Wild Horses by Jenny Oldfield

In Jenny Oldfield's Wild Horses, the first book in The Horses of Half Moon Ranch series, we meet Kirstie Scott, a young girl who lives on the family's horse ranch with her mother and older brother. When she is helping to lead guests on a riding tour of Miners' Ridge, there is a storm and a landslide, which leaves her and her horse, Lucky, trapped in Dead Man's Canyon. Kirstie realizes she's trapped with a herd of wild horses, and the black stallion leading them has a badly injured knee.

Kirstie does what she can to stop the bleeding before she is rescued, and they rush back to the ranch to get the vet. When they return, the stallion and the rest of the wild horses are gone. Kirstie enlists the help of her best friend, Lisa, to find the stallion, who obviously could not walk out of the canyon by himself.

I began reading Wild Horses with my daughter, aka The Girl, but she stopped reading about 90 pages into the book because the story was unfolding too slow for her taste. I agree with her assessment of the plot pacing, as it seemed like there were pages of wondering where the horse might be when we just wanted Kirstie to hurry up and find him. However, once the stallion is found and other complications arise, the story moves quickly to a resolution.

Overall, I think Wild Horses is a good read for girls around the same age as my daughter, who's 8. What I liked best is that Kirstie's character is a good role model; she's active, eager to help those in need, and she doesn't dress or talk too old for her age. She didn't always make the right decisions, but she's a young girl, and her actions were true to her character.

Stay tuned for my review of the second book in the series, Rodeo Rocky, later this week.

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of Wild Horses from Sourcebooks for review purposes.

Mailbox Monday -- March 30

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend. Mine was pretty uneventful, but there were a few family movies, a card game or two, and even some reading time. I was even in a pleasant mood for someone who missed her usual Sunday nap! ;) We're still without a home computer, so I'm still behind in blog reading. :( Hopefully that situation will be remedied soon.

Anyway, it was a pretty busy week for me mail-wise, not that my leaning towers of books needed more additions. Here's what I received:

The Lacemakers of Glenmara by Heather Barbieri (via Shelf Awareness)

The Blue Notebook by James A. Levine (an unexpected package from Random House)

Finding Grace by Donna VanLiere (an unexpected package from Wesman PR)

Horrid Henry, Horrid Henry and the Mega-Mean Time Machine, Horrid Henry Tricks the Tooth Fairy, and Horrid Henry's Stinkbomb by Francesca Simon (all from Sourcebooks)

Aesop's Fables retold by John Cech (a contest win from Booking Mama...thanks, Julie!)

Shanghai Girls by Lisa See (via Shelf Awareness)

The Shipwreck of a Nation: Germany: An Inside View by H. Peter Nennhaus (from the author)

Coventry by Helen Humphreys (from the publisher)

What books did you welcome into your home recently? Visit Mailbox Monday at The Printed Page to see what other people received. Thanks to Marcia for hosting!

Everyone Is Beautiful by Katherine Center

Everyone Is Beautiful is the kind of book you read in one sitting, the kind of book that makes you laugh out loud, the kind of book that makes you feel like you're not alone. Katherine Center has put into words things I've been feeling for the nearly nine years I've been a mother.

Lanie Coates is a young mother of three boys (ages 4, 2, and 10 months). She's given up her art to stay at home with the kids, and she's just relocated the family from Houston (where she's lived all her life) to the Boston area so her husband, Peter, can work on his music career. She doesn't know anyone, she barely has time to take a shower with two kids running around and a baby on her hip, and she soon learns that her parents are selling their long-time home and moving to Dubai. She runs into a girl she knew (but never really talked to) in high school, Amanda, and the two hit it off, but the new friendship doesn't stop Lanie from worrying about the extra weight she packed on during her pregnancies, the lack of intimacy with her husband, and her need for something to do outside mothering.

Lanie decides to change her life. She joins the gym, takes up photography, even befriends the "Mean Witch" who lives in the apartment below theirs. But just as her life is starting to turn around, the bottom falls out from under her and she realizes she might lose everything. And that's all I'm going to say about the plot.

Center's writing is wonderful, perfectly capturing the fluctuating emotions of motherhood and marriage, coating the more disgusting parts of parenting with a bit of humor, and showing that we can find beauty anywhere if only we stop to look. The characters are well-rounded, and Center takes great care in showing a change in all of them by the time the book ends. I loved them all, from the high-maintenance Amanda and the grief-stricken Nora to the creepy photography teacher Nelson. These characters are unique, but none of them seemed over the top.

I think any woman would enjoy this book, kids and husbands or not, but as I closed the book I realized I loved it so much because I understood Lanie. In many aspects of her life and her personality, I saw myself. I've been asked when my baby's due one week after she was born, I've been puked and pooped on, I've napped on the couch while my daughter colored all over the walls. I've gone a whole day without talking to an adult, I've struggled to find time for a shower, I've been called chubby by my child, and I've lamented the romance my husband and I shared in the early days of our relationship. I also know what it's like to feel like I've lost myself amid the diapers and the toys and the burned dinners, and I've found creative outlets (reading, writing, blogging) that keep me sane. Granted, I don't change diapers anymore, but I remember what it was like to be a stay-at-home mom with an infant, and now I juggle the parenting stuff, the marriage stuff, and the hobby stuff with a full-time job.

Everyone Is Beautiful pulls you from happiness to despair to hope and contentment. I didn't realize how much I needed to read this book until I finished it. As I write these words, I'm looking at things differently than I did yesterday. And that a book can make me see myself and other women in a new light, to me, is beautiful.



