"Perfection" by J.L. Spelbring~Dystopian Thriller

SUMMARY :

The personification of Aryan purity, Ellyssa's spent her whole life under her creator's strict training and guidance; her purpose is to eradicate inferior beings. She was genetically engineered to be the perfect soldier: strong, intelligent, unemotional, and telepathic.

Only Ellyssa isn't perfect.

Ellyssa feels emotions--a fact she's spent her life concealing. Until she encounters the epitome of inferiority: a dark-haired boy raised among renegades hiding since the Nazis won the war a century ago. He speaks to her telepathically, pushing thoughts into her mind, despite the impossibility of such a substandard person having psychic abilities.

But he does.

His unspoken words and visions of a place she's never visited make Ellyssa question her creator. Confused and afraid her secret will be discovered, Ellyssa runs away, embarking on a journey where she discovers there is more to her than perfection.


PARTICULARS OF THIS BOOK :

Published by Spencer Hill Press
Pages:  317
Genre:  YA/Dystopian
Author:  J.L. Spelbring


ABOUT THE AUTHOR :

J.L. Spelbring lives in Texas, where she wanders out in the middle of the night to look at the big and bright stars. Besides knocking imaginary bad guys in the head with a keyboard, she enjoys being swept away between the pages of a book, running amuck inside in her own head, pretending she is into running, and hanging out with her kids, who are way too cool for her. 


THE BOOKISH DAME REVIEWS :

This book is a sleeper!  Imaginative and spellbinding, it's captivating from the first chapter on.  I enjoyed the story immensely.  Spelbring is an author to keep your eyes on.

J.L. Spelbring was an unknown author to me, and one I told Spencer Hill Press I was willing to take a chance on because the summary of the book was so compelling.  I found the story more than satisfying with characters that were vastly interesting and well-conceived. The plot was fast-paced.  This is a dystopian unlike any I've read in six years of reviewing.  Really a book that transcends all age groups.  Young adults and adults, both, will love this one.

I thought the concept of continuing the Nazi ideal of an Aryan race was a great one, coupled with the modern extension of having the children be psychic and more.  They were stealthy in their different roles, with different genetic/innate "gifts."  The main character, Ellyssa in her aberration was engaging and exciting.  I was drawn in to her struggle from the beginning and never faltered along the way.  Other characters are strongly developed.  Loved them and their different quirks and flaws.

The ending is perfect!  And I look forward to what appears to be a set up for a sequel.   

I highly recommend this book which may not be on the list of books touted by major publishers this season.  It's a show-stopper!  (Don't be thrown off by some editing flaws at the beginning of the book.)  It's available on Amazon.

5 stars              Deborah/TheBookishDame        

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International Writers ThrillerFest VIII~July 10-13, Grand Hyatt, NYC

 

 

 

 

 

 

The International Thriller Writers (ITW) brings ThrillerFest VIII on July 10-13, 2013 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in NYC to celebrate the art of the thrill.

Spines are already tingling for the legendary Anne Rice, Queen of the Gothic Thriller, who will make a rare appearance to serve as the 2013 ThrillerMaster. Rice is the author of 31 novels, including The Vampire Chronicles, Songs of the Seraphim and the newWolf Gift Chronicles.

 

Her latest book, which will be out this October is:

 

 

 

Spotlight guests also include Michael Connelly, T. Jefferson Parker, Michael Palmer, and Silver Bullet Award Recipient Steve Berry.

Here's something about author, STEVE BERRY:

 

Steve Berry is the New York Times and #1 internationally bestselling author of The King’s Deception, The Columbus Affair, The Jefferson Key, The Emperor’s Tomb, The Paris Vendetta, The Charlemagne Pursuit, The Venetian Betrayal, The Alexandria Link, The Templar Legacy, The Third Secret, The Romanov Prophecy, and The Amber Room. His books have been translated into 40 languages with more than 15 million printed copies in 51 countries. They consistently appear in the top echelon of The New York Times, USA Today, and Indie bestseller lists.

History lies at the heart of every Steve Berry novel. It’s his passion, one he shares with his wife, Elizabeth, which led them to create History Matters, a foundation dedicated to historic preservation. Since 2009 Steve and Elizabeth have crossed the country to save endangered historic treasures, raising money via lectures, receptions, galas, luncheons, dinners and their popular writers workshops. To date, nearly 2,000 students have attended those workshops. In 2012 and 2013 Steve’s devotion to historic preservation was recognized by the American Library Association, which named Steve it’s spokesperson for National Preservation Week. Among his other honors is the Royden B. Davis Distinguished Author Award, and the 2013 Barnes & Noble Writers for Writers Award given by Poets & Writers.

Steve was born and raised in Georgia, graduating from the Walter F. George School of Law at Mercer University. He was a trial lawyer for 30 years and held elective office for 14 of those years. He is a founding member of International Thriller Writers—a group of more than 2,000 thriller writers from around the world—and served three years as its co-president.


If any of you are in the area, please find time to attend this awesome event!!


Just to whet your appetite, here's an excerpt from Steve Berry's  novel!   Published by Random House, it has 432 pgs.

