready to host a party that evening. The nice day reminds her of her youth and makes her wonder about her choice of husband; she married the reliable Richard Dalloway instead of the enigmatic and demanding Peter Walsh and she "had not the option" to be with Sally Seton, for whom she felt strongly. Peter reintroduces these conflicts by paying a visit that morning, having returned from India.

Clarissa's party in the evening is a slow success, attended by most of the characters we have met in the book, including people from her past.

I don't know much about this book but I saw this at Barnes and Noble and recognize the author. So I am willing to give it a read.
Paradise Lost is the greatest epic poem in the English language. In words remarkable for their richness of rhythm and imagery, Milton tells the story of Man's creation, fall, and redemption to "justify the ways of God to men." Milton produced characters which have become embedded in the consciousness of English literature, the frail, human pair, Adam and Eve; the terrible cohort of fallen angels; and Satan, tragic and heroic in his unremitting quest for revenge. The tale unfolds from the aftermath of the great battle between good and evil to the moving departure of Adam and Eve from Eden, with human and eternal anguish intertwined in magnificent resonance.

I do own several more classics that I want to read but these are the ten I really want to try to get to first. Maybe I will do another on the rest of them.
Until next time keep reading and stay safe.

Books Beside My Chair #19

This is for the week of May 4th to May 10th. I read 8 books which brings my yearly total to 102 books. These books totaled 2,981 pages. I didn't include the one book that I DNF'D. I read only 88 pages in that book. I will have the DNF'd book first then go onto the books that I read for the last week.

 This is the book that I was buddy reading with Tara and we both decided that we weren't enjoying it so decided to DNF it at chapter 9 which is 88 pages in. I know a lot of people enjoy this book. This book was slow and I wasn't liking how they side characters were treating the main character. You aren't given the main character name and she was day dreamer and you couldn't tell when she was doing this or if it was part of the details for the present day. Also there is no reason to take five pages of detail for a two mile drive.

 I gave this book 4 stars. It is a Young book that deals with mental health. I highly recommend that you read this book.

 I finally finished this book. I borrowed this from Bekah a while ago. I gave it 3 stars. I am considering this book a classic. I don't think I need to tell you about this book. This book I put on my 20 books in 2020

 This book was on my 10 books that I owned that has been on my TBR the longest.  I gave it 4 stars. This book is a revised edition and it has pictures and simple writing. This is about the life of Joseph Smith as told by his mother. She told about her family and her husband family at the beginning of the book. I did enjoy it and love hearing about it from her view.

 This book I read for my library book club. We will be have a zoom meeting on the 2nd of June to discuss this book. I have had this book on my TBR since August of 2011 so it was about time that I got this book read. It was ok and I gave it 3 stars. It is about a research doctor who  has some issues because during a surgery she ended up blinding a young boy and she is having trouble getting over that. She also ends up going to Brazil in search of her missing partner.

 This is the book that Tara and I ended up buddy reading after the DNF. We both enjoyed this book. I gave it 4.5 stars. It is a contemporary. This book is about two writers who are going through some personal things and they find each other and help other. The one thing I didn't like about this is that their communication is terrible.

 This is a young adult contemporary book written by a man. It was ok and I gave it 3 stars. I am so glad that I decided to listen to this book on audio because there was some Korean that I would have never been able to read let alone pronounce. This is a fake dating troupe.

 I have heard a lot about this book and just wanted to give it a try. I am also thinking about watching the movie. I gave this book 4 stars. This book is about a little boy trying to deal with the fact that is mom is ill and will end up dieing. It goes through how he is dealing with this or not. I highly recommend that you give this book a try.

This was my favorite book of the week. I haven't been able to say that in awhile. I gave this book 5 stars. This is a middle-grade book. This book is a Pakistani village. A 12 year girl who is hoping to become a teacher makes a mistake and tells the leader of the area off and ends up in trouble. This book will tell how she deals with this and the truth of how things are in this town and the surrounding town. This is based on true events but using fictional names and events. I highly recommend that you read this book.

I hope you give each of these books a try even the book that I didn't like. As always let me know what you think about these books if you have read them.
Until next time keep reading and stay safe.

May 2020 Book of the Month

I am sharing the books that I picked from Book of the month. I hope this will help you choose the books if you are a member. If not why not give them a try. Here is my link if you want to give them a try. https://www.mybotm.com/0cxpwrpoiqlivn29?show_box=true
Now onto the books.