Everyone Is Beautiful also was reviewed by:

Peeking Between the Pages
The Friendly Book Nook
You've GOTTA read this!
Caribousmom
S. Krishna's Books
Wendi's Book Nook
Bookopolis
Maw Books Blog
Booking Mama

If you've also reviewed it, let me know in the comments, and I'll add your link!

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of Everyone Is Beautiful from the publisher for review purposes.

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County by Tiffany Baker

I'd heard so many good things about The Little Giant of Aberdeen County that by the time I had a chance to read it, my expectations were high. I was pleased to discover that the book exceeded these expectations. Tiffany Baker has penned a story with unique characters and a captivating plot. I never knew from one chapter to the next where she was taking me, and I got so caught up in her beautiful writing that I just went with the flow and didn't try to figure it all out.

(There may be some spoilers in my description of the plot, which is pretty complex, though I tried to keep to the events described on the book jacket. If you want to avoid these, please scroll down.)

The book opens with Truly Plaice standing at the grave of a Dr. Robert Morgan. There's some animosity between them, and you soon learn there have been several Dr. Robert Morgans in Aberdeen since the first deserted the Confederate Army during the Civil War, made his way to New York, and married Tabitha, the area's "witch" or herbal healer. She supposedly left her "shadow book" with her healing recipes hidden in the Morgan home, but no one had found it and no one knew whether it really existed.

From this graveyard scene, we are transported back in time to the early 1950s and the start of Truly's story. Her mother dies giving birth to the larger-than-life Truly, who quickly outgrows her older sister's hand-me-downs and keeps growing, leaving their grief-stricken father unsure how to feed or clothe her. Truly suffers from a form of gigantism, a condition out of her control, but she is shunned by pretty much everyone in Aberdeen. When her father dies, her beautiful, perfect sister Serena Jane goes to live with the Reverend Pickerton and his wife, and Truly goes to the rundown Dyerson farm. The Dyersons are good people, but they are very poor, and while Truly doesn't have the nicest clothes or a lot to eat, she is content. Truly bonds with the daughter, Amelia Dyerson, who is known for having trouble with words, and Marcus Thompson, the smartest and smallest boy in their class who obviously is fond of Truly. Truly and Serena Jane drift apart, and ultimately Truly's life is forever changed because of Tabitha's "shadow book."

(End of possible spoilers)

Baker's writing style pulled me in from the first page, and it seemed so Southern to me, along with the characters and the setting, that I had to keep reminding myself it took place in New York. Telling the story from Truly's point of view, Baker does a great job getting into the mind of this complex character. Here's one of my favorite passages:

"She looks like she eats plenty to me," Cally gibed, but Estelle quieter her with a frown.

"It's not her fault she's built like a Sherman tank. Besides, maybe in her situation it's better. Look at Serena Jane. Beauty only landed her in a rat's nest of trouble."

The three women fell silent then, staring into their empty plates and ruminating on the paradoxical connection between opportunity and loveliness that Serena Jane and I presented. Without beauty, I knew, life's possibilities might pass me up, but too much loveliness was clearly a liability. It was like a train wreck, pulling in trouble. So in the end, maybe it really was me who was better off, I thought. I was ugly--no one was going to dispute that--but I was also so big that nothing in life was going to slide past me. And if it did, then maybe I was smart enough to let it keep going. (page 123 in the ARC--might differ from the published book)

I really felt for Truly, and while I couldn't agree with many of her actions during the course of the story, I could see why she did what she did. Even the unlikeable characters, like Bob-Bob and the mean teacher Miss Sparrow, were interesting and gave a fullness to the story. Baker covers a whole range of themes, from healing to the definition of beauty, but the storyline that touched me the most was Marcus and Truly's relationship. It's really hard to put my thoughts about this wonderful book into words. Baker covered a lot of ground, and it's hard to believe The Little Giant of Aberdeen County is her first novel. You'll just have to snag a copy and find out for yourself.

The Little Giant of Aberdeen County also was reviewed by:

Maw Books Blog
The Book Lady's Blog
she reads and reads
Bookopolis
A Bookworm's World
Bibliophile By the Sea
Caribousmom
Medieval Bookworm
Peeking Between the Pages

If you've also reviewed it, let me know in the comments, and I'll add your link!

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of The Little Giant of Aberdeen County from Hachette for review purposes.

Deep Dish by Mary Kay Andrews

In Deep Dish, Mary Kay Andrews tells the story of two Southern cooks in an all-out war to win a spot in the Cooking Channel's lineup. I jumped at the chance to read the book because I desperately needed a light read, and I love cooking and numerous Food Network shows.

Andrews' characters are both funny and complex. Gina Foxton has a show on Georgia public television, Fresh Start With Regina Foxton, and if she doesn't get the Cooking Channel show, she's out of a job. Her loser of a boyfriend and producer, Scott, slept with the wife of the show's sponsor, who learned of the tryst and pulled the sponsorship. Meanwhile, Tate Moody has a successful hunting, fishing, and cooking show on the Southern Outdoors Network, Vittles, and his overbearing producer, Val, wants to take his success up a notch.

When Gina meets Tate's dog, Moonpie, and accidentally lets him lose on the Vittles set, it's obvious the two will be rivals. Their animosity prompts the Cooking Channel to create a reality show, Food Fight, that takes them to Eutaw Island for a three-day competition. The winner will get their own show on the network. The plot is pretty predictable, but it's a funny, romantic story that kept my interest until the very last page. I love Southern fiction, and Andrews has a great sense of humor.

