10/28/11
10/27/11
10/26/11
Upcoming Book Review
When She Woke
Hillary Jordan
Hannah Payne's life has been devoted to church and family. But after she's convicted of murder, she awakens in a new body to a nightmarish new life. She finds herself lying on a table in a bare room, covered only by a paper gown, with cameras broadcasting her every move to millions at home, for whom observing new Chromes--criminals whose skin color has been genetically altered to match the class of their crime--is a sinister form of entertainment. Hannah is a Red for the crime of murder.....Outfit of the Day
10/21/11
10/20/11
10/19/11
10/18/11
Outfit of the Day (OOTD)
I know I said I would feature Bloggers but Eve looks so fab I had to share!
I'll Walk Alone
Author: Mary Higgins Clark
Genre: Mystery
Publish Date: April 5, 2011
Pages: 332
Rating: 2.5 out of 5
Summary:
Who has not read about—or experienced—with a sinking feeling the fear that someone else out there may be using your credit cards, accessing your bank account, even stealing your identity?
In I'll Walk Alone, Alexandra “Zan” Moreland, a gifted, beautiful interior designer on the threshold of a successful Manhattan career, is terrified to discover that somebody is not only using her credit cards and manipulating her financial accounts to bankrupt her and destroy her reputation, but may also be impersonating her in a scheme that may involve the much more brutal crimes of kidnapping and murder. Zan is already haunted by the disappearance of her own son, Matthew, kidnapped in broad daylight two years ago in Central Park—a tragedy that has left her torn between hope and despair.
Now, on what would be Matthew’s fifth birthday, photos surface that seem to show Zan kidnapping her own child, followed by a chain of events that suggests somebody—but who? Zan asks herself desperately, and why?—has stolen her identity.
Hounded by the press, under investigation by the police, attacked by both her angry ex-husband and a vindictive business rival, Zan, wracked by fear and pain and sustained only by her belief, which nobody else shares, that Matthew is still alive, sets out to discover who is behind this cruel hoax.
What she does not realize is that with every step she takes toward the truth, she is putting herself— and those she loves most—in mortal danger from the person who has ingeniously plotted out her destruction.
Even Zan’s supporters, who include Alvirah Meehan, the lottery winner and amateur detective, and Father Aiden O’Brien, who thinks that Zan may have confessed to him a secret he cannot reveal, believe she may have kidnapped little Matthew. Zan herself begins to doubt her own sanity, until, in the kind of fast-paced explosive ending that is Mary Higgins Clark’s trademark, the pieces of the puzzle fall into place with an unexpected and shocking revelation.
Deeply satisfying, I’ll Walk Alone is Mary Higgins Clark at the top of her form.
Review:
You know when you stop doing something you dislike, and then you don't do that "thing" for so long that you forget why you stopped in the first place? Then you end up accidentally doing that "thing" again, and you immediately remember why you stopped? (I know its not just me) Well Mary Higgins Clark books were my "thing." I decided to stop reading her books a long time ago, and after 50 pages of Walk Alone I remembered exactly why I stopped.
Mary Higgins Clark is a world revered author. However, in my opinion her books are very.....elementary. See mysteries are all about Whodunit. A good author can throw curve balls and twists to keep you guessing the entire book. *coughJamesPattersonCough* Then you have elementary authors. They are the authors who focus on one thing and one thing only, which inevitably causes the reader to figure out the Whodunit almost immediately. Unfortunately, Walk Alone falls into the latter category. Walk Alone is a frustratingly simple novel, but you continue to read it to figure out the why (and let me tell you even that is extremely disappointing.)
So what did I like about Walk Alone?
- The concept: To say that Walk Alone is simply about identity thief is not doing it any justice. The concept behind Walk Alone is about trying to become someone else, in every aspect of their life (Or is it?), not just steal their credit. If another mystery author *coughJamesPattersoncough* wrote Walk Alone it would have been epic.
- Zan: Her character was extremely well developed. Mary Higgins Clark went into Zan's mind and explained her doubts, concerns, and thought process to the point that the reader starts to doubt themselves.
I recommend this book to anyone that cheats while reading books. If you or anyone you know always reads the back of the book first (like my mother) than they will LOVE this book. (because they wont have to read the back at all to figure out Whodunit.)
