Teaser Tuesday

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Tuesday TeaserTeaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. The idea is to give everyone a look inside the book you’re reading.

1.) Grab your current read

2.) Open to a random page

3.) Share two teaser sentences from that page

4.) Share the title and author so that other participants know what you’re reading.

Be careful not to include spoilers. You don’t want to ruin the book for others!

My Teaser this week:

“The vessel that was the bear us toward Rome was my mother’s thalamegos, a ship so large that its pillared courtyards had once hosted my father’s mock battles on horseback. From the docks, I could hear the Roman soldiers exclaiming in delight over every small detail on board: the fountains and potted palms in the grottos, the ivory-paneled bedrooms with their gilded images of Isis, the cedar chairs and embroidered couches.”

Cleopatra’s Daughter by Michelle Moran, pg. 35.

Cleopatra's Daughter

The Devil’s Queen: A Novel of Catherine de Medici

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The Devil's Queen: A Novel of Catherine de Medici

The Devil’s Queen: A Novel of Catherine de Medici

By Jeanne Kalogridis

St. Martin’s Press

ISBN: 978-0-312-36843-2

4 stars

Catherine de Medici was born into Florence’s most powerful family, the de Medicis. An heiress to a family fortune, she learned at an early age that life would be one fight after another. When she is nine years old, her family faces a revolt and she stands with her aunt against the family’s enemies. She soon finds herself imprisoned in a convent. Suffering but still strong, she is rescued by a French cousin and taken to a more friendly convent but her peace doesn’t last long. Once again, enemies of the de Medicis manage to imprison her and threaten her life. When her imprisonment finally comes to an end, she finds herself married off to a French Prince by her uncle Pope Clement.

At 14, she finds married life no easier. While the French King Francois likes her very much, her husband Henry is less enthralled. He does seem to have a genuine regard for her but there is no love at first. Henry takes a mistress and Catherine goes childless for many years knowing that her life in France is tenuous without an heir. Always the student of mathematics and astrology, she turns to a trusted adviser for help. She buys the lives of her children with blood and dark magic and finds the flimsy hold she has on happiness pulled very thin. With the death of her husband, her life becomes one fight after another to keep her promise to her husband — to keep the throne of France in Valois hands.

Catherine’s interest in the occult brings a mystical quality to the story. She very much wants to protect her family and those she loves so much so that she is willing to go to great lengths to buy their doomed happiness. Disgusted by what she has to do, she does feel some remorse but it doesn’t stop her. You see how badly she wants to please others and to be happy but it’s not in her stars, literally. She makes a lot of bad choices along the way but still believes she is only doing what is right for her family.

I enjoyed this book a lot. While I’m not sure if I liked Catherine or not by the end of the book, I do know that every small turn in her life was interesting. I wanted to see how she would handle the next hurdle and what magic she would turn to. I also felt sorry for her. She wanted so badly to be happy and to make those around her happy but her attempts only brought on more hurt. It was a sad life but it made for a good read.

Kalogridis has a way of bringing characters life. The clothing, palaces, and events were done so well that you can imagine each and every detail. It’s historical fiction the way I like it.

October 2009 Reading List

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cropped-book-stack-1e.jpgIt’s hard to believe that November is here already. I feel like October just started and now I’m doing a wrap-up of my month’s reading already. Oh well, at least I can look back on October as a good month of reading. :-)

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe

Dracula The Un-Dead by Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt

Enemy of God by Bernard Cornwell

Excalibur by Bernard Cornwell

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

The King’s Favorite by Susan Holloway Scott

The Magicians by Lev Grossman

Haunting Bombay by Shilpa Agarwal

The Killing Way by Tony Hays

The Fleet Street Murders by Charles Finch

The Devil’s Queen: A Novel of Catherine de Medici by Jeanne Kalogridis

Library Loot

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Library LootSome good finds at the library today.

 

 

 

 

The Haunting of Hill House

 

 

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson. It’s Halloween today and it seemed a very appropriate read.

 

 

 

 

Cleopatra's Daughter

 

 

Cleopatra’s Daughter by Michelle Moran. I’ve been wanting to read this one for a long time. I loved The Heretic Queen and have high hopes for this one too.  She’s got a great writing style.

 

 

 

 

The White Queen

 

 

The White Queen by Philippa Gregory.

 

 

 

 

Shiver

 

 

Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater.

 

 

 

 

Heretic

 

 

Heretic by Bernard Cornwell. Lately it seems I’ve been on a Cornwell kick. I like his writing a lot and decided to peruse the stacks to see what other books of his the library has. I picked up Heretic and now after taking a closer look at it — it’s book 3 in a series. I don’t like to read books in a series out of order so I may have to make a trip back to the library next week to see if they have 1 and 2.

 

 

Kristin Lavransdatter II: The Mistress of Husaby

 

 

Kristin Lavransdatter: II the Mistress of Husaby by Sigrid Undset. Eva at A Striped Armchair reviewed this series recently and it sounded wonderful. I put a hold on it and the library gave me book 2. So when I go back to pick up the other Cornwell books, I’ll have to see if they have book 1.

 

 

 

 

I have a long trip for work coming up and, with the addition of a few more books, should have enough to see me through a long work trip.

