Dreaming of Books Giveaway Hop

It's time for another wonderful giveaway hop.  This time it's the Dreaming of Books Giveaway Hop, hosted by Martha's Bookshelf and I Am a Reader, Not a Writer.  Thanks to these two great blogs for hosting!  Come hop away with me to over 180 blogs that are hosting giveaways - I know I will be busy entering the next few days!

So it's easy, just enter your information in the form and you are entered.  No extra entries, no need to be a follower, though I do love new followers and I also love comments!  Please check out the rest of my blog while you are here and see if you like it.

What am I giving away?  Any book, with the value of $15 or less from The Book Depository.  So that makes this giveaway open to anyone that the Book Depository ships to for free.  So enter away.  I'll draw the winner and post by January 19th.

If you can't see the form below, go here.

New Year's Reading Resolutions Giveaway Winner

My winner is:

Taffy

I will be emailing Taffy with the books to choose from in the next day or so. 

Thanks to all who entered, be sure to stop by tomorrow (1/14) for the next giveaway, Dreaming of Books Giveaway Hop!

Book Review: Cross Fire by James Patterson

Cross Fire by James Patterson
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

Publish Date: November 15, 2010

Hardcover, 384 pages

Suspense/Thriller, Alex Cross #17

My Review:
I look forward each year to a new Alex Cross novel.  I have enjoyed them since I picked up Along Came A Spider back when I was in college.  I still enjoy them.  They give me a chance to see Alex work his magic in another case and a glimpse into his family life again.

Cross Fire did not disappoint me at all.  The suspense plot was great and I liked seeing a little more of Alex's personal life.  The kids aren't in this one much and neither are Bree or Alex's grandmother.  So I guess I would say that truthfully this one is mostly about the case (or cases).  This one also focuses again on Kyle Craig, The Mastermind and he's back and as evil as ever.

Fair warning, these books are not for the faint of heart.  Murder scenes can be described in grisly detail, but I have never found it overwhelming.  The book moves fast and I easily finished it in a day while at home on a snow day.  Easy to read and keep up with, one thing I like about these books is I don't usually get characters confused.  Also I think that if you wanted to start with this book, I don't think  you would be at a loss for not reading the rest of the series.  Sure there is background, but I believe it can be read as a stand-alone. (But I highly recommend the rest of the series, especially the beginning books).

So if you have missed Alex, or want to be introduced to Alex Cross, Cross Fire is a great book.  A quick easy suspenseful read and I never guessed where the ending was going.  I'm now ready for the next installment.

My rating: 4.0/5.0

About the Book:
Wedding bells ring
Detective Alex Cross and Bree's wedding plans are put on hold when Alex is called to the scene of the perfectly executed assassination of two of Washington D.C.'s most corrupt: a dirty congressmen and an underhanded lobbyist. Next, the elusive gunman begins picking off other crooked politicians, sparking a blaze of theories--is the marksman a hero or a vigilante?

A murderer returns

The case explodes, and the FBI assigns agent Max Siegel to the investigation. As Alex and Siegel battle over jurisdiction, the murders continue. It becomes clear that they are the work of a professional who has detailed knowledge of his victims' movements--information that only a Washington insider could possess.

Caught in a lethal cross fire

As Alex contends with the sniper, Siegel, and the wedding, he receives a call from his deadliest adversary, Kyle Craig. The Mastermind is in D.C. and will not relent until he has eliminated Cross and his family for good. With a supercharged blend of action, deception, and suspense, Cross Fire is James Patterson's most visceral and exciting Alex Cross novel ever.

About the Author (from the Goodreads.com):

Melissa de la Cruz is the New York Times and USA Today best-selling author of many critically acclaimed and award-winning novels for teens including The Au Pairs series, the Blue Bloods series, the Ashleys series, the Angels on Sunset Boulevard series and the semi-autobiographical novel Fresh off the Boat.

Her books for adults include the novel Cat’s Meow, the anthology Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys and the tongue-in-chic handbooks How to Become Famous in Two Weeks or Less and The Fashionista Files: Adventures in Four-inch heels and Faux-Pas.

