Blog Tour: Blind Sight by James H. Pence

Join me for the Blog Tour of Blind Sight by James H. Pence, my review will come later today.  I also plan on featuring Terror By Night, a non-fiction book by James H. Pence later this month.  Thank you to Kathy Carlton Willis Communications for the book for review.

Publisher:Tyndale

      Paperback: 364 pages   

   ISBN-10: 1601454384

ISBN-13: 978-1601454386
Retail: $17.95

About Blind Sight:

No one plans for bad things to happen. No one plans on losing their family. No one knows how to move on after horror strikes. No one. Not even Thomas Kent. After receiving a strange phone call from a long-ago friend requesting Kent to pick up a package at the airport, Kent begins a spine tingling, suspense filled journey in which he hopes to reunite the package (his friend’s children) with their mother, Justine, a traitor in the Fellowship for World Renewal Cult. Twists and turns in this page turning drama make Blind Sight not only a journey of extreme action and thrills, but one of discovering the sovereign plan of God.

James H. Pence is a full-time professional writer and editor living near Dallas, Texas. James is a multi-talented writer who has been published in both fiction and nonfiction. His publishers include Tyndale House, Kregel, and Osborne/McGraw-Hill. James holds a master’s degree in Biblical Studies with an emphasis in creative writing and journalism from Dallas Theological Seminary. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in theology from Dallas Bible College.

James is also a vocalist and gospel chalk artist, and he regularly uses his talents to share the gospel in prisons. James is the author of Blind Sight, a gripping novel about mind-control cults and coauthor (along with Terry Caffey) of the new book: Terror by Night: The True Story of the Brutal Texas Murder that Destroyed a Family, Restored One Man’s Faith, and Shocked a Nation.

How I Met Terry Caffey...

Terry Caffey and I met through my karate for homeschoolers class. Back in 2005, his wife Penny brought two of their three children and enrolled them in my class. Erin their oldest daughterand Tyler their youngest son or two of my students. Over time, Erin and my daughter Charlene became very good friends. As a matter of fact, Charlene would often stay with the Caffey's when my wife and I were traveling. Somewhere in there I gave Mrs. Caffey a copy of my novel Blind Sight. I don't remember if she read it, but she was a big reader so she probably did. As far as I know Terry had never read it. About six weeks after his family was murdered and his house burned, Terry returned to his property and stood on the ashes of his house crying out to God. His burden that day was to understand why God had taken his family and left him behind without them. As he was praying, he noticed about 15 feet away a brown scorched page from a book leaning up against the trunk of a tree. He went over and picked it up and read it. It just happened to be a single page from Blind Sight that had survived the fire. But it wasn't just any page. It was the page where my main character, a man who had lost his family in an automobile accident, came to grips with God's sovereignty in his loss.  When Terry picked up that piece of paper the first lines he read were, "I couldn't understand why you would take my family and leave me to struggle along without them but I do believe you are sovereign. You are in control." It was as if God had saved or preserved that piece of paper to remind Terry that he still cared. Some time ago, when I was struggling with my own depression over the fact that Blind Sight hadn't sold very well, I gave my book back to God. And I told the Lord that he would just use it in someone's life I would be happy. And boy did he use it in someone's life. From the standpoint of a writer I can think of no greater honor than for God to use my words to change someone's heart. A few weeks after I learned of the connection between Terry and my book, we got together and began to discuss the possibility of telling this amazing story in book form.

Special Gift Basket Opportunity!

Each blog tour host has the opportunity to send in the name of one of their commenters for a chance to win a gift basket from the author.

This special one of a kind basket includes:

Angel- James Pence

Bind Sight- James Pence

Terror By Night- James Pence

Quality 8.5 X 11 in printing of the scorched page

DVD of Chalk Art Illustrations from James Pence

An Interview with James Pence:

1. You've dabbled in a little bit of everything career-wise. Give us a brief summary of your journey so far.   I have definitely had a colorful background as you've already mentioned. I guess the one unifying thread that has run through everything I do is the service of God. I knew when I was 14 years old that God had called me into the ministry, and I've never wavered from that. And even though that ministry now includes such things as teaching karate to homeschoolersI consider that as much a part of my calling as anything else. Since finishing Bible College back in 1978 I have been a youth pastor, a camp director, a pastor, a prison evangelist, a gospel chalk artist, a speaker, a singer, a Web designer, a writer, a karate teacher, an art teacher, and a writing teacher. Amazingly, I'm still active in most of those things. I'm not pastoring anymore, and I've long since left directing summer camps behind me, but everything else I still do. It would be a book in and of itself if I were to try to go into the details of all of those different things and how I got started doing each of them. Suffice it to say that I've always believed that the talents that we have are stewardships. Thus I've always felt that if I have a talent in an area I have a responsibility to develop and use it for God's glory. And that's why do so many different things.  I wouldn't have it any other way.

