The Book Stacks

Welcome to this week’s A Book By Any Other Name!

The game works like this: Each week I will choose a word and offer a few titles that I’ve come up with containing that word in the title. Then it’s your turn to come up with book titles containing the same word, without duplication (yes, that includes my titles.) I would also like the author, but that is just so I can find the book if I want to read it.

The current challenge: I challenge you all to reach 21 titles containing the weekly word by midnight Friday, (with no more than 10 titles commented per person and not including *my* title in the total.)

My forfeit? If you make it to 21 titles, I will draw a name from the participants and that person will win a copy of any one of the books on this page along with a bookmark (or two!). I’ve decided this is a much better way of doing things rather than offering the SAME book over and over.

Choice is good!

So if you’d like a chance to win, join in!

If you don’t reach the goal, we’ll try again next week. If you reach the goal, I’ll have a brand new challenge for you next Monday where you’ll get another chance to win a book - regardless if you have won a book previously!

(If you’re feeling pouty about the ten titles per person limit, why not get a friend to come and comment as well? The more, the merrier.)

The word this week is:

Step

I Say: Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life by Thich Nhat Hanh, H. H. the Dalai Lama, and Arnold Kotler

You Say…

Hello everyone!

I’ve decided to hold a contest that will be a good thing for everyone. I don’t feel right just asking for help without offering something in return, so I figured a contest would be the perfect way to do things.

I write for a site called The Bloggers Guide, writing articles all about my beloved Melbourne and surrounds. Currently, they have a contest running for the six regional winners from around the world. (I’m standing for Australasia.)

I’m hoping to not only win the grand prize but to also have at least some of my entries become popular enough to be published in The Bloggers Guide to Melbourne book. I very much need your help.

What You Can Win

Like I said, I don’t feel quite right asking for your help and giving nothing in return. What I’m offering you is… drumroll… a copy of Chicken Soup for the Soul: Campus Chronicles. (The one in the picture.)

Why this book? This recently published book just so happens to have a nonfiction story about a horror roommate of mine tucked in its pages.

I’m giving away three copies. If more than ten people enter, I will increase the number of copies to give away to five.

If you’re not keen on this book, just let me know and we’ll work something else out.

Winners of this (my) contest will be announced May 3rd.

How to Win

I very much hope you’ll go in and vote to help me, as it doesn’t take a lot of time and you don’t have to sign up to do so. However, there is no way to keep track of who voted. Because of that…

All you have to do is put up one post. Easy peasy. Just let your readers know what’s going on and that I’m looking for a little help from my friends (I’m going to get that song stuck in my head now). Put up a post with a little blurb, the links to where they can vote, and how they can also go in for a chance to win. (They must come back here to leave a link to their post to be entered.)

Where to Vote:

Go here: http://www.thebloggersguide.com/wbc and give five stars to The New Australian.

Go here: http://www.thebloggersguide.com/melbourne/the-new-australian and rate me at five stars again.

Lastly, go here: http://www.thebloggersguide.com/blogs/jmsilver That’s a list of all my blog entries. You can click on the “+” signs next to each entry.

Voting goes until May 1st, so be sure to check in often and cheer on The New Australian.

As always, thank you for your kindness and support.

The combination of food and sex is by far not a unique or new concept in the world of sexual bliss. The book Erotica Café, however, is.

We have included a fun “Kiss” scale from one to ten, rating each recipe. The rating formula was based on fun, passion and pleasure.

Recently I decided that I should spice up my reading list a little bit by adding something fun. Described as a sensual recipe book with humor and fun facts as well, Erotica Café, appeared to be the perfect book for me to read next.

Lo and behold, I was wrong.

I probably should have figured out by the first page with the weirdly alternating fonts and lack of chapters or other organization, but I kept on.

While many of the recipes sounded tasty and easy to make, I didn’t get to read them all. I kept getting distracted because along with no chapters, there are also often no page breaks. This book’s arrangement is like someone’s scrapbook – all kinds of interesting pieces with no organization. Let me amend that – I have seen plenty of scrapbooks more reader/viewer friendly and organized than this book.