She has worked as a fashion and beauty editor and has written for many publications including The New York Times, Marie Claire, Harper’s Bazaar, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Allure,...moreJames Patterson has had more New York Times bestsellers than any other writer, ever, according to Guinness World Records. Since his first novel won the Edgar Award in 1977, James Patterson's books have sold more than 180 million copies. He is the author of the Alex Cross novels, the most popular detective series of the past twenty-five years, including Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider. Mr. Patterson also writes the bestselling Women's Murder Club novels, set in San Francisco, and the top-selling New York detective series of all time, featuring Detective Michael Bennett. He writes full-time and lives in Florida with his family.

Website


***I received this book from my local library.  I was not compensated in any way.  I do not receive money for my amazon links since I live in NC (something about some law), so they are up purely for my readers to have a place to check out the book.***

The Alphabet in Crime Fiction: A - A look at author Ginny Aiken

This week's letter is A.  I looked through my  spreadsheet of books I have read from 2004-2010 to find something to go with A, because I haven't read a book that starts with A or an author that starts with A this year.  While perusing I found the author, Ginny Aiken.  I have read 4 of Ginny's books and I loved them.  Full of suspense and some romance, her books are great.  The 4 I read were for the Love Inspired Suspense line that Harlequin puts out.


Here is some more information about Ginny Aiken (from Wikipedia):


Ginny Aiken is an author of inspirational fiction and mystery novels.
Ginny was born in Havana, Cuba, and grew up in Valencia and Caracas, Venezuela.
The former newspaper reporter discovered books early on and wrote her first novel at age fifteen, burning it when she turned a "mature" sixteen. That effort was followed years later by award-winning and best-selling titles in the secular and Christian markets. Ginny holds certification in French literature and culture from the University of Nancy, France, as well as a B. A. from Allegheny College in Pennsylvania. She lives in South-Central Pennsylvania with her husband, four sons, daughter-in-law, two dogs, and a steady stream of her sons' musician-friends. When she's not busy with the duties of a soccer mom or band mom, Ginny enjoys reading, writing, classical music, and assorted needle arts.

The four books I read were:
Married to the Mob
Danger in a Small Town
Suspicion
Mixed Up With the Mob

I especially loved Danger in a Small Town and when checking her booklist out I realized I haven't read the second book in that series.  I will have to remedy that.

Some of her series books that are mysteries:

Deadly Decor Mysteries
1. Design On a Crime (2005)
2. Decorating Schemes (2006)
3. Interior Motives (2006)

Mob
1. Mistaken for the Mob (2006)
2. Mixed Up with the Mob (2006)
3. Married to the Mob (2006)

Carolina Justice
Danger In A Small Town (2008)
Suspicion (2008)
Someone to Trust (2009)

\

So check her out, I'm off to find some of her books I haven't read :)

Book Review: Misguided Angel by Melissa de la Cruz

Misguided Angel by Melissa de la Cruz
Publisher: Hyperion Book CH

Publish Date: October 26, 2010

Hardcover, 256 pages

Young Adult, Paranormal, Blue Bloods #5

My Review:
I have really enjoyed reading the Blue Bloods series by Melissa de la Cruz since I started it last year.  I actually didn't want to get caught up on the books because they usually tie up one thing at the end of the book, but the over-arcing plot is not solved (and I don't want it to be yet, because then I will lose my Blue Bloods.)  So I had gotten pretty caught up and lucked up on Misguided Angel showing up at my library.  I got the book last Friday and had it read by Sunday.  I plowed right through it and thankfully Bloody Valentine is on it's way to me soon.

The Blue Blood series has a different take on vampires and makes them good guys and they have ties to angels.  The Blue Bloods are the "good guys" and they mix and mingle in society and have a code to follow.  However there are also Silver Bloods unleashed in the world and these are the bad guys as they are the fallen angels and they are out to rid the world of Blue Bloods.  It's a fascinating storyline that doesn't lose it's appeal through the books.  I love Schuyler and Jack and they are in part of the book and Mimi and Oliver (an unlikely team) are in the other part.  A new character, Deming Chen is also introduced in this book and I really like her and look forward to seeing more of her in future books. She provides a fresh breath to the series without taking away from what is already there.  She just fits in the storyline really well.

The plot continues to excite in this one and I don't want to give much away for fear of spoilers for those that haven't read this book.  But I was on the edge of my seat through a lot of the book.  I wasn't looking forward to the Mimi storyline, but I like how her character becomes more developed in Misguided Angel.  She becomes less shallow and slightly more likable.  Oliver is also present and while Schuyler is not with him, he's still very much a part of the story.  Schuyler and Jack are my favorite characters and I loved the parts of the book with them in it.  They become slightly more developed as this book goes along.  I also enjoy the history part of the stories that shows the Blue Bloods in their previous lives.