SUMMARY :

Cotton Malone is back! Steve Berry’s new international adventure blends gripping contemporary political intrigue, Tudor treachery, and high-octane thrills into one riveting novel of suspense.

Cotton Malone and his fifteen-year-old son, Gary, are headed to Europe. As a favor to his former boss at the Justice Department, Malone agrees to escort a teenage fugitive back to England. But after he is greeted at gunpoint in London, both the fugitive and Gary disappear, and Malone learns that he’s stumbled into a high-stakes diplomatic showdown—an international incident fueled by geopolitical gamesmanship and shocking Tudor secrets.

At its heart is the Libyan terrorist convicted of bombing Pan Am Flight 103, who is set to be released by Scottish authorities for “humanitarian reasons.” An outraged American government objects, but nothing can persuade the British to intervene.

Except, perhaps, Operation King’s Deception.

Run by the CIA, the operation aims to solve a centuries-old mystery, one that could rock Great Britain to its royal foundations.

Blake Antrim, the CIA operative in charge of King’s Deception, is hunting for the spark that could rekindle a most dangerous fire, the one thing that every Irish national has sought for generations: a legal reason why the English must leave Northern Ireland. The answer is a long-buried secret that calls into question the legitimacy of the entire forty-five-year reign of Elizabeth I, the last Tudor monarch, who completed the conquest of Ireland and seized much of its land. But Antrim also has a more personal agenda, a twisted game of revenge in which Gary is a pawn. With assassins, traitors, spies, and dangerous disciples of a secret society closing in, Malone is caught in a lethal bind. To save Gary he must play one treacherous player against another—and only by uncovering the incredible truth can he hope to prevent the shattering consequences of the King’s Deception.

Praise for The King’s Deception

“A Dan Brown-ian secular conspiracy about the Virgin Queen driving nonstop international intrigue.”—Kirkus Reviews

Praise for Steve Berry

“Berry raises this genre’s stakes.”—The New York Times

“I love this guy.”—#1 New York Times bestselling author Lee Child

“Forget Clancy and Cussler. When it comes to this genre, there is simply no one better.”—The Providence Journal

Excerpted from Chapter One of THE KING’S DECEPTION

By Steve Berry 

 

In a few minutes his favor for Stephanie Nelle would be over, then he and Gary would catch their connecting flight to Copenhagen and enjoy the week, depending of course on how many uncomfortable questions his son might want answered. The hitch was that

the Denmark flight departed not from Heathrow, but Gatwick, London’s other major airport, an hour’s ride east. Their departure time was several hours away, so it wasn’t a problem. He would just need to convert some dollars to pounds and hire a taxi.

They left Customs and claimed their luggage.

Both he and Gary had packed light.

“The police going to take me?” Ian asked.

“That’s what I’m told.”

“What will happen to him?” Gary asked.

He shrugged. “Hard to say.”

And it was. Especially with the CIA involved.

He shouldered his bag and led both boys out of the baggage area.

“Can I have my things?” Ian asked.

When Ian had been turned over to him in Atlanta, he’d been given a plastic bag that contained a Swiss Army knife with all the assorted attachments, a pewter necklace with a religious medal attached, a pocket Mace container, some silver shears, and two paperback books with their covers missing.

Ivanhoe and Le Morte D’Arthur.

Their brown edges were water-stained, the bindings veined with thick white creases. Both were thirty-plus-year-old printings. Stamped on the title page was any old books, with an address in Piccadilly Circus, London. He employed a similar branding of inventory, his simply announcing COTTON MALONE, BOOKSELLER, HØJBRO PLADS, COPENHAGEN. The items in the plastic bag all belonged to Ian, seized by Customs when they took him into custody at Miami International, after he’d tried to enter the country illegally.

 “That’s up to the police,” he said. “My orders are to hand you and the bag over to them.”

He’d stuffed the bundle inside his travel case, where it would stay until the police assumed custody. He half expected Ian to bolt, so he remained on guard. Ahead he spied two men, both in dark suits walking their way. The one on the right, short and stocky with auburn hair, introduced himself as Inspector Norse.

He extended a hand, which Malone shook.

“This is Inspector Devene. We’re with the Met. We were told you’d be accompanying the boy. We’re here to give you a lift to Gatwick and take charge of Master Dunne.”

“I appreciate the ride. Wasn’t looking forward to an expensive taxi.”

“Least we can do. Our car is just outside. One of the privileges of being the police is we can park where we want.”

The man threw Malone a grin.

They started for the exit.

Malone noticed Inspector Devene take up a position behind Ian. Smart move, he thought.

“You responsible for getting him into the country with no passport?”

Norse nodded. “We are, along with some others working with us. I think you know about them.”

That he did.

They stepped out of the terminal into brisk morning air. A bank of dense clouds tinted the sky a depressing shade of pewter. A blue Mercedes sedan sat by the curb. Norse opened the rear door and motioned for Gary to climb in fi rst, then Ian and Malone. The inspector stood outside until they were all in, then closed the door. Norse rode in the front passenger seat, while Devene drove. They sped out of Heathrow and found the M4 motorway. Malone knew the route, London a familiar locale. Years ago he’d spent time in England on assignments. He’d also been detached here for a year by the navy. Traffi c progressively thickened as they made their way east toward the city.