 Your books will come in a box like this.

 They come in a bundle with plastic wrap to protect them during shipping. Last month they weren't plastic wrap.

 I was able to choose a book from a back month and this one came highly recommended by Reagan from Peruse Project. This book was from the September 2019 picks. This is what the inside cover says about the book.
England, 1879. Brilliant but destitute Annabella Archer is one of the first female students at Oxford University. Her scholarship demands that she recruit men of influence to champion the rising women's suffrage movement. Her target: the cold and calculating Duke of Montgomery, commander of Britain's politics.
But Montgomery wouldn't be the kingdom's greatest strategist if he couldn't turn the tables and confront Annabella with an altogether different offer...
Locked in a battle with rising passion and impossible attraction, Annabella will learn just what it takes to topple a duke.

 This is the book I picked from the choose they gave me for the month. I do have to say the choices this month weren't very good. This is what the inside cover has to say about the book.
Lizzie Kirsakis is working late when she gets a call. Grueling hours are standard at elite law firms like Young & Crane, but they'd be easier to swallow if Lizzie was there voluntarily. Until recently, she'd been happily underpaid federal prosecutor. With that job and her brilliant, devoted husband, Sam, she had everything she's ever wanted. And t, suddenly, it all fell apart.
No. That's a lie. It wasn't sudden, was it? Long ago the cracks in Lizzie's marriage had started to show. She was just good at averting her eyes.
The last thing Lizzie needs right now is a call from an inmate at Rikers asking for help-even if Zach Grayson is an old friend. But Zach is desperate: his wife. Amanda, has been found dead at the bottom of the stairs in their Brooklyn brownstone. And Zach's the primary suspect.
As Lizzie is drawn into the dark heart of idyllic Park Slope, she learns that Zach and Amanda weren't what they seemed-and that their friends, a close-knit group of fellow parents at the exclusive Brooklyn Country Day school, may be protecting troubling secrets of their own. In the end, she's left wondering not only whether her own marriage can be saved, but what it means to have a good marriage in the first place.

This book was a choice from last month and I grabbed it. Last month had a lot of good choices and since you can only choose three books I wasn't able to get this. I was really glad that it was still available for me to get. This is what the inside cover has to say about the book.
In the glittering Paris of 1927, Josephine Baker dances with Ernest Hemingway, Maurice Ravel plays a lonely piano, and Gertrude Stein hosts her legendary salons. Yet alongside these creative geniuses, a quartet of ordinary men and women are forging their own extraordinary stories.
Since the death of her beloved employer, housemaid Camille has lived  a secret: when Marcel Proust asked her to burn his notebooks, she saved one for herself. Now it has disappeared, and she is desperate to recover it before her betrayal is revealed. Across town, lovesick painter Guillaume is also racing against the clock, with only a few more hours to repay a debt that threatens to bury him alive. Souren, an Armenian refugee seeking connection in a city that has never felt like home, performs puppet shows for children. While Souren relentlessly relives his tragic past, journalist Jean-Paul is unable to confront his own, searching for his missing daughter in every stranger's face.
As the hours tick toward midnight, the City of Light pulls these four characters ever closer, until their paths collide in an unforgettable climax.

I hope you enjoyed the synopsis of the books. I hope you also give this book box a try.

Nevertell Review

Here is my review on the book Nevertell. This is the UK cover.

Nevertell
By: Katharine Orton
Candlewick Press
Walker Books US
Middle Grade
Publish Date 14 April 2020
#Nevertell
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I am so pleased that I have been given the chance to review this book. This is a very cute middle grade book and highly recommend that you give it a read. I gave it 4 stars. This book is 378 pages long and keeps you turning the pages. I was able to figure out one part of the story but it didn't distract from the story. This story is based in Siberia.
The story is about a young girl who escapes from a labor camp to find her Grandma and try to get help to release her mother. Her best friend ends up following her. They both go on have some interesting adventures and try stay away from the local witch who haunts the areas. I love the adventures and the people who they come across and their relationship. You also learn about the time of Stalin and why they were in the labor camp.
I hope you read this book and enjoy the adventures and challenges they go through.

Books Beside my Chair #18

This is for the week of April 27th through May 3rd. I read 6 books which brings my yearly total to 94 books. These books totaled 1,954 pages.

 This book is a mystery and I gave it 4 stars. I had a great time reading this book and recommend it for you to read if you like mysteries. This is what Amazon has to say about it.