With great characters and fabulous plot, Misguided Angel is a quick read and a great installment to the Blue Bloods series.  However I warn you, have Bloody Valentine handy when you finish this one because you will want it.  I can't wait until I get it and then I'm not sure how I will wait until the next installment is out later this year.

If you enjoy paranormal young adult stories that are slightly different, and haven't tried the Blue Bloods series, I highly recommend it.

My rating: 4.5/5.0

About the Book:
After inheriting the dark Van Alen Legacy, Schuyler fled to Florence with her forbidden love, Jack. Now the two of them must embark on the mission Schuyler was destined to complete: to find and protect the five remaining gates that guard the earth from Lucifer, lord of the Silver Bloods.

Back in New York, Mimi has been elected Regent of a crumbling coven. Struggling with her heartache over the loss of Kingsley and with her overwhelming desire to destroy Jack, she must focus all of her energy on a perilous new threat. Vampires are being abducted and their captors are planning to burn them alive online…for all the world to see. Help arrives in the form of Deming Chen, a Venator from Shanghai, who must untangle the web of deceptions before the killers strike again.

As the young vampires struggle for the survival of the coven, they uncover a deadly secret, a truth first discovered by Schuyler’s mother during the Renaissance but kept buried for centuries. And as the Blue Blood enclave weakens yet further, fate leads Schuyler to a terrible choice that will ultimately map the destiny of her heart
About the Author (from the Goodreads.com):

Melissa de la Cruz is the New York Times and USA Today best-selling author of many critically acclaimed and award-winning novels for teens including The Au Pairs series, the Blue Bloods series, the Ashleys series, the Angels on Sunset Boulevard series and the semi-autobiographical novel Fresh off the Boat.

Her books for adults include the novel Cat’s Meow, the anthology Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys and the tongue-in-chic handbooks How to Become Famous in Two Weeks or Less and The Fashionista Files: Adventures in Four-inch heels and Faux-Pas.

She has worked as a fashion and beauty editor and has written for many publications including The New York Times, Marie Claire, Harper’s Bazaar, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Allure,...moreMelissa de la Cruz is the New York Times and USA Today best-selling author of many critically acclaimed and award-winning novels for teens including The Au Pairs series, the Blue Bloods series, the Ashleys series, the Angels on Sunset Boulevard series and the semi-autobiographical novel Fresh off the Boat.

Her books for adults include the novel Cat’s Meow, the anthology Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys and the tongue-in-chic handbooks How to Become Famous in Two Weeks or Less and The Fashionista Files: Adventures in Four-inch heels and Faux-Pas.

She has worked as a fashion and beauty editor and has written for many publications including The New York Times, Marie Claire, Harper’s Bazaar, Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Allure, The San Francisco Chronicle, McSweeney’s, Teen Vogue, CosmoGirl! and Seventeen. She has also appeared as an expert on fashion, trends and fame for CNN, E! and FoxNews.

Melissa grew up in Manila and moved to San Francisco with her family, where she graduated high school salutatorian from The Convent of the Sacred Heart. She majored in art history and English at Columbia University (and minored in nightclubs and shopping!).

She now divides her time between New York and Los Angeles, where she lives in the Hollywood Hills with her husband and daughter. 

Website
Twitter



***I received this book from my local library.  I was not compensated in any way.  I do not receive money for my amazon links since I live in NC (something about some law), so they are up purely for my readers to have a place to check out the book.***

Guest Post: Author Lou Aronica

Greetings everyone - today I have author and now publisher as well, Lou Aronica, whose book, Blue comes out today. I am currently in the middle of reading Blue and really enjoying it.  The characters are engaging and the plot has me hooked.  So let's hear more from the author himself on writing Blue.

There’s a strategy that poker players use known as “going all in.” I’m not a poker player, so I’m working from second-hand knowledge here, but I’m under the impression that this strategy involves putting all of your chips in the pot with the goal of winning big or getting knocked out of the game. One of the reasons I don’t play cards is that this gambling concept is largely lost on me. Even if I had only two dollars left to bet, I’d raise by the minimum in order to forestall the end of my run.


