Happy Friday!
Up until I started Book It Forward, I had very little experience in the blogging and social media writing world. Having been blogging now for a little while, I have to say that I am thoroughly enjoying it. I am always thinking of new post ideas and love researching new book releases and coming up with book lists for my followers. One thing I have come across when reading fellow bloggers sites is this thing called a Book Tag. My first thought was “What the heck is a Book Tag?” I thought maybe it was a literal tag someone put on a book, or maybe they tagged the author on the post much like you would tag a friend in a Facebook photo. After I did some research and read some of these Book Tag posts, I learned that Book Tags are basically blogs posts with a bunch of questions that a blogger answers about their reading habits, book preferences, etc. So, I decided to do one myself! Check out my answers and PLEASE feel free to post your answers to these questions in the comments. I also included purchase links for Amazon in case any of these titles sound good to you.
1. What was the last book you read?
Paris For One by Jojo Moyes
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eHnqFO
Nell is twenty-six and has never been to Paris. She’s never even been on a romantic weekend away—to anywhere—before. Traveling abroad isn’t really her thing. But when Nell’s boyfriend fails to show up for their mini-vacation, she has the opportunity to prove everyone—including herself—wrong. Alone in Paris, Nell finds a version of herself she never knew existed: independent and intrepid. Could this turn out to be the most adventurous weekend of her life? Funny, charming, and irresistible, Paris for One is quintessential Jojo Moyes—as are the other stories that round out the collection.
2. Was it a good one?
It was just ok for me. This is a collection of short stories by an author I love, but a couple of the stories fell flat to me. On the other hand, I LOVED a couple of the others. 3 Stars on GoodReads.
3. What made it good?
The stories were sweet and quirky just like Jojo’s usual writing. They were light and quick to read. I just finished a few heavier books, so this one was just what I needed.
4. Would you recommend it to other readers?
Yes I would. Most people who like Jojo Moyes will really enjoy this book. The only story I really didn’t love which surprised me is the title story.
5. How often do you read?
All the time! I listen to Audiobooks while working and sometimes while driving. Plus I read at least a few chapters before bed each night. I always have a book going on my kindle app and usually a hard copy on my nightstand.
6. Do you like to read?
LOVE isn’t a strong enough word for how much I enjoy to read.
7.What was the last bad book you read?
I actually think that most books aren’t bad, but what you enjoy reading is subjective. Something I love may be completely despised by someone else and vice versa. With that being said however, I really didn’t enjoy Among The Ten Thousand Things by Julia Pierpont. After reading it, I looked on line and it seemed a ton of people loved this book. I invite you to read it for yourself to see if you like it. I was just plain bored reading it.
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eOAufY
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE AND THE HUFFINGTON POST • Features an exclusive conversation between Julia Pierpont and Lena Dunham
For fans of Jennifer Egan, Jonathan Franzen, Lorrie Moore, and Curtis Sittenfeld, Among the Ten Thousand Things is a dazzling first novel, a portrait of an American family on the cusp of irrevocable change, and a startlingly original story of love and time lost.
Jack Shanley is a well-known New York artist, charming and vain, who doesn’t mean to plunge his family into crisis. His wife, Deb, gladly left behind a difficult career as a dancer to raise the two children she adores. In the ensuing years, she has mostly avoided coming face-to-face with the weaknesses of the man she married. But then an anonymously sent package arrives in the mail: a cardboard box containing sheaves of printed emails chronicling Jack’s secret life. The package is addressed to Deb, but it’s delivered into the wrong hands: her children’s.
With this vertiginous opening begins a debut that is by turns funny, wise, and indescribably moving. As the Shanleys spin apart into separate orbits, leaving New York in an attempt to regain their bearings, fifteen-year-old Simon feels the allure of adult freedoms for the first time, while eleven-year-old Kay wanders precariously into a grown-up world she can’t possibly understand. Writing with extraordinary precision, humor, and beauty, Julia Pierpont has crafted a timeless, hugely enjoyable novel about the bonds of family life—their brittleness, and their resilience.
9. Do you wish to be a writer?
I have a couple book ideas floating around in my head, but I can’t imagine when I will have the time to sit down and begin writing. It’s an eventual goal!
