Jan 14

27

Review & Giveaway: BECOMING JOSEPHINE by Heather Webb

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on January 27, 2014
Posted in Books Read in 2014 • My Past Giveaways | 9 Comments

One of my favorite book genres is historical fiction. Find out what I thought of Becoming Josephine by Heather Webb and enter to win a copy for yourself!

Book Description:

Publication Date: December 31, 2013

Plume Books/Penguin

Paperback; 320p

ISBN-10: 0142180653

Rose Tascher sails from her Martinique plantation to Paris to trade her Creole black magic culture for love and adventure. She arrives exultant to follow her dreams of attending Court with Alexandre, her elegant aristocrat and soldier husband. But Alexandre dashes her hopes and abandons her amid the tumult of the French Revolution.

Through her savoir faire, Rose secures her footing in high society, reveling in handsome men and glitzy balls—until the heads of her friends begin to roll.

After narrowly escaping death in the blood-drenched cells of Les Carmes prison, she reinvents herself as Josephine, a socialite of status and power. Yet her youth is fading, and Josephine must choose between a precarious independence and the love of an awkward suitor. Little does she know, he would become the most powerful man of his century- Napoleon Bonaparte.

BECOMING JOSEPHINE is a novel of one woman’s journey to find eternal love and stability, and ultimately to find herself.

My Thoughts:

Rose Tascher goes through a lot before she come Josephine Bonaparte. Her father arranges a marriage to a man she doesn’t know and shows no affection for her. Her husband, Alexandre, leaves her with his parents months and months at a time while he spends his time running around with other women. It is common knowledge and is thrown in Rose’s face repeatedly.

Despite Alexandre, she does find her place in high society and attends many salons and hooks up with other men. However, with the French Revolution, no one is safe, including Rose. Then, after the revolution, she meets her fate and becomes Josephine.

This book is a pulsating page turner, I just couldn’t put it down. I did not want it to end. If you are a lover of historical fiction, don’t miss Becoming Josephine!

5/5

I received the ebook version for my honest review.

About Heather Webb:

Heather Webb grew up a military brat and naturally became obsessed with travel, culture, and languages. She put her degrees to good use teaching high school French for nearly a decade before turning to full time novel writing and freelance editing.

When not writing, Heather flexes her foodie skills or looks for excuses to head to the other side of the world.

For more information please visit Heather’s website. You can also find her on Facebook,Pinterest and Twitter.

Thanks to Amy Bruno of Historical Fiction Virtual Book Tours, I am giving away one print copy of Becoming Josephine. This giveaway is open to Canada and the U.S. and ends on January 31, 2014. Please use Rafflecopter to enter.

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Jan 14

25

International Giveaway: Almost Perfect by Diane Daniels Manning

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on January 25, 2014
Posted in My Past Giveaways | 10 Comments

Thanks to Sandpiper Publicity, I am giving away one print copy of Almost Perfect away.

Book Description:

Dreams come true in almost perfect ways—it might just take a special boy and his dog to make them happen.

Bess Rutledge, a cranky seventy-year old, has dreamed of winning the Westminster Dog Show all her life. Despite her decades-long career as one of America’s top Standard Poodle breeders, Bess has decided she’s too old to hold on to this foolish dream. She sells off all the dogs in her once famous kennel except for the aging champion McCreery and his mischievous, handsome son Breaker. Part of Bess senses they might have been the ones to take her to Westminster, if only she’d dared to try.

When Bess meets Benny, a fourteen year-old with mild autism, she learns he has a dream of his own: to impress his self-absorbed mother. Benny is drawn into the world of dog shows and becomes convinced he has found the perfect way to gain her attention. If he can win Westminster with either McCreery or Breaker, he just knows his Mom will finally be proud of him. Getting Bess to go along with his plan, however, is not going to be so easy. . .

About Diane Daniels Manning:

Diane Daniels Manning is the co-founder and director of The New School in the Heights, a therapeutic school in Houston, Texas which helps children dealing with social-emotional challenges find success in school and life. She has a Ph.D. in Education and a post-doctoral Master of Public Health (MPH) from Harvard and is a practicing child psychoanalyst certified by the American Psychoanalytic Association. Formerly, she was the Director of the Reading and Learning Disabilities Clinic at Tufts University, Lecturer and Research Associate in the Department of Behavioral Sciences at Harvard, and Chair of the Department of Education at Tulane University. She learned the inner workings of dog show kennels by writing an authorized oral history of a lifetime President of the Poodle of Club of America. Her writing awards include the Faulkner-Wisdom Novella Prize and the Women in Film and Television Short Script Competition.

When not at The New School, Diane and her writing partners, a Standard Poodle named Misty and a rescue cat named Elvira, convene at the keyboard to share great thoughts and plan the dinner menu.

