Book Beginnings: September 6, 2013

Book Beginnings on Friday



You would think it would be impossible to find anything new in the world, creatures no man has ever seen before, one-of-akind oddities in which nature has taken a backseat to the coursing pulse of the fantastical and the marvelous.  The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman

 

Summary Courtesy of Goodreads

 

From the beloved, bestselling author of The Dovekeepers, a mesmerizing new novel about the electric and impassioned love between two vastly different souls in New York during the volatile first decades of the twentieth century.Coney Island: Coralie Sardie is the daughter of the impresario behind The Museum of Extraordinary Things, a boardwalk freak show that amazes and stimulates the crowds. An exceptional swimmer, Coralie appears as the Mermaid in her father’s “museum,” alongside performers like the Wolfman, the Butterfly Girl, and a one-hundred-year-old turtle. One night Coralie stumbles upon a striking young man photographing moonlit trees in the woods off the Hudson River.

The dashing photographer is Eddie Cohen, a Russian immigrant who has run away from his father’s Lower East Side Orthodox community and his job as an apprentice tailor. When Eddie captures with his camera the devastation on the streets of New York following the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, he becomes embroiled in the mystery behind a young woman’s disappearance.

New York itself becomes a riveting character as Hoffman weaves her magic, romance, and masterful storytelling to unite Coralie and Eddie in a sizzling, tender, and moving story of young love in tumultuous times. The Museum of Extraordinary Things is Hoffman at her most spellbinding.

If the first line of The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman grabs your attention?  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read!

Thanks to Rose City Reader for hosting this event every Friday allowing bloggers to share the first sentence of a book that they are reading and offer some impression of said book!

Happy reading to all! ☮

Happy Reading☮
The Things You Can Read!
Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

Book Beginnings on Friday: August 30, 2013

Book Beginnings on Friday

"On the day the worst happened to her-and by worst I mean the tragedy you'd die to prevent, kill to prevent, the cruelty beyond endurance-Lucy Adams was working in a flower shop, arranging scarlet and orange hothouse roses whose colors could have put a midsummer sunset to shame."-Seven for a Secret by Lyndsay Faye

Summary on Goodreads

From Edgar-nominated author Lyndsay Faye comes the next book in what Gillian Flynn calls "a brilliant new mystery series.”

Publication Date September 17, 2013

If the first line of Seven for a Secret by Lyndsay Faye grabs your attention let us know here at The Things You Can Read!

Thanks to Rose City Reader for hosting this event every Friday allowing bloggers to share the first sentence of a book that they are reading and offer some impression of said book!

Happy reading to all! ☮

Happy Reading☮
The Things You Can Read!
Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

Book Beginnings on Friday:Traveling Sprinkler by Nicholson Baker August 23, 2013

"Roz called to ask me what I wanted for my fifty-fifth birthday.  One of her many good qualities is that she remembers people's birthdays." Traveling Sprinkler: A Novel by Nicholson Baker

Summary Courtesy of Goodreads:

A new novel by bestselling author Nicholson Baker reintroduces feckless but hopeful hero Paul Chowder, whose struggle to get his life together is reflected in his steadfast desire to write a pop song, or a protest song, or both at once.

How about that first and second line?  As I work on my back log of ARCs 

Traveling Sprinkler: A Novel by Nicholson Baker is up next.  I look forward to starting this one.

Thanks to Rose City Reader for hosting this event every Friday allowing bloggers to share the first sentence of a book that they are  reading and offer some impression of said book!

Does Traveling Sprinkler: A Novel by Nicholson Baker 
grab your attention?  Is it a novel you'd be interested in reading?  Have you read any of Nicholson Baker's other books?  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read!

Happy reading to all! ☮ 

Happy Reading☮

The Things You Can Read!

Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

Book Beginnings on Friday: Swimming at Night by Lucy Clarke August 9, 2013



Charles Dickens reads to his daughters Mamie and Kate in the garden at Gad’s Hill, Kent.  1865
Via: bookorithms:
Book Beginnings on Friday

       

"Katie had been dreaming of the sea." Swimming at Night by Lucy Clarke

 

Summary Courtesy of Goodreads:

People go traveling for two reasons: because they are searching for something, or they are running from something.

Katie's world is shattered by the news that her headstrong and bohemian younger sister, Mia, has been found dead at the bottom of a cliff in Bali. The authorities say that Mia jumped--that her death was a suicide.

Although they'd hardly spoken to each other since Mia suddenly left on an around-the-world trip six months earlier, Katie refuses to accept that her sister would have taken her own life. Distraught that they never made peace, Katie leaves her orderly, sheltered life in London behind and embarks on a journey to find out the truth. With only the entries in Mia's travel journal as her guide, Katie retraces the last few months of her sister's life and, page by page, country by country, begins to uncover the mystery surrounding her death. . . .

Weaving together the exotic settings and suspenseful twists of Alex Garland's The Beach with a powerful tale of familial love in the spirit of Rosamund Lupton's Sister, Swimming at Night is a fast-paced, accomplished, and gripping debut novel of secrets, loss, and forgiveness.

How about that first line?  Swimming at Night by Lucy Clarke is the start of an older sister's journey to discover answers about her younger sister's death.  I'm over half way through this one and look forward to finishing it before the weekend.

