It seemed like FOREVER since I participated in Friday Finds and it turns out it has. The last Friday Finds I posted here was back on August 14th! So, without further ado, here are my Friday Finds for October 23rd, 2009.
Friday Finds is hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading. While browsing book blogs, Amazon.com, Washington Post.com, NPR.org, various other places on the Internet, and getting recommendations from friends, these are the books that either made it to my wish list this week or I downloaded the samples onto my Kindle from Amazon.com.
We choose to read books for many reasons. Sometimes the cover art speaks to us from the shelves of a local library or book store and we feel the need to take that book home. We may chose our books based on reviews read in Bookmarks Magazine, the book review section of the local newspaper or even because we read a fabulous review here on Planet Books. LOL! Well I chose to read Jenna Blum’s haunting novel, Those Who Saved Us, for a fairly unique reason. The main character has the same last name as I had till I got married in 2004.
Those Who Saved Us is a story about a woman named Anna who finds the Nazis invading all aspects of her hometown of Weimar, Germany and putting it on the map due to its geographical relation to Buchenwald concentration camp. Anna’s father is a terrible parental figure, making Anna’s life miserable and difficult as her sole purpose becomes the huge job of handling every need of his and their home. She finds relief in the friendship with “The Good Doktor”, Max Stern, and eventually the forbidden love that grows out of their chess games and conversations. Max is a Jew and the risk of even talking with him is deadly. Eventually, fear for Max’s life due to his association with The Resistance pushes Anna into action and she hides him in the walls of his father’s house. Of course, as happened all over Europe in the late 30’s and early 40’s, Max is discovered by Anna’s father and shipped off to the Gestapo. This is the catalyst for Anna and she quickly leaves her childhood home and becomes apprentice to a local baker and spy for The Resistance.
Well folks, that is just the beginning of this enrapturing and memorable book. The book jumps from WWII Germany to mid’90’s Minnesota and back again. In Minnesota, Anna is an elderly, secret filled woman who has just lost her husband and has a stressed relationship with her middle-aged daughter Trudy. Trudy is a professor of German history at a university in Minneapolis. She joins a fellow professor on a project that finds her locating Germans in the area who survived WWII in Germany by any means possible and recording their stories. Little does she know what one of her interviews will disclose about her own mysterious path and the ways her mother made it possible for the two of them to survive during one of this planets most hellish periods.
The drama and stories that emerge from Those Who Saved Us will stay with me forever. I have said before that I think it is very important for these historical fiction novels to find a voice. They may be fiction but they are based on fact and in the case of Those Who Saved Us, Jenna Blum completed a great amount of research thanks to Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation.
Those Who Saved Us reads like a drama and horror story at times but provides a lesson in history and how you can never truly escape your past. I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys the historical fiction genre but warn you that there are some stories within that will cause your jaw to drop and your stomach to turn.
Hello Strangers! Well, since we last spoke, Hubby, Rocky and I moved into our house and have been busy working (hubby), job searching (me), unpacking, organizing, setting up and getting settled in the new digs. Things are not moving along as quickly as I had thought they would and that is due to the fact that we are simply exhausted over the whole ordeal.
My books aren’t completely unpacked but a lot are. My Kindle is keeping me away from the “real” bookshelves though. I’ve been reading Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum on my Kindle and though is it very heavy and upsetting, it is really very good. It’s another novel partially set during WWII Germany. According to the Kindle I am almost 50% the way through which is pretty good since I am only finding time to read at bedtime.
Like I mentioned, the house is coming together, slowly but surely. Tomorrow evening we are having the neighbors on our left over for dinner and I am very excited for a little dinner party. Here are some pics of the house so far. The screens in the formal living room were the ones we got at the last furniture auction in Okinawa just three days before our pack out. The rugs in both the living and dining rooms are from HomeDecorators.com and I just love them. The furniture in both rooms is all from Macy’s and the comfort level is high, high, high.
What a fresh and interesting title to add to the many historical fiction books out there. The Day THE FALLS Stood Still is a must read for those looking to dive into a new book this fall. Author Cathy Marie Buchanan has created a cast of characters led by Bess and Tom. Bess is a wonderful heroine whose desires, dreams and fears helped to keep me enthralled as I read. After reading a few books set during WWII this year, it was interesting reading this book which is set during WWI. The mood was much different but still set a stress in the story and for its character. Set between 1915 and 1923 in Niagara Falls, Canada, Ms. Buchanan also presents focuses on a new way of getting energy to the masses is making its way into everyday life. It’s called hydroelectric power and it will change the way lives are lived and will change the lives of residents in Niagara Falls forever. Bess is also on the cusp of womanhood and finding love and will never be the same again. The Day THE FALLS Stood Still will keep you enraptured from beginning to end.