2. There was a tight deadline for Terror by Night. Tell us a little bit about how you interviewed Terry Caffey and the timeline you had to submit your book.   There was definitely a tight deadline for Terror by Night. I had a total of 12 weeks in which to write it and that included doing all the interviewing with Terry. I'm very happy to say that I was able to meet that challenge, but there were times when I wondered if I could get it all done. Terry and I got together every Wednesday for several hours and I would interview him. Our first few interviews were just for getting the layout of the book planned. I had to get an idea of the different aspects of the story that needed to be pulled together, sort of like a plot outline.  And then I actually had a plan the storyline based on my discussions with Terry. It was sort of a cumulative thing, because as we talked each week more questions would come up and I would make notes on those and we would discuss them in subsequent weeks. I recorded all of the interviews with a digital voice recorder and then transferred them all to my computer.  After that I edited the interviews down into soundbites of two to three minutes all according to topics. Then I put them all on my iPod and would listen to them at every spare moment. My goal was to be familiar enough with Terry's voice so that the book would sound natural and that it would sound like Terry was doing the speaking or writing.

3. Because of the intensity of this book, how did you deal with the emotional side of writing? Did it ever become more than you or Terry could deal with at one sitting? This was a very difficult story to write and it was very stressful for both of us, but in different ways. As we went through the interview process Terry began to struggle with depression and had some rough moments. Once or twice we had changed the topic of our discussion because it was just getting to be too hard on him. For me the stress came from the deadline more than the storyline. The fastest I'd written a book before was 20 weeks, and writing this one in 12 weeks was like running a marathon. Near the end I was exhausted, but still had to get that word count out every day. There were times when I would just become overwhelmed with the size of the task. But there was nothing to do but keep moving forward. So we were both very happy when this project was complete.

4. You enjoy some great ministry opportunities outside of your writing. Share how God is using your other gifts to reach others for Christ.   As I mentioned earlier, in addition to being a writer I am a gospel chalk artist and a vocalist. I've been doing that for over 30 years now and really enjoy being able to use art and music to bring a message to people. For about the last 15 years I've been going into prisons with my art and music and sharing the gospel with inmates. That's been a huge blessing to me.  In fact, I often say that after a prison service I've been far more blessed than the inmates. And recently God has begun to open up more doors both in prison and out. Over a six-week period, I'll be drawing in Florida, Iowa, and Alabama. One of the great things about chalk art is that even if the people who see a drawing don't remember everything I say, they will remember the picture and the scripture that the picture represented. I've had people write me who saw my pictures 20 years ago and came to Christ through them, and now they are serving Christ in churches and other ministries. That's one of the great joys of this ministry.

5. With the re-release of Blind Sight, it's almost like two books releasing at once. What message do you hope readers will take away from reading both books?   I was so excited when Tyndale decided to release Blind Sight a second time. It's rare that a novel gets a second chance at life. And it's especially satisfying that both books were released simultaneously. And even though one is a novel and the other a nonfiction book, the message that people can take away from the books is really the same. God is sovereign. So often we are confused when difficult circumstances come into our lives and we wonder why God would allow that. Sometimes we even get angry with him and demand an explanation like Terry did. But the message of both Blind Sight and Terror by Night is that while God doesn't explain himself to us, we can trust in his goodness and sovereign grace. We know that he is working all things together for our good and we can trust him in that.  Blind Sight communicates that message by way of a novel; Terror by Night communicates the same message by way of a true story.

FSB Holiday Book Giveaway

I received this in my email and wanted to pass this great opportunity along to my blog readers. 

FSB Holiday Giveaway!

We at FSB Associates want to do our share to support books and the publishing industry. In the spirit of the holiday season, and support for BuyingBooksfortheHolidays.com, we will be conducting a 3-Day Holiday Giveaway!

For three days only, December 8th, 9th, and 10th, we will be giving away a limited quantity of books to randomly selected winners! The official entry begins at 12pm (eastern) on each day. Here is our schedule of events:

Day 1. Lost Symbol Fans! If you have read and loved Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol, enter to win this companion pack! The pack features The Masonic Myth by Jay Kinney and Decoding the Lost Symbol by Simon Cox.  We have 3 packs to giveaway!