However, with my new novel, Blue, the notion of going all in suddenly resonates with me. I’ve been in the book world for a long time, having stints as Deputy Publisher of Bantam Books and then Publisher of Berkley and Avon, and I published my first book as an author in 2003. I’ve invested at least a bit of myself – and sometimes a great deal of myself – in every book with which I was ever associated. Blue, though, takes this level of commitment to entirely new heights. For one thing, Blue took me six years to write. The longest I’ve ever taken to write a nonfiction book is a year and a half, and the longest it had ever taken me to write a novel before this was nine months. With Blue, though, the story came to me in layers, and each layer required a substantial revision of the entire text. More significantly, though, I invested a tremendous amount of myself in this novel. Many of the things that matter the most to me form major themes in Blue. The relationship between fathers and daughters. The consequences of divorce. The necessity of and power of imagination. The quantum possibilities (if you’ll excuse the term) of belief. While none of the major plot points in this novel correlate to my life, I am all over the page in Blue in a way I’ve never been before.

I knew from the start that my investment in this novel was greater than my investment in any of my previous books. For the longest time, I just accepted this as the case, but after finishing Blue, I felt the need to ask myself, “Why this one above all that came before?” With my nonfiction, the answer was simple. I write all of my nonfiction in collaboration with others, so by definition those experiences could not be as all-encompassing as my experience with Blue. What of the other fiction, though? It took me some time to understand this, but eventually I realized that my feelings about Blue stemmed from a confluence of events: I was finally ready to talk about many of the things most important to me, and I finally had learned enough about writing fiction to adequately dramatize these things on the page. I think the primary reason I feel so connected to this novel is that I feel that I finally have enough command of my skills to convey what I really want to convey. (And yes, I do realize that I’m opening myself to all kinds of criticism and even ridicule for saying that, but that’s an essential part of “going all in,” isn’t it?)

I have always loved writing, but I’m unashamed to say that I’ve loved writing Blue the most. This was the first time I’ve moved all of my chips to the middle of the table. I certainly hope fate isn’t holding four aces.

Thank you so much for joining us today Lou and also for "going all in" with Blue.  I will have a post featuring Blue up later today and hopefully a review as well.

Mini-Reviews: Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Book 2: Rodrick Rules and Book 3: The Last Straw

      
I'm going to review these two books together because it's easiest.  If you have a boy between the ages of 7-12 I heartily recommend this series.  If you have followed my blog for any amount of time, I know you are saying - "Wait a minute Crystal, you didn't like the 4th book and you didn't want your son to read this series."  Well yes, I did write that and it was for me personally at the time.  I'm getting ready to re-read the 4th book and I'll let you know how I feel  on that one soon. 

However, starting from the beginning I htink I understand the books more.  I understand where Greg is coming from.  This is a series that I will say if you are an adult, start with the first one, don't start in the middle. If you are a kid it probably won't matter.  I think starting from the beginning gave me a better feel for Greg and his family.  Greg is just your average middle school student whose life is changing.  His father doesn't think he's tough enough.  His mom is a little clueless at times, his best friend is sometimes a loser, his older brother is annoying and his younger brother gets everything he wants.  I think I now see things better through Greg's eyes.  Yes there is some attitude in the books, but I am already getting that from my 4th grader and I don't think the books gave him that, more like his friends and what he is seeing around him.

I think this series is wonderful for boys who are going to hit those middle school years soon.  Especially if they are in the middle-of-the-road group - not popular, not jocks, etc.  I think it shows them that there are other boys out there that are going through the same things.  And most of all I think this series with it's mix of realism, cartoons and great humor gets young boys  (and girls and adults) to read.  They are quick reads and as we (my older son and myself) have worked our way through these, we have talked about various things in the books and he has always anxiously grabbed the latest one to bring home and read immediately.


I think I found the second and third books even funnier than the first book.  Logan and I would often show each other parts we thought were funny.  The cartoons are great, the antics are hysterical at times and both books are very entertaining.

So Mr. Kinney - great job - I can't wait to read the last two available at this time and see what you give us next year.  Thank you for taking care of a group that I think is often forgotten about - young boys and giving them something fun and meaningful to read.

My Rating:  4.5/5.0 for both books

***I borrowed these books from my wonderful local library.  I was not compensated in any way for my review.  I do not receive money for my amazon links since I live in NC (something about some law), so they are up purely for my readers to have a place to check out the book.***