10/16/11
10/14/11
Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self
Author: Danielle Evans
Genre: African American; Short Stories
Publish Date: Sept. 23, 2010
Pages: 155
Rating: 3 out of 5
Rating: 3 out of 5
Summary:
Now this debut collection delivers on the promise of that early story. In "Harvest," a college student's unplanned pregnancy forces her to confront her own feelings of inadequacy in comparison to her white classmates. In "Jellyfish," a father's misguided attempt to rescue a gift for his grown daughter from an apartment collapse magnifies all he doesn't know about her. And in "Snakes," the mixed-race daughter of intellectuals recounts the disastrous summer she spent with her white grandmother and cousin, a summer that has unforeseen repercussions in the present.
When Danielle Evans's short story "Virgins" was published in The Paris Review in late 2007, it announced the arrival of a bold new voice. Written when she was only twenty-three, Evans's story of two black, blue-collar fifteen-year-old girls' flirtation with adulthood for one night was startling in its pitch-perfect examination of race, class, and the shifting terrain of adolescence.
Striking in their emotional immediacy, the stories in Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self are based in a world where inequality is reality but where the insecurities of adolescence and young adulthood, and the tensions within family and the community, are sometimes the biggest complicating forces in one's sense of identity and the choices one makes.
Review:
Suffocate is a collection of short stories about the Black experience in America. Every story dealt with a sensitive and taboo subject (especially within the African American community). Virginity, abortion, and post traumatic stress disorder are just a few of the subjects Suffocate discusses.
Suffocate is a collection of short stories about the Black experience in America. Every story dealt with a sensitive and taboo subject (especially within the African American community). Virginity, abortion, and post traumatic stress disorder are just a few of the subjects Suffocate discusses.
Some of the stories (Snakes, Harvest, Someone Ought to Tell Her There's Nowhere to Go), are spectacular. As with most short stories, you are left with a sense of longing. You're left wanting more. You NEED to know how the character that you fell in love with ends up. However these stories left you with just enough. You're able to fill in the blanks and make up your own ending (and chile with my vivid imagination I need a book club ASAP).
On the other hand, the other stories were less than desirable. Not only were the endings cliffhangers, umm they really didnt have a clear beginning. Let's see if I can explain this better.....
Yeah so the point of that illustration (I told ya I have a vivid imagination): Suffocate (other than the afore mentioned septacular stories) is pretty much like that bad movie that messed up your movie night. There isn't a beginning. There isnt an ending. There is just enough of a "story" to wet your appetite and then leave you hanging.
Sooooooo *in Kevin Hart's daughters voice* who would I recommend this book to? Anyone who has a short attention span and can never seem to finish a book. If you make it to the middle of a book and then get distracted by life, or if you take years to finish a book than Suffocate is the book for you.
Ok imagine after a stressful week at work all you want to do on Saturday is chill on your couch and watch movies. You have everything in place Netflixawineacomfy sweatsaThe first movie you watch is the BOMB! Then you pick another movie (that Netflix "suggests" of course), but something is wrong with the stream. It starts in the middle of the movie. Being optimistic (I mean the Netflix gods did say you would like this movie), you continue to watch the movie. After about 45 minutes, you are really getting into the movie. You've figured out the plot (or so you think) and can't wait to see how it's going to end. And then you get the dreaded "We're sorry you've lost connection. Would you like to try again?"
Yeah so the point of that illustration (I told ya I have a vivid imagination): Suffocate (other than the afore mentioned septacular stories) is pretty much like that bad movie that messed up your movie night. There isn't a beginning. There isnt an ending. There is just enough of a "story" to wet your appetite and then leave you hanging.
Sooooooo *in Kevin Hart's daughters voice* who would I recommend this book to? Anyone who has a short attention span and can never seem to finish a book. If you make it to the middle of a book and then get distracted by life, or if you take years to finish a book than Suffocate is the book for you.
Outfit of the Day (OOTD)
Chomy from The Culture Cynic
Loving this look? Here is the look for less (I couldn't find a neon green blazer like Chomy's. Im pretty sure that is vintage.)
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