10. Has any book every influenced you greatly?
Hmmmm….I’m not sure that a book has ever influenced me per se, but I have to give credit to early books in my reading life for driving me towards a love of reading. Nothing specific stands out that I can recall. A book I read recently that was very moving however was When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eOGEwn
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi’s transformation from a naïve medical student “possessed,” as he wrote, “by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life” into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.
What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir.
Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,” he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’” When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.
11. Do you read fan fiction?
No
12. Do you write fan fiction?
No
13. What’s your favorite book?
Ahhh! What a tough question! I think I have an answer for you though.
11/22/63 by Stephen King is by far the book I recommend the most to friends and followers and reminisce over. I loved that book so much. It was a thrilling book to immerse myself in and I loved that it was sooooo long! I listened to it on Audible and then purchased a copy for my bookshelf.
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eHhQmG
WINNER OF THE 2012 LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE
In Stephen King’s “most ambitious and accomplished” (NPR) and “extraordinary” (USA TODAY) #1 New York Times bestselling novel, time travel has never been so believable. Or so terrifying.
Dallas, 11/22/63: Three shots ring out.
President John F. Kennedy is dead.
Life can turn on a dime—or stumble into the extraordinary, as it does for Jake Epping, a high school English teacher in a Maine town. While grading essays by his GED students, Jake reads a gruesome, enthralling piece penned by janitor Harry Dunning: fifty years ago, Harry somehow survived his father’s sledgehammer slaughter of his entire family. Jake is blown away…but an even more bizarre secret comes to light when Jake’s friend Al, owner of the local diner, enlists Jake to take over the mission that has become his obsession—to prevent the Kennedy assassination. How? By stepping through a portal in the diner’s storeroom, and into the era of Ike and Elvis, of big American cars, sock hops, and cigarette smoke… Finding himself in warmhearted Jodie, Texas, Jake begins a new life. But all turns in the road lead to a troubled loner named Lee Harvey Oswald. The course of history is about to be rewritten…and become heart-stoppingly suspenseful.
14. What’s your least favorite book?
This one is a bit easier. I have a few that I either didn’t finish, or finished with great difficulty. Although it was on the Oprah book club list, I found Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides utterly boring. I didn’t even finish it. Another was Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. The subject matter really turned me off. Couldn’t finish. I also didn’t love Wild by Cheryl Strayed. I enjoyed the travel portion of the book and what it took for her to survive in the wilderness, but she annoyed me.
Middlesex
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2env6BI
I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day of January 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of l974. . . My birth certificate lists my name as Calliope Helen Stephanides. My most recent driver’s license…records my first name simply as Cal.”
So begins the breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides and three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family who travel from a tiny village overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit, witnessing its glory days as the Motor City, and the race riots of l967, before they move out to the tree-lined streets of suburban Grosse Pointe, Michigan. To understand why Calliope is not like other girls, she has to uncover a guilty family secret and the astonishing genetic history that turns Callie into Cal, one of the most audacious and wondrous narrators in contemporary fiction. Lyrical and thrilling, Middlesex is an exhilarating reinvention of the American epic.
Oryx & Crake
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2fBQ5hq
Oryx and Crake is at once an unforgettable love story and a compelling vision of the future. Snowman, known as Jimmy before mankind was overwhelmed by a plague, is struggling to survive in a world where he may be the last human, and mourning the loss of his best friend, Crake, and the beautiful and elusive Oryx whom they both loved. In search of answers, Snowman embarks on a journey–with the help of the green-eyed Children of Crake–through the lush wilderness that was so recently a great city, until powerful corporations took mankind on an uncontrolled genetic engineering ride. Margaret Atwood projects us into a near future that is both all too familiar and beyond our imagining.
Wild
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2fBQuRj
At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother’s death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life. With no experience or training, driven only by blind will, she would hike more than a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State—and she would do it alone. Told with suspense and style, sparkling with warmth and humor, Wild powerfully captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.