Day 2. Celebrity Chef Mary Ann Esposito, has 5 signed copies of her latest cookbook to be given away: Ciao Italia: Five Ingredient Favorites. Check out Mary Ann's tips for holiday cooking here!

Day 3. 3 copies of Quirk Classics' bestselling literary monster mash-up,  Sense & Sensibility & Sea Monsters signed by co-author Ben Winters! Also included: the Deluxe hardcover edition of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, co-authored by Seth Grahame-Smith! Learn more about the books, and discover the next monster mash-up at QuirkClassics.com.

Anyone within the continental US is eligible to enter. Entries made on a specific day after 12pm (eastern time) will only be eligible for that day's giveaway, so visit often! To enter for your chance to win, simply click here! Spread the word to your friends by forwarding this message.

We would also like to wish each and every one of you a very happy holiday season. Thank you for your time and support, and we look forward to working with you in 2010! 

Best wishes,

Teaser Tuesday - December 8

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Michelle spoke up. "Please. We're traveling by ourselves. And my brother is blind."

The schoolteacher's expression softened.  She smiled at Michelle and Micah, then said to the attendant, "It's all right. Let the children go first."

From Blind Sight by James H. Pence

What are You Reading Monday - December 8 (a day late)

Come post weekly and see what others are reading too just so you can add to your tbr - I always do! For more information see J.Kaye's Book Blog and join in!

Books Completed Last Week:

• Matters of the Heart by Danielle Steel
• Tempted by P.C. and Kristin Cast

Reading Now:

• Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough (review)
• Blind Sight by James H. Pence (review)
  
• Revelations by Melissa de la Cruz (library)
  

Reviews Completed Last Week

• The Christmas Kitchen by Tammy Maltby and Anne Christian Buchanan (4.0/5.0)
  
• One Simple Act by Debbie Macomber (4.25/5.0)
• One False Note (39 Clues) by Gordon Korman (4.0/5.0)
  

Next:

• Essie in Progress by Marjorie Presten
  
• The Possibility of Everything by Hope Edelman
• Under the Dome by Stephen King
• Kissing Games of the World by Sandi Kahn Shelton
• The Silent Gift by Michael Landon and Cindy Kelley

Reviews to do:

• Tempted by P.C. and Kristin Cast
  
• 13 1/2 by Nevada Barr
• Sole Survivor by Dean Koontz
• Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
• Only In Your Dreams by Cecily von Ziegesar
• Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead
• The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Summary -

Lots going on this past week - I had my surgery and it went well.  I had the surgery around 9am on Thursday and was discharged from the hospital at 1pm on Friday - pretty good for brain surgery.

I did get some reading done last week - I went to an old familiar standby, one of those authors that captivated me as a teenager - Danielle Steel.  I enjoyed the book.  It was an easy read amidst the many distractions of the hospital.  I also finished Tempted the latest in the House of Night series which was also enjoyable.  Now I must get back to some review books.  I have six weeks of recovery so I should be reading and blogging quite a bit.

I did several reviews last week but still need to do some catching up.  I'll work on that this week.

Have a great week everyone  I'm off to bed to curl up with a good book for nap/rest #1 for the day.

Blog Tour: The Possibility of Everything by Hope Edelman

Join Hope Edelman, author of the book of the personal memoir, The Possibility of Everything (Ballantine Books), as she virtually tours the blogosphere in December on her first virtual book tour with Pump Up Your Book Promotion!

I will be reading this over this week - there's been a slight delay in my reviewing due to a surgery that came up with one week's notice.  So watch for my review in the coming week - but for now enjoy some information about the author, the book and an excerpt.  Also check out the other blogs participating in the tour.

Thanks to Pump Up Your Book Promotion for providing me with this book.