While Scott and Val were annoying, I couldn't get enough of D'John, Gina's gay makeup and hair stylist, and Lisa, Gina's tough younger sister who is pretty wise despite her wild antics. Gina and Lisa's mom also is a riot. She leaves phone messages for the girls that start out with, "This is Mrs. Birdelle Foxton calling," and I was delighted to finally "meet" her in the last scene. In addition to the entertaining cast of characters, Andrews does a great job describing the cooking show segments, from the planning of the recipes to last-minute replacements and doctoring for the cameras. And though the book definitely is light reading, it does make you think about finding your true self and figuring out what you want in life. I really enjoyed Deep Dish and would recommend it for readers who like some laughs, fun characters, a hilarious plot, and much talk about food and television.

Mary Kay Andrews was a guest on Book Club Girl's radio show last night. You can check it out here if you missed it.

Deep Dish also was reviewed by:

Savvy Verse & Wit
Peeking Between the Pages
Booking Mama
Redlady's Reading Room


If you've also reviewed it, let me know in the comments, and I'll add your link!

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of Deep Dish from HarperCollins for review purposes.

And the winner is...

Thanks to everyone who entered the Galway Bay giveaway! I now have a long list of family sagas to check out. If only there was more time in the day for reading!

Congratulations to Marie Lay, who was chosen by Randomizer.org. The book is on its way to you, and I hope you love it as much as I did.

Check Out My Book Recommendations!

Ramya from Ramya's Bookshelf asked me to list my top 5 favorite books for her Book Lovers Recommendations feature. Just 5?!? It was hard, but I managed. Check out my picks here.

Thanks, Ramya, for asking me to participate!

Interview with Phyllis Schieber, author of Willing Spirits

Today I have the pleasure of welcoming Phyllis Schieber to Diary of an Eccentric! Phyllis first visited my blog back in January as part of her Promo 101 Virtual Blog Tour for The Sinner's Guide to Confession. (You can read my review and Phyllis' guest post here.) This time, she's stopping by to promote Willing Spirits. (You can read my review here if you haven't already.)

Welcome, Phyllis! Thanks so much for taking time to answer my questions. What inspired you to write Willing Spirits?

My friendships with the women in my life inspired me. I felt a need to celebrate those relationships and to pay them tribute.

How long did it take to write the book?

I would say about three years with rewrites. I don’t write full-time though I hope to some day.

Do you have a special place where you write?

I like to write in my office at home. It’s very comfortable. We created an office for me in the garage. The office has a separate entrance, and it is filled with books and photos and artwork that I like.

What are your top 5 favorite books?

I think this list changes, but today, I would pick the following:

Unless—Carol Shields
The Fat Woman’s Joke—Fay Weldon
Madame Bovary-Gustav Flaubert
Dinner at Homesick Restaurant—Anne Tyler
Ordinary Love and Good Will--Jane Smiley

What book is on your nightstand right now?

I never read one book at a time. These books are on my nightstand. I’m sure because I checked!

Gwen John, A Life by Susan Roe
Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky
A Year in the Merde by Stephen Clark
The Beck Diet Solution by Judith S. Beck
The Republic of Love by Carol Shields

Are you working on another book? If so, any hints as to what it's about?

I am working on another book. I don’t really want to go into too much detail, but it’s very much the same and very much different from what I’ve written before.

With regard to writing, what's the best piece of advice you've received?

I’ve received much good advice from very wise folks, but I always return to Letters to a Young Poet by Ranier Maria Rilke. In the first letter, Rilke responds to the young poet’s question about whether or not his work has any merit. Rilke suggests that there is only answer to this question:

“There is only one thing you should do. Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple 'I must,' then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your while life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse.”

What else is there to say beyond that? Write because you must. It is the only reason to write.

Phyllis, thanks again for stopping by Diary of an Eccentric. I wish you much success!

******

About Willing Spirits:

Jane Hoffman and Gwen Baker, both teachers and in their forties, have a friendship that helps them endure. Years after Gwen is abandoned and left to raise two sons alone, she finds herself in love with a married man. After Jane is humiliated by her husband’s infidelity and Gwen must face her own uncertain path, the two women turn to each other.

Now, as each is tested by personal crisis, Jane and Gwen face new challenges—as mothers, as daughters, as lovers. And in the process, they will learn unexpected truths about their friendship—and themselves.

About Author Phyllis Schieber:

The first great irony of my life was that I was born in a Catholic hospital. My parents, survivors of the Holocaust, had settled in the South Bronx among other new immigrants. In the mid-fifties, my family moved to Washington Heights. The area offered scenic views of the Hudson River and the Palisades, as well as access to Fort Tryon Park and the mysteries of the Cloisters. I graduated from George Washington High School. I graduated from high school at sixteen, went on to Bronx Community College, transferred to and graduated from Herbert H. Lehman College with a B.A. in English and a New York State license to teach English. I earned my M.A. in Literature from New York University and later my M.S. as a developmental specialist from Yeshiva University. I have worked as a high school English teacher and as a learning disabilities specialist. My first novel , Strictly Personal, for young adults, was published by Fawcett-Juniper. Willing Spirits was published by William Morrow. My most recent novel, The Sinner’s Guide to Confession, was released by Berkley Putnam. In March 2009, Berkley Putnam will issue the first paperback publication of Willing Spirits.

Win A Free Book from Phyllis Schieber – Free books will be awarded during the tour.
Each comment on any of the blogs in the tour will offer a chance to win a free copy of Willing Spirits or The Sinner’s Guide to Confession. A couple of people who make a real impression on Phyllis during the tour will be chosen to win a free book. We’ll see you on the virtual blog tour trail.

