Love and Other Natural Disasters by Holly Shumas

Eve is eight months pregnant and in the middle of a Thanksgiving celebration when she discovers that her husband Jonathan has developed an intimate relationship with a woman over the past year. Jonathon asserts his innocence (an affair involves physical intimacy, and he didn't have any), while Eve feels deeply betrayed by the emotional connection he shared with someone else. What Jon has done seems so terrifyingly out of character that Eve finds herself questioning her entire reality. Did she ever really know Jon at all? Was their happiness together a lie? Is emotional intimacy more forgivable than sexual intimacy? And can their marriage survive?

Eve and Jon seem to have it all, a wonderful son, Jacob with a baby due in a few months time. But, when Eve overhears Jon on the phone during Thanksgiving dinner her whole world crumbles. Laney happened. Eve makes everyone leave and confronts Jon, who admits to having an "emotional" relationship with Laney over the past year. He doesn't see this as cheating because it never once got physical, although he "has love" for her.

This book was very thought provoking. My husband and I discussed it, and I was with Eve's friend Lil. I thought that an emotional relationship was worse than a physical one, and it would be harder for me to forgive. I was happy with the ending and how the author brought you to it. She also left the possibility of a sequel - I for one would love to know more about what happens with Uncle Charlie.

This is the first book that I have read by this author, but I really enjoyed it. Once again I want to thank Miriam Parker of The Hachette Book Group for sending this to me for review.

Testimony by Anita Shreve

About the book:

At a New England boarding school, a sex scandal is about to break. Even more shocking than the sexual acts themselves is the fact that they were caught on videotape. A Pandora's box of revelations, the tape triggers a chorus of voices--those of the men, women, teenagers, and parents involved in the scandal--that details the ways in which lives can be derailed or destroyed in one foolish moment.

Writing with a pace and intensity surpassing even her own greatest work, Anita Shreve delivers in TESTIMONY a gripping emotional drama with the impact of a thriller. No one more compellingly explores the dark impulses that sway the lives of seeming innocents, the needs and fears that drive ordinary men and women into intolerable dilemmas, and the ways in which our best intentions can lead to our worst transgressions.

Review:

Believe it or not, this is the first book by Anita Shreve that I have read. And am happy to say that it will not be my last. This book centers around an act at a prestigious private school in Vermont - an act that is sure to change the lives of more than a few people.

When the headmaster (Mike Borden) is handed a tape by his secretary, he has no idea what he is about to view. Never in his wildest dreams did he expect to view a sexually explicit tape involving a 14 year old girl and 3 other students. The thing I enjoyed the most about this book is the fact that it is told from so many different view points. I believe that there are people that did not like this aspect of the book, but I for one found it very intriguing. Maybe in the hands of a lesser author this wouldn't have worked, but that certainly isn't the case with this book.

That said, this certainly is not a book that can be rushed through. You really need to take your time reading this one, or you are sure to become lost and disoriented easily. Some characters are more involved in the story telling, but there are some "blurbs" by characters that are just a few pages in length. All in all it is a very interesting way to write a book - I would love to hear how she kept things straight while writing it.

Thanks again Miriam Parker and The Hachette Group for allowing me to review this fantastic book!

About the author:

Anita Shreve is the critically acclaimed author of 14 novels, including Body Surfing, The Pilot's Wife, which was a selection of Oprah's Book Club, and The Weight of Water, which was a finalist for England's Orange Prize. She lives in Massachusetts.

Flirting with Forty by Jane Porter

About the book:

He got the second home and the Porsche. She got the kids and a broken heart. Now Jackie, post-divorce and heading toward the big four-oh, is on vacation in sunny Hawaii and staring down her upcoming birthday-alone. But not for long. She's soon falling for Kai, her gorgeous, much younger surf instructor, and the wild passionate fling they have becomes the biggest surprise of Jackie's life.

Back home in Seattle, Jackie has to struggle with single parenthood...and memories of Kai. He hasn't forgotten her. Yet thousands of miles of ocean-not to mention an age difference that feels even wider-separate them. And, of course, her friends disapprove. When a choice must be made, can she, will she risk everything for her chance at happiness?

Interested in the reading guide? You can find it here.

Let me start out by saying that once again I owe a big thank you to Miriam Parker of The Hatchette Book Group for sending me this book (along with two others by Ms. Porter). Thanks really isn't enough - you're an angel!


This book was one of the best books I have read in the last year! Books like this used to sit on my shelf waiting to be read - I used to limit myself to mostly suspense and horror books and would try and fit in a book of this kind every once in awhile to prove that I wasn't a book snob.


The blogging community has truly been an eye opener and I am truly blessed to have found fantastic people like Miriam who are willing to let me review books of all kinds. This book revolves around the life of Jackie Lauren. She has had an extremely trying year and is struggling to overcome the emotional scars that are left by her divorce and coping with being a single parent. As her fortieth birthday nears, she sees constant reminders about the difference between being a single parent and married families. She isn't sure how she is going to make it through.


She decides to accept the invitation of a friend to a go all out to celebrate turning the big 4-0. Her friend backs out at the last minute, but Jackie decides to go anyway, and try to bring some sunshine into her dreary days, and if any place can do that it would have to be Hawaii.

And boy does the sun shine when Jackie meets Kai, a gorgeous surfing instructor. Sure, he's ten years younger, but he makes her feel the way every woman wants and brings back some of the spark and sass that had been missing for so long. The affair is short, but her feelings for Kai follow her home and she is forced to decide whether she is reading more into them, or if this is a relationship worth pursuing, and if she can do this without the approval of her family and friends.