About Hope Edelman

Hope Edelman holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Northwestern University, and a master’s degree in English from the University of Iowa. She is the author of five nonfiction books: the international bestseller Motherless Daughters (1994), which was translated into seven languages; Letters from Motherless Daughters (1995), an edited collection of letters from readers; Mother of My Mother (1999), which looks at the depth and influence of the grandmother-granddaughter relationship; Motherless Mothers (2006), about the experience of being a mother when you don’t have one, from HarperCollins; and The Possibility of Everything (2009), her first book-length memoir, set in Topanga Canyon, California, and Belize.
Hope has lectured widely on the long-term effects of early parent loss. She has appeared on national and local television throughout the U.S., including the Today show and Good Morning America, and has also appeared on TV and radio in Toronto; Vancouver; London; Sydney; Melbourne, Australia; and Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch, New Zealand.
She began her journalism career with a part-time job at Outside magazine, and soon after interned for three months at the Salem Statesman-Journal in Salem, Oregon. Her first full-time editorial job was at Whittle Communications in Knoxville, Tennessee. From there, she went on to the University of Iowa, earning a master’s degree in creative nonfiction writing in 1992, one of the first of its kind.
Since then, her articles and essays have appeared in numerous publications, such as the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Washington Post, the Dallas Morning News, Glamour, Child, Parenting, Seventeen, Real Simple, Self, The Iowa Review, and The Crab Orchard Review, and many anthologies, including The Bitch in the House, Toddler, Blindsided By a Diaper, and Behind the Bedroom Door.
She is the recipient of a New York Times Notable Book of the Year designation and a Pushcart Prize for creative nonfiction. Nearly every July you can find her at the Iowa Summer Writing Festival in Iowa City, and periodically at other conferences and festivals throughout the U.S.
Hope plays piano and guitar (sort of); cooks a mean French Toast; and has discovered an unexpected aptitude for sixth-grade math. She lives in Topanga, California, with her husband, their two daughters, a fat cat named Timmy (”No, Mom, tell them he’s buff!”) and their pet tarantula, Billy Bob.
You can visit her website at www.thepossibilityofeverything.com.

About The Possibility of Everything

From the bestselling author of Motherless Daughters, the real-life story of one woman’s search for a cure to her family’s escalating troubles, and the leap of faith that changed everything for her.
In the autumn of 2000, Hope Edelman was a woman adrift, questioning her place in her marriage, her profession, and the larger world. Feeling vulnerable and isolated, she was primed for change. Into her stagnant routine dropped Dodo, her three-year-old daughter Maya’s curiously disruptive imaginary friend. Confused and worried about how to handle Maya and Dodo’s apparent hold on her, Edelman and her husband made the unlikely choice to bring her to Mayan healers in Belize, hoping that a shaman might help them banish Dodo-and, as they came to understand, all he represented-from their lives.
Examining how an otherwise mainstream mother and wife finds herself making this unorthodox choice, The Possibility of Everything chronicles the magical week in Central America that transformed Edelman from a person whose past had led her to believe only in the visible and the “proven” to someone open to the idea of larger, unseen forces. A deeply affecting and beautifully written memoir of a family’s emotional journey, it explores what Edelman and her husband went looking for in the jungle-and what they ultimately discovered-as parents, as spouses, and as ordinary people-about the things that possess and destroy, or that can heal us all.

Read the Excerpt!