 

Thanks to Rose City Reader for hosting this event every Friday allowing bloggers to share the first sentence of a book that they are  reading and offer some impression of said book!

Does Swimming at Night  grab your attention?  Is it one you'd be interested in reading?  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read!

Happy reading to all! ☮

Happy Reading☮

The Things You Can Read!

Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

Book Beginnings on Friday: Bellman & Black by Diane Setterfield

Book Beginnings on Friday

 

I have heard it said, by those that cannot possibly know, that in the final moments of a man's existence he sees his whole life pass before his eyes.-The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

Summary Courtesy of Goodreads: 

As a boy, William Bellman commits one small, cruel act: killing a bird with his slingshot. Little does he know the unforeseen and terrible consequences of the deed, which is soon forgotten amidst the riot of boyhood games. By the time he is grown, with a wife and children of his own, William seems to be a man blessed by fortune—until tragedy strikes and the stranger in black comes. Then he starts to wonder if all his happiness is about to be eclipsed. Desperate to save the one precious thing he has left, William enters into a rather strange bargain, with an even stranger partner, to found a decidedly macabre business.

And Bellman & Black is born.
 

How about that first line?  Having read it, how can you put this novel down?  And believe me it sure does set the tone for what is to come.  I'm over half way through Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale, and although I had to wait seven years to read her second novel it was worth the wait.  Bellman & Black  is intriguing.  It is the type of book that keeps you on your toes.  Just when you think you know where you are going with this one, you realize you don't.

Thanks to Rose City Reader for hosting this event every Friday allowing bloggers to share the first sentence of a book that they are  reading and offer some impression of said book!

 

 

Does Bellman & Black grab your attention?  Is it one you'd be interested in reading?  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read!

Happy reading to all! ☮

Happy Reading☮

The Things You Can Read!

Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

Book Beginnings on Friday: Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

Book Beginnings on Friday is a great way share what you're reading and find some great books to add to your TBR pile.  Here is what you are asked to do:

Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author's name.-Rose City Reader

"They say I must die"-Burial Rites by Hannah Kent

So far I'm really enjoying this one.  It was one of my older ARCs and I thought I'd better get busy and read it.  It is set in Iceland in 1829, and I am not too familiar with this era of Icelandic history.  It is a historical novel, but is based on a true story.  So far so good!  I can't wait to see where this one will take me.  I'm about 20% done, so I've got a bit more reading to do, but as I said I'm liking it so far.

Summary Courtesy of Goodreads:


In northern Iceland, 1829, Agnes Magnúsdóttir is condemned to death for her part in the brutal murder of two men. Agnes is sent to wait out the months leading up to her execution on the farm of district officer Jón Jónsson, his wife and their two daughters. Horrified to have a convicted murderess in their midst, the family avoid contact with Agnes. Only Tóti, the young assistant priest appointed her spiritual guardian, will listen to Agnes’s side of the story. As the year progresses and the hardships of rural life force everyone to work side by side, the family’s attitude to Agnes starts to change, until one winter night, she begins her whispered confession to them, and they realize that all is not as they had assumed.

Based on a true story, Burial Rites is an astonishing and moving novel about the truths we claim to know and the ways in which we interpret what we’re told. In beautiful, cut-glass prose, Hannah Kent portrays Iceland’s formidable landscape, in which every day is a battle for survival, and asks, how can one woman hope to endure when her life depends upon the stories told by others?

What are you reading right now.  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read!

Happy reading to all! ☮  

Happy Reading☮  

The Things You Can Read!

Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

 

Book Blogger Hop: Question of the Week July 19-25, 2013

What is your favorite classic novel?

 My favorite classic novel is To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.

 

What is your favorite classic?  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read! 

Happy Hopping and Reading!
The Things You Can Read

Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

 

Book Beginnings on Friday

 

This is my second time participating in Book Beginnings on Friday.  Here is what you are asked to do:

 

Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author's name.-Rose City Reader

 

 

"William Stoner entered the University of Missouri as a freshman in the year 1910, at the age of nineteen."- by Stoner by  John Edward Williams

 

This book caught my attention because all the big literary gurus have been praising it as an overlooked classic.  Some have called it a modern day masterpiece.  I am not far enough along to have a firm opinion, but what I have noticed is the writing distances the reader from the main character, Stoner.

What are you reading right now.  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read! 

Happy Reading

The Things You Can Read!

Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!

Book Beginnings on Friday: Response

 

This is my first time participating in Book Beginnings on Friday.  Here is what you are asked to do:

 

Please join me every Friday to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author's name.-Rose City Reader

 

 

"My grandmother said she prays for me every day."-Whistling Past the Graveyard by Susan Crandall

 

I was drawn to read this book by the comparison many have made between Whistling Past the Graveyard and the classic, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  They both have young pre-teen southern narrators, but Whistling Past the Graveyard is not another To Kill a Mockingbird, in my opinion.  With that said, it is a very good read, and I am enjoying it. 

 

 

 

What are you reading right now.  Let us know here at The Things You Can Read! 

Happy Reading

The Things You Can Read!

Believe In Truth, Beauty, Freedom, Love, and the Power of Books!