15. Do you prefer physical books or ready on a device (like a kindle)?
I really enjoy both. It is much easier to carry my teeny Kindle around in my purse than a book first of all. On top of that, I can have multiple books and ARC books on my Kindle to jump around between. But…I love a real book. Many times I will pick up a hard copy of a book even if I have read it already on my Kindle. I’m always adding new books to my collection. I also love audiobooks!
16. When did you learn to read?
I believe I was either 4 or 5? My parents really worked with me early on reading and spelling.
17. What is your favorite book you had to read in school?
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
18. What is your favorite book series?
I really enjoyed Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King. But, I have a feeling that the new series I just started called the Dublin Murder Squad by Tana French may quickly become a favorite series of mine.
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2fBQBw6
The stolen Mercedes emerges from the pre-dawn fog and plows through a crowd of men and women on line for a job fair in a distressed American city. Then the lone driver backs up, charges again, and speeds off, leaving eight dead and more wounded. The case goes unsolved and ex-cop Bill Hodges is out of hope when he gets a letter from a man who loved the feel of death under the Mercedes’s wheels…
Brady Hartsfield wants that rush again, but this time he’s going big, with an attack that would take down thousands—unless Hodges and two new unusual allies he picks up along the way can throw a wrench in Hartsfield’s diabolical plans. Stephen King takes off on a “nerve-shredding, pulse-pounding race against time” (Fort Worth Star-Telegram) with this acclaimed #1 bestselling thriller.
19. Who is your favorite author?
This is hard! I love Gillian Flynn, Liane Moriarty, Blake Crouch and Stephen King.
20. What is your favorite genre?
I can’t seem to answer any of these questions with just one answer! Thrillers, Post Apocalyptic fiction, Light Sci-Fi/Horror and General Fiction (I realize that’s three, but I am an eclectic reader and my books are all so different) I don’t read anything in the Fantasy Genre and not much in Romance.
21. Who is your favorite character in a book series?
Holly Gibney from the Mr. Mercedes Trilogy. She was funny, quirky and very likeable. She was someone you wanted to see succeed and find happiness.
22. Has a book ever transported you somewhere else?
All the time! Back in history, to post apocalyptic America, to distant lands and foreign countries, etc.
23.Which book do you wish had a sequel?
My Name Is Memory by Ann Brashares. She was supposed to write a darn sequel and hasn’t yet 6 years later.
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eOCioV
The latest from Ann Brashares, the New York Times bestselling author of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, a magical story of reincarnation and a love that lasts more than a lifetime
Daniel has spent centuries falling in love with the same girl. Life after life, crossing continents and dynasties, he and Sophia (despite her changing name and form) have been drawn together-and he remembers it all. For all the times that he and Sophia have been connected throughout history, they have also been torn painfully, fatally, apart.
But just when Sophia (now “Lucy” in the present) finally awakens to the secret of their shared past, the mysterious force that has always separated them reappears. Ultimately, they must come to understand what stands in the way of their love if they are ever to spend a lifetime together.
24. Which book do you wish DIDN’T have a sequel?
You by Carol Kepnes. I will admit that I haven’t read the next book Hidden Bodies yet. My reasoning for not wanting a sequel is that You was really good and yet very hard to get through. I don’t know that I want to experience another story with that twisted main character again.
You: A Novel
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eHnwxf
“Hypnotic and scary.” —Stephen King
“I am RIVETED, AGHAST, AROUSED, you name it. The rare instance when prose and plot are equally delicious.” —Lena Dunham
From debut author Caroline Kepnes comes You, one of Suspense Magazine’s Best Books of 2014, and a brilliant and terrifying novel for the social media age.
When a beautiful, aspiring writer strides into the East Village bookstore where Joe Goldberg works, he does what anyone would do: he Googles the name on her credit card.
There is only one Guinevere Beck in New York City. She has a public Facebook account and Tweets incessantly, telling Joe everything he needs to know: she is simply Beck to her friends, she went to Brown University, she lives on Bank Street, and she’ll be at a bar in Brooklyn tonight—the perfect place for a “chance” meeting.
As Joe invisibly and obsessively takes control of Beck’s life, he orchestrates a series of events to ensure Beck finds herself in his waiting arms. Moving from stalker to boyfriend, Joe transforms himself into Beck’s perfect man, all while quietly removing the obstacles that stand in their way—even if it means murder.
