#50 Book Pledge List. Made it to 50 and beyond!

May 28, 2012

@just_d_world book contest, Book reviews, moms, Motherless Mama Leave a comment

 

Thanks Harper Collins Canada for the challenge.

Books I have read this year so far (in no particular rating order)

1. Chicken Soup for the soul: Children with Special Needs: Co-creator team: Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Heather McNamara, and Karen Simmons.

2. Selected: Why Some People Lead, Why Others Fail and Why It Matters By Mark Van Vugt and Anjana Ahuja

3. MWF seeking BFF: My Yearlong Search for a New Best Friend by Rachel Bertsche

4. Everyday Food Light: From the Kitchens of Martha Stewart Living

5. If I Tell By Janet Gurtler

6. Your Voice in my Head by Emma Forrest

7. The Possibility of Everything by Hope Edelman

8. Christmas at Tiffany’s by Karen Swan

9. Your Twitter Diet: How I Used Twitter to lose 20 pounds & you can too. By Rebecca Regnier

10. I’ve Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella

11. An Exclusive Love: A Memoir by Johanna Adorjan

12. C’mon Papa by Ryan Knighton

13. Daughters in Law by Joanna Trollope

14. The Right to Write by Julia Cameron

15. Hand Me Down by Melanie Thorne

16. The Ice Princess by Camille Lackberg

17. The Descendants by Kaui Hart Hemmings

18. Autism: from the Chinese Traditional Medicine Perspective by Anthony Young

19. Lone Wolf by Jodi Picoult

20. The Taming by Teresa Toten and Eric Walters

21. Life Is but a Dream by Brian James

22. The Night She disappeared by April Henry

23. This is not a Test by Courtney Summers

24. The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

25. How Not to Move Back in with your Parents by Robert Carrick

26. The Out-Of-Sync Child by Carol Stock Kranowitz, M.A.

27. Absolution by Patrick Flanery

28. The Wild Beast of Wuhan by Ian Hamilton

29. The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party by Alexander McCall Smith

30. Sisters of Glass by Stephanie Hemphill

31. Carly’s voice by Arthur Fleishman and Carly Fleishman

32. The Golden Hat

33. Betrayal by Danielle steel

34. Calico Joe by John Grisham

35. Among Others by Jo Walton

36. Thieves of Bay Street by Bruce Livesey

37. Trail of the Spellman by Lisa Lutz

38. Kaleidoscope by Gail Bowen

39. Web of Angels by Lillian Nattel

40. Both of Us: My Life with Farrah by Ryan O’Neil

41. Pulse by Julian Barnes

42. Girl Meets boy edited by Kelly Milner Halls

43. The Red House by Mark Haddon

44. Knocked Up by Rebecca Eckler

45. I Remember Nothing by Nora Ephron

46. Let’s Pretend this Never Happened by Jenny Lawson (The Bloggess)

47. Why Men Lie by Linden MacIntyre

48. Home by Toni Morrison

49. In One Person by John Irving

50. An Innocent, A Broad by Ann Leary

51. February by Lisa Moore

52. Magnified World by Grace O’Connell

#50 Book Pledge List

May 15, 2012

@just_d_world Book reviews, Mommy minute, moms, Motherless Mama, My Women's Post Book Reviews , , Leave a comment

 

Thanks Harper Collins Canada for the challenge.

Books I have read this year so far (in no particular rating order)

1. Chicken Soup for the soul: Children with Special Needs: Co-creator team: Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Heather McNamara, and Karen Simmons.