For full details about Phyllis Schieber’s virtual tour, visit her tour home page here.

Order Your Copy here –
Penguin Publishers
Amazon

You can visit Phyllis Schieber here.

Mailbox Monday -- March 23

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend. I've had more time to read and nap in my recliner since the death of my computer. Nothing new on that front, unfortunately, so I'm still hopelessly behind in blog reading. Still haven't replaced the bookcase either, but I bet that problem will be remedied a lot faster than the computer issues. My hubby must be getting sick of tripping over the numerous stacks of books all over our room.

Anyway, it's time for another Mailbox Monday! (Thanks to Marcia from The Printed Page for hosting!) I received more books than I expected.

Fairy Glade & Other Enchanting Tales by Dawn Beaumont-Lane (from the author...I'll be reviewing this one with The Girl)

The Secret by Beverly Lewis (from LibraryThing Early Reviewers...can't wait to read this one, as I have nearly all of Lewis' books!)

The Lost Hours by Karen White (for a book tour next month)

The Italian Lover by Robert Hellenga (Serena somehow received an extra copy and generously gave it to me. Thanks, buddy!)

Dear Anais: My Life in Poems for You by Diana M. Raab (from the author for a contest win at Savvy Verse & Wit)

Gray Apocalypse by James Murdoch (from the publisher)

Looks like I won't run out of things to read while I'm computer-less. Not that there was ever any doubt about that. ;)

What books did you welcome into your home recently?

Willing Spirits by Phyllis Schieber

After participating in the Promo 101 Virtual Blog Tour for Phyllis Schieber's The Sinner's Guide to Confession (you can read my review here) and really enjoying the book and her writing style, I knew I had to be part of the tour for Schieber's Willing Spirits.

Willing Spirits opens with Jane Hoffman, a forty-something teacher, catching her husband in bed with a girl not much older than their college-age daughter. She realizes she's had enough and was never really happy with Arnold, and she decides a divorce is in order. Jane immediately turns to her long-time best friend, Gwen Baker, for comfort. Gwen has problems of her own, though, as her married lover decides he's finally ready to leave his wife.

Gwen and Jane have been there for each other since they met, and they are so close that it's almost as though they don't need anyone else.

Women comfort each other with touch that is meant to heal, rather than to excite. The mysteries of love are less complex between women. The hidden passages are easier to negotiate. And the dangers do not seem as great as when the same journey is taken with a man. Around each dank and frightening corner, women hold out their hands to each other and form a human chain that is, quite simply, spiritually different. The lucky ones find men who (and it is a deep and well-kept secret between women) are more like women. (pages 50-51)

Schieber brilliantly shows the complexity of female relationships. Both women had difficult relationships with their mothers, and Jane doesn't really get along with her sister. Schieber also does a good job showing how women often can't make up their minds when it comes to men (Gwen wants Daniel around because she doesn't want to be alone, but at the same time doesn't like seeing his stuff all over her house). Both Jane and Gwen are moms, and I could really relate to some of the passages about motherhood.

Some secrets were meant to be shared. But now it was her children and their secrets that frightened her. The subterfuge they must have already been a part of. The tacit pledges they had sworn to strangers. She did not want to know. And she did. That made her too much like her own mother. The sameness frightened her. (pages 157-158)

I think Schieber's writing is beautiful. Her characters are well-developed and interesting, and while I didn't think there was a major conflict or plot point that carried the book from beginning to end, I enjoyed watching Jane and Gwen deal with the tensions in their roles as mothers, daughters, wives, lovers, and friends. I recommend Willing Spirits for readers who enjoy character-driven novels about women and their numerous, complex relationships.

******

About Willing Spirits:

Jane Hoffman and Gwen Baker, both teachers and in their forties, have a friendship that helps them endure. Years after Gwen is abandoned and left to raise two sons alone, she finds herself in love with a married man. After Jane is humiliated by her husband’s infidelity and Gwen must face her own uncertain path, the two women turn to each other.

Now, as each is tested by personal crisis, Jane and Gwen face new challenges—as mothers, as daughters, as lovers. And in the process, they will learn unexpected truths about their friendship—and themselves.

About Author Phyllis Schieber:

The first great irony of my life was that I was born in a Catholic hospital. My parents, survivors of the Holocaust, had settled in the South Bronx among other new immigrants. In the mid-fifties, my family moved to Washington Heights. The area offered scenic views of the Hudson River and the Palisades, as well as access to Fort Tryon Park and the mysteries of the Cloisters. I graduated from George Washington High School. I graduated from high school at sixteen, went on to Bronx Community College, transferred to and graduated from Herbert H. Lehman College with a B.A. in English and a New York State license to teach English. I earned my M.A. in Literature from New York University and later my M.S. as a developmental specialist from Yeshiva University. I have worked as a high school English teacher and as a learning disabilities specialist. My first novel , Strictly Personal, for young adults, was published by Fawcett-Juniper. Willing Spirits was published by William Morrow. My most recent novel, The Sinner’s Guide to Confession, was released by Berkley Putnam. In March 2009, Berkley Putnam will issue the first paperback publication of Willing Spirits.

Win A Free Book from Phyllis Schieber – Free books will be awarded during the tour.
Each comment on any of the blogs in the tour will offer a chance to win a free copy of Willing Spirits or The Sinner’s Guide to Confession. A couple of people who make a real impression on Phyllis during the tour will be chosen to win a free book. We’ll see you on the virtual blog tour trail.

For full details about Phyllis Schieber’s virtual tour, visit her tour home page here.