Erotica Café, appears to be a book that its creators didn’t take seriously enough to set up in a reader-friendly manner, so I don’t think it’s any surprise that I don’t take it seriously either. I would have been immensely better if the creators had just taken some time to format it properly.

But that is a far off dream, as the publisher – Rain Publishing – no longer exists.

I don’t recommend this book for anything other than a laugh. If you’re looking for seductive recipes and/or erotic lore, there are plenty of better books out there that will do the job quite nicely.

Muscled hunks with shining swords. Dazzling maidens trapped in towering castles. Haunted woods where lurking creatures threaten doom. Such things dwell within the realm of heroic fantasy. There where evil threatens, bronze-skinned warriors will rise to meet the challenge; and where all who came before have failed, they will overcome. The greater the danger faced, the more reward and glory that our hero gains.

This is the idealized world we enter when immersing ourselves into the stories of heroic fantasy. Where in our own lives evil seems to triumph just as often as does good, where justice is evasive and ethics anything but black and white, where corrupt men rise to wealth and power and honest men die cold and poor, unknown and alone, here wrong is always overcome and evil is defeated. It is the world we wished we lived in, the strong and awe-inspiring heroes that we wished we were.

What child has not dreamed of slaying dragons, or played make-believe with capes and wooden swords? But who among these young, untainted minds would play the part of troll or ogre, or the evil overlord whose downfall is at hand? It’s as if the innocence of youth knows well the landscape of this realm that we adults must strive to find.

In a sense it’s as if by reading these heroic tales of knights and demons we can regain that sense of truth and honor, and revisit once again the wondrous landscape we had wandered in our youth.

Heroic fantasy has had a long and illustrious career, for in every age the threat of doom has lurked among us. From Achilles to Aragorn, Gilgamesh to Conan the Barbarian, we readers of fantastic works have always loved our epic heroes.

The earliest mythologies are fraught with tales of superhuman exploits, events that loom as larger-than-life, one of the fundamental tenets of heroic fantasy. It can, in fact, be argued that heroic fantasy was the first and foremost of literary genres. The Epic of Gilgamesh, for example, is among the earliest known works of literary fiction, composed sometime prior to 2000 B.C.E., telling of the super-human king of Uruk’s epic battles with the demon-ogre Humbaba, of his walking on the bottom of the ocean, and many other great adventures.

Greco-Roman mythology is filled with heroes overcoming fantastic creatures, from snake-haired gorgons to seven-headed hydras. Among the earliest of prose novels is that of Don Quixote, a satire of heroic fantasy, in which our witless hero jousts with windmills thinking they are giants.

And who has never read the tales of Arthur and the hero quests of his fabled Knights of the Round Table, filled with magic and supernatural horror from the hands of Merlin and Moran Le Fay? From The Odyssey to Beowulf the hero’s quest has taken us on mythic voyages through wondrous realms of magic and enchantment, where evil lurks at every turn, and only we as heroes can defeat it.

About the Author:

R. Scot Johns is a life-long student of ancient and medieval literature, with an enduring fascination for Norse mythology and epic fantasy. He first came to Beowulf through his love of J. R. R. Tolkien, a leading scholar on the subject.

As an Honors Medieval Literature major he has given lectures on such topics as the historical King Arthur and the construction of Stonehenge. He owns and operates Fantasy Castle Books, his own publishing imprint, and writes the blog Adventures of an Independent Author, where you can follow his progress as he writes The Jester’s Quest, his second novel.

You can visit his website at www.fantasycastlebooks.com.

Today has been all about cleaning virtual house. I’m canceling accounts left and right.

It’s come to my attention just how many sites I’m signed up for that I don’t want or need to be signed up for. Some I don’t even remember signing up for. So I’ve been going through, canceling accounts and making record of the details of the accounts I’m keeping. It’s a bigger job than I thought it would be.

Do you keep track of all the sites you sign up for?

Remember to play the Monday game for your chance to win a book of your choice and bookmark.