During the languid days of the Christmas break, a group of thirtysomething friends from Oxford meet to welcome in the New Year together, a tradition they began as students ten years ago. For this vacation, they’ve chosen an idyllic and isolated estate in the Scottish Highlands—the perfect place to get away and unwind by themselves.

The trip begins innocently enough: admiring the stunning if foreboding scenery, champagne in front of a crackling fire, and reminiscences about the past. But after a decade, the weight of secret resentments has grown too heavy for the group’s tenuous nostalgia to bear. Amid the boisterous revelry of New Year’s Eve, the cord holding them together snaps, just as a historic blizzard seals the lodge off from the outside world.

Two days later, on New Year’s Day, one of them is dead. . . and another of them did it.

Keep your friends close, the old adage says. But how close is too close?

DON'T BE LEFT OUT. JOIN THE PARTY NOW.

 I read this graphic novel because I read them quickly and it was the Good Reads winner for 2019. I gave it 4 stars. This is what the inside cover says about the book.
Every Autumn. all through high school, they've worked together at the world's best pumpkin patch. They say good-bye every Halloween, and they're reunited every September 1.
But this Halloween is different, Josie and Deja are finally seniors. It's their last season at the Patch, their last shift together-their last good-bye.
Josie's ready to spend the whole night feeling melancholy about it. (He's the melancholy type.) But Deja has a plan: What if, instead of moping and instead of the usual-slinging lima beans down at the Succotash Hut-they went out with a bang? They could see all the sights! Taste all the snacks! Maybe Josie could even talk to that cute girl he's been mooning over for three years...
What if their last shift was an adventure?

 This is a collection of short stories from real women from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I gave it 4 stars which is unusual because I am not a fan of short stories. I liked them because they were mostly about historical facts.

 This is another mystery book with a twist of Science fiction mixed in. I like it but I only gave it 3 stars. I was confused during some of it. It did pick up near the end. This is what Amazon has to say.
Seventeen-year-old Tempe was born into a world of water. When the Great Waves destroyed her planet five hundred years ago, its people had to learn to survive living on the water, but the ruins of the cities below still called. Tempe dives daily, scavenging the ruins of a bygone era, searching for anything of value to trade for Notes. It isn't food or clothing that she wants to buy, but her dead sister's life. For a price, the research facility on the island of Palindromena will revive the dearly departed for twenty-four hours before returning them to death. It isn't a heartfelt reunion that Tempe is after; she wants answers. Elysea died keeping a terrible secret, one that has ignited an unquenchable fury in Tempe: Her beloved sister was responsible for the death of their parents. Tempe wants to know why.

But once revived, Elysea has other plans. She doesn't want to spend her last day in a cold room accounting for a crime she insists she didn't commit. Elysea wants her freedom and one final glimpse at the life that was stolen from her. She persuades Tempe to break her out of the facility, and they embark on a dangerous journey to discover the truth about their parents' death and mend their broken bond. But they're pursued every step of the way by two Palindromena employees desperate to find them before Elysea's time is up--and before the secret behind the revival process and the true cost of restored life is revealed.

 This is the book I was reading for the OWLS readathon for the care of magical creatures. I didn't get it finished in time. I finished it on the 1st. I gave it 3 stars and it is the third and final book in a series. It was a little slow for me. The back of the book says.
Sam Gribley has been told that it is illegal to harbor an endangered bird, so when his beloved falcon, Frightful, comes home, he has to let her go. But Frightful doesn't know how to lie alone in the wild. She can't feed herself, mate, brood chicks, or migrate. Frightful struggles to survive and learns to enjoy her new freedom. But she feels a bond with Sam that can never be broken, and more than anything else, she wants to return to him.

This is the last book that I read for the week. It is a middle-grade book and I gave it 4 stars. I was able to predict the story line and where it was going. I did enjoy it though. I was lucky enough to get the e-arc from Net Galley but I also bought the book from book depository and got the beautiful UK cover. I will be posting a review for this sometime this week so keep a look out.

How did your reading go for the last week? Did you read any good books? If so let me know what you thought of them. If you have read any of these books also let me know what you thought of them.
Until next time keep safe and keep reading.

April 2020 Book Outlet Haul

Since I really can't visit the book store I have been doing my shopping online. Book outlet has been having a sale and I have been taking advantage of it. These are the books that I bought.