This giveaway is open internationally and ends on February 7, 2014. Please use Rafflecopter to enter.

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Jan 14

20

Review & Giveaway: Where the Wild Flowers Grow by Vera Jane Cook

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on January 20, 2014
Posted in Book Tours • Books Read in 2014 • My Past Giveaways | 4 Comments

Today if is my pleasure to kick of the Where the Wild Flowers Grow tour! Vera Jane Cook enthralled use with her book The Story of Sassy Sweetwater back in July. You can read my 5 star review here.

About Where the Wild Flowers Grow:

Publisher: Musa Publishing (March 8, 2013)
Genres: Womens Fiction, Southern Fiction, Contemporary Fiction
Tour Dates: January, 2013
Available in: ebook only 312 pages

Sexual confusion and dysfunction cause the unravelling of the perfect American family in small town Georgia in 1960.

Rose Cassidy’s fantasy life is a haunting reminder that she’s living a lie. So when she has the opportunity to act on those fantasies, she dives in without any thought to consequences.

Rose’s husband, Ryan, has fantasies of his own, and his actions cause unimaginable pain to the very children he tries so hard to protect.

When the happiness each member of the Cassidy family seeks so desperately to find is shattered by shame, guilt, and ultimately murder, they must each face the truth that lies deep within their souls.

My Thoughts:

It’s the 1960’s south and the Cassidy family seems like the perfect southern family to all the town folks who live in the same town. They seem to have it all and are well respected. Ryan Cassidy is a doctor with two beautiful children and a wife. He is considered to be a pillar of the community. However, what may seem perfect on the outside, has many secrets on the inside and little by little this perfect family starts to unravel and their secrets seem to be coming to the surface.

Where the Wild Flowers Grows has it all. An unravelling family, secrets, and even murder. Or is it murder? You will have to decide. This book is for adults only and only for those who aren’t bothers by sexual scenes, including a lesbian sex scene. To me sex is natural so I think it is natural for it to be included in books and movies.

This book is well written and flows well. The characters are well drawn out and the household in the south with the wild flowers are a big part of the story. The only thing missing for me is that it seemed like it could have taken place anywhere in 1960’s United States, not just the south. The south played such a large role in The Story of Sassy Sweetwater, but it took a back seat to this book. Other than the sense of place not being well drawn out, everything else was, including plot. Vera Jane Cook wrote another hit. I can hardly wait to read more!

4.5/5

I was sent this ebook for my honest opinion.

About Vera Jane Cook:

Vera Jane Cook, writer of Award Winning Women’s Fiction, is the author of The Story of Sassy Sweetwater, Lies a River Deep, Where the Wildflowers Grow, Dancing Backward in Paradise and Annabel Horton, Lost Witch of Salem.

Jane, as she is known to family and friends, was born in New York City and grew up amid the eccentricity of her southern and glamorous mother on the Upper West and Upper East Side of Manhattan.

An only child, Jane turned to reading novels at an early age and was deeply influenced by an eclectic group of authors. Some of her favorite authors today are Nelson DeMille, Calib Carr, Wally Lamb, Anne Rice, Sue Monk Kidd, Anita Shreve, Jodi Picoult, Alice Walker and Toni Morrison. Her favorite novels are too long to list but include The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, Cheri and The Last of Cheri, The Picture of Dorian Grey, Wuthering Heights, Look at Me, Dogs of Babel, The Bluest Eye, The Art of Racing in the Rain, Body Surfing, Lolita, The Brothers Karamazov, She’s Come Undone, Tale of Two Cities, etc., etc., etc.,

The Story of Sassy Sweetwater, Vera’s second published southern novel, was a finalist for the ForeWord Book of the Year Award for 2012! The novel also won the Eric Hoffer Award for 2012 – Honorable Mention Best ebook Fiction! Vera’s first published southern novel, Dancing Backward in Paradise, won the Indie Excellence Award for notable new fiction in 2007 and the Eric Hoffer Award for publishing excellence, also in 2007. Both books earned five star ForeWord Clarion reviews!

The author works by day for an education publishing company as an account manager and lives on the Upper West side of Manhattan with her long term partner, her Pomeranian, Daisy, her Basenji/Chihuahua mix, Roxie, her Chihuahua, Peanut and her two pussy cats, Sassy and Sweetie Pie.

Vera Jane Cook’s Website: http://www.verajanecook.com/

Vera Jane Cook on Twitter: https://twitter.com/verajanecook
Vera Jane Cook on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/vera.j.cook

Buy Where the Wildflowers Grow:

Amazon
Barnes and Noble

Thanks to Vera Jane Cook, I am giving away one ebook copy of Where the Wildflowers Grow. Please use Rafflcopter to enter.

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