Reading:
In Bad Dreams – Horror Anthology – Edited by Mark Deniz and Sharyn Lilley
The Daughters of Moab - Kim Westwood

Going to Read:
Saffron Dreams – Shaila Abdullah
The Vision – C.L. Talmage
Fallout – C.L. Talmage
The Scorpions Strike – C.L. Talmage
Scattered Leaves – Richard Roach
Kissing Games of the World – Sandi Kahn Shelton
Supernatural – Graham Hancock
Neutron Star – Short story collection – Larry Niven
Firebirds – Fantasy/Sci-fi Anthology – Edited by Sharyn November
The Foreshadowing – Marcus Sedgwick
The Redemption of Althalus – David and Leigh Eddings
The Serpent Bride – Sara Douglass
The Twisted Citadel – Sara Douglass
Season of Sacrifice – Tristi Pinkston
Copper Star – Suzanne Woods Fisher
Copper Fire – Suzanne Woods Fisher
The Lost Diary of Don Juan – Douglas Carlton Abrams

Upcoming Reviews:
Dead Ringer – Mary Burton
Erotica Cafe – Tilly Rivers
The Cult of the Amateur - Andrew Keen

So what’s on your list?

Welcome to this week’s A Book By Any Other Name!

The game works like this: Each week I will choose a word and offer a few titles that I’ve come up with containing that word in the title. Then it’s your turn to come up with book titles containing the same word, without duplication (yes, that includes my titles.) I would also like the author, but that is just so I can find the book if I want to read it.

The current challenge: I challenge you all to reach 21 titles containing the weekly word by midnight Friday, (with no more than 10 titles commented per person and not including *my* title in the total.)

My forfeit? If you make it to 21 titles, I will draw a name from the participants and that person will win a copy of any one of the books on this page along with a bookmark (or two!). I’ve decided this is a much better way of doing things rather than offering the SAME book over and over.

Choice is good!

So if you’d like a chance to win, join in!

If you don’t reach the goal, we’ll try again next week. If you reach the goal, I’ll have a brand new challenge for you next Monday where you’ll get another chance to win a book - regardless if you have won a book previously!

(If you’re feeling pouty about the ten titles per person limit, why not get a friend to come and comment as well? The more, the merrier.)

The word this week is:

Third

I Say: The Third Reich at War by Richard J. Evans

You Say…

Things have been busy but calm all at the same time this past week. It’s quite strange, but I take it to mean that I am finally getting the hang of the thing I want so much – balancing my time. Work, creative writing, reading… I’ve actually done it all this week. Weird.

Recently my reading focused has honed in on a non-fiction book: The Cult of the Amateur – How Today’s Internet is Killing Our Culture and Assaulting Our Economy by Andrew Keen.

Long title. Interesting subject.

As complicated as the title may make it sound, Keen actually does a good job of making himself clear on what he is saying and what his position is. I won’t get into it any more than that because I don’t want to write a review until I’m done.

One way I know a book is a good one is if it moves me to feel something. Even if that something is a hatred of the book, it’s still a ‘good’ book because of the lack of apathy on my part.

I already know this is a good book. I’m only fifty pages in and twice already I’ve gotten into a deep conversation with my husband about certain aspects of the book. I nearly preached to him as we talked about it last night.

Why do I have so much to say about this book? Because I feel Keen ignores key things, but on the other hand, I can understand why he does. But the very fact I am so impassioned about this book and this subject to actually go on and on about it makes it a good book no matter how I feel about it at the end.

(Mind you, the case would be different were it a fiction book. Bad endings can turn good books bad.)

What I’m wondering is if you have ever gotten so wrapped up in a book that you couldn’t help but go on and on about it. That you couldn’t help but talk with anyone who would listen about it.

Melayne and her young brother Sarrow are Talents, hunted by the King’s relentless Seekers. If their Talent is discovered, they will be sent to their death. So they must hide…or die.

Melayne must unlock the secret of Dragonhome. As danger approaches, it will be her only hope.