“Would it be all right if we made one stop before we head for Gatwick?” Norse asked him.

 “No problem. We have time before the plane leaves. The least we can do for a free ride.”

Malone watched Ian as the boy gazed out the window. He couldn’t help but wonder what would happen to him. Stephanie’s assessment had not been a good one. A street kid, no family, completely on his own. Unlike Gary, who was dark-haired with a swarthy complexion, Ian was blond and fair-skinned. He seemed like a good kid, though. Just dealt a bad hand. But at least he was young, and youth offered chances, and chances led to possibilities. Such a contrast with Gary, who lived a more conventional, secure life. The thought of Gary on the streets, loose, with no one, tore at his heart. Warm air blasted the car’s interior and the engine droned as they chugged through traffic.

Malone’s eyes surrendered to jet lag.

When he woke, he glanced at his watch and realized he’d been out about fifteen minutes. He willed himself to alertness. Gary and Ian were still sitting quietly. The sky had darkened further. A storm was approaching the city. He studied the car’s interior, noticing for the first time no radio or communications equipment. Also, the carpets

were immaculate, the upholstery in pristine condition. Certainly not like any police car he’d ever ridden in.

He then examined Norse.

The man’s brown hair was cut below the ears. Not shaggy, but thick. He was clean-shaven and a bit overweight. He was dressed appropriately, suit and tie, but it was the left earlobe that drew hisattention. Pierced. No earring was present, but the puncture was clear.

“I was wondering, Inspector. Might I see your identification? I should have asked at the airport.”

Norse did not answer him. The question aroused Ian’s attention, and he studied Malone with a curious look.

“Did you hear me, Norse? I’d like to see your identification.”

“Just enjoy the ride, Malone.”

He didn’t like the curt tone so he reached for the front seat and pulled himself forward, intending to make his point clearer.

The barrel of a gun came around the headrest and greeted him.

“This enough identification?” Norse asked.

“Actually, I was hoping for a picture ID.” He motioned to the weapon. “When did the Metropolitan Police start issuing Glocks?”

 

Excerpted from THE KING’S DECEPTION Copyright © 2013 Steve Berry. Excerpted by permission of Ballantine Books, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.



The ThrillerFest is sure to prove to be a great event.  Hope you can attend!

Deborah/TheBookishDame

 

 

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"Flora" by Gail Godwin~Brilliant Coming of Age Novel

SUMMARY :

Ten-year-old Helen and her summer guardian, Flora, are isolated together in Helen’s decaying family house while her father is doing secret war work in Oak Ridge during the final months of World War II. At three, Helen lost her mother, and the beloved grandmother who raised her has just died. A fiercely imaginative child, Helen is desperate to keep her house intact with all its ghosts and stories. Flora, her late mother’s twenty-two-year-old first cousin, who cries at the drop of a hat, is ardently determined to do her best for Helen. Their relationship and its fallout, played against a backdrop of a lost America, will haunt Helen for the rest of her life.

This darkly beautiful novel about a child and a caretaker in isolation evokes shades of The Turn of the Screw and also harks back to Godwin’s memorable novel of growing up The Finishing School. With a house on top of a mountain and a child who may be a bomb that will one day go off, Flora tells a story of love, regret, and the things we can’t undo.

PARTICULARS OF THE BOOK :

Publisher:  Bloomsbury USA
Pages:  288
Genre:  Fiction
Author:  Gail Godwin
Website:  http://www.gailgodwin.com
Purchase this book:  Barnes & Noble


ABOUT THE AUTHOR :

Gail Godwin was born in Birmingham, Alabama June 18, 1937, during the summer her father was managing a Krahenbuhl cousin’s lakeside resort. (Gail’s maternal grandfather, Thomas Krahenbuhl, a first generation Swiss-American, was raised in Alabama.) Gail’s parents divorced soon after, and she and her mother and newly widowed grandmother, Edna Rogers Krahenbuhl, moved back to the mountains of Asheville, N.C., the grandmother’s home. In Asheville, Kathleen Godwin supported the family by teaching at two colleges, working as a newspaper reporter, and writing romance stories for pulp magazines. Gail attended St. Genevieve’s of the Pines, a Catholic school for girls, through the ninth grade. Her new novel, Unfinished Desires, was inspired by St. Genevieve’s. Her mother remarried when Godwin was eleven, and the family moved frequently after that. Godwin attended five high schools in four years. She reunited with her father at her high school graduation from Woodrow Wilson in Portsmouth, and went to live with him in Smithfield, N.C. Godwin graduated from Peace Junior College in Raleigh, N.C., (see “Old Lovegood Girls” in Evenings at Five and Five New Stories) and transferred to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, receiving a BA in journalism in 1959. While she was at Chapel Hill, her father committed suicide. Years later, she would memorialize him as Uncle Ambrose in her novel Violet Clay. After graduation, she worked as a reporter on the Miami Herald (a year that inspired Queen of the Underworld) and subsequently traveled to Europe, working for the United States Travel Service at the US Embassy in London. (These years are documented in Volume One of The Making of a Writer, and also treated in her novella “Mr. Bedford” in Mr. Bedford and the Muses.) In 1967, she was accepted into the Writers’ Workshop program at the University of Iowa. Along with John Irving and John Casey, she studied with Kurt Vonnegut. Her Ph.D. dissertation was published in 1970 as her first novel, The Perfectionists, thus launching a long and prolific career as a writer. Three of her novels, The Odd Woman, Violet Clay, and A Mother and Two Daughters, were National Book Award finalists and five of them (A Mother and Two Daughters, The Finishing School, A Southern Family, Father Melancholy’s Daughter, and Evensong) were New York Times best sellers. Godwin has lived in Woodstock, N.Y. since 1976 with her long time companion, the composer Robert Starer, who died in 2001. Together they wrote ten musical works, including the chamber opera The Other Voice: A Portrait of Hilda of Whitby, available from Selah Publishing Company: www.selahpub.com. Evenings at Five is a novella based on Godwin’s and Starer’s life together. Godwin received a Guggenheim Fellowship and two National Endowment grants, one for fiction and one for libretto writing. Her archives are in the Southern Historical Collection, the Wilson Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Her thirteen novels, two story collections, and non-fiction works are:

