The Friday 56, What's So Funny?

Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of Storytime With Tonya and Friends.
*Post a link along with your post back to Storytime With Tonya and Friends.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.


The book this week is What's So Funny? by Donald Westlake. It's one from his Dortmunder series. I like Westlake, especially his Dortmunder books which are comic crime novels, in case you didn't already know.

The sentence:

"I don't understand," she admitted. "What's wrong?"

"I know about banks," he told her. "When it comes to money, they are very serious. They got no sense of humor at all. You ever been down to this vault?"

With Dortmunder usually everything is wrong, like being forced to break into a vault that he doesn't know how to break into. Ah, well, sometimes it isn't easy having a reputation of being a master thief.

What? Who? Huh?

It has been a while since I have posted anything here. I didn’t make the Friday 56 last week, no contests, no reviews, and if you look at my sidebar you can see I didn’t even get rid of the contests that are already over. I would apologize but I’m sure no one even noticed. I bet there is no one even out there, there, there.

It’s an echo joke. Because no one is out there. Get it? Yes, well, it is rather lame. I will apologize for that. Sorry.

So, as for the blog…

I thought about getting online and posting something but every time I did it seemed like a lot of work and I just couldn’t work up the energy to do it. Hopefully I will get back on track. Not that I posted much before so it shouldn’t be too hard to get back up to the slow speed I was going. With any luck I will even get a Friday 56 up later today. Of course it has been a long week and I could just go home and take a nice long nap…

Luxury Reading Giveaways

Luxury Reading has some wonderful books that you can win.

For South of Broad by Pat Conroy go here. Deadline is April 22nd. Open to the US and Canada.

For Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton go here. Deadline is April 23rd. Open to the US and Canada.

For The Crazy School by Cornelia Read go here. Deadline is April 25th. Open to the US and Canada.

For Get Lucky by Katherine Center go here. Deadline is April 27th. Open to the US and Canada.

For Alex Cross's Trial by James Patterson go here. Deadline in May 1st. Open to the US and Canada.

For The Girls from Ames by Jeffrey Zaslow go here. Deadline is May 4th. Open to the US and Canada.

For Morpheus Road: The Light by D.J. MacHale go here. Deadline is May 5th. Open to the US only.

There are lots of ways to get extra entries for all of the giveaways so make sure you read the rules for each one. Good luck!

Hawk Review

Hawk by Brian Neary

(from the back of the book)

After a terrifying chase through the alleys of France, an eminent U.S. scientist faces death on a Paris rooftop at the hands of a mysterious assassin. CIA agents deem it a random act of violence.

Simultaneously, in the U.S., a terrorist bomber places a massive charge of C4 explosive in Minnesota’s Mall of America and a 50 lb. bomb under the Mormon’s Winter Quarters in Omaha. Undetected, he’s heading for the Staples Center in Los Angeles. His Jihadist partners expect the combined detonations to yield more than 700,000 dead Americans.

Young CIA agent, Quentin Hawk, a former pro athlete with a bum knee, a high I.Q. and a bad attitude, is the only person who sees the connection. As the seconds tick down, Hawk must find a solution before the explosions detonate a horrifying national disaster.

There is a lot going on here in different places, with different agencies and different groups with different agendas but as the story progresses it all coalesces and comes together. I like how Neary brings us back into the lives of the people involved so we can see how they got to where they are today, so we can see what has brought this group of vastly different characters to all be players in this one moment in time. The Hawk from the title is Quentin Hawk who works for the CIA but it is easy to forget that the book is about him since it tends to focus on Lukas Towne more than it does Hawk. There are some interesting characters here that had real potential but sometimes they were just too much. Like they were personifications of a type instead of real people and sometimes lacked subtlety and complexity. And they all want to be the one on top. So many times when you have two characters meet there is a chest thumping shouting match about who is in control and what they are in control of and who can tell who what to do and who needs who’s help and… It becomes juvenile in the characters, tedious to listen to as the reader and some times seems to take the spotlight off the plot and slows the pace. There are some true moments of tension and suspense. Some brought about because as the reader you know more information than the people you are reading about and just have to hope they figure it out. Others simply because Neary makes the threat of terrorists among us real and has the reader convinced that no one is safe. At the end the action comes quickly with a few twists that I didn’t see coming. It had its fun moments and I did want to keep reading to find out how it all worked out. But I think that it ran a little long and there were a few scenes that could have been shortened or maybe ever left out entirely.