As I mentioned in a past Thursday Thirteen, when I’m ill, I like ‘light’ and easy reading. That’s why, when faced with the choice of what to read next, I opted for an old favourite: The Secret of Dragonhome.

John Peel has an easy but masculine way of writing, which means that a story coming from a fifteen-year-old girl sounds a bit different. However, the world Peel has created for this book is so enjoyable – and familiar enough to easily lose yourself in – that Peel’s masculine writing voice in a teenage girl is little more than a niggle, if that.

I have to admit that this book was more enjoyable to me when I was younger. Maybe back then I was just able to suspend my belief more than I can now or I simply didn’t care as much. But now, at my age, it’s worth a reread for nostalgia, but important story elements like the romance between Melayne and her man fell a little too flat to be enjoyable.

I recommend this book to young ladies who want a light, uncomplicated read with a bit of mystery and romance. I’d recommend it to young men, too, but having it read from a teenage girl’s perspective along with the romance, I don’t think it’d appeal very much.
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My review policy.

Giddy sugarplum or calculating bitch? Pretty Konstanze aroused strong feelings among her contemporaries. Her in-law’s loathed her. Mozart’s friends, more than forty years after his death remained eager to gossip about her “failures” as wife to the world’s first superstar. Maturing from child to wife to hard-headed widow, Konstanze would pay Mozart’s debts, provide for their children and relentlessly market and mythologize her brilliant husband.

Mozart’s letters attest to his affection for Konstanze as well as to their powerful sexual bond. Nevertheless, prominent among the mysteries surrounding the composer’s untimely death: why did his “best beloved little wife” never mark his grave?

About the Author

Juliet Waldron was educated in the U.S., England, and the West Indies. She has a B.A. in English, and has worked in the financial and brokerage industries. Now retired, she’s published several novels. Mozarts Wife won the First Independent e-Book Award (The VA Festival of the Book) and is currently available in audio, “e” and print at Amazon, B&N and Hardshell.com.

www.julietwaldron.com
www.mozartswife.com

“Waldron’s writing is humorous, erotic, and fluid. Her beautiful use of words reveals the delicate, volatile intimacy inherent in marriage. In the antagonist, Waldron characterizes a woman’s quiet (and sometimes not so quiet) struggle to remain the dutiful wife while also protecting her children and herself from her husband’s self-destructive behavior. Mozart’s Wife is a consuming piece that reminds us that all humans, regardless of talent or skill, are within the boundaries of fault and outside the lines of perfection. I highly recommend this wonderful book.”

— Melissa Levine
In the Library Reviews

Everyone knows that serious purveyors of fiction write in the third person. They hover high above their characters, the better to examine them with high-powered binoculars. And there is nothing wrong with this approach, if you can pull it off.

I did passably well in my first two novels “Crystal Meth Cowboys” and “The Violin Player.” But I felt there was something missing. A consistent point of view. The all-knowing third person narrator should, by definition, maintain a semblance of neutrality towards his characters, let their actions and dialogue speak for them.

But I’m one opinionated s.o.b. And I like to think I have a good sense of humor. I got to indulge both these predilections when I shifted to first person narrative in my new mystery “A Pure Double Cross.”

Which is not to say you can’t create humor in the third person. Catch-22’s Yossarian is a funny guy who gets tangled in bizarrely humorous situations. But while we’re often amused we rarely laugh at this exploits. I think this is because we view him from a distance. Humor is generally more immediate. And it needs an individual point of view. Stand-up comics get their biggest yoks when telling stories on themselves.

I wish I could say I had puzzled this all out before I dove into the Hal Schroeder trilogy, of which “A Pure Double Cross” is Book One. But I had not. I had the makings of a story and a central character and set about the tedious task of crafting an outline. The plot line behaved itself but Hal Schroeder insisted on speaking to me in the first person.

I liked him that way. He cracked me up. And why not? First person narratives are commonplace in the mystery genre, though I have never been quite sure why. Doesn’t the suspense in a thriller depend upon the fate of the hero? And if the hero is also the narrator we know he’s not getting knocked off no matter what mayhem comes his way.