The Perfectionists (Harper & Row, 1970)

Glass People (Knopf, 1972)

The Odd Woman (Knopf, 1974) National Book Award Finalist

Dream Children (Knopf, 1976) Story collection

Violet Clay (Knopf, 1978) National Book Award Finalist

A Mother and Two Daughters (Viking, 1982) National Book Award Finalist. Three months on the New York Times bestseller list. #1 on the New York Times paperback bestseller list.

Mr. Bedford and the Muses (Viking, 1983) A novella and five stories

The Finishing School (Viking, 1984) New York Times bestseller

A Southern Family (Morrow, 1987) New York Times bestseller

Father Melancholy’s Daughter (Morrow, 1991) New York Times bestseller

The Good Husband (Ballantine, 1994)

Evensong (Ballantine, 1999) New York Times bestseller

Heart: A Natural History of the Heart-Filled Life (Harper Collins, 2001) Godwin’s first work of non-fiction.

Evenings at Five (Ballantine, 2003)

Queen of the Underworld (Random House, 2006)

The Making of a Writer, Volume One (Random House, 2006)

Unfinished Desires (Random House, 2009)

Volume Two of The Making of a Writer is due from Random House in 2010.

THE BOOKISH DAME REVIEWS  :

I'm stepping out here with humility to write a review of Ms Godwin's latest book, "Flora."  She's my hero.  There's hardly another Southern woman writer I admire as much as I do her.  You only have to look at her list of books written and her prestigious awards to be dumb-struck.  So it is with much hesitation and trembling that I set this review to my blog today.

I, of course, think this book is another masterpiece of Gail Godwin's.  It's a coming-of-age novel in the first instance, but it's a much deeper portrayal of psychology and humanity than that beneath the surface, as so many of hers are.  Ms Godwin digs deep and she shares much with her readers.  This book is pure gold that she's mined.

The character of Helen, the 10 year old child who is featured, can only remind us of Scout in "To Kill A Mockingbird," with her precociousness and earnest ways.  She's bored and she's set on the edge of disinterest and discovery...a lethal combination in a situation in which she's become a sort of prisoner of the polio scare in her town.  Her absentee father has left her with a slightly inept distant cousin for the summer, and she has nothing to do but ruminate, investigate and sort out problems for the right or for the wrong.  This young girl's life lived and reviewed over a summer of  forced abandonment and relative captivity is moving and touching in extraordinary ways.

Every page of this novel is beautifully written.  Gail Godwin is a master author of the most profound kind.  She can sort her words in the simplest way and have them deliver the largest impact.  That's the genius of this book.  While it is a novel with a child narrator, it's a story on a much deeper level.

I can't recommend the book more to friends and readers.  Perfectly wonderful read!

5 stars                     Deborah/TheBookishDame

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"Survival Lessons" by Alice Hoffman~ Illuminating

SUMMARY :

Survival Lessons provides a road map of how to reclaim your life from this day forward, with ways to reenvision everything—from relationships with friends and family to the way you see yourself. As Alice Hoffman says, “In many ways I wrote Survival Lessons to remind myself of the beauty of life, something that’s all too easy to overlook during the crisis of illness or loss. I forgot that our lives are made up of equal parts of sorrow and joy, and that it is impossible to have one without the other. I wrote to remind myself that despite everything that was happening to me, there were still choices I could make.”

Wise, gentle, and wry, Alice Hoffman teaches all of us how to choose what matters most.