A terrifying exploration of how vulnerable we all are to stalking and manipulation, debut author Caroline Kepnes delivers a razor-sharp novel for our hyper-connected digital age. You is a compulsively readable page-turner that’s being compared to Gone Girl, American Psycho, and Stephen King’s Misery.
The Sequel to You…
Hidden Bodies
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eHjNzF
In the compulsively readable follow-up to her widely acclaimed debut novel, You, Caroline Kepnes weaves a tale that Booklist calls “the love child of Holden Caulfield and Patrick Bateman.”
That’s all the synopsis I’m leaving for this one to avoid spoilers.
25. How long does it take you to read a book?
That depends on how much time I have, how much I like the book and how long it is. I can generally finish a book each week as long as I find the time.
26. Do you like when books become movies?
I actually do. Unless someone does a really bad job with the adaptation. I really enjoy seeing what I have read translated to the big screen. It is always exciting to see who has been cast as characters that I have loved reading about and seeing love stories come to life.
27. Which book was ruined by its movie adaptation?
I actually have a TV show for this answer and not a movie. I loved Stephen Kings book Under The Dome but the TV show was horrible!!! They completed changed the ending and it became so cheesy. The producers wanted to extend the series for financial reasons and threw in this crazy plot that didn’t exist in the book. Plus it was cleaned up for TV because King wrote some pretty graphic scenes of violence and sexual content.
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2fBSKb6
On an entirely normal, beautiful fall day in Chester’s Mill, Maine, the town is inexplicably and suddenly sealed off from the rest of the world by an invisible force field. Planes crash into it and fall from the sky in flaming wreckage, a gardener’s hand is severed as “the dome” comes down on it, people running errands in the neighboring town are divided from their families, and cars explode on impact. No one can fathom what this barrier is, where it came from, and when—or if—it will go away.
Dale Barbara, Iraq vet and now a short-order cook, finds himself teamed with a few intrepid citizens—town newspaper owner Julia Shumway, a physician’s assistant at the hospital, a select-woman, and three brave kids. Against them stands Big Jim Rennie, a politician who will stop at nothing—even murder—to hold the reins of power, and his son, who is keeping a horrible secret in a dark pantry. But their main adversary is the Dome itself. Because time isn’t just short. It’s running out.
28. Which movie has done a book justice?
I really enjoyed Gone Girl! Gone Girl is one of my favorite books too. I know it has been a bit polarizing to readers, but I really enjoyed it. Books rarely surprise me anymore so when I read Gone Girl and got to the second part I was thrown for a loop with that plot twist!
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eHfIeS
On a warm summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri, it is Nick and Amy Dunne’s fifth wedding anniversary. Presents are being wrapped and reservations are being made when Nick’s clever and beautiful wife disappears. Husband-of-the-Year Nick isn’t doing himself any favors with cringe-worthy daydreams about the slope and shape of his wife’s head, but passages from Amy’s diary reveal the alpha-girl perfectionist could have put anyone dangerously on edge. Under mounting pressure from the police and the media—as well as Amy’s fiercely doting parents—the town golden boy parades an endless series of lies, deceits, and inappropriate behavior. Nick is oddly evasive, and he’s definitely bitter—but is he really a killer?
29. Do you read newspapers?
Not really. I read my news online or listen to it via podcast.
30: Do you read magazines?
Rarely
31. Do you prefer newspapers or magazines?
If I had to pick, magazines.
32. Do you read while in bed?
Just about every night.
33. Do you read while on the toilet?
Yup! Gotta get the reading in wherever you can! Ha!
34. Do you read while in the car?
On road trips with my husband driving yes. Although he sometimes prefers me not to so we can talk.
35. Do you read while in the bath?
Love to! I actually put my Kindle in a ziploc bag just in case it falls in the water.
36. Are you a fast reader?
Yup.
37. Are you a slow reader?
No.
38. Where is your favorite place to read?
My couch on a rainy day with the patio door open and a blanket on. Cup of hot coffee in my hand.
39. Is it hard for you to concentrate while you read?
If the writing is super complicated or the humor is the type that I am not familiar with such as British humor than I tend to lose my train of thought.