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Eva and Marg that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. If you’d like to participate, just write up your post-feel free to steal the button-and link it using the Mr. Linky any time during the week. And of course check out what other participants are getting from their libraries!

Dracula The Un-Dead

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Dracula The Un-Dead

Dracula The Un-Dead

By Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt

Dutton

ISBN: 978-0525951292

3 stars

Since Saturday is Halloween, I thought this would be a good book to talk about.

In addition to this blog, I also do reviews for The Book Reporter website. Below is a short summary of my review of Dracula The Un-Dead which can be found on their website in full here.

Dracula The Un-Dead re-introduces us to the original characters — Dr. Jack Seward, Jonathan and Mina Harker, Arthur Holwood, and Dr. Abraham Van Helsing — 25 years after their heroic battle against Dracula in the Carpathian Mountains. We find out that Dracula is still roaming the earth and so is a new evil — an evil more cunning and diabolical than Dracula himself. The next incarnation of the undead is committing gruesome murders and terrorizing residents of London and Paris, leaving one individual to stop the carnage.

Dracula The Un-Dead is written by the great grand nephew of Bram Stoker, Dacre Stoker, and is billed as a sequel to the original written in 1897 using Bram Stoker’s notes. All in all, it’s a fast read and exciting in parts but I think too much is asked of readers of the original in having to forgo old beliefs of who and what Dracula is. In the end, enjoy it for what it is, another vampire story for October.

If you are interested in my review of the original, it can be found here.

Booking Through Thursday

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Booking Through ThursdayBooking Through Thursday asks — Something I’ve been thinking about lately: “What words/phrases in a blurb make a book irresistible? What words/phrases will make you put the book back down immediately?”

For me, any of the following words used to describe a book will get me to pick it: historical fiction, fantasy, magic, mystery, thriller, paranormal, romance, ghost, and sometimes horror (as long as it’s not completely gory, I’m in). Even charming, fast-paced, exciting, and new take on…will usually get a book past the immediate inspection phase.

What will make me drop a book: anything religious based (I find I just don’t have the interest), biography (not a big fan), anything sports related (as my husband can attest, not a big fan of anything sports related), chicklit (I’ve read a few but not a huge fan) and erotica (I don’t mind romance but I think characters should have pants on for at least part of the story).

Oh, I forgot, anything self help related.  Just NO.

How about you? What words make a book an absolute must read?

The Killing Way

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The Killing Way

The Killing Way

By Tony Hays

A Tom Doherty Associates Book

ISBN: 978-0-7653-1945-6

4.5 stars

CSI meet Arthur; Arthur meet CSI. The Killing Way is a murder mystery set to Arthurian legend mixed with modern ideas of investigation techniques.

At Castellum Arturius, shortly before Arthur is to be elected ruler of Britain, a murder is committed putting Arthur in an awkward position when Merlin is accused of the crime. Arthur turns to Malgywn to investigate. A former soldier, the one armed Malgywn is not fond of Arthur. He would have preferred to die fighting the Saxons who had taken his wife’s life but all they got from him was his arm. He hates Arthur for rescuing him when death was all he craved. Malgywn, now a drunk who prefers to spend his time whoring and waiting for an early death, is not thrilled with the investigator role Arthur assigns him but has no choice. When he finds out that his dead wife’s sister, Eleonore, was the one found murdered, the case takes on a personal tone for him.

With his leadership role at stake, Arthur is in a hurry to have the murder solved but Malgywn tells him at the start that he’ll take as long as he needs to finish his investigation and won’t be swayed when it comes to the guilty. Although he doesn’t believe Merlin capable of murder, he keeps going back to him letting Arthur know things won’t be as clean and easy as he wants them to be. When a second woman shows up dead and a suspect goes missing, Malgywn gets pulled deeper into a world he tried for many years to fade out of.

The story moves fast and so does the investigation giving readers a look at the political landscape and the battles Arthur faces as the new leader of Britain. I liked the character of Malgywn, he’s gruff, mean-spirited, but fair. He also turns out to be kinder than one imagines; an old farmer, widower, and soldier who cares more than he wants to admit or believe. He doesn’t think he has much to gain but knows that Arthur has a lot to lose. In the end, he only wants to find the truth knowing he can’t let down either Eleonore or the memory of his wife.

It’s a short book, 264 pages only, and moves incredibly fast. It’s entertaining and the mystery takes a few turns before all is revealed in the end although for hard-core mystery readers, you’ll probably figure things out fairly quickly. I don’t read many mysteries but I did enjoy this one and the setting which was a nice change from the rather Sherlock Holmesy feel I get with most mysteries.

Teaser Tuesday

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Tuesday TeaserTeaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. The idea is to give everyone a look inside the book you’re reading.

1.) Grab your current read

2.) Open to a random page

3.) Share two teaser sentences from that page

4.) Share the title and author so that other participants know what you’re reading.

Be careful not to include spoilers. You don’t want to ruin the book for others!

My Teaser this week:

“In looks he was tall, thin, and gray, with bifocals that forced him at all times to lean slightly forward. These made him particularly unpleasant to talk to at parties, where one felt inspected and analyzed at every conversational turn.”

The Fleet Street Murders

The Fleet Street Murders by Charles Finch, pg. 4.

I love this description. It’s perfect imagery — at least for me. 🙂