Kirkus Reviews

A how-to guide to facing death and living life by the popular novelist and cancer survivor. When Hoffman (The Dovekeepers, 2011, etc.) received the diagnosis about her lump, her immediate response was denial: "I was busy after all, the mother of two young sons, caring for my ill mother, involved in my writing. My most recent novel, Here on Earth, had been chosen as an Oprah Book Club Choice; an earlier novel, Practical Magic, was being filmed in California with Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman. I didn't have time to be ill." Once she came to terms with the fact that disease doesn't necessarily strike at our convenience, she was able to deal directly with her situation, put her life in perspective and get her priorities in order. She was one of the lucky ones--15 years later, she remains very much alive and productive, capable of writing the book that might have helped her when the shock of cancer blindsided her. "In many ways I wrote Survival Lessons for myself to remind myself of the beauty of life, something that's all too easy to overlook during the crisis of illness or loss," she writes. Though Hoffman has earned renown as a talented writer, this isn't really a writerly book, but more like conversational advice from a close friend. Most of the advice is common sense, yet the element of choice is crucial when faced with a fate that seems beyond your control. You can choose how to respond and put your crisis in perspective: "Good fortune and bad luck are always tied together with invisible, unbreakable thread." Hoffman ends with words of wisdom from her oncologist, who advised that, "cancer didn't have to be my entire novel. It was just a chapter." In other words, this too shall pass. A lightweight but heartening book.



PARTICULARS OF THIS BOOK :

Published by:  Algonquin Press
Pages:  96
Genre:  Non-fiction
Author:  Alice Hoffman
Website:  http://www.alicehoffman.com



ABOUT THE AUTHOR :

Alice Hoffman was born in New York City on March 16, 1952 and grew up on Long Island. After graduating from high school in 1969, she attended Adelphi University, from which she received a BA, and then received a Mirrellees Fellowship to the Stanford University Creative Writing Center, which she attended in 1973 and 74, receiving an MA in creative writing. She currently lives in Boston.

Hoffman’s first novel, Property Of, was written at the age of twenty-one, while she was studying at Stanford, and published shortly thereafter by Farrar Straus and Giroux. She credits her mentor, professor and writer Albert J. Guerard, and his wife, the writer Maclin Bocock Guerard, for helping her to publish her first short story in the magazine Fiction. Editor Ted Solotaroff then contacted her to ask if she had a novel, at which point she quickly began to write what was to become Property Of, a section of which was published in Mr. Solotaroff’s magazine, American Review.

Since that remarkable beginning, Alice Hoffman has become one of our most distinguished novelists. She has published a total of twenty-one novels, three books of short fiction, and eight books for children and young adults. Her novel, Here on Earth, an Oprah Book Club choice, was a modern reworking of some of the themes of Emily Bronte’s masterpiece Wuthering Heights. Practical Magic was made into a Warner film starring Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman. Her novel, At Risk, which concerns a family dealing with AIDS, can be found on the reading lists of many universities, colleges and secondary schools. Hoffman’s advance from Local Girls, a collection of inter-related fictions about love and loss on Long Island, was donated to help create the Hoffman Breast Center at Mt. Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, MA. Blackbird House is a book of stories centering around an old farm on Cape Cod. Hoffman’s recent books include Aquamarine and Indigo, novels for pre-teens, and The New York Times bestsellers The River King, Blue Diary, The Probable Future, and The Ice Queen. Green Angel, a post-apocalyptic fairy tale about loss and love, was published by Scholastic and The Foretelling, a book about an Amazon girl in the Bronze Age, was published by Little Brown. In 2007 Little Brown published the teen novel Incantation, a story about hidden Jews during the Spanish Inquisition, which Publishers Weekly has chosen as one of the best books of the year. Her most recent novels include The Third Angel,The Story Sisters, the teen novel, Green Witch, a sequel to her popular post-apocalyptic fairy tale, Green Angel. The Red Garden, published in 2011, is a collection of linked fictions about a small town in Massachusetts where a garden holds the secrets of many lives.

Hoffman’s work has been published in more than twenty translations and more than one hundred foreign editions. Her novels have received mention as notable books of the year by The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, The Los Angeles Times, Library Journal, and People Magazine. She has also worked as a screenwriter and is the author of the original screenplay “Independence Day,” a film starring Kathleen Quinlan and Diane Wiest. Her teen novel Aquamarine was made into a film starring Emma Roberts. Her short fiction and non-fiction have appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe Magazine, Kenyon Review, The Los Angeles Times, Architectural Digest, Harvard Review, Ploughshares and other magazines.

Hoffman has been at work on The Dovekeepers, which Toni Morrison calls “.. a major contribution to twenty-first century literature” for the past five years. The story of the survivors of Masada is considered by many to be her masterpiece.



THE BOOKISH DAME REVIEWS :

Do you have a little treasure book or two on your nightstand?  Is there a book you turn to in difficult times just to thumb through for a small word of advice?  "Survival Lessons" by the incomparable author Alice Hoffman needs to be one of those books from now on.  It's filled with wisdom, yes, but it's much more than that.  It's a sort of recipe book for the trials of life, as well as the good times with people we love, and who love us back.

I will confess that I've read every single one of Alice Hoffman's books since she began writing.  I won't embarrass her or myself, but let's conservatively say that's been at least 25 years or more.  She has been the maven of magical realism in every day life stories to me.  When I lived in Wellesley, MA, raising my children there, and was a member of my long time book group...we adored Alice Hoffman.  We understood her.  Her books spoke to us of the special human relationships that filter out of the ether...and they smelled of salty ocean air, starlight and family secrets.  Alice Hoffman is a conjurer of all things delectable and discernible.  I waited every year or so for a new creation to come forth from her heart and pen.  I have first editions of all her books.  Does this tell you anything?