2. Selected: Why Some People Lead, Why Others Fail and Why It Matters By Mark Van Vugt and Anjana Ahuja

3. MWF seeking BFF: My Yearlong Search for a New Best Friend by Rachel Bertsche

4. Everyday Food Light: From the Kitchens of Martha Stewart Living

5. If I Tell By Janet Gurtler

6. Your Voice in my Head by Emma Forrest

7. The Possibility of Everything by Hope Edelman

8. Christmas at Tiffany’s by Karen Swan

9. Your Twitter Diet: How I Used Twitter to lose 20 pounds & you can too. By Rebecca Regnier

10. I’ve Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella

11. An Exclusive Love: A Memoir by Johanna Adorjan

12. C’mon Papa by Ryan Knighton

13. Daughters in Law by Joanna Trollope

14. The Right to Write by Julia Cameron

15. Hand Me Down by Melanie Thorne

16. The Ice Princess by Camille Lackberg

17. The Descendants by Kaui Hart Hemmings

18. Autism: from the Chinese Traditional Medicine Perspective by Anthony Young

19. Lone Wolf by Jodi Picoult

20. The Taming by Teresa Toten and Eric Walters

21. Life Is but a Dream by Brian James

22. The Night She disappeared by April Henry

23. This is not a Test by Courtney Summers

24. The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

25. How Not to Move Back in with your Parents by Robert Carrick

26. The Out-Of-Sync Child by Carol Stock Kranowitz, M.A.

27. Absolution by Patrick Flanery

28. The Wild Beast of Wuhan by Ian Hamilton

29. The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party by Alexander McCall Smith

30. Sisters of Glass by Stephanie Hemphill

31. Carly’s voice by Arthur Fleishman and Carly Fleishman

32. The Golden Hat

33. Betrayal by Danielle steel

34. Calico Joe by John Grisham

35. Among Others by Jo Walton

36. Thieves of Bay Street by Bruce Livesey

37. Trail of the Spellman by Lisa Lutz

38. Kaleidoscope by Gail Bowen

39. Web of Angels by Lillian Nattel

40. Both of Us: My Life with Farrah by Ryan O’Neil

41. Pulse by Julian Barnes

42. Girl Meets boy edited by Kelly Milner Halls

43. The Red House by Mark Haddon

44. Knocked Up by Rebecca Eckler

45. I Remember Nothing by Nora Ephron

46. Let’s Pretend this Never Happened by Jenny Lawson (The Bloggess)

Personal Book Review: Honky Tonk Girl

May 9, 2012

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My Life In Lyrics

By Loretta Lynn

“She’d smile in Mommy’s understanding way.” The song, the 1976 best-selling memoir and the Oscar-winning bio picture, The Coal Miner’s Daughter, made Loretta known world-wide. She was the first woman to be named Entertainer of the Year by the Country Music Association and she continues to play to full houses today. This book is filled with her stories, lyrics and personal pictures that tell her rags-to-riches story.

She became famous to me when I was young. My mom would raise the volume on the car radio when her songs came on. We once packed into the family car to travel hours to see Ms. Lynn perform, and I was lucky to see her face to face when she walked by to shake the hands of her fans. I was mesmerized by her larger than life persona. The music bounced off the walls with her passion for singing her story of how she pushed the boundaries in music and life.

Ever since my mom died, when I hear Coal Miner’s Daughter I recall the warmth I felt back then. She represents a time in my life when I still had a childhood. Despite her own childhood in Butcher Holler, Kentucky, she empowered herself to get more out of life. Loretta writes fondly about her time as a child, and more so on writing about her marriage to becoming a mother.

“My mommy used to say I wasn’t afraid of anything. To tell me I couldn’t do something was like daring me to do it.” That drove Loretta to write Mountain Climber. “The higher the mountain the better I like ‘em.”

Whether it’s tears or laughter that moves you as you read about her, you cannot help but feel appreciative of your own life. It is moving and motivating. I miss my mom terribly and feel connection to her when I read this or hear a Loretta tune.

Random Weekend Reads

April 27, 2012

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Absolution by Patrick Flannery

This book signs late on modern South Africa in the dark shadow of apartheid. An acclaimed elderly author searches for a daughter that looked away to fight for her beliefs.  Sam Leroux has been commissioned to pen Clare Wald’s biography. Sam wonders if she left her walls of isolation down and be honest with him and yourself about his ghosts.

Patrick weaves the plot while surrounds the characters with ricj scenery. You can almost feel the humidity seeping through the city’s armor.

The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

The story takes Tony Webster and his boyhood friends meeting Adrian Finn at school. They steer their way through teen angst adolescence together. Adrian was one of the most generous and most intelligent of the group. They all swear they would be friends for life
The plot fast forwards to Tony at retirement after career and a calm divorce. Then a letter arrives that throws a surprise to his quiet retirement and meeting the past. The writing is fast and furious from past to present and back again.