Order Your Copy here –
Penguin Publishers
Amazon

You can visit Phyllis Schieber here.

******

Willing Spirits also was reviewed by:

Peeking Between the Pages
S. Krishna's Books
Ramya's Bookshelf
Book Addiction
Confessions of a Real Librarian


If you've also reviewed it, let me know in the comments, and I'll add your link!

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of Willing Spirits from the publisher for review purposes.

Conversations and Connections 2009 Conference

It's official! Serena and I will be attending the Third Annual Conversations and Connections: Practical Advice on Getting Published conference on April 11. We attended last year and had a great time. (Read my conference recap here.)

This year, the featured speaker is Amy Hempel, and panelists include Susan Muaddi-Darraj (I reviewed her book, The Inheritance of Exile: Stories From South Philly, and interviewed her here); C.M. Mayo, author of The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire; and Deborah Ager of 32 Poems, who is working with Serena on those awesome poet interviews you've been hearing about on Savvy Verse & Wit.

The panels include "The Novel: Juggling POVs," "The Digital Literary Landscape," and "Craft Lecture: Writing Sex Scenes." See the complete list of speakers and panels here.

The Conversations and Connections conference is April 11 from 8:30 am to 5 pm at the Johns Hopkins University Advanced Writing Program campus in the Dupont Circle area of Washington, D.C. It costs just $55, and that includes 3 panels, a book, a subscription to a literary magazine, and speed dating with a literary magazine editor, in which you have 10 minutes to have them read and critique 1-2 pages of your writing.

If any of you are in the D.C. area and want to learn more about writing and publishing, we'd love to meet up with you!

Awards That Make My Day!

I'm still plugging along without a home computer. It's really hard for me to keep up with Google Reader and answer all my comments, but I want you all to know that I'm reading each and every comment and hope to get back on track soon. Thanks to everyone who stops by to visit Diary of an Eccentric...you totally make my day!

Awards from my blogging friends also make my day, and I figure it's about time I posted these.

My dear friend Serena from Savvy Verse & Wit apparently thinks my blog is fabulous! Thank you so much! I'm supposed to list 5 things I'm obsessed with, so here goes.

1. My family--I'm thankful that my husband supports my addiction to books as they're taking over our home! My bookcase of 10 years finally bit the dust yesterday, and I wasn't too pleased to find hundreds of books all over my bedroom floor when I got home after a long day at work. It probably wasn't a great idea to cram books into every nook and cranny of a bookcase that's barely standing up, but rather than point this out to me, my darling husband offered to remove the bookcase and neatly stack the billion books against the wall. He even offered to run out and buy me a replacement bookcase immediately, but I figured the poor guy had a busy day at work, too, and needed some dinner. Also, I'm thrilled my daughter takes after me, as I love to share books (and occasionally the blog) with her. One day, my billion books will be hers.

2. Books--If you're still with me after the previous long-winded paragraph, then this obsession shouldn't surprise you at all!

3. Hogan's Heroes--I own the entire series on DVD, and I watch them over and over. They make me laugh every time.

4. Writing--Even when I'm away from my many notebooks, I'm thinking about what I could be writing. If only I had more time to devote to this obsession.

5. My new nephew--The highlight of my recent trip home was meeting my little prince. When I get my new computer and can upload pics from the trip, I'll see if my sister will let me post one here. He's so cute!

******

Kaye from Pudgy Penguin Perusals and Wendy from Wendy's Minding Spot gave me the I Love Your Blog award. Thanks so much! I love your blogs, too!

******

Finally, Serena from Savvy Verse & Wit, Luanne from A Bookworm's World, Alyce from At Home With Books, Marie from The Boston Bibliophile, and Blodeuedd of Book girl of Mur-y-Castell gave me the Proximidade Award.

Here's what this award is about:

"This blog invests and believes in the PROXIMITY-nearness in space, time and relationships. These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in prizes or self-aggrandizement! Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers! Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this clever-written text into the body of their award."

Thanks so much! I'm honored!

It would be too hard for me to pass these awards on, as I love so many blogs. Instead, I'm going to encourage you to check out these awesome blogs. They're definitely worth your time!

Mailbox Monday -- March 16 (Yup, I'm late!)

Well, I'm back from my trip to visit family in CT and MA. It was my first time flying in 10 years, and it wasn't as bad as I thought. I was terrified, but at least it was only an hour flight and everything was on time. It was nice seeing my family again, as I haven't been home in over a year. My nephew (almost 6 months old) and I had a lot of bonding time, and my sister was thankful for the help. I fell in love with him right away, and I'm thrilled that I'm not only his aunt but also his godmother.

Still no computer at home, which stinks since I have so many emails and unread blog posts from the time I was away. Hopefully that problem will be remedied soon, but if it takes me awhile to make the rounds, you know why.

Anyway, I did receive a few books in the mail last week, and I can't wait to read them!

A Lucky Child: A Memoir of Surviving Auschwitz as a Young Boy by Thomas Buergenthal (from Hachette, and it's perfect for the WWII reading challenge)

Miranda's Big Mistake by Jill Mansell (from Sourcebooks)

Deep Dish by Mary Kay Andrews (from HarperCollins for the upcoming Book Club Girl show)

What books did you welcome into your home recently?

Thanks to Marcia from The Printed Page for hosting Mailbox Monday!

Galway Bay by Mary Pat Kelly (with author guest post and giveaway)

I'm always drawn to multi-generational family sagas, so I knew I had to be part of the Early Birds Blog Tour hosted by Hachette and Grand Central Publishing for Galway Bay by Mary Pat Kelly. At more than 500 pages, I was a bit nervous when I received the book in the mail, but by the time I finished, I wished it were longer so I could spend more time with Kelly's captivating characters.