So writing a first-person mystery does have that drawback. But Raymond Chandler’s Phillip Marlowe novels are first person, and legendary. Not to mention such classics of general fiction as Salinger’s “Catcher in the Rye” and Kerouac’s “On the Road.” Plus those of one of my favorite authors that you never hear about anymore, that slightly daft Southern gentleman Walker Percy.

So high quality fiction can be written from the p-o-v of one character. You’d be hard pressed to create a sweeping epic, and the Nobel Prize committee isn’t likely to awaken you with a 4 a.m. phone call. But you just might have some fun!

************
John Knoerle’s first novel, “Crystal Meth Cowboys,” was optioned by Fox for a TV series. His second novel, “The Violin Player,” won the Mayhaven Award for Fiction. His new novel, “A Pure Double Cross,” is Book One of the American Spy Trilogy. John lives with his wife in Chicago. You can learn more about John Knoerle at www.bluesteelpress.com.

Hi all!

I’ve deleted quite a few titles off my list. That doesn’t mean I’ve decided not to read them, just that I’m sick of having them on my list. Why those books? Well, to be honest, they’re ebooks. I work all day on the computer, not to mention the usual emails, keeping up with friends, etc. To also then sit and read books on the computer screen…

Like I said, I’m not saying I won’t read them; I just won’t get to them anytime soon. That’ll change the day I can afford to buy an ereader. Until then, I focus more on portable hard copies.

Remember to play the Monday game for your chance to win a book of your choice and bookmark.

Reading:
In Bad Dreams – Horror Anthology – Edited by Mark Deniz and Sharyn Lilley
The Daughters of Moab - Kim Westwood
Dead Ringer – Mary Burton
Erotica Cafe – Tilly Rivers

Going to Read:
Saffron Dreams – Shaila Abdullah
The Vision – C.L. Talmage
Fallout – C.L. Talmage
The Scorpions Strike – C.L. Talmage
Scattered Leaves – Richard Roach
Kissing Games of the World – Sandi Kahn Shelton
Supernatural – Graham Hancock
Neutron Star – Short story collection – Larry Niven
Firebirds – Fantasy/Sci-fi Anthology – Edited by Sharyn November
The Foreshadowing – Marcus Sedgwick
The Redemption of Althalus – David and Leigh Eddings
The Serpent Bride – Sara Douglass
The Twisted Citadel – Sara Douglass
Season of Sacrifice – Tristi Pinkston
Copper Star – Suzanne Woods Fisher
Copper Fire – Suzanne Woods Fisher
The Lost Diary of Don Juan – Douglas Carlton Abrams

Upcoming Reviews:
The Secret of Dragonhome - John Peel

So what’s on your list?

Welcome to this week’s A Book By Any Other Name!

The game works like this: Each week I will choose a word and offer a few titles that I’ve come up with containing that word in the title. Then it’s your turn to come up with book titles containing the same word, without duplication (yes, that includes my titles.) I would also like the author, but that is just so I can find the book if I want to read it.

The current challenge: I challenge you all to reach 21 titles containing the weekly word by midnight Friday, (with no more than 10 titles commented per person and not including *my* title in the total.)

My forfeit? If you make it to 21 titles, I will draw a name from the participants and that person will win a copy of any one of the books on this page along with a bookmark (or two!). I’ve decided this is a much better way of doing things rather than offering the SAME book over and over.

Choice is good!

So if you’d like a chance to win, join in!

If you don’t reach the goal, we’ll try again next week. If you reach the goal, I’ll have a brand new challenge for you next Monday where you’ll get another chance to win a book - regardless if you have won a book previously!

(If you’re feeling pouty about the ten titles per person limit, why not get a friend to come and comment as well? The more, the merrier.)

The word this week is:

Soul

I Say: Your Soul’s Plan: Discovering the Real Meaning of the Life You Planned Before You Were Born by Robert Schwartz

You Say…

A band’s demo tape is intended to introduce listeners to their music. Likewise, this collection of short pieces allows readers into the fictional world of Trevor Wolff and his band, ShapeShifter.