So, when I received this little book I was beside myself with joy and anticipation.  I knew she had something real and special to say about surviving the bumps and fault-lines of life and that it would be upbeat and positive, no doubt.  It is.

It's also clear and practical.  It's practical magic because it's so simple and profound at the same time.
I love that she zero's in on the exact point of pain and then carves it out with humor and compassion, giving a ready answer as to how it's best soothed and reconciled with a survivor's eye.   Several times I had to smile, and a couple of times laugh out loud at her quick mind and how she held no punches at identifying things and people who hold us back in surviving life's ups and downs.

"Survival Lessons" is a small, thin book that seems delicate and light-weight upon first view.  It's beautifully packaged and fits nearly in the palm of your hand, which is perfect, of course.  This is a book for everyone, not just cancer survivors. The insights you'll find are wise and worldly...and they're spiritually tipped, as well.  I, for one, won't easily part with my copy.   You'll need to get your own.


5+ stars for a little miracle book                        Deborah/TheBookishDame

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"The Gods of Heavenly Punishment" by Jennifer Cody Epstein~Chilling and Engaging

SUMMARY :

A lush, exquisitely rendered meditation on war, The Gods of Heavenly Punishment tells the story of several families, American and Japanese, their loves and infidelities, their dreams and losses, and how they are all connected by one of the most devastating acts of war in human history.

In this evocative and thrilling epic novel, fifteen-year-old Yoshi Kobayashi, child of Japan’s New Empire, daughter of an ardent expansionist and a mother with a haunting past, is on her way home on a March night when American bombers shower her city with napalm—an attack that leaves one hundred thousand dead within hours and half the city in ashen ruins. In the days that follow, Yoshi’s old life will blur beyond recognition, leading her to a new world marked by destruction and shaped by those considered the enemy: Cam, a downed bomber pilot taken prisoner by the Imperial Japanese Army; Anton, a gifted architect who helped modernize Tokyo’s prewar skyline but is now charged with destroying it; and Billy, an Occupation soldier who arrives in the blackened city with a dark secret of his own. Directly or indirectly, each will shape Yoshi’s journey as she seeks safety, love, and redemption.

PARTICULARS OF THIS BOOK :

Twitter Hashtag: #HeavenlyPunishmentTour
Publication Date: March 11, 2013
Published by:  W.W. Norton & Company
Hardcover; 384p
ISBN-10: 039307157X
Author:  Jennifer Cody Epstein
Website:  http://www.jennifercodyepstein.com


ABOUT THE AUTHOR :

I am an unrepentant book addict and the author of The Gods of Heavenly Punishment, as well as the international bestseller The Painter from Shanghai. I have also written for The Wall Street Journal, The Asian Wall Street Journal, The Nation (Thailand), Self and Mademoiselle magazines, and the NBC and HBO networks, working in Kyoto, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Bangkok as well as Washington D.C. and New York. I’ve taught at Columbia University in New York and Doshisha University in Kyoto, and have an MFA from Columbia, a Masters of International Relations from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and a BA in Asian Studies/English from Amherst College. I currently live in Brooklyn, NY with my husband, filmmaker Michael Epstein, my two amazing daughters and an exceptionally needy Springer Spaniel.



INTERVIEW WITH MS EPSTEIN!!!

We are pleased to be able to bring you this personal interview today with Jennifer Cody Epstein.  Thanks for taking time out from your very busy schedule to be with us, Jennifer!  Let's start out...

1)      Tell us something about yourself, please.  How do most people describe you?

Hmmm….honestly? I’d say it depends on the person. My friends might describe me as thoughtful, chatty, self-deprecating, bookish, in love with shoes and always up for a night out. My husband would say I’m terrible in the morning (which I guess goes with the up-for-a-night-out thing), not the world’s best housekeeper (ha!) but a good best friend and mother. My dog (whom I consider an honorary person) would say I’m awesome.

2)     Briefly, from where did the idea for your novel germinate?

Ever since living in Japan (which I did for five years) I’ve been fascinated by the US/Japan dynamic and our complicated but incredibly rich history together. I knew I wanted to write about it, but I didn’t really know where to start until my husband—who is a filmmaker--came back from an interview he’d just conducted with a military lawyer on the topic of war crimes. He told me that the Tokyo firebombing is widely considered to fall into that category today and asked me what I knew about it—which (to my chagrin), I realized was very little. So I began to research the event, and was floored by both how profoundly destructive it was and how little anyone seems to know about it in general.

3)     Who first told you that you could write well, and how did it affect you?

Miss Markey, my creative writing teacher in third grade, was the first one to really encourage me with my writing, though my sixth-grade teacher Mr. Kahane was also super-supportive. He helped me win the coveted “Author’s Corner” spot in our middle school, where I had a short story I’d written—I think it was about a magic swingset—posted on the wall by the principle’s office. Along with an appropriately broody-looking author’s photo.

4)     Which contemporary authors do you most admire?

