- Win 1 of 3 copies of How To Never Look Fat Again by Charla Krupp at All About {n}, ends 4/24/10.
- Win 1 of 3 copies of Admission by Jean Hanff Korelitz at All About {n}, ends 4/23/10. I read and reviewed this and enjoyed it. My review is here (my giveaway was last year).
- Romance Lovers Giveaways - there is something for everyone here who loves romance, 5 copies of 5 different books up for grabs. Go enter at All About {n}, ends 4/17/10.
- Win A Week In December by Sebastian Faulks at A Bookworm's World, ends 5/1/10.
- Win 1 of 3 copies of The Pocket Therapist by Therese Borchard at A Bookworm's World, ends 4/24/10.
- Win The Body Finder and great swag at The Eager Readers, ends 4/30.
- Another great The Body Finder giveaway at Candace's Book Blog, ends 4/30.
- Win 2 of Kristina's McBride's The Tension of Opposites notebooks/journals from Margaret's Book Blog, ends 5/7.
- Win 1 of 3 copies of Foxy: My Life in Three Acts by Pam Grier at Books and Needlepoint, ends 4/20.
- See Mr. Linky at this post at Princes Bookie for more giveaways to enter.
- Alaine at Queen of Happy Endings is having her April giveaway - select from 3 great books. ends 4/30.
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
More Giveaways
As I stated on Monday - I plan to do a post every few days with links to giveaways I've found around the blogosphere. It's not just to get extra entries but to provide you my readers with additional giveaways you can enter and other great blogs/websites to visit. So here's this installment:
Book Review: Asking For Trouble by Sandra Byrd
Asking For Trouble by Sandra Byrd
Publisher: Tyndale
Publish
Date: April 1, 2010
Paperback, 266 pages
My Review:
This is an adorable book about 15-year-old Savvy Smith whose family has moved to a village outside of London during her high school years where they all pretty much have to start over. The book shows that starting over isn't easy, whether it's for Savvy, her mom, her little sister or even for her dad. It's very entertaining and I love Savvy's outlook on things. She never gets too down and in her times of deepest need she turns to the Bible and to God in a very realistic way.
I also felt this book was very realistic as Savvy tries to find her place. Things are not completely resolved over night and Savvy has lessons to learn and that is what makes it interesting. Savvy has a lot of character building moments that are interesting and not too over-the-top. I think it will be helpful for tween/teen girls that are going through a lot of the same things as Savvy. I feel that Ms. Byrd has a great handle on the teen/tween readers she is seeking (as well as their moms because I found this book wonderful).
I laughed and was touched in this book. It's well-written and I look forward to the next book, Through Thick and Thin, which is also available now from Tyndale House.
Rating: 4.5/5.0
About the Book:
When her family moves to London, 15-year-old Savvy Smith has to make her way in a new school and a new country. She just knows the school newspaper is the right place for her, but she doesn’t have the required experience, and the cute editor-in-chief is not looking to train anyone. She has to come up with a way to prove herself and nab the one available position on the newspaper staff at Wexburg Academy.
London Confidential is a new series where British fashion, friendships, and guys collide, and where an all-American girl learns to love life and live out her faith.
About the Author (from Goodreads.com):
Best-selling author Sandra Byrd has published nearly three dozen books in the Christian fiction and non-fiction market, including her latest series for adults, French Twist, which includes the Christy finalist Let Them Eat Cake (2007) and its sequels, Bon Appétit (2008) an Piece de Resistance (2009). Her newest series for young adults debuts in April, 2010: London Confidential. The first two books are entitled, Asking For Trouble, and Through Thick and Thin. London Confidential Books Three and Four will follow in September, 2010. Sandra's next series for adults will debut in June, 2011. Sandra also has a number of nonfiction titles available for women and tweens/teens.
Several of Sandra's shorter works appear in periodical markets such as Today's Christian Woman(Kyria), Relevant, Clubhouse, Pockets, Decision, Susie, and Guideposts. For nearly a decade Sandra has shared her secrets with the many students she mentors through the Christian Writers Guild. Before turning to full-time writing, Sandra was an acquisitions editor in the ABA market. She lives in the Seattle, Washington, area with her husband and two children.
FTC Information: I received this book through FIRST Wild Card Tours from Christy Wong of Tyndale House Publishers for review. I have Amazon links on my review pages but I do not make any money from these because of NC laws. I put them solely for people to check out the books on a retail site.