Galway Bay is a fictional account of Kelly's great-great-grandmother, Honora Keeley Kelly, the daughter of a fisherman and the granddaughter of a woman who believed in the importance of folklore, storytelling, and passing stories down through the generations. Just as Honora is about to enter the convent, Michael Kelly, the son of a blacksmith, swims toward her in Galway Bay, and they fall in love at first sight. Thanks to the sacrifice of her older sister, Maire, the couple enjoy wedded bliss on a hill overlooking Galway Bay, but their happy family soon encounters great hardship. Mary Pat Kelly does a wonderful job telling the story of the potato famine of the late 1840s and the struggle between the English and the Irish and the landlords who take everything the Irish have and hope The Great Starvation will get rid of them once and for all.

Kelly's characters are well-rounded and captivating, from Honora and her strong sister Maire to Honora's mysterious brother-in-law, Patrick Kelly, a man on the run as he fights for Ireland's independence. I was on the edge of my seat reading about Honora and Maire's journey to America with their many children and the hardships they endured as immigrants living in Chicago, and as I'm part Irish, it made me curious about how my ancestors ended up in the States. As a mother, I understood how Honora and Maire were pained by their sons' decision to fight in the Civil War after all they had done to keep them alive during the potato famine. Kelly's writing is beautiful, and her descriptions are so vivid I felt like I was with Honora through it all. Along with Honora's young children, we witness the horrors of starvation and the cruelties inflicted upon the Irish people, both in Ireland and America. I cried several times while reading the book, and after I turned the last page and dried my eyes, I placed Galway Bay on the special shelf reserved for my most favorite books.

Read an excerpt from Galway Bay here.

Listen to Mary Pat Kelly talk about Galway Bay on Blog Talk Radio today, March 17, at 11 am EST. Click here.

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I'm thrilled to welcome Mary Pat Kelly, author of Galway Bay, to Diary of an Eccentric to talk about why she wrote the book.

What Inspired Me to Write Galway Bay
By Mary Pat Kelly

When I began I didn’t even know my great-great-grandmother’s name. After decades of cranking through microfilm, turning the pages of church registers and haunting libraries in the U.S. and Ireland, they emerged from the past: Honora, the fisherman’s daughter; Michael Kelly, who fed his family with potatoes coaxed from stony ground; and their children – four boys and a girl. Finally I stood on the piece of earth where they lived and thanked them for my very existence. They had survived unimaginable suffering, and here I was.

Later, I walked the shore of Galway Bay with Geraldine Folan, who had written The Lost Fishing Hamlet as a chapter in a book telling the history of the area. We looked at the stretch of grass, rock and sand where my great-great-grandmother was born. “It’s still empty. Nothing has been built on it for more than a hundred and fifty years.” Why? It seemed the landlord had sold the land to a company intent on developing it into a seaside resort. This, during the Great Starvation. The story had it that the new owners evicted the fishermen and burnt down the thirty cottages on one night. The people were driven out, but this haunted ground resisted the efforts of the new owners and it remained empty as a kind of monument to the exiled ones. It was as if the ghosts of those who left kept watch over it.

“I always wondered what happened to the people that were here,” Geraldine said. The shared realization dawned on us both.

“I’m what happened to them,” I said. “Honora took her family to Chicago, to Bridgeport. Her grandson, Ed Kelly, became the mayor. There’s hundreds of us Kellys, all doing well enough for ourselves.”

Geraldine and I laughed. The fisher folk had won after all.

This is America’s story. We’re all descended from those who refused to be defeated by war, famine, genocide, the middle passage, death itself. Hope won. Our lives are their victory. Remembering our ancestors can sustain us in the toughest of times. This is the message of Galway Bay.

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Now for the giveaway! Hachette is generously offering one copy of Galway Bay to a lucky reader.

Because shipping is being handled by the publisher, this giveaway is open only to U.S. and Canada addresses, no P.O. Boxes.

To enter:

1. Leave a comment on this post about why you'd like to read Galway Bay.

2. For a second entry, blog about the giveaway or post it in your blog sidebar and leave me a link here.

3. For a third entry, tell me the title of your favorite family saga. I'm always looking for more of these books to read.


You don't need to leave separate comments, but you must leave your email address or blog URL.

The giveaway will end on Tuesday, March 24, at 11:59 pm EST.

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Here's a list of the other bloggers participating in the Early Birds Blog Tour for Galway Bay:

2 Kids and Tired Book Reviews
At Home With Books
book:thirty
A Reader's Respite
My Friend Amy
Bermudaonion's Weblog
A Circle of Books
The Book Nest
Lori's Book Den
Books Ahoy!
So Many Precious Books, So Little Time
Library Queue
Allison's Attic of Books
Cheryl's Book Nook
A Bookworm's World
Booking Mama
Enroute to Life
The Tome Traveller's Weblog
Marjolein Reviews
Peeking Between the Pages
Cafe of Dreams
Jenn's Bookshelf
The Book Czar
Write for a Reader
Linus's Blanket
Books by TJBaff
Caribousmom
A High and Hidden Place
Medieval Bookworm
Library Girl Reads
Savvy Verse & Wit
Pudgy Penguin Perusals
Write by Faith
Radiant Light
Booksie's Blog
Book Bargains and Previews
Wendi's Book Corner
This Book for Free
A Book Blogger's Diary

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of Galway Bay from Hachette for review purposes.