Winnings

Here is a list of books I have won from various blogs since the last time I did such a list. I had planned to be better about it and thank everyone when I got the books but that didn't happen. Mostly because I'm lazy and somewhat because I'm forgetful. So I want to thank everyone now for making blog giveaways possible. I appreciate them all very much.


From Bookfan, Heretic Queen by Michelle Moran

From Beth’s Book Review Blog, Friends Like These by Danny Wallace

From Fantasy & SciFi Lovin', Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire

From Books and Needlepoint, Life After Genius by M. Ann Jacobs

From Free Book Friday, Dead Pan by Gayle Trent

From I’m Booking It, Beat the Reaper by Josh Bazell

From Drey’s Library, a James Patterson prize pack that included


Maximum Ride: Max
Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment
Maximum Ride: School’s Out – Forever
Maximum Ride: Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports
Maximum Ride: The Final Warning
Maximum Ride: Manga
The Dangerous Days of Daniel X
Daniel X: Watch the Skies


From BookHounds, Dino Vicelli, Private Eye in a world of evils by Lori Weiner

From At Home With Books, The Dolphin People by Torsten Krol

From Peeking Between the Pages, Try Darkness by James Scott Bell

From The Burton Review, The Secret of the Glass by Donna Russo Morin

The Friday 56, Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!

Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of Storytime With Tonya and Friends.
*Post a link along with your post back to Storytime With Tonya and Friends.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

The book this week is "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" by Richard P. Feynman. It's a bunch of anecdotal stories told by Richard Feynman (as you may have guessed) who is a Nobel Prize winning physicist. I can't remember why I picked this book up in the first place but I'm glad I did. It's really rather funny. There are a few times that he talks about things that are beyond me but they are really not the important part of the story so I just kind of ignore them and everything is fine.

The sentence:

Now I didn't want to interrupt them in their own conversation and keep asking them to explain something, and on the few occasions that I did, they'd try to explain it to me, but I still didn't get it.

This was when he decided to sit with the philosophers instead of the physicists just to see what other people were talking about. He is a very interesting man.

Harry Potter

Bermudaonion's Weblog is giving away an entire boxed set of Harry Potter! The winner will also get a $50 Amazon gift certificate. Contest ends at midnight EST, Friday, April 30, 2010. Winners will be announced on Saturday, May 1, 2010. It is open to US addresses only. All you have to do to enter is head on over there and leave a comment. Good luck!

The Friday 56, The Time of Terror

Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of this blog (this time only because as of the time of this posting Storytime with Tonya and Friends does not have a Friday 56 posted for this week).
*Post a link along with your post back to Storytime with Tonya and Friends.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

The book this week is The Time of Terror by Seth Hunter. Sounds exciting doesn't it? It is rather. Navel battles, smuggling and all sorts of good stuff.

The sentence:

If you are apprehended, the First Lord had assured him, we will be obliged to disown you.

Yes, that's exactly what you want to hear right before you take off on a dangerous mission into enemy territory.

Dead and Buried, movie vs. book

Dead and Buried by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
Dead and Buried with James Farentino

In Potter’s Bluff people are being killed and it looks like they just might be coming back.

The book is creepy and spooky and a lot of that comes from the fact that things develop slowly and you don’t know what is going on for some time. So many things look normal and there are just little clues for you to follow. The sheriff has time to wonder if the deaths are accidental, to wonder what is going on with his wife. There is time for the tension and mystery to build. Unfortunately there isn’t time for that in the movie. Things happen much more quickly. The tension wasn’t allowed to build and it made it less a creeping terror and made it a little campy. And one of the scenes that I found most frightening in the book, where a couple and their son are being chased, loses some of its impact by being turned into a short chase instead of the running and hiding and moments when you think they are safe. Except for the pace, at first the movie does closely follow the book. You can see all the major events and they happen pretty much the way they did in the book. There are changes to some small things, people die in different ways for instance, and there seemed to be no reason for the changes but they didn’t make too much difference, they just made it more gruesome (maybe that’s the reason I was looking for). And the movie was more gruesome. There are some descriptions of the burned dead bodies in the book but mostly it isn’t a blood and guts horror it is more an eerie kind of horror. Later in the movie there are a few big event changes that I was annoyed about at first but they managed to fit in without much change to the overall plot and outcome. Because you can actually see who is doing what in the movie a few things were more explicit than they were made in the book but they were hinted at in the book so not too much was given away and in the end it just added to the quicker pace of the movie that had already been established. I was glad to see that the ending of the movie was very close to the book and so kept the effect the same. Overall I think the movie was pretty true to the ideas, concepts and feel of the book if not always the exact sequence of events. I think this is a good book to movie conversion but I still find myself on the side of the book. Mostly, I think, because I tend to like the creepy horror, the empty house, spooky sounds, you feel like someone if watching you type stuff over the splashing blood and dismemberment horror. And the book was more the former and the movie more the latter.

