Teddy Rose Book Reviews Plus More


Mar 17

24

Munich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring: Review

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on March 24, 2017
Posted in Book Tours • Books Read in 2017 • Historical Fiction • WWII  | Tagged With: , , , | 4 Comments

Munich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly RingMunich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring


Publisher: Whole Sky Books (November 14, 2015)
Category: Historical Fiction,  WWII, Germany, Family Saga
Tour date: Feb 1-Mar 31, 2017
ISBN: 978-0996546980
Available in Print & ebook, 356 pages

The Munich Girl

Description of Munich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring


The Munich Girl: A novel of the legacies that outlast war.

The past may not be done with us. What secrets is a portrait of Eva Braun hiding?

Anna Dahlberg grew up eating dinner under her father’s war-trophy portrait of Eva Braun. Fifty years after the war, she discovers what he never did—that her mother and Hitler’s mistress were friends.

Plunged into the world of the “ordinary” Munich girl who was her mother’s confidante—and a tyrant’s lover—Anna uncovers long-buried secrets and unknown reaches of her heart, to reveal the enduring power of love in the legacies that always outlast war.

Fiction Finalist in 2016 Eric Hoffer Book Awards

My Thoughts Munich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring


Anna Dahlberg’s mother, Peggy has asked her to come over to talk.  She has something important to tell her.  However, Peggy dies before Anna can get there.  What did she want to tell her?  Not long after, Anna moved into her mother’s house with her husband, Lowell. Lowell has been writing a book about Hitler and also owns a magazine called “The Fighting Chance”.  Although Anna has a job lined up, Lowell demands that she write some articles for the magazine to help the promotion of his upcoming book.

A German man by the name of Hannes runs the magazine for Lowell and he respects Anna’s work, unlike her husband.  Anna and Hannes decide that she should write an article on Eve Braun, Hitler’s mistress.  She gets to work with research and is surprised at what she finds.  It turns out that Eve was friends with Anna’s mother.  As she digs deeper, Anna unearths many family secrets.

The Munich Girl is told by Anna and her mother, Peggy, via a manuscript Anna found.  It shifts back and forth from the 1990’s to World War II.  It is a story of the self discovery of Anna Dahlberg, lost family, history, romance, and of course, the real life person from history, Eve Braun.

I was a bit worried about how I would feel reading about Hitler’s mistress.  How could anyone have cared for the monster, let alone slept with him, willingly.  However, woman throughout history have made poor choices in men.  I included, my first husband was not a nice person.  So over the course of the book, I did build some sympathy for Eva.  I would have liked an author’s note at the end of the book to find out if that sympathy was really warranted.  I loved Anna’s character and how she developed and grew over time.  Actually all of the characters were well drawn out.  The sense of time and place were also well written and Phyllis Edgerly Ring’s descriptions of World War II Germany were excellent.  I highly recommend ‘The Munich Girl’!

4.5/5

I received the Kindle ebook for my honest review.

About Phyllis Edgerly RingMunich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring


Author Phyllis Edgerly Ring lives in New England and returns as often as she can to her childhood home in Germany. Her years there left her with a deep desire to understand the experience of Germans during the Second World War. She has studied plant sciences and ecology, worked as a nurse, been a magazine writer and editor, taught English to kindergartners in China, and served as program director at a Baha’i conference center in Maine.

She is also author of the novel, Snow Fence Road, and the inspirational nonfiction, Life at First Sight: Finding the Divine in the Details. Her book for children, Jamila Does Not Want a Bat in Her House, is scheduled for release by Bellwood Press in early 2017.

Blog: http://phyllisedgerlyring.wordpress.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/PhyllisEdgerlyRing?ref=hl
Twitter: http:// www.twitter.com/phyllisring

Buy Munich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring


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Enter to Win Munich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring


There is still time to enter to win your very own copy of ‘The Munich Girl’.  Hurry, the giveaway ends on March 31st!  You can enter here: https://theteddyrosebookreviewsplusmore.com/2017/02/munich-girl-by-phyllis-edgerly-ring-interview-giveaway.html#.WNIbbBsrKUk

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Munich Girl by Phyllis Edgerly Ring

Mar 17

9

Confessions Of Young Nero by Margaret George: Giveaway

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on March 9, 2017
Posted in My Past Giveaways  | Tagged With: , , | 7 Comments

Confessions Of Young Nero by Margaret GeorgeConfessions Of Young Nero by Margaret George


Thanks to Lauren Burnstein of  Berkley Books, I am giving away one print copy of Confessions Of Young Nero by Margaret George.

Description of Confessions Of Young Nero by Margaret George


THE CONFESSIONS OF YOUNG NERO (Berkley Hardcover; March 7, 2017; $28) is written, like Robert Graves’s I, Claudius, in the form of an autobiography. It reveals with luminescent detail Nero’s complex talents and successes, his childhood, his rise to power, and his instinct for self-preservation which first took root on the moonlit night his insane uncle, the Emperor Caligula, tried to drown him.