I’m not the only reader singing Ms. Buchanan’s praises these days. The Day THE FALLS Stood Still debut on the New York Times bestseller list at #31 two weeks ago and Barnes & Noble selected the book as a “Recommended Pick.”
Ms. Buchanan started touring for her debut book last week but has taken a moment to answer a few questions for us here at Planet Books. I would love to welcome The Day The Falls Stood Still author Cathy Marie Buchanan to Planet Books.
PB ~ Having written a book that I consider historical fiction, what other era in history is your favorite? What is your favorite historical fiction title?
CMB ~ My formal education in history ended in grade nine, and so I hardly feel qualified to have a favourite era. That said, I did fall in love with the WWI period as I researched The Day the Falls Stood Still. The way communities pulled together, the way everyone was doing their bit really struck me. People gave up driving and meat and started war gardens and, if they had a free moment, rolled bandages and wrote letters to buoy the spirits of soldiers they’d never met. It seemed the crisis brought out the best in people, that sacrifice was widespread. It made me feel hopeful that at some point, hopefully not too far off, all of mankind will take up the fight against our own looming crisis–climate change.
PB~ What has been your favorite part of the process you went through to get to this finished product? The research? The writing? The press junket?
CMB ~ I was fascinated on a daily basis as I researched The Day the Falls Stood Still. Born and bred in Niagara Falls, the lore I’d grown up came to life as I read old newspaper accounts of the stunts and rescues on the river or as I came upon gorgeous old photographs of the river before the massive diversion of water away from the falls for the production of hydroelectricity or as I gazed out over the Niagara River from Loretto Academy, the boarding school the book’s protagonist attends. A now I have the great pleasure of meeting readers online and in the flesh, and I love being told their stories of Niagara Falls or hearing how The Day the Falls Stood Still has touched them in some way. Still, I am a writer at heart, and it’s what I love most. I write everyday, sitting down at the computer as soon as my boys leave the house for school. The objective is always the same, to lose myself in the words I am setting on the page. And I have had moments when I look up from the computer, dazed. It takes a second to grasp that I am sitting at my desk, a further second to decide: Is it morning or afternoon? Have I had lunch? Have I forgotten to pick up my boys from school? My head was a hundred years away in Niagara Falls. It’s when the best writing has come, and I overflow with happiness.
PB ~ Being an author, do you feel that book blogs are a great way to get the word out? Have you enjoyed your blog tour? Do you find it an effective way of communicating with readers?
CMB~ I was a marketer (among other things) before I was a writer. In marketing lingo, the groups of consumers who seek out new product information and then go about spreading the word are called chat leaders. These chat leaders are respected authorities in their areas of expertise, and companies jump through hoops to get newly launched products into their hands. For a new line of lipstick, the chat leaders might include the beauty editors at magazines, the cosmeticians in stores, that neighbour you’d know to turn to for a recommendation for a lipstick that stays on for more than five minutes. Book bloggers and their followers fit the bill when it comes to books. You are the chat leaders–the people who know books, who talk about books, who can’t wait to find that next great read, the people whose opinions on what to read next are regularly sought. So, yes, absolutely, book bloggers are a great way to get the word out. And the book blogs do provide a wonderful platform for giving readers further insight into a book. Through reviews and guest posts and Q&As, the bloggers enrich the experience of reading a particular book for their followers. I have loved my tour, not only because the chat leaders are chatting but also because having someone thoughtfully consider the work that I’ve poured my heart into for the last umpteen years has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. Thank you, bloggers and followers, for that.
For more information about Cathy Marie Buchanan and THE DAY THE FALLS STOOD STILL, be sure to check out her website HERE.
Well, it’s been a quick and painless summer since moving from Okinawa back to the DC area in May. We decided to go with new construction and had a house built in a cute and beautiful neighborhood in Northern Virginia. Hubby and I selected our upgrades, colors, model and excavation and enjoyed watching the speedy progress while it was built. Ground was broken on the lot we chose back in mid-June and on August 28th Hubby and I had our final walk through and closed on August 31st.