 I was able to get this book that was recommended to me by a family member. The back of the book says. After Alba Ashby, the youngest PhD student at Cambridge University, suffers the Worst Event of Her Life, she finds herself at the door of 11 Hope Street. There, a beautiful older woman named Peggy invites Alba to stay, on the house's usual conditions: she'll have ninety-nine nights, and no more, to turn her life around.
Once inside, Alba sees that 11 Hope Street is no ordinary place. Past residents include Virginia Woolf, Dorothy Parker, and Agatha Christie, who all stayed there when they, too, had lost hope. With the house's help, Alba decides to risk everything-and embarks on a journey that may even save her life.

 Another book that was recommended by a family member. I just posted on this book on Tuesday so I won't retype what the book says about the story. You need to go to my Top Ten Tuesday #11 to learn about this book.

 I also just posted about this book on my Top Ten Tuesday #11. If you want to learn more about this series you can go to that post.

 I was finally able to pick up the rest of this series from them. I will write what the first book says since the others will be spoilers. The first book in the series is called The Selection.
The opportunity to be swept up in a world of glittering gowns and priceless jewels. To live in a palace and compete for the heart of gorgeous Prince Maxon.
But for America Singer, being Selected is a nightmare. It means turning her back on her secret love with Aspen, who is a caste below her, and leaving her home to enter a fierce competition for a crown she doesn't want.
Then America meets Prince Maxon. Gradually, she begins to realize that the life she's always dreamed of may not compare to a future she never imagined.

 I have already read this book. I bought this because I didn't have it for my collection, which surprised me. This book contains letters that Laura wrote to Almanzo while she was in San Francisco visiting Rose.

 This is the last book that she wrote before she passed away. I am trying to get the whole series before I start to read them. I am almost there.
In 1979, four teenage boys from an elite private school sexually assault a fourteen-year-old classmate—and film the attack. Not long after, the tape goes missing and the suspected thief, a fellow classmate, is murdered. In the investigation that follows, one boy turns state’s evidence and two of his peers are convicted. But the ringleader escapes without a trace.
       
Now, it’s 1989 and one of the perpetrators, Fritz McCabe, has been released from prison. Moody, unrepentant, and angry, he is a virtual prisoner of his ever-watchful parents—until a copy of the missing tape arrives with a ransom demand. That’s when the McCabes call Kinsey Millhone for help. As she is drawn into their family drama, she keeps a watchful eye on Fritz. But he’s not the only one being haunted by the past. A vicious sociopath with a grudge against Millhone may be leaving traces of himself for her to find...

 This is the third book in the companion series. The back of the book says.
Let the battle for Christmas begin...
It isn't always easy growing up as a human in Elfhelm, even if your adoptive parents are the newly married Father Christmas and Mary Christmas.
For one thing, elf school can be annoying when you have to sing Christmas songs every day-even in July-and when you fail all your toy-making tests. Also it can get very, very cold.
But when the jealous Easter Bunny and his Rabbit Army launch an attack to stop Christmas, it's up to Ameila, her new family, and the elves to keep Christmas alive. Before it's too late...

This is the last book that I bought for the month. I did check this book out from the library but I wanted to own it so I saw it and bought it. It is about Laura and her daughter Rose. This is what the inside cover has to say about the book.
Generations of children have fallen in love with the pioneer saga of the Ingalls family, of Pa and Ma, Laura and her sisters, and their loyal dog, Jack. Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books have taught millions of Americans about frontier lif, giving inspiration to many and becoming icons of our national identity. Yet few realize that this cherished series wandered far from the actual history of the Ingalls family and from what Laura herself understood to be central truths about pioneer life.
In this groundbreaking narrative of literary detection, Christine Woodside reveals for the first time the full extent of the collaboration between Laura and her daughter. Rose Wilder Lane. Rose hated farming and fled the family homestead as an adolescent, eventually becoming a nationally prominent magazine writer, biographer of Herbert Hoover, and successful novelish, who shared the political values of Ayn Rand and became a mentor to Roger Lea MacBride, the second Libertarian presidential candidate.
Drawing on original manuscripts and letters, Woodside shows how Rose reshaped her mother's story into a series of heroic tales that rebutted the policies of the New Deal. Their secret collaboration would lead in time to their estrangement. A fascinating look at the relationship between two strong-willed women, Libertarians on the Prairie is also the deconstruction of an American myth.
I do know that Rose did a lot to Laura's stories so this doesn't surprise me.

Let me know if you have read any of these books and which one I should read first. As always keep reading and stay safe.