How Not to Move Back in with Your Parents: The Young Person’s Guide to Financial Empowerment by Rob Carrick
The Boomerang Generation has many young people were moving back in with their parents due to rising costs of student loans than fierce job competition. The book doesn’t preach. It does contain examples from young adults featured in case study interviews. Rob walks you through the wealth of information on financial struggles, paying off student loans, establishing a credit rating and many more financial challenges in a case as you get older. The unique angle in the book is that the author addresses the young person as well as offering tips for parents to help their children established strong financial life skills. I would have liked to have this book and have had this book in my early childhood and many tips for all generations

 

 

Reads for Parents on Autism

April 20, 2012

@just_d_world Autism, Book reviews, Marriage, Mommy minute, moms, Motherless Mama , Leave a comment

The Out-of- sync Child

recognizing and coping with sensory processing disorder

by Carol Kranowitz, M.A.
Before my youngest daughter was diagnosed last year with autism I was overwhelmed with all of the  books offering advice.  This book helps break down what you can do for your child who might not be on the spectrum but exhibit sensory overload. What really caught my eye was that all of them approaches that are mentioned in the book are drug-free. This is a book for my reference shelf.

The Golden Hat

Taking Back Autism

By Kate Winslet, Margret Ericsdottir, and Keli Thorsteinsson

“Thank you for taking this journey   with us. We hope this book brings a new awareness of the opportunity we have   to help those with autism learn to communicate and realize their ambitions.   People with autism have the potential to achieve great things, but only when   given the appropriate support and education. This is why the Golden Hat   Foundation was formed. All author proceeds from this book go directly to the   Golden Hat Foundation. With your help, we can change the world for people   with autism.”

The book is made up of Kate and Margret’s stories, their personal email   correspondence, and Keli’s poetry. Kate has shared this story with some of   the world’s most famous people, posing the question: “What is important   to you to express?” Their responses are a collection of self-portraits   and their answers to the question

All the author proceeds from this book   will benefit the Golden Hat Foundation, founded by Kate Winslet and Margret   Ericsdottir to build innovative living campuses for people with autism and   raise public awareness of their intellectual capabilities.

 

 

Stay tuned for my review of Carly’s   Voice. A book on autism from the inside!
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

#50BookPledge Weekend and Spring Break Reads

March 23, 2012

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Daughters in Law

By Joanna Trollope

Anthony Brinkley and his wife, Rachel, have brought up their three sons in Suffolk. The novel tells of various minor crises in each of these marriages. Its most interesting plot is that of Rachel’s struggle to cope when her sons move away, which leads her to alienate everyone – even gentle Anthony. When confronted with an empty nest, it is easier to engage with the fragility of bird bones than human emotions.

Daughters-in-Law is most successful in its set-pieces. The vicar’s sermon at Luke’s wedding to Charlotte at the beginning of the book is perfectly judged, as is Ralph’s resignation from his merchant bank in Singapore. At these moments, Trollope uses her keen sense of melding plots with poetic backdrops.

 

The Right to Write by Julia Cameron

Writing, for Julia Cameron, is neither solely vocation nor avocation: it is a way of life. It comes first thing in the morning, while the horses are waiting to be fed; it happens at the kitchen counter, while the onions are sautéing and many more places. The more than 40 brief personal essays that make up the book are an unyielding affirmation of the writing life and a reality of all that gets in the way: busy schedules, procrastination, insecurity, lack of writing space, a day job–you get the point. Cameron’s common sense advice is liberating to anyone who has felt hampered by making a big deal out of writing. My favorite piece of advice: Steal time!

 

Hand Me Down by Melanie Thorne

Never has a book hit home of my own teenage life. This story follows fourteen-year-old Elizabeth Reid who has spent her life protecting her sister, Jaime, from their parent’s destructive choices. Jaime lives with their dad and Liz with their mother and stepfather who happens to be an ex-con.

Because of her mother’s husband’s parole conditions Liz is forced to bed hop between two states in search of a stable home. All the while trying to protect her sister from the alcoholic abusive father.

Through fear and shame she stays up at night dreaming of breaking free.

On sale April 12,2012.

 

18/50!!!!

Diving into Ice Princess by Camilla Lackberg. Can’t wait!!!

#50BookPledge Weekend Reads

March 16, 2012

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An Exclusive Love

A Memoir

By Johanna Adorjan

This is not a sugary romance novel.  It’s a memoir by the granddaughter of a couple who committed suicide together when the husband fell fatally ill. The couple married just before WWII and were Jewish. She, writer/granddaughter, tells their story through interviews with people who knew them and her memories of them. She pens trying to imagine what their last day was like. She tries to understand why they killed themselves, particularly Vera who was very healthy.
Love has so many meanings in this book.
It is a very sad yet thoughtfully deep book.