While waiting for our new home we were lucky to have such generous and patient parents (Hubby’s) who let us take over their basement and let us keep Rocky with us the whole summer. Last night was Hubby and my last night at the house and Rocky will join us at our new home on Friday after all our household goods and deliveries have arrived.
So, here is our new house and a pic of our beautiful gourmet kitchen!! We are very very excited about starting the next chapter in our lives and get started living in our new house and making it a home. Once my office is set up and all my books are on their shelves I’ll post pics.
Of course we have to wait till the 10th for Verizon to come out and set up our phone/cable/Internet, so till then I hope you all have a lovely Labor Day weekend and I’ll see ya on the flip side. XOXO
Congratulations ladies! You have each won a copy of Philippa Gregory’s new novel, The White Queen. Please e-mail me your mailing addresses and I will forward your info to Kelly, Ms. Gregory’s publicist, so she can send your books to you. planetbooksworldwide@gmail.com
To the rest of you lovely people who stopped by Planet Books and took time to enter in this giveaway, THANK YOU. Keep checking back here because there are more book giveaways to come. (I used the list randomizer function on Random.org.)
Earlier this week I received an e-mail from BBAW (Book Blogging Awareness Week) and learned that Planet Books was nominated for the MOST CHATTY award! How excited am I?! Extremely! (There’s a lot of exclamation points going on here aren’t there.) Turns out that the MOST CHATTY award represents the following: “This blogger has a very ‘chatty’ style. You feel like you could be sitting together, sipping wine, and chatting about life.” How friggin’ COOL is that!?!
Well, after being nominated (thank you SOOOOO MUCH to those of you who thought my blog was worthy of this awesome nod) I had to submit five posts that would represent the “chattiness” of my blog. That was VERY HARD to do people! I thought about going back to the beginning of Planet Books but my writing wasn’t as strong and conversational as it has developed into over the last two years. (Side note: I can’t believe that Planet Books has been going here on WordPress for almost two years!!!) I decided to stick with posts from this year and submitted a couple of book reviews as well as Sunday Salon posts and the random babbling post.
We’ll see what happens but I’m curious about who else got nominated for BBAW awards and in what categories. Are you one of those nominated bloggers out there? If you are, CONGRATULATIONS!!!
The School of Essential Ingredients follows the lives of eight students who gather in Lillian’s Restaurant every Monday night for cooking class. It soon becomes clear, however, that each one seeks a recipe for something beyond the kitchen. Students include Claire, a young mother struggling with the demands of her family; Antonia, an Italian kitchen designer learning to adapt to life in America; and Tom, a widower mourning the loss of his wife to breast cancer. Chef Lillian, a woman whose connection with food is both soulful and exacting, helps them to create dishes whose flavor and techniques expand beyond the restaurant and into the secret corners of her students’ lives. One by one the students are transformed by the aromas, flavors, and textures of Lillian’s food, including a white-on-white cake that prompts wistful reflections on the sweet fragility of love and a peppery heirloom tomato sauce that seems to spark one romance but end another. Brought together by the power of food and companionship, the lives of the characters mingle and intertwine, united by the revealing nature of what can be created in the kitchen.
Having recently re-located back to the DC area and wanting to create a book club with my friends, I thought that The School of Essential Ingredients would be the perfect first selection. I think I hit the nail on the head folks! Lit & The City ladies, what say you? What a wonderful, fun, interesting, educational and cozy book author Erica Bauermeister has gifted the reading and cooking community with.
The core of the story is about eight people coming together to take a cooking class at a local restaurant in (I think Seattle) the Pacific Northwest under the instruction of the restaurant owner and head chef, Lillian. What we get when these people come together from all different backgrounds for one common goal, to cook, is nothing short of a wonderful, memorable and inspirational book. There’s Helen and Carl, a married couple in their sixties or so, who though they have faced crisis in their marriage are stronger for it and have rekindled their romance. The observations they make to each other about their fellow classmates are made from experience. There’s Chloe, who at first is a lost soul looking for romance and a home in the wrong places but then finds love and family where she least expects it. Claire, a young mother who is loosing herself in her daily life, has the shortest back story of them all but may have gotten the most out of the actual process of cooking. Antonia is a woman who has left a life of peace, familiarity and family for a new adventure on a new continent but finds herself grounded by her past. Then there is Ian. A great character in and out of the kitchen and who finds himself in search of the next culinary challenge to take on.