Guest post by Helena P. Schrader, author of An Obsolete Honor

Today I'd like to welcome Helena P. Schrader to Diary of an Eccentric. Helena is the author of An Obsolete Honor: A Story of the German Resistance to Hitler, an engrossing story that takes place during World War II and centers on one officer involved in the July 20, 1944, attempt to kill Hitler. You can read my review of the book here.

Here's what Helena has to say about An Obsolete Honor:

My books are like children. They cause me great joy--but much worry and despair and frustration as well. They are never perfect, but I love them just the same. And they are all different, all unique, with their own strengths and weaknesses.

An Obsolete Honor is unique because it is the book which incorporates the greatest amount of primary research. While all my books reflect and incorporate my own experiences and observations of mankind combined with historical research, An Obsolete Honor is a book which reflects encounters--interviews and deep, lasting friendships--with hundreds of survivors of the Second World War. Its greatest strength is its authenticity: this is a book that shows the reader what it was like to be part of the military and humanitarian resistance in Nazi Germany. Its weakness is that--like the German Resistance itself--it is a long, complicated story.

While some of my novels virtually write themselves, An Obsolete Honor has been re-written many times as my own understanding of the events described evolved and I met more and more people with important insights into the Resistance. I lived in Berlin, Germany for over 20 years and there I came to know personally a number of the key figures in the German Resistance and/or their widows and children. Through them I was introduced to others, including the widow of Claus Graf von Stauffenberg, Nina. I was friends with the would-be assassin Axel Freiherr von dem Bussche, visiting him at his various homes over the years, and I was particularly close to General Olbricht's widow, Eva, and his son-in-law Friedrich Georgi. (For those of you interested in more about these individuals, I have published four short articles on "Encounters with Survivors" featuring Axel von dem Bussche, Marion Countess Yorck, Philipp Baron von Boeselager and Renate Bethge, Dietrich Bonhoeffer's niece here.) All these courageous and exceptional people taught me about Nazi Germany and the German Resistance by sharing with me their memories, experiences, feelings, observations and analysis. I learned how to see Germany through their eyes, and I learned about motives, human nature and emotions in times of exceptional stress in a way that no history book can even come close to depicting.

An Obsolete Honor captures some--but by no means all--of these lessons. In fact, the very greatest difficulty in writing An Obsolete Honor was to edit it down to a coherent story without removing too much of the diversity that is a fundamental part of any historical period and the human experience of history. The stories of even ordinary people who experience exceptional events are always the stuff of novels, so by the time I had been living in Berlin only a few months, I had already heard more great stories than I could possibly put into one novel. But the men and women who had the courage to oppose the Nazi regime are more than witnesses of historic events. They were--each and every one of them--men and women of unique ethical stature and exceptional character. They may have been people from ordinary backgrounds, with ordinary education and jobs, but they were not ordinary people.

An Obsolete Honor is my tribute and my memorial to the German Resistance. It was a labor of love, which I dedicate to those who took part in the Resistance in their many different ways, but it is not about the Resistance alone. The German opposition to the Nazi regime was a series of tiny, isolated islands in a vast ocean of opportunism whipped up by the winds of Nazi fanaticism into a violent destructive force. The opposition was overwhelmed, it foundered and failed. This is why the opposition cannot be described in isolation. As important is the Resistance, is the environment in which it existed, and so An Obsolete Honor attempts to give the reader a feel for the entire spectrum of political and human attitudes toward Nazism, even while it gives pride of place to the Resistance.

If I can give my reader insight into the complexity of life in Nazi Germany and a sense of humility before the Resistance I will have accomplished what I set out to do with this particular novel. I hope that no reader finishes An Obsolete Honor without having seriously put themselves in the shoes of my characters and honestly asked themselves what they would have done in the same circumstances.

Thank you.

Award-Winning Novelist Helena P. Schrader is the author of An Obsolete Honor: A Story of the German Resistance to Hitler.

Thanks, Helena, for taking the time to tell your story to me and my readers. This is an important book, and I look forward to reading more about this period of history.

An Obsolete Honor by Helena P. Schrader

An Obsolete Honor: A Story of the German Resistance to Hitler is a must-read for anyone who mistakenly believes all Germans sided with Hitler and his evil minions during World War II. Helena P. Schrader undertook extensive research and interviews with survivors of the failed plot to kill Hitler on July 20, 1944, as well as the spouses of those officers executed for their involvement. (This plot was recently featured in the movie Valkyrie.)

An Obsolete Honor opens in 1938 and ends after the attempted coup (with an epilogue to detail the fates of the many characters, both historical and fictional). There are so many layers to this nearly 560 page story, and I know I can't do it justice here. The book is intense and engrossing, and though there were a lot of characters and military strategy to follow, I was never bored or overwhelmed with details. However, if you're not overly interested in this period in history, the book might be a bit much for you.

The main character of An Obsolete Honor is Philip Baron von Feldburg, a German staff officer who spends a lot of the war on the Russian front, growing increasingly sick of Hitler's ridiculous military strategy and angry about the SS's extermination of innocent Jews by rounding up women, children, and the elderly, shooting them, stacking their bodies up, and leaving them behind. Philip believes a change in command is necessary to end the war and stop the senseless killing. He serves under real-life officers involved in the Valkyrie plot, including General Friedrich Olbricht, Major General Henning von Tresckow, and Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg. Philip's wife, Alexandra von Mollwitz, also plays a large role in the story. She meets Philip in the General Staff Headquarters in Berlin and shares his feelings of hatred for Hitler and the Nazi regime, even working with Olbricht on Valkyrie.

