Teddy Rose Book Reviews Plus More


May 08

10

Mudbound by Hillary Jordan

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on May 10, 2008
Posted in Books Read 2008 • Hillary Jordan • Historical Fiction  | 12 Comments

Wonderful Southern Fiction

In 1939, at 31 years old, spinster, Laura meets Henry McAllen. After a bit of dating, they get married and start a family. Henry works for the Army Corps of Engineers, they’re in the city. This is great, because Laura is a city woman through and through.

One day Henry comes home with news, he has bought a farm in the Mississippi Delta and is quitting he job to farm. Of course this is quite a blow to Laura, Henry didn’t even consult her. The farmhouse has none of the conveniences that city folk take for granted such as running water, plumbing, electricity, etc. However, Henry is her husband, so Laura goes along with it.

After WWII Henry’s brother Jamie shows up at the farm. At the same time Ronsel Jackson returns home as decorated solder. He is the son of the black sharecroppers’ family living on the farm.

Ronsel and Jamie become friends, which is very risky in the Jim Crow south. This unlikely friendship is what brings this powerful novel to its grim conclusion.

Mudbound is told by each of the character’s own point of view. This technique works very well for this novel. Jordon was able to write each characters point of view so well, that it felt as if I was each character. She really enables the reader to get in side the heads of the characters.

Jordan’s prose sings! She makes the farm a kind of character itself and captures both its beauty and muddy short falls, exquisitely!

I highly recommend this book and can hardly wait for Hillary Jordan to write another novel!
5/5

Thanks to Harper Collins for an advance copy of this wonderful book!

Also Reviewed by:

everything distils into reading

Copyright 2007-2010: All the posts within this blog were originally posted by Teddy Rose and should not be reproduced without express written permission.

May 08

8

BFF Award

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on May 8, 2008
Posted in Awards  | 6 Comments

Christina from Book-a-rama gave me this award.

This is so cool but I was wondering how much free credit I get on this credit card and how I cash it in? Must be at least $5000, right? LOL!

All kidding aside, I would like to thank Christina for this honour! If you haven’t been to her blog, it is worth the stop, she is an excellent blogger and I love visiting her blog. As a move novice blogger, I have learned a lot from her!

I would like to pass this award on to others, whose blogs I love:

Marg at Reading Adventures

Tanabata at In Spring It is the Dawn

BookFool at Bookfoolery and Babble

Copyright 2007-2010: All the posts within this blog were originally posted by Teddy Rose and should not be reproduced without express written permission.

May 08

4

Weekly Geeks #2 and My New Policy Open to All My Fellow Bloggers

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on May 4, 2008
Posted in Weekly Geeks  | 14 Comments

This is how Dewey explained this week’s Weekly Geeks:

The theme for Week 2 is something I borrowed (yes, she said it was ok!) from Darla at Books and Other Thoughts. She says in her sidebar that if she reviews a book that you’ve reviewed, you can email her and she’ll link to it in her review. I love this idea for three reasons.

1. As a blog reader, I like that I can have my review linked in someone else’s blog.
2. As a blog reader, I like that if I’m interested in a book Darla writes about, there will be other reviews linked at the bottom of the page, so I can get other viewpoints. You can see how this works

here.

3. As a blog writer, when I review a book, I often remember that I read someone else’s review at some point, but whose? And when? With Darla’s method, people tell her about their reviews, and she can see what they had to say about a book that is still fresh in her mind.

So here’s your challenge! If you’re willing, adopt Darla’s policy in your own blog. I realize this is a big commitment, so think it over first, but I think it can be really community-building.

1. Write a blog post as soon as possible telling your readers that you’re adopting Darla’s policy.

2. As much as you can with the time available to you during the week, visit other Weekly Geeks who are adopting Darla’s policy and see if you have any reviews of books they’ve reviewed.


3. Later in the week (by Thursday is easiest for me, but by Friday is also ok) write about your experience this week: did people take you up on your offer, did you find reviews you could give to other bloggers, did you enjoy the experience, do you think you want to keep this policy, etc.

4. I would remind people for a while, at the end of your reviews, that you’re doing this. After a while, your regular readers will remember your new policy, but you might want to state it somewhere permanent for new readers.

Attention Fellow Bloggers:

I love Darla’s policy and am adopting it for my blog too. Therefore, if you also wrote a review on your blog for the same book I reviewed on my blog, please leave a link to your review in the comments section on my blog for the applicable book. I will add the link to the end of the applicable book review I have written. (this is retroactive, so will also include all previous reviews I have posted on this blog.)

I will also be updating this post at the end of the week to let you know how I like or dis-like this new policy. I reserve the right to cancel it at any time.

May 7, 2008 Update:

Hooray, I finally figured out how to use labels! To find out if I reviewed any of the same books that you did, scroll down to the bottom right hand side of my blog and look in Labels. That should make it much easier. Then, as before, just leave your links to your reviews in my comments here.

May 9th Update:
Summary of my experience with Weekly Geeks #2:

This weeks challenge seemed like a big scavenger hunt to me. I visited every Weekly Geeks # 2 participant’s blog and tried to find reviews of books that I also reviewed.

It was time consuming, but worth while. I not only found some reviews of some books that I also review, but in the process also found more incredible blogs! I really like linking reviews, I think it gives my readers more opinions of the same book to help them decide if a particular book is for them or not.

Thanks for this awesome challenge!

Copyright 2007-2010: All the posts within this blog were originally posted by Teddy Rose and should not be reproduced without express written permission.

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