C’mon Papa

By Ryan Knighton
C’mon Papa is Ryan Knighton’s heartbreaking and hilarious voyage through the first year of fatherhood. Becoming a father is a stressful, daunting rite of passage to be sure, but for a blind father, the fears are unimaginably heightened. Ryan will have to find novel ways to adapt to nearly every aspect of parenting.
This is no pity party, and Ryan has no time for sentimentality. Tackling these hurdles with grace and humour, Ryan is determined to do his par.  In his struggle to “see” Tess, Ryan reimagines the relationship between father and child during that first chaotic year.

#50BookPledge Weekend Reads

March 9, 2012

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Your Twitter Diet

How I Used Twitter to Lose 20 pounds & you can too.

By Rebecca Regnier

Rebecca writes a how-to tweet your way to weight loss in an amusing way. She does point out that the book does not create an eating or exercise plan, or replace your doctor.
The core of the Twitter diet is ‘Don’t eat what you wouldn’t tweet.’
With one tweet at a time, Twitter can be with you when you are at the vending machine looking for the 3 o’clock cravings. She covers sources and who to follow if weight loss is your goal. By harnessing the power of Twitter you get the great support you may need. She also includes a ‘twitter for newbies’ section on how you can join Twitter. I didn’t use the book for weight loss specifically. It did help me during my wanderings into the kitchen when I should have been writing. Water in hand I walked out of the kitchen with not one snack. Well done Rebecca.

I’ve Got Your Number

By Sophie Kinsella

Author of the popular Shopaholic series brings us her latest story. Poppy is at a lovely function with friends when the fire alarm goes off. She realizes that she cannot find her engagement ring.  Considering the ring has been in her fiancée’s family for three generations, she panics.  Magnus’s parents are academic and intimidating. She knows they do not want him to marry her. And now the ring is gone. Sitting five feet away from her in a trash bin is a cell phone. She grabs it and ends up getting involved in a whole new turn of events.

#50bookPledge Weekend Reads

March 2, 2012

@just_d_world Book reviews, Mommy minute, moms, Motherless Mama , , 2 Comments

 

The Possibility of Everything by Hope Edelman

Hope Edelman was a woman questioning her life. Feeling vulnerable she was in tuned for change. Dodo, her three-year-old daughter Maya’s disruptive imaginary friend appeared and did not leave. Worried about how to handle Dodo’s strong hold on their daughter, Edelman and her husband made the unlikely choice to take her to Maya healers in Belize, hoping that a shaman might help them banish Dodo. Author of Motherless Daughters and Motherless Mothers writes this beautiful memoir about her family’s journey into the jungle and what they discovered.

Christmas at Tiffany’s by Karen Swan

Three cities in three seasons and one chance to find the life that fits. Cassie settled down too young, marrying her first serious boyfriend. Ten years later, she is betrayed and broken. With her marriage in shambles and no career or home of her own, she needs to work out where she belongs in the world and who she really is. So begins a year-long trial as Cassie leaves her sheltered life in rural Scotland to stay with each of her best friends in the most glamorous cities in the world: New York, Paris and London. Cassie tries on each city for size as she attempts to track down the life she was supposed to have been leading, and with it, the man who was supposed to love her all along.

Your Twitter Diet

February 22, 2012

@just_d_world Book reviews, moms 1 Comment

How I Used Twitter to Lose 20 pounds & you can too.

By Rebecca Regnier

I experience the community of Twitter almost daily. After trying any fad diet to come along, I never thought of using Twitter to help me lose weight. It is so true when you have people keeping you accountable to your goals, many great things can happen.

Rebecca writes a how-to tweet your way to weight loss in an amusing way. She does point out that the book does not create an eating or exercise plan, or replace your doctor.
The core of the Twitter diet is ‘Don’t eat what you wouldn’t tweet.’
With one tweet at a time, Twitter can be with you when you are at the vending machine looking for the 3 o’clock cravings. She covers sources and who to follow if weight loss is your goal. By harnessing the power of Twitter you get the great support you may need. She also includes a ‘twitter for newbies’ section on how you can join Twitter.
Her wisdom, ‘If you wouldn’t say it to your parents, the police or your pastor, don’t Tweet it.’
I didn’t use the book for weight loss specifically. It did help me during my wanderings into the kitchen when I should have been writing. Water in hand I walked out of the kitchen with not one snack. Well done Rebecca.
You can find her on Twitter @LaughItOff and her blog doesthisblogmakemelookfat.com

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