I really enjoyed this book! Although I haven't reached this age my relationship with my husband was questioned due to the age difference between us. Thankfully my family and friends accepted it, but it did take awhile. I love Jane's writing style and will be sure to read her other books. I really recommend this book and think it is an easy read with some depth and situations that most women can relate to.


About the author:

A UCLA grad with an MA in Writing, I am one of those original book geeks, the girl with the coke bottle glasses that sat with a novel next to the classroom door rather than play during recess. I wrote my first story in first grade, my first picture book in second grade and my first novel in 4th, and I've just continued to write from there—bad poetry, passionate essays, romance rich novels and poignant, bittersweet contemporary fiction.

But writing doesn't always come easy to me. I have to work at it. To go below the surface and find the real story in each story, the heart of the novel, the one the reader will hopefully remember long after the story is through. Writing makes me a bit mad which is why I work very hard to have good hair.

When not writing, what do I do for fun? Travel. I don’t know if it's from growing up in a small Central California town, or living abroad with my family when I was 13, but I crave change, travel, adventure. Put me in a car, a ship, a plane and send me off. I subscribe to countless travel magazines, have a library of travel books, and am always interested in where people have been.

Then of course, there are my kids. Being the mom of two boys I watch a lot of sports, and do goofy boy things with them like create slug habitats and nurture baby geckos. It's not the life I expected—I was such a Barbie doll girl—but its full of Tom Sawyer moments that surprise, delight and absolutely exasperate me but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

The boys and I live in Bellevue, Washington, six miles from downtown Seattle, and with the plethora of pro sport teams, rugged mountains, coffee houses and bookstores, it's the perfect place for a writer to call home.

You can find out more by visiting her website at http://www.janeporter.com/



Here's a little info about the origin of the book:



Yes, I'm dating a surfer, and yes, I got the idea for Flirting with Forty while staying at the luxurious Halekulani Hotel on Waikiki Beach in Hawaii, but two years ago when I had my brainstorm--and tracked down the sexy surfer for an interview--I never imagined we'd have one date, much less still be dating two years later. The fact that we're still seeing each other leads people to believe that Flirting with Forty is about me, us, but I sold the story to 5 Spot before there was an “us”.

I sold the story to 5 Spot when it was just a premise, a huge what if that teased me with lives unlived and paths untaken. The character Jackie is not me, but there is me in Jackie, just as there are memories and conversations that have become embedded, imprinted that demand in their own way to be shared. Spoken.

So which comes first? The writer or the story? The writer, yes, but the writer is made up of a lifetime of stories and everything that goes onto the page starts with an event, a word, a lost opportunity. Stories--books--are shaped by dreams, broken hearts, curiosity, wishes, accidental meetings. I went to Hawaii to finish a book for another publisher and left with a new novel idea. And even with the book finished, the idea lives on.

What if we could reinvent ourselves?

What if we changed our direction mid-stream?

What if wanted more than we had?

And thus (my) books are born.

I live and I write. I write and I live. And as I've tried to explain to my children and non-writer friends, I could not do one without the other. The two are so intertwined that I have been transformed by the writing. I am changed, just as my characters are changed. I write a new heroine now, one that asks questions and isn’t satisfied with a half portion of anything. Rather my heroines today demand happiness. They deserve fulfillment, satisfaction. And in the end, my readers are empowered, too, as the writer, the reader, and the character share one goal—to live more richly, to live with more love.

Copyright © 2006

The Gate House by Nelson DeMille

Reviewed by Tim Gleichner

About the book:

#1 New York Times bestselling author Nelson DeMille delivers the long-awaited follow-up to his classic novel The Gold Coast.

When John Sutter's aristocratic wife killed her mafia don lover, John left America and set out in his sailboat on a three-year journey around the world, eventually settling in London. Now, ten years later, he has come home to the Gold Coast, that stretch of land on the North Shore of Long Island that once held the greatest concentration of wealth and power in America, to attend the imminent funeral of an old family servant. Taking up temporary residence in the gatehouse of Stanhope Hall, John finds himself living only a quarter of a mile from Susan who has also returned to Long Island. But Susan isn't the only person from John's past who has reemerged: Though Frank Bellarosa, infamous Mafia don and Susan's ex-lover, is long dead, his son, Anthony, is alive and well, and intent on two missions: Drawing John back into the violent world of the Bellarosa family, and exacting revenge on his father's murderer--Susan Sutter. At the same time, John and Susan's mutual attraction resurfaces and old passions begin to reignite, and John finds himself pulled deeper into a familiar web of seduction and betrayal. In THE GATE HOUSE, acclaimed author Nelson Demille brings us back to that fabled spot on the North Shore -- a place where past, present, and future collides with often unexpected results.

Two phrases sum up my feelings about this book. The first would be the well know sports analogy "too little, too late". The second would be courtesy of Elvis Presley who asked for "a little less conversation, a little more action". Either one will do.

Now, to be fair, I didn't dislike this book. It's jus that a book that is nearly 700 pages long and has a Mafia Don looking to avenge his father's murder at the hands of his lover, who just happens to be the ex-wife of the main character, missed many chances to pump some life into the story.

The entire story comes to a climax in the last 30 pages or so, and that would be fine except that there is so much over written dialogue it takes 630 pages to get to that point.

Also, why take the time to develop a character like Mr. Nusim and imply that there may be terrorist danger, and then have nothing come of it.

And finally, while most things took quite awhie to develop, John and Susan got back together and decided to remarry after one meeting. I didn't get that at all.

"The Gate House" wasn't a bad book. Mr. DeMille would appear to be a talented writer whose style I quite enjoyed. In the end, the book was boring and even the big finish couldn't save it for me. It really was a case of too little, too late.

Thanks again to Miriam Parker of The Hatchette Book Group for sending me this book for review!