Nero’s life—riddled with murders, rivalries, plots, orgies, and incest—is sensational on its own. But for George, THE CONFESSIONS OF YOUNG NERO is not just an opportunity to tell his story. It is an attempt to rehabilitate his image, and to expose the truth and complexities about both a man—and a time period—that has been much mythologized. George spent five years researching the novel, but her idea of resetting Nero’s villainous reputation has been building for more than thirty.

When he is just a small child, Nero’s mother, Agrippina, is released from exile by her elderly uncle—the newly crowned Emperor Claudius. Agrippina quickly plucks Nero from his modest upbringing, and embarks on a ruthless pruning of the family tree to ensure what she believes is her son’s rightful place in the Palace. Her naked ambition, cunning, and well-placed doses of poison help the obstacles fall one by one, until a teenage boy is given control of an Empire. Both tempted and terrified to assume his reign, Nero’s indoctrination into the incest, violence, luxury, and intrigue that have gripped Rome’s seat of power for generations will shape him into the man he was fated to become.  

George covers the unfolding of Nero’s life and legacy, including his forced marriage to his cousin Octavia at fifteen; his passion for a beautiful ex-slave and other love affairs; the influence of the great philosopher Seneca on his reign; and his attentiveness to his political duties, including the improvement of Rome’s courts and public amenities. George uses Nero’s expansion of theatres, athletic games, chariot races, and musical performances as a window into the powerful artistic and athletic impulses that governed him, and which made him a champion of the common man—the men among whom he’d begun his life as “Lucius,” until fate made him forever “Nero.”

Like Mary Beard’s revisionist history of ancient Rome, SPQR, NERO both challenges our assumptions of that time period and taps into readers’ fascination with the Empire. Readers of Philippa Gregory will adore and find much to discover in George’s latest novel.

The author will continue Nero’s story in a second book, which picks up during the ill-fated, final four years of his young life, as he faces his biggest test and challenge: the Great Fire of Rome.

Praise for Margaret George


“If only history lessons had been like this.”—Cosmopolitan

 “Extensively researched with the highest integrity, and deeply engaging, it sets a new benchmark for the genre.”—New York Times bestselling author Alison Weir

“George leaves us with the most coveted prize of fiction: a world. . . we wished existed, and that thoroughly does between the covers.” —Chicago Tribune

About Margaret George


Confessions Of Young Nero by Margaret George

(c) Alison Kaufman

Margaret George is the New York Times bestselling author of six novels of biographical historical fiction, including Elizabeth I, Helen of Troy, Mary, Called Magdalene, The Memoirs of Cleopatra, The Autobiography of Henry VIII, and Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles. She also has written a children’s book, Lucille Lost.

Giveaway of Confessions Of Young Nero by Margaret George


This giveaway is open to the U.S. only and ends on April 1, 2017 midnight pacific time.  Entries are accepted via Rafflecopter only.

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Mar 17

5

Yellow House by Jeroen Blokhuis, Asja Novak (Translator): Giveaway

Posted by Teddyrose@1 on March 5, 2017
Posted in My Past Giveaways  | Tagged With: , , , , | 5 Comments

Yellow House by Jeroen BlokhuisYellow House by Jeroen Blokhuis


Thanks to Bernadette of Holland Park Press, I am giving away one print copy of Yellow House by Jeroen Blokhuis.

Description of Yellow House by Jeroen Blokhuis


The Yellow House, by Jeroen Blokhuis, paints a fictional picture of Vincent van Gogh’s life between August 1888 and December 1889 when he lived in Arles in Southern France and where he created many of his masterpieces. 

In his debut novel Jeroen Blokhuis tells the story from van Gogh’s point of view, from inside his mind, providing a fresh and revealing look at how this intriguing painter worked.

The Vincent in this novel very much tries to fit in, but is often baffled by how people react. Almost as if he can only express himself through his paintings, which in turn flummox the public. In one scene people literally turn up to see Vincent and Gauguin paint Marie Ginoux, but he, Vincent, is just concerned about creating a good painting. 

About Jeroen BlokhuisYellow House by Jeroen Blokhuis


Jeroen Blokhuis is a Dutch author and a Communications Advisor.

He has published short stories in literary magazines including Passionate and KortVerhaal. He also wrote booklets for educational publishers and professional publications about content strategy. 

His short story ‘Vroeger’ (‘The Past’) was published in Dutch and English in the Holland Park Press online magazine in 2012. The basis for this short story was a short screenplay written ten years ago which won the Gouden Vlam screenplay prize.

In answer to the questions about his inspiration for writing The Yellow House, the author answered: ‘The protagonist, Vincent van Gogh, is an iconic painter, but I was interested in who he really was, in the actual world: soldiering on, an outsider and a dreamer. Well, that’s what I think, and that’s how, for me, he’s become a real person.’

His debut novel, Place Lamartine was published in Dutch in September 2015 and will be published in English as The Yellow House in March 2017. 

Giveaway of  Yellow House by Jeroen Blokhuis


This giveaway is open worldwide and ends on March 17, 2017 midnight pacific time.  Entries are accepted via Rafflecopter only.

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