That’s such a hard question, since I admire so many of them. I’d have to say Jennifer Egan is somewhere at the top, however—I find the craft of her sentences truly breathtaking. I love Sarah Waters’ work as well—The Night Watch was one of my favorite books in recent years. And Toni Morrison has written two of my favorite books ever: The Bluest Eye and Beloved. I also really admire the works of Joanna Hershon and Hillary Jordan, both of whom I am lucky enough to share work with.

5)     Which are your favorite classical authors?

If you can consider Nabakov classical, I’d say he tops my list—he’s got an ability to both innovate in his storytelling and manipulate the English language in a way no other author I know can do (and English wasn't even his first language!). Lewis Carroll is also a longstanding favorite, as is Edith Wharton and Henry James.

6)     Jump into any book~which character would you be?

Another tricky question! I’d say at the moment, though, I’d opt for Ursula Todd in Kate Atkinson’s most recent novel Life After Life. She does die several grisly deaths in the book, but the fact that she gets to keep coming back and try living again over and over gives her character’s storyline extra bang-for-the-buck. Plus, she kills Hitler.

7)     If you could have 5 historical people to dinner, who would they be?  What would you have to eat?

Pan Yuliang, the prostitute-turned-painter who became one of China’s early pioneers of Western-style painting (and the subject of my first novel) would be one of them for sure. Anais Nin would be another. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald seem like they’d be interesting and entertaining additions. And lastly, since we’d need another guy, James Doolittle—the dashing aviation legend who led the 1943 Doolittle Raid to Japan (which I explore in The Gods of Heavenly Punishment).  To eat we’d probably have French food, including really pungent cheese, foie gras and some super-decadent dessert.  

8)     Read any good books in the past 6 months?

Life After Life was, as I said, really wonderful and a very unique reading experience. I also loved Joanna Hershon’s A Dual Inheritance, which I read in the early draft stages but got to read as a finished novel this winter. I loved Butterfly’s Child by Angela Davis-Gardner, and Debra Dean’s The Mirrored World, and also really enjoyed Karen Russell’s Vampires in the Lemon Grove and Heidi Julavits’ The Vanishers.

9)     Favorite two tv shows:

A month ago I (like almost everyone else I know) would have said Game of Thrones was one, but it’s gotten so violent that I haven’t been able to bring myself to turn it on for the last couple of episodes! I’m going into Tyrion Lannister/Peter Dinkel withdrawal, however, so I think I may have to just suck it up and go back to it one of these days. The other show that’s become something of an obsession for my family is Once Upon A Time, which follows a small New England town that happens to be full of fairy tale characters. I love it because it’s engaging for all of us without being too “adult” for my kids, who are 9 and 12.

10)  Favorite movie of all time:

La Dolce Vita.

11)   Are you working on a new book?

I’m actually researching two (!) One is set in California and Germany, the other in Southeast Asia. I haven’t figured out which one I want to write yet—or maybe which one I want to write first. They’re very different thematically, though both will have historical elements to them.

12)  Anything else I forgot to ask you?

I don’t think so….but thanks for some fun and thought-provoking questions!

 

Such interesting answers!  I'm particularly intrigued by your favorite "La Dolce Vita" movie!  And, it's fun to see who you'd have for dinner...great choices there.  I'd love to be a part of that one.  Zelda is one of my favorite historical figures.  I hope I get a chance to read one or both of your new books when they come out.  I'll be the first in line, Jennifer!

 

THE BOOKISH DAME REVIEWS :

Chilling, absorbing, unique, humorous and heart-breaking.  All those adjectives come to mind when I think to describe Jennifer Cody Epstein's book "The God's of Heavenly Punishment."  It's part historical account churned with love stories and family dysfunction.  It's character-driven in the most powerful of ways.  This is a book I will remember among the many this year.

 

I have read several accounts of the war between America and Japan, but none so specifically personal as this one.  The characters are captivating, as immediate relationships with the reader are cultivated.  The impact of their stories is both devastating in parts and heart-tugging.  I found each of them immensely engaging; some endearing, and some stone cold hateful.  The humorous moments take one by surprise in several instances. Either way, it was as if I couldn't tear my eyes away from them.

 

This is a novel told in sections from the perspectives of the different nationalities/countries and characters, which gives it an even more significant impact.  Because of the way Epstein chose to structure her story, I was sympathetic to both sides, as well as to the neutral view.  War in all it's human drama was staggering in her hands, sometimes brutal and sometimes drawing out the best in people with love.

 

"The Gods of Heavenly Punishment" is a show-stopper of a book.  You won't be able to put it down once you start reading.  It halted my life for hours. 

 

I recommend this book to everyone without reservation.  It's a very adult book in the sense that it's written with intelligence and aplomb.  You can't help but be taken in by its significance and engaging quality.  I loved it!

 

5+ stars                            Deborah/TheBookishDame

 

This review and interview are brought to you in cooperation with Historical Fiction Virtual Book Tours, although the review is strictly my own opinion and have no bearing on that fact.

Please find more information, reviews, guest posts and interviews by clicking on this link to their website:  http://hfvirtualbooktours.com

 

 

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"A Fatal Likeness" by Lynn Shepherd~Gothic and Ghostly

SUMMARY :

With The Solitary House, award-winning author Lynn Shepherd introduced readers to Charles Maddox, a brilliant private detective plying his trade on the gaslit streets of Dickensian London. Now, in this mesmerizing new novel of historical suspense, a mystery strikes disturbingly close to home—and draws Maddox into a world of literary legends, tormented souls, and a legacy of terrible secrets.