Originally published online between April 2006 and March 2007, the Demo Tapes: Year 1 brings together the moments that parallel – but never encounter – Susan Helene Gottfried’s debut novel, Trevor’s Song. Arranged chronologically and with introductions to each, this is a must-have volume for anyone who’s ever wanted to hang with a rock band.

In my opinion, one true measure of a book is whether or not you want to continue reading the book through stressful events. Recently, The Demo Tapes, was put to this test by yours truly and passed with gold stars and a bottle of Ping’s soy sauce.

The husband took me into the doctor and the book I grabbed to read just so happened to be The Demo Tapes. Right from the beginning, I was drawn into the lives of the ShapeShifter band as well as the people who loved them. I’m not a rock n’ roll chick by any means, but I found the well-formed characters to be endearing right from the start. People I couldn’t help but want to get to know more.

I didn’t want to put the book down, even as I sat waiting for an x-ray – and not even when I sat down later to wait to hear the results of the x-ray.

Gottfried’s writing style is easy and relaxed, so the reader’s focus is exactly where it is supposed to be: the characters.

Even if you aren’t familiar with Trevor Wolff and ShapeShifter, you can enjoy this introduction to the band. The fly-on-the-wall vantage point you get in this book will make you feel like you’re hanging out with the guys on tour, stopping over at the Voss house to hang out and laughing it up with them as they experience life.

I definitely recommend this book even if, like I said before, you’re not familiar with ShapeShifter. This book is still worth a read.

My only complaint is that it ended.

__
PS. I’m fine, by the way. Definitely on the mend.
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If you would like to check out my review policy, click here.

A little late, but worth the wait…

This week’s question:

“What book do you think should be made into a movie? And do you have any suggestions for the producers?

Or, What book do you think should NEVER be made into a movie?”

Oooo, the book I would love to see made into a movie is Clive Barker’s Abarat! A lot of his fans are pissed off because he’s taking so darn long to finish the series, but that aside, I think Abarat would be fantastic. Very hard to produce, but awesome.

There are colours, fantastic places, fun characters… Can I buy tickets yet?

Beyond that…

My brain has suddenly gone blank. Goodie.

There are quite a few books I love - especially women’s fiction - that, I really do love, but I wouldn’t want to see made in a movie. Shobhan Bantwal’s books, for instance. I completely and absolutely adore the books, but as a movie? I don’t think they’d do well. Audiences these days would get bored because they cater to people (mostly women) who like to sit down and read about relationships and other cultures.

You know what? Frankly, I could do with some movies that just plain aren’t based on books, comic books, children’s books, classic books, yada yada. You hear that, Hollywood? Produce something good an original. We’ve seen enough comic book characters on screen and you have plenty of book to movie things happening, so why not something original, okay?

Haha. I didn’t plan to go there, but hasn’t that been annoying you as well?

Hello everyone! JM here. Yes, I am still alive and kicking.

Thank you to everyone for your patience while I recover and to my wonderful husband for taking over on my blogs when and where he could. I know he had a lot of fun. I hope you enjoyed his writing.

Because I’m cross-posting this on most of my sites, I can’t say whether or not he’ll continue to post on *this* site in particular. He took on the heavier load of the beginning of the week and now things are winding down a bit. I’m hoping that by next week, I’ll be either completely back to health or at least to a point where being awake for more than two hours isn’t an effort.

For those of you who are curious about what’s going on, I’ve had some sort of virus or other for about a month now. It’s quite miserable, but a big problem for me because I can’t get paid leave from work (a downside to freelancing) is the fatigue (and zero energy). I am sleeping a lot, and thought I’m told it’s what I need, it still doesn’t make life any easier.

So that is what’s been going on with me and why my husband volunteered to step in and share some of the load so I can recover properly.

We went to the hospital last night and I got a chest x-ray to make sure I’m free and clear of pneumonia, which I am. So now it’s up to me to rest and a new round of antibiotics to get cracking on this virus.

Thank you again for all your patience. I’ll be right again in no time.