A ragged dirt road twists through six miles of rain forest in
western Belize, linking the villages of Cristo Rey and San
Antonio. If you make this drive the day after a heavy December
rain, as my husband, Uzi, and I do, the road will still be gluey and
ripe. Its surface will be the color and consistency of mango pudding.
You might focus intensely on these two elements, mango and pudding,
to divert your attention from how the white van you’re riding in keeps
sashaying across the slippery road. And you might look down at the
three- year- old lying across your lap and think about how she is a child
who loves mangoes and loves pudding but that you have never thought
to put the two together for her before. You might look at her and think,
Mango pudding! Great idea! Let’s find a way to make some tonight! Or you
might think, If you’ll be okay, I’ll make you mango pudding every night for
the rest of your life. Or you might look down at her and just think, Please,
and leave it at that.Victor, our driver for this ride, maneuvers the eleven- seat passenger van with more skill and less caution than I could safely manage.“Hee- yah!” he calls out as he deftly steers us out of a skid. Every time
the van’s back end fishtails, I spring for the door handle. I don’t know
what I’m thinking: grabbing the door handle in an unlocked car is only
going to result in an open door on a muddy road, but when you’re ricocheting
around in the back of a van without seat belts, with a sick child
lying across your thighs, the impulse is to lunge for something solid. I tighten my right arm around my daughter Maya’s waist. Everything’s
fine, I tell myself. She’s going to be fine. I press my left hand against
the window and watch the landscape stream by between my fingertips.
The jungle grows flush against both sides of the road, tangled and pristine.
The bulldozers of American expatriates chewing up the Caribbean
coast haven’t found their way back here yet. Fat, squat cohune palms
burst up from ground level like Las Vegas fountains spraying out of the
forest floor. Thick, serpentine vines encircle tree trunks like lush maypole
ribbons. The biodiversity here is astounding. I never imagined
there could be so many different kinds of leaves in one place, or so
many shades of green.
The air outside is like nothing I’ve encountered before: energetic
and molecular and intense. A few hours ago, when we were sitting on
the front steps of our cabana at Victor’s resort, I took in deep gulps of
the jungle’s bright, wet promise, the loamy, rich animation of the dirt
marrying with chlorophyll to form air so dense it tempts you to take a
bite.
At lunch, we ate family style in an open- air dining hall lined with
rectangular wooden tables, under the thatched roof Victor and his sons
had woven from local palm fronds. While his wife and daughters
served heaping plates of rice and beans and bowls of fried plantains,
Victor meandered between the tables with a small pad of paper in one
hand and a bottle of orange Fanta dangling between the thumb and
forefinger of the other. As he approached each table he flipped a chair
around and sat on it backward, pulled a pen from behind his ear, and
scribbled down each family’s travel request for the day. A foursome of
fresh- scrubbed Brits— mother, father, daughter, son— wanted to go
canoeing on the Macal River. Two bearded men who looked too old to
still be backpackers wanted to see the nearby Maya ruins at Xunantunich.
A family from Montreal with two college- age daughters opted for
a few hours in the neighboring town of San Ignacio, a few miles downriver.
“Sure, sure,” Victor said to everyone, tossing back swigs from his
bottle. “We take you. No problem.” Victor quickly established himself
as part hotelier, part chauffeur, and part general contractor, a rainforest
Renaissance man in an olive green baseball cap. At our table, he
rested a hand on Uzi’s shoulder. We’d already put in our afternoon
request.
“Two o’clock,” Victor told us. “I’ll take you, or my son will.”
This drive to San Antonio rolls on. Our tires make loud sucking
noises as they peel away from the gummy earth. Off to our right, an
animal lets loose with what sounds like a familiar, plaintive howl. Maya
raises her head in recognition, pivots it around like a slow periscope,
then lets it drop back down against my thigh.
“You have coyotes here?” Uzi asks. He’s riding up front with Victor,
one hand braced against the glove compartment for support.
“What?” Victor maneuvers the van around a wide puddle.
“Coyotes,” Uzi says. “You know, like little wolves. We have them at
home.”
“Oh, yeah,” Victor says, swatting the air with his hand. “We got
anything you want here.”
Anything? Maya coughs her raspy cough against my leg, the sound
of gravel rattling between her ribs. I press my palm against her forehead.
I’m guessing 101, maybe 101.5, better than yesterday, but not by
much. I tuck a sprig of dark curls behind her ear.
Mi vida, I think. My life.
These words that come to me are not the words of my own country,
but those of a language I struggled to learn for years, a language
that both exhilarates me and breaks my heart. Mi vida. At home in Los
Angeles, it is the language of the hardworking and the oppressed, of the
woman who cleans my house with care once a week, of the man with
the white pickup truck who trims the palm trees that line our driveway,
of the childless nanny who loves my daughter with a selfless passion
while I spend hours in front of a computer screen rearranging words.
But here in Belize it is the language of conquerors, the language that
overtook the indigenous Maya and then, centuries later, turned around
and pushed out the imperial British masters. A language that says,
“Here. This. Mine.”
Victor sits calmly behind the van’s steering wheel. Perhaps he’s
made this drive for dozens of guests before. I imagine a steady parade
of Americans traipsing into the jungle in their Lakers caps and Teva
sandals, acting entitled to their cures. Yet surely, we must stand out
from the pack. There’s Uzi, who’s forty, though so boyish no one can
believe his age, with an Israeli accent so slight it barely dusts the surface
of his speech. He’s a quintessentially low- impact kind of guy, softspoken,
careful to tread lightly on the earth. Not like me, who can’t
help leaving footprints and food wrappers in my wake everywhere I go.
And there’s Maya, three feet tall with a mop of dark curls, carrying two
rubber baby dolls tucked under her right arm, refusing to eat anything
but cucumbers and water for the past three days because everything
else hurts going down.
And me? How might I look to someone I’ve just met? Probably like
a medium- aged American woman in striped cotton pants who’s equal
parts grateful and unsure about being here and who can’t stop hovering
over her three- year- old— checking, fixing, trying to coax forkfuls of
food past the child’s tightly shut lips. Or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I
don’t make an impression at all. Maybe I’m just another tourist messing
up the bedsheets, acting as if I have a right to benefit from knowledge
that took Victor’s ancestors millennia to learn.
The low, brightly painted buildings of San Antonio Village appear
in the distance, like a handful of colorful marbles scattered across the
valley’s gentle bowl. The Maya Mountains rise blue- gray in the distance.
Maya coughs again.
“Ay, raina,” Victor sighs. He calls her “queen.”
Here in the land of the Maya, where body, mind, and spirit are
tightly intertwined, physical and spiritual illness are considered one
and the same. Physical symptoms, the Maya believe, erupt when the
life force that surrounds a person’s body, the ch’ulel, is damaged by
trauma or stress. Those who are sick in body are believed to first be sick
in spirit, and so Maya healers always treat both.
Uzi glances at me over his left shoulder, searching my face for a
sign. My gentle husband, always gauging my moods, always trying to
position himself on the safe side of conflict. Are you still okay with this?
his expression asks. I crimp the left side of my mouth and shrug my
shoulder slightly. I’m deliberately impossible to read.
Even now, eight years later, I cannot tell you if I traveled down
that road as a whole person, held intact by my own convictions, or if I
went there as a broken woman, mechanically following my husband’s
lead. I can tell you only what it is like to be riding in that van, on that
mango road, rolling past dense fields of brown and green. It is to be a
thirty- six- year- old woman, a mother and a wife, who is willing to do
anything—anything— to help her child.
Mi vida. I will tell you. This is how it feels. As if my life is lying
across my lap and I am bringing it into the jungle, to the man who
speaks with spirits, so it can be healed.