When his great-uncle, the master detective who schooled him in the science of “thief taking,” is mysteriously stricken, Charles Maddox fears that the old man’s breakdown may be directly related to the latest case he’s been asked to undertake. Summoned to the home of a stuffy nobleman and his imperious wife, Charles finds his investigative services have been engaged by no less than the son of celebrated poet Percy Bysshe Shelley and his famed widow, Mary, author of the gothic classic Frankenstein. Approached by a stranger offering to sell a cache of rare papers allegedly belonging to the legendary late poet, the Shelley family seeks Maddox’s aid in discovering whether the precious documents are authentic or merely the work of an opportunistic charlatan.

But the true identity of his quarry is only the first of many surprises lying in wait for the detective. Hardly a conniving criminal, Claire Clairmont is in fact the stepsister of Mary Shelley, and their tortured history of jealousy, obsession, and dark deceit looms large over the affair Maddox must untangle. So, too, does the shadow of the brilliant, eccentric Percy Shelley, who found no rest from the private demons that pursued him. With each new detail unearthed, the investigation grows ever more disturbing. And when shocking evidence of foul play comes to light, Maddox’s chilling hunt for the truth leads him into the blackest reaches of the soul.

Steeped in finely wrought Victorian atmosphere, and rife with eye-opening historical revelations, A Fatal Likeness carries the reader ever deeper into a darkly magnetic tale of love and madness as utterly harrowing and heartbreaking as it is undeniably human.

Praise for Lynn Shepherd and A Fatal Likeness
“As a piece of literary detective work, it’s stimulating and hugely fun—even brilliant.”—The Spectator

“A potent mixture of passion, intrigue, perversion, and betrayal, exploring the lives of Shelley, Byron, and their Romantic intimates through a Gothic lens.”—Lyndsay Faye, author of The Gods of Gotham

“A wonderfully ingenious novel: perceptive, gripping, and fascinating.”—Miranda Seymour, author of Mary Shelley

“Shepherd sets a new standard of brilliance in historical fiction with A Fatal Likeness. Her summoning of dead souls—Mary Shelley, Lord Byron, and their most intimate circle—is so psychologically penetrating, it feels like truth. Exquisitely rendered in Shepherd’s pitch-perfect prose, this tale will haunt the reader long after its close.”—Stephanie Barron, author of Jane and the Canterbury Tale

“A literary thriller that weaves back and forth in time and gives some plausible answers to certain genuine biographical mysteries . . . [The novel’s] conclusion has haunted me ever since I finished the book. But if you want to know what it is, you’ll have to read it yourself.”—The Independent

PARTICULARS OF THIS BOOK :

              

Publisher: Random House Publishing Group

• Publication date: 8/20/2013
• Pages: 384
• Genre:  Historical Fiction/Suspense
• Author:  Lynn Shepherd
• Purchase the book:  Barnes & Noble

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR :

 

Lynn Shepherd studied English at Oxford in the 1980s, and got a doctorate degree there in 2006. She always wanted to be a writer and in 2000 she went freelance to see if it was possible to make her dream into reality. Ten years later her dream finally comes true. Murder at Mansfield Park was her first novel.

She describes her genre as 'literary mystery', and in 2012 she since published Tom All-Alone's / The Solitary House, which is inspired by Charles Dickens' Bleak House.

Her third book A Treacherous Likeness explores the dark secrets of the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley and his wife Mary, the author of Frankenstein. It was published in the UK in February 2013, and in the US in August under the title A Fatal Likeness.




THE BOOKISH DAME REVIEWS :

How I enjoyed this novel by Ms Shepherd!  Shelley is one of my favorite poets, I have to admit, but Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" has always made me so happy as a feminist more than his poetry!  This novel brings them both together in a different way.  It was a thoroughly entertaining story with lots of twists that kept me glued to the pages and returning to the book when others were calling to me this week.

The plot is suspenseful, but not altogether easy to follow.  One must keep on her toes.  I found it challenging to figure out exactly what the puzzle was that the main character was trying to unravel.  At times it seemed it was about the conflict between Mary Shelley and her family vrs. her step-sister Claire over papers, and at others it seemed deeper than that, plumbing the depths of Shelley's secrets, as well.  Eventually, as things began to take on more light, the story picked up for me and I was hooked.

Lynn Shepherd's writing style is mesmerizing.  I felt much like I was reading a Sherlock Holmes novel.  The characters were fully realized with Shelley himself being starkly drawn and infinitely interesting.  Gothic in its content, there's always a sort of cloud of doom and dread hanging over the story which makes it ghostly. The very mysterious Claire Clairmont became my favorite character with her grief-stricken and gloomy ways in this mix.

A powerful historically inspired novel that's sure to keep you on the edge of your seat, this is one you have to read if you're a fan of both Percy Bysshe and Mary Shelley...one or the other.  It's a great novel of intrigue!

5 stars                Deborah/TheBookishDame

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