Book Tour: Asking for Trouble by Sandra Byrd
It is time for a FIRST Wild Card Tour book review! If you wish to join the FIRST blog alliance, just click the button. We are a group of reviewers who tour Christian books. A Wild Card post includes a brief bio of the author and a full chapter from each book toured. The reason it is called a FIRST Wild Card Tour is that you never know if the book will be fiction, non~fiction, for young, or for old...or for somewhere in between! Enjoy your free peek into the book!You never know when I might play a wild card on you!
Today's Wild Card author is:
and the book:
Tyndale House Publishers (March 4, 2010)
***Special thanks to Christy Wong of Tyndale House Publishers for sending me a review copy.***
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Best-selling author Sandra Byrd has published nearly three dozen books in the Christian market, including her latest series, French Twist, which includes the Christy Award finalist Let Them Eat Cake (WaterBrook Press, 2007) and its sequel, Bon Appétit (WaterBrook Press, 2008). Many of her acclaimed fiction and nonfiction books target the tween and young adult markets. She has also published a book for new moms entitled Heartbeats. Several of Sandra’s shorter works have appeared in periodicals such as Relevant, Clubhouse, Pockets, Decision, and Guideposts. For the past seven years, she has shared her secrets with the many students she mentors through the Christian Writers Guild. Before turning to full-time writing, Sandra was an acquisitions editor in the ABA market. She lives in the Seattle, Washington, area with her husband and two children.
Visit the author's website.
Product Details:
List Price: $6.99
Reading level: Ages 9-12
Paperback: 272 pages
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers (March 4, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1414325975
ISBN-13: 978-1414325972
AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:
I hung back at the doorway to the cafeteria of my new supercool British school, Wexburg Academy. Most of the lunch tables were already packed, and the room was buzzing with chatter. The populars, whom I'd secretly nicknamed the Aristocats, commanded an entire table right in the center of the room. Their good looks and posh accents made up the sun around which all other tables orbited. The normal kids were in the second circle, arranged by friends or clubs or activities. The drama table was on the outer edge of the room, and so were the geeks, the nerds, and the punk wannabes--way out there like Neptune, but still planets. Most everyone had a group. I didn't.
Okay, so there was one table with lots of room. The leftovers table. It might as well have been the dark side of the moon.
No way.
I skipped lunch--again--and headed to the library. One of the computers was available and I logged on, desperately hoping for an e-mail from Seattle.
There was an e-mail from my grandmother reminding me to floss because British dentists only cleaned adult teeth.
Spam from Teen Vogue.
An invitation to join the Prince Harry fan club--I opened it and gave it a quick scan. I'd consider it more later.
And . . . one from Jen!
I clicked open the e-mail from my best friend at home--well, it had been my home till a couple of months ago--hoping for a lunch full of juicy news served alongside tasty comments about how she missed me and was planning stuff for my next visit home. I craved something that would take me the whole lunch period to read and respond to and remind me that I did have a place somewhere in this universe.
From: Jen
To: Savannah
Hey, Fortune Cookie, so how's it going? Met the Queen yet? LOL. Sorry I haven't written too much. It's been so busy. Samantha took the position you'd been promised on the newspaper staff. She's brand new, but then again you would have been too. It seemed strange without you at first, but I think she'll do okay--maybe even better than okay. And hey, life has changed for everyone, right? Things are crazy busy at school, home, and church. We hang out a lot more now that a bunch of us are driving. Will write again in a few weeks.
Miss you!
Jen
A few weeks! My lungs filled with air, and I let it out slowly, deflating like a balloon with a slow leak. I poised my hands over the keyboard to write a response but just . . . couldn't. What would I say? It had already been weeks since we'd last e-mailed. Most of my friends texted instead of e-mailing anyway, but texting across the Atlantic Ocean cost way too much. And the truth was . . .
I'd moved, and they'd moved on.
I logged off the computer and sat there for a minute, blinking back tears. Jen hadn't meant to forget me. I was simply out of her orbit now.
I pretended to read Sugar magazine online, but mostly I was staring at the clock, passing the time till I could respectably head to my next class.
Five minutes before class I swung my book bag onto my shoulder and headed down the hall. Someone was stapling flyers to the wall. “Hi, Hazelle.”
“Hullo, Savannah.” She breezed by me, stapling another pink flyer farther down the wall. We had math class together--oh yeah, maths, as the Brits called it--first period. I'd tried to make friends with her; I'd even asked her if she'd like to sit together in lunch, but she'd crisply informed me that she sat at the table with the other members of the newspaper staff.
She didn't bother with small talk now either, but went on stapling down the hall. I glanced at one of the flyers, and one sentence caught my eye right away: Looking for one experienced journalist to join the newspaper staff.