The Possibility of Everything Tour Schedule

Tuesday, Dec. 1
Book spotlighted at Examiner
Wednesday, Dec. 2
Book reviewed at One Person’s Journey Through a World of Books
Thursday, Dec. 3
Book reviewed & giveaway at Luxury Reading
Friday, Dec. 4
Book reviewed at Readaholic
Guest blogging at As the Pages Turn
Monday, Dec. 7
Interviewed at Blogcritics
Book reviewed at My Reading Room
Tuesday, Dec. 8
Interviewed at The Hot Author Report
Book reviewed at The Life of an Inanimate Flying Object
Wednesday, Dec. 9
Reviewed at Review From Here
Reviewed at Rundpinne
Thursday, Dec. 10
Guest blogging at Blogging Authors
Guest blogging at Carol’s Notebook
Friday, Dec. 11
Book reviewed at A Sea of Books
Monday, Dec. 14
Interview l Chat l Book Giveaway at Pump Up Your Book!
Tuesday, Dec. 15
Book reviewed at Brizmus Blogs Books
Book reviewed and guest blogging at My Book Views
Wednesday, Dec. 16
Book reviewed at Buuklvr81

Article and Giveaway: 12 Days and 12 Facts for This Holiday Season

12 Days and 12 Facts for This Holiday Season

By Caroline Taggart,
Author of I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From School

Ever catch yourself saying I Used to Know That?

Each holiday season brings another round of cocktail parties, family get-togethers, and corporate gatherings -- and invariably, lots of small talk. It's easy to feel overwhelmed when discussing politics, literature, and other intellectual "stuff," especially when what is thought to be general knowledge is often long-forgotten. Enter I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From School. From English and Literature to Math and Science, from History and Geography to Religion and Other-Worldly Topics, this book leaves you equipped to handle any topic of conversation.
Here we've cherry-picked twelve fun facts for the holiday season -- one for every day of Christmas (or whatever holiday you prefer!) Quiz yourself to see how much "stuff" you need to brush up on before hobnobbing with the boss or office crush.
1. On building sentences: Just what is a "clause"? (Not to be confused with Santa Claus.) 
Answer: A clause contains a subject and a verb and may stand alone as a sentence or as part of a sentence (when it is often called a subordinate clause): Santa Claus loves cookies but can't eat them without milk.
2. How many bones is the spine made up of? 
Answer: 26 small bones called vertebrae (Be careful lifting all those heavy holiday boxes.)
3. Acclaimed author Charles Dickens (1812-70) wrote which Christmas classic?
Answer: A Christmas Carol. The miserly Ebenezer Scrooge tries to ignore Christmas and is haunted by the ghost of his former partner, Marley, and by the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Yet to Come, who show him the error of his ways.
4. The first chapter of this famous book opens with "Call me Ishmael." Name the book and author. (Hint: it makes a whale of a gift!)
Answer: Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Melville is also the author of Pierre and the unfinished Billy Budd.