I found many other characters in the book interesting, including Sophia Maria von Feldburg, Philip's mother, who also is against the Nazis and does her best to care for the Polish laborers forced to work at her manor. Theresa von Feldburg, Philip's sister, is another interesting character. She is married to Walther, a self-made man who takes over Jewish factories in Warsaw, uses forced labor from the concentration camps, and creates a home for his family by evicting a Jewish family and moving in. Theresa only cares about herself, never realizing the hardships others endure during the war. I also was captivated by Marianne Moldenauer, a young college student who lives in Philip's Berlin apartment building and forges documents to help the Jews, all the while dating a Gestapo inspector.

There are so many other characters (there's a list of characters at the beginning and even a glossary of German terms and military rank at the end) and subplots that I couldn't possibly mention them all, but Schrader does a brilliant job showing different aspects of the resistance and discontent, as well as the fear that characterized daily life under the Nazis. Imagine being arrested for laughing at a joke about Hitler, being turned in by a relative or an acquaintance for making a statement not in line with Nazi ideology, watching your Jewish neighbors forced out of their homes never to return, or having your children forced into service for the Fuhrer. There were countless German men, women, and youth who opposed Hitler and many who were willing to put their lives on the line to spur change. Those behind the Valkyrie plot knew the odds were against them, yet they made the commitment to show the world that Hitler didn't speak or act for everyone. Schrader does an excellent job blending fiction and history to give us a glimpse of what it was like for Germans under Nazi rule. Given the subject matter, it's hard to say I "enjoyed" the book, but reading it was an eye-opening and emotional experience and well worth the two weeks it took me to finish.

Here are some passages that I wanted to share with you all:

Sophia Maria drew the horse to a halt and turned to face her firstborn. 'Philip, we didn't bring Hitler to power, and we cannot bring him down. All we can try to do is to survive with our personal honor intact--or as untarnished as humanly possible.' Philip looked at her rather strangely, and she felt she had to explain. 'Look, I think what our government has done to the Poles is outrageous, but I can't give them back their land. I can't reverse the injustice done to them. All I can do is treat them with as much consideration, kindness and respect as is possible within my own small realm. God knows, that realm is tiny indeed. Technically, I can't even give my workers an old pair of boots. Common decency has been made illegal by this regime, and I have been turned into a 'criminal.' But I must be a criminal if I am to maintain a much higher law: the law of humanity and Christianity.'
(page 92)

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'It's as if Hitler and his close associates were carriers of a disease--a disease which eats away at the moral fiber of the individual. The nearer or longer one is in contact with them, the weaker one's own ethical structure and sense of humanity becomes. Over time, one's entire system of values is corroded to nothing. In the advanced stages of the disease, not only has one's normal sense of human decency been destroyed, but criminal values have replaced healthy ones.' . . .

'But if our senior military commanders can't resist the criminal orders of Hitler, then the fate of the entire nation is in the hands of an emotionally unstable, morally degenerate madman.' (page 129)

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The Reich was to be made 'Jew-Free' by transporting all the Jews to the mammoth and growing ghettos established throughout the occupied territories in Eastern Europe--Warsaw, Riga, Krakow, and Lublin. 'To the pale,' as Herr Silber described it. 'First the Russians sent us there and now the Germans, always to the pale. Funny--I just said 'the Germans' as if I weren't a German, too. All that propaganda eventually seeps into your brain, even if you don't want it to.' (page 216)

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'Herr General, protectiveness toward women, respect for old people, and love for children are basic human instincts. What does it take to suck the most elemental sympathy out of a young man?'

'Maybe not as much as you think,' Rittenbach countered. 'Murders are committed in every society. If all the moral force of church, law and society is not enough to prevent such things, what can you expect from men given justification and orders to murder? We should not be so surprised when men turn back into the sadistic, bloodthirsty beasts they really are.' (pages 222-223)

Helena P. Schrader, author of An Obsolete Honor, will be a guest blogger at Diary of an Eccentric tomorrow. I hope you'll come back to read what she has to say about writing the book.

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An Obsolete Honor marks the 5th book I've read for the WWII Reading Challenge at War Through the Generations that I'm co-hosting with Serena. Technically, I've completed the challenge, but I plan to read more WWII books over the remainder of the year.

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An Obsolete Honor also was reviewed by:

MariReads

If you've also reviewed it, let me know in the comments, and I'll add your link!

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of An Obsolete Honor from Author Marketing Experts, Inc. for review purposes.

Mailbox Monday -- March 9

It's time for another Mailbox Monday! The books are coming in more slowly, and that's a conscious decision on my part given the out-of-control state of my TBR pile. Here's what I received this time around:

Mission Accomplished: Stop the Clock by Muriel P. Engelman (from the author...a perfect book for the WWII reading challenge)

The 8th Confession by James Patterson (from Hachette)

The Agency by Ally O'Brien (a contest win from Wendi's Book Corner...thanks, Wendi!)

I'm looking forward to reading these! What books did you welcome into your home recently?

Thanks to Marcia from The Printed Page for hosting Mailbox Monday.

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Oh, the horror! My home computer died over the weekend! So with the lack of online access at home, coupled with a trip to CT for my nephew's baptism this weekend, I soon will be even more behind in my blog reading and commenting than I already was. So if you don't see me around, don't take it personally. And please send good thoughts my way...my husband's trying to fix it. It's an old computer, so we knew it was only a matter of time until we had to buy a new one. But getting a new one could take several weeks. It's a good thing I'm too busy to think about it right now. I might break down and cry. ;) Well, I guess I'll have more reading time...