I yanked the flyer off the wall and jammed it into my bag. I was experienced. Wasn't I?
A nub of doubt rose inside me--the kind that popped up, unwelcome, anytime I tried to rationalize something that wasn't exactly true or right.
This time I swallowed it back. I thought back to Jen's e-mail that kind of felt like a polite dismissal. I lived in London now.
It was time to take matters into my own hands.
Okay, so there was one table with lots of room. The leftovers table. It might as well have been the dark side of the moon.
No way.
I skipped lunch--again--and headed to the library. One of the computers was available and I logged on, desperately hoping for an e-mail from Seattle.
There was an e-mail from my grandmother reminding me to floss because British dentists only cleaned adult teeth.
Spam from Teen Vogue.
An invitation to join the Prince Harry fan club--I opened it and gave it a quick scan. I'd consider it more later.
And . . . one from Jen!
I clicked open the e-mail from my best friend at home--well, it had been my home till a couple of months ago--hoping for a lunch full of juicy news served alongside tasty comments about how she missed me and was planning stuff for my next visit home. I craved something that would take me the whole lunch period to read and respond to and remind me that I did have a place somewhere in this universe.
From: Jen
To: Savannah
Hey, Fortune Cookie, so how's it going? Met the Queen yet? LOL. Sorry I haven't written too much. It's been so busy. Samantha took the position you'd been promised on the newspaper staff. She's brand new, but then again you would have been too. It seemed strange without you at first, but I think she'll do okay--maybe even better than okay. And hey, life has changed for everyone, right? Things are crazy busy at school, home, and church. We hang out a lot more now that a bunch of us are driving. Will write again in a few weeks.
Miss you!
Jen
A few weeks! My lungs filled with air, and I let it out slowly, deflating like a balloon with a slow leak. I poised my hands over the keyboard to write a response but just . . . couldn't. What would I say? It had already been weeks since we'd last e-mailed. Most of my friends texted instead of e-mailing anyway, but texting across the Atlantic Ocean cost way too much. And the truth was . . .
I'd moved, and they'd moved on.
I logged off the computer and sat there for a minute, blinking back tears. Jen hadn't meant to forget me. I was simply out of her orbit now.
I pretended to read Sugar magazine online, but mostly I was staring at the clock, passing the time till I could respectably head to my next class.
Five minutes before class I swung my book bag onto my shoulder and headed down the hall. Someone was stapling flyers to the wall. “Hi, Hazelle.”
“Hullo, Savannah.” She breezed by me, stapling another pink flyer farther down the wall. We had math class together--oh yeah, maths, as the Brits called it--first period. I'd tried to make friends with her; I'd even asked her if she'd like to sit together in lunch, but she'd crisply informed me that she sat at the table with the other members of the newspaper staff.
She didn't bother with small talk now either, but went on stapling down the hall. I glanced at one of the flyers, and one sentence caught my eye right away: Looking for one experienced journalist to join the newspaper staff.
I yanked the flyer off the wall and jammed it into my bag. I was experienced. Wasn't I?
A nub of doubt rose inside me--the kind that popped up, unwelcome, anytime I tried to rationalize something that wasn't exactly true or right.
This time I swallowed it back. I thought back to Jen's e-mail that kind of felt like a polite dismissal. I lived in London now.
It was time to take matters into my own hands.
Waiting on Wednesday - April 7
"Waiting On" Wednesday
is a weekly event, hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly
anticipating.
Release: April 27, 2010 (my son's birthday)
From Goodreads:
Before Carrie Bradshaw hit the big time in the City, she was a regular girl growing up in the suburbs of Connecticut. How did she turn into one of the most-read social observers of our generation?
The Carrie Diaries opens up in Carrie's senior year of high school. She and her best friends -- Walt, Lali, Maggie, and the Mouse -- are inseparable, amid the sea of Jens, Jocks and Jets. And then Sebastian Kydd comes into the picture. Sebastian is a bad boy-older, intriguing, and unpredictable. Carrie falls into the relationship that she was always supposed to have in high school-until a friend's betrayal makes her question everything. With her high school days coming to a close, Carrie will realize it's finally time to go after everything she ever wanted.
Rabid fans of Sex and the City will love seeing Carrie Bradshaw evolve from a regular girl into a sharp, insightful writer. They'll learn about her family background -- how she found her writing voice, and the indelible impression her early friendships and relationships left on her. We'll see what brings Carrie to her beloved New York City, where the next Carrie Diaries book will take place.
I've watched the first few seasons of Sex and the City so I am interested to see what Carrie was like in high school. I love her character on the show so this book makes it onto my really-want-to-read pile!
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