5. There's a name for the process of watering your Christmas tree? Who knew?

Answer: Grab the kids and give them this science factoid as they nurture the family tree: Osmosis is a form of diffusion that is specific to the movement of water. Water moves through a selectively permeable membrane (that is, one that lets some types of molecules through but not others) from a place where there is a higher concentration of water to one where it is lower.
6. Can you name all 6 wives of Henry VIII, father of the Church of England?
Answer: (Listed in order) Catherine, Anne, Jane, Anne, Catherine, Catherine. They are often remembered as divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived. Sure makes you think twice when complaining about bad relatives.
7. Who was the 16th President of the United States?
Answer: Abraham Lincoln (R, 1861-65) and yes -- he really was born in a log cabin on a winter's day. Notably famous for many reasons including his Gettysburg Address: "Four Score and Seven Years ago our fathers brought fourth upon this continent a new nation conceived in Liberty . . . "
8. 'Tis the season to be jolly giving! Don’t forget to tip well this season -- etiquette coaches will tell you that means no less than 18%. So just how much should you tip on a bill of $50? 

Answer: Percent means by a hundred, so anything expressed as a percentage is a fraction (or part, if you prefer) of 100. So 18% is 18 parts of 100, or 18/100 or .18. If your bill is $50, multiply 50 by .18 to get your tip total of $9. If you're feeling generous, a 20% tip would require you to multiply 50 by .20, for a total of $10.00
50.00 x .18 = 9.00
50.00 x .20 = 10.00
Percentages can also be holiday-relevant when it comes to figuring out in-store sales. In this case, you want to multiply by the inverse of the percentage listed. So if you have a $50 sweater that's on sale for 25% off, multiply 50 by .75 for your total of $37.50. That same $50 sweater on sale for 40% off would equate to $30, or $50 multiplied by .60.
50.00 x .75 = 37.50
50.00 x .60 = 30.00

9. Brr, it's cold outside. But just how cold does it have to be to get some snow around here? 

Answer: Did you know that the freezing point of water is 32 degrees Fahrenheit? Keep an eye on the temperature and watch your footing for ice on the ground. (See previous fact about those treasured vertebrae!)
10. Everyone knows Santa and his elves live in the North Pole. But what about the South Pole (aka Antarctica)?
Answer: The South Pole was discovered by Roald Amundsen (1872-1928, Norwegian), who was also the first to sail though the Northwest passage, the sea route from Pacific to Atlantic along the north coast of North America. Antarctica is the only continent that contains no countries -- instead, it is a stateless territory protected from exploitation by an international treaty. A good place for the elves to protest low wages?

11. Which Ocean is bigger: the Pacific or the Atlantic?
Answer: The Pacific Ocean is larger at 69,374 square miles -- that's almost double the Atlantic, which comes in at 35,665 square miles. Making it evenmore astonishing that St. Nick can cross the globe in just one night.
12. Remember the reason for the Season! Can you name a few things that both Judaism and Christianity have in common? 
Answer: Both are monotheistic religions that share the first five books of the Christian Old Testament. Both religions view Jerusalem as a sacred site, the former for the Wailing Wall (contains the remains of the temple that was thought to be the place where God resides on earth) and the latter for Christ's burial and resurrection site.
Happy Holidays to all!
©2009 Caroline Taggart, author of I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From School


Author Bio
Caroline Taggart, author of I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From School, has been an editor of non-fiction books for nearly 30 years and has covered nearly every subject from natural history and business to gardening and astronomy. She has written several books and was the editor of Writer's Market UK 2009. For more information please visit www.amazon.com.

GIVEAWAY:

Thanks to Caitlin Price at FSB Associates I have one copy of I Used to Know That: Stuff You Forgot From  School by Caroline Taggart to give away.  Simply leave your email address in the comment to be entered.  Additional entries for being a follower of the blog or me on twitter, for tweeting or for mentioning on your blog.  Contest for the US and Canada only and will run until 12/14.

FIRST Wild Card Tour: Essie in Progress by Marjorie Presten

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:

Marjorie Presten

and the book:

Essie in Progress

Kregel Publications (April 1, 2009)

***Special thanks to Marjorie Presten for sending me a review copy.***

My thoughts:

Due to my surgery I haven't finished reading the book yet.  But from the first few chapters that I have read I can tell I'm going to enjoy it.  The characters are very interesting and fun to see fleshed out.  I'm really liking Essie's father-in-law right now - he's a great character. 

I look forward to finishing the book and writing a more thorough review in the next week as I begin my recovery from surgery.  Until then you can learn more about the book below.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Marjorie Presten is a native Georgian who has her own fair share of experience juggling career and motherhood. She lives outside of Atlanta with her husband, Tom, and their three children.


Listen to a radio interview about the book HERE.