Of course I had some favorite characters because of their back stories. My absolute favorite character was Isabelle and the metamorphosis that took place within her after the exit of her husband and she found herself. Though now she suffers from memory loss and mix-matched memories, her life was rich with relationships, children and then the adventures she made for herself.
Tom was my second favorite character because of the depths of his love for a woman and the sorrow that replaced that love. Food played a huge roll in his relationship with the love of his life and attending the cooking class is equal parts difficult and therapeutic for him. The curiosity and dread of finding out the details of Tom’s back story made his part of the book extremely effective for me.
I must emphasize that there may be eight students and a teacher that make up this wonderful book but they are all held together by the tenth, and at times, most important character of all. The food! Erica Bauermeister had me salivating and my stomach growling throughout her intimate and divine descriptions of the class dishes and other recipes being prepared here and there. It really was cruel and unusual punishment for me since our house with our new gourmet kitchen won’t be ready for another two weeks and then we still have to wait for our household goods shipment to arrive and be unpacked. Erica’s talent for food writing is spectacular and at times I could smell the ingredients and the dishes as the characters prepared them in class and at home waft off the page and up to my nose!
I look forward to discussing The School of Essential Ingredients with my book club, Lit & The City, but I also hope if you have read Erica Bauermeister’s masterpiece that you will share with us here at Planet Books your thoughts on it. Erica Bauermeister’s website can be foundHERE.
Brother turns on brother to win the ultimate prize, the throne of England, in this dazzling account of the wars of the Plantagenets. They are the claimants and kings who ruled England before the Tudors, and now Philippa Gregory brings them to life through the dramatic and intimate stories of the secret players: the indomitable women, starting with Elizabeth Woodville, the White Queen.
The White Queen tells the story of a woman of extraordinary beauty and ambition who, catching the eye of the newly crowned boy king, marries him in secret and ascends to royalty. While Elizabeth rises to the demands of her exalted position and fights for the success of her family, her two sons become central figures in a mystery that has confounded historians for centuries: the missing princes in the Tower of London whose fate is still unknown. From her uniquely qualified perspective, Philippa Gregory explores this most famous unsolved mystery of English history, informed by impeccable research and framed by her inimitable storytelling skills. – This text refers to theAudio CD edition.
The White Queen by Philippa Gregory kicks off a new series by the best selling and beloved author. This time the focus is on the famed “War of the Roses” or “The Cousins’ War.” The Houses of York and Lancastor battled for the throne of England between 1455 and 1487. At the time “The White Queen” takes place, King Edward IV of York’s reign. He privately married our heroine, Elizabeth Woodville, after a short courtship.
The historical fiction that Gregory produces is wonderful. It’s rich with storytelling and fact that has been blended perfectly together. I have never read any of Gregory’s novels before but I can say that she has struck a positive chord with this new book as she introduces her readers to a new reign in England’s history.
From the beginning, I thoroughly enjoyed Elizabeth. Her thoughts are strong and well written and her adventures from widow and mother to Queen of England and beyond held my attention. Kind Edward was five years Elizabeth’s junior and because he married for love (or lust, because Elizabeth wouldn’t go to bed with him until he married her) and not for an alliance between countries, this caused weakness in his personal and professional relationships that make for good drama. Of course there is heartbreak, romance and all the great aspects that are expected in a Philippa Gregory novel (I’ve read the reviews and seen the film adaptation of “The Other Boleyn Girl”). However, I did feel that the flow felt a bit like a non-fiction work at times but for the most part The White Queen was a good read.
Thank you so much to Philippa Gregory’s publicist Kelly at Touchstone-Fireside Books for inviting me to read and review The White Queen and for sending me my beautiful copy of the book. The cover art is exquisite! Kelly has also offered to giveaway two copies of The White Queen to two lucky winners/readers here at Planet Books. Please leave your name, e-mail address and the name of your favorite Philippa Gregory book so far for a chance to win. This contest will conclude on Friday, August 21st at Midnight, EST. Good luck!! You can check out Philippa Gregory’s websiteHERE.
Friday Finds is hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading. While browsing book blogs, Amazon.com, Washington Post.com, NPR.org, various other places on the Internet, and getting recommendations from friends, these are the books that either made it to my wish list this week or I downloaded the samples onto my Kindle from Amazon.com.
Summary ~ 