40.Do you need a room to be silent while you read?
No.
41. Who gave you your love for reading?
My mom for sure but dad and I love to share books too and I think he is the one who really taught me to read.
42. What book is next on your list to read?
I have an Advanced copy of The Twilight Wife by AJ Banner that I need to read and review asap.
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2eOHf1f
From bestselling author A.J. Banner comes a dazzling new novel of psychological suspense in the vein of S.J. Watson’s Before I Go to Sleep and Mary Kubica’s The Good Girl that questions just how much we can trust the people around us.
Thirty-four-year-old marine biologist Kyra Winthrop remembers nothing about the diving accident that left her with a complex form of memory loss. With only brief flashes of the last few years of her life, her world has narrowed to a few close friendships on the island where she lives with her devoted husband, Jacob.
But all is not what it seems. Kyra begins to have visions—or are they memories?—of a rocky marriage, broken promises, and cryptic relationships with the island residents, whom she believes to be her friends.
As Kyra races to uncover her past, the truth becomes a terrifying nightmare. A twisty, immersive thriller, The Twilight Wife will keep readers enthralled through the final, shocking twist.
43. When did you start to read chapter books?
Third or fourth grade? Goosebumps books!
44. Who is your favorite children’s book author?
My 4 year old son and I are currently in a Dr. Seuss phase. We love his books.
45. Which author would you most want to interview?
Blake Crouch! Love him. His stories are new, unique and always exciting!
46. Which author do you think you’d be friends with?
Does it count if I say Amy Schumer? I know she is a comedian…but she did just write a book! Haha
The Girl With The Lower Back Tattoo
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2fpfRF4
The Emmy Award-winning comedian, actress, writer, and star of Inside Amy Schumer and the acclaimed film Trainwreck has taken the entertainment world by storm with her winning blend of smart, satirical humor. Now, Amy Schumer has written a refreshingly candid and uproariously funny collection of (extremely) personal and observational essays.
In The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo, Amy mines her past for stories about her teenage years, her family, relationships, and sex and shares the experiences that have shaped who she is—a woman with the courage to bare her soul to stand up for what she believes in, all while making us laugh.
Ranging from the raucous to the romantic, the heartfelt to the harrowing, this highly entertaining and universally appealing collection is the literary equivalent of a night out with your best friend—an unforgettable and fun adventure that you wish could last forever. Whether she’s experiencing lust-at-first-sight while in the airport security line, sharing her own views on love and marriage, admitting to being an introvert, or discovering her cross-fit instructor’s secret bad habit, Amy Schumer proves to be a bighearted, brave, and thoughtful storyteller that will leave you nodding your head in recognition, laughing out loud, and sobbing uncontrollably—but only because it’s over.
47.What book have you reread the most?
One Second After by William Forstchen. I am not a huge re-reader, but I have read this one more than once. It is one of my favorite Post Apocalyptic novels. In general though, I believe that life is too short to read the same book more than once.
Purchase link…http://amzn.to/2g1Zp19
New York Times best selling author William R. Forstchen now brings us a story which can be all too terrifyingly real…a story in which one man struggles to save his family and his small North Carolina town after America loses a war, in one second, a war that will send America back to the Dark Ages…A war based upon a weapon, an Electro Magnetic Pulse (EMP). A weapon that may already be in the hands of our enemies.
Months before publication, One Second After has already been cited on the floor of Congress as a book all Americans should read, a book already being discussed in the corridors of the Pentagon as a truly realistic look at a weapon and its awesome power to destroy the entire United States, literally within one second. It is a weapon that the Wall Street Journal warns could shatter America. In the tradition of On the Beach, Fail Safe and Testament, this book, set in a typical American town, is a dire warning of what might be our future…and our end.
48. Which books do you consider “classics”?
Anything by Jane Austen
49. Which books do you think should be taught in every school?
Books that teach our kids to love reading and that display good literature with a message.
50. Which books should be banned from all schools?
None! Even books with adult content can have some sort of message. Let’s choose books that will teach our youth good ideals without unnecessary censorship.
Do we have any similar answers? Are you planning to do this tag?
Have a great weekend Readers!
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