Product Details:

List Price: $13.99
Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Kregel Publications (April 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 082543565X
ISBN-13: 978-0825435652

AND NOW...THE FIRST CHAPTER:

Prologue

1972

In a thirty-second phone call, Hamilton Wells would make a decision that would earn him more money than he could spend in his lifetime. Everything was on the line, but he was not nervous, euphoric, or eager with anticipation. In Hamilton’s mind, the matter was not speculative, debatable, or anything less than a sure thing. Hamilton had the gift, and it had never let him down. Yet even before he made the call, he knew money wouldn’t cure the unrelenting pain of his grief. He sat at his desk with only a single orange banker’s lamp for illumination and cried silently.

Her death had been inevitable, but feelings of helplessness still overwhelmed him. His young son’s dependency on him only multiplied his grief and anger. Six-year-old Jack Wells had insisted his father do something to help Mama, but the only thing Hamilton could do was sit at her bedside and try not to cry. Now it was six weeks after her death, and Hamilton knew his son needed him to be strong, to return life to normal. A neighbor had enrolled Jack in the local church baseball league. They played a game every Wednesday afternoon. It will be good for him, they’d said. Life has to go on.

Hamilton cradled his head in his hands and groaned. The enormity of the risk he was about to take didn’t concern him. It was purely mechanical. He would surrender all he owned for just one more blissful afternoon at the lake he and his wife both loved, but now that was impossible. His wife was dead. Nothing he could do would change that.

He remembered the book of Job. Would a loving and caring God do this to the love of my life? Well, he did, Hamilton thought bitterly. Earline had lingered for months. The doctors said it was miraculous that she had endured as long as she had. Be grateful for these last days to say goodbye, they’d said. But for Hamilton, the prolonged end only added anger to his bottomless sorrow. Standing alongside his son as a helpless witness to her slow deterioration and suffering in the final weeks was more than he could bear. It was the worst time of Hamilton’s life. Nothing really mattered anymore, and it seemed he had nothing left to lose.

Under different circumstances, he might have played it safe and put the proceeds away for his son’s education, bought a new house, or perhaps invested in a bit of lake property. He could have become like the rest of the players and worn monograms on his starched cuffs so everyone could remember whose hand they were shaking. Instead, he had gone it alone. His brokerage business had few clients. He was the only big player left. Now he planned to risk everything on something happening on the other side of the world.

Ham couldn’t remember exactly when he had recognized his innate ability to pick the winner out of a crowd. It had always been there, ever since he was conscious of being alive. The talent had blossomed in the military when the card games occasionally got serious. Now, with every dollar he had to his name, Hamilton approached wheat futures with that same instinct. The Russian harvest had been a disaster, and the United States was coming to the rescue. The price of wheat was going to go through the roof, and then through the floor. He was going to make a fortune on both ends.

He picked up the phone and dialed a number on the Chicago Mercantile exchange. He listened for a few moments as the connection was made. Young Jack tugged at his father’s shirtsleeve. “Pop? Can we go now?” Jack held a baseball in his hand and a glove under his arm. Hamilton swiveled his chair, turning his back to his son.

A familiar voice announced his name. “How can I help you?”

“It’s Ham,” he said. “Short the entire position.”

“What? Everything?” the voice asked.

“Everything.” No emotion colored his voice.

Young Jack crept gingerly around the chair to face his father. “Pop,” he whispered, “come on, the game is about to start.” Hamilton shook his head and looked away.

The voice on the phone was still talking. “Most folks are still enjoying the ride, Ham. You could get hurt.”

“It’s not going a penny higher. Short it all.”

“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“Warn me? My wife is dead. What else matters?”

The voice mumbled something about her passing.

“She didn’t pass. She’s dead. Just do what I ask.”

“OK, Ham.” The phone disconnected.

Jack was standing there in front of him, shoulders slumped. The ball hung loose at the end of his fingers, and the glove had fallen on the carpet. “Pop, can we go now?”

“Sorry, Son. Not today.”

“It’s not fair!” Jack erupted. Hot tears sprang up in his eyes. “What am I supposed to do now?”

Ham looked down, silent.

Jack hurled the ball to the floor, wiped his tears angrily, and stormed out of the house.

Ten minutes later on the futures board, wheat ticked down.

It ticked down again.

And so it would continue. Ham would be richer than he’d ever imagined. He’d never experience another financial challenge for the rest of his life. It was not really important, though. Scripture came back to him: “what good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul?”

He would trade it all to have his love, his life, back again.

But that was not an option.

Out his window, Ham could see young Jack riding his bicycle furiously down the street. He watched with a passive surrender as his son’s small frame shrank into the distance.