Take a Peek at This!

Peeking Between the Pages is giving away a bunch of great books. You should go take a look.


For Without Mercy by Lisa Jackson go here. Open until April 23rd to the US and Canada, no PO boxes.

For Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow go here. Open until April 23rd to the US and Canada, no PO boxes.

For Sugar by Bernice McFadden go here. Open until April 24th. Open to everyone.

For Cradle by Patrick Somerville go here. Open until May 1st to the US and Canada, no PO boxes.

For The Host by Stephenie Meyer go here. Open until May 1st to the US and Canada, no PO boxes.

For Mistress of Rome by Kate Quinn go here. Open until May 7th to the US only.

For The Queen's Pawn by Christy English go here. Open until May 7th to the US only.

A Corpse at St. Andrew's Chapel Review

A Corpse at St Andrew's Chapel by Mel Starr

From the back of the book:

Alan, the beadle of the medieval manor of Bampton, had gone out at dusk to seek those who might violate curfew. When, the following morning, he had not returned home, his young wife Matilda sought out Master Hugh de Singleton, surgeon and bailiff if the manor.

Two days later Alan's corpse was discovered in the hedge, at the side of the track to St Andrew's Chapel. His throat had been torn out - his head was half severed from his body - and his face, hands and forearms were lacerated with deep scratches.

Master Hugh, meeting Hubert the coroner at the scene, listened carefully to the coroner's surmise that a wolf had caused the great wound. And yet... of so, why was there so little blood?



This is a light fast book that is about the likeable surgeon and bailiff Hugh de Singleton. Hugh seems to be a forward thinker. He tells you about the procedures he performs while curing various injuries and how his thoughts differ from what was then the norm. It gives the reader a good, but not overbearing, look at the state of medicine at the time. He also tends to wax philosophic about religious matters. It is a rather prevalent theme in the book and he talks about it a lot. He is not preachy but more conversational in a ‘here’s what I think about this, don’t tell the bishop’ sort of way. And once again his ideas do not always conform to what the church would call the norm. But he is just sharing his thoughts and ponderings with us, not telling us what to think. And since religion and the church play a role in the everyday life of the people it is really not surprising to find that Hugh thinks about it so much. Hugh has a wit and a self deprecating humor that make him a fun character to get to know. And Starr fills the account with little facts from the everyday life of the people so that the setting comes to life. You hear about a widow having to worry about getting her dead husband’s shoes back because they are worth more than she can afford to lose and about how the plague has ravaged the country and the people. You learn how the religious observances affect their daily lives and how having food all through the winter was a problem. And you hear a lot about eating. This is a first person account so the things that are important to Hugh and that are in the forefront of his mind get mentioned most. And one of those things is food. He tells you what every meal he eats consists of. He also mentions often that people are not usually happy to see him and talks about wanting a wife to the point of annoyance. It does tell you something about Hugh but I do wish he wouldn’t talk about it so much. This is a mystery, but only because someone happens to get killed and it is Hugh’s job to find the murderer. You do not get a list of clues that you can follow to the logical conclusion. Hugh is telling his story after the fact and he will tell you everything he sees but he will also tell you which parts turn out to be important in the future or add something that he didn’t know until later. And when you do find out what happened it sort of comes out of nowhere. And Hugh is not a detective who reasons everything out and expertly follows logic to the conclusion of his investigation. He is a little out of his field with murder mysteries. And it is often clear that he really doesn’t know what he is doing. He has all these carefully laid plans that usually come to not, except that he gets clunked on the head with something. He lucks into most of the information that he gets by being in the right place at the right time instead of deducing anything. These are not complaints about the book but I do think that they make it more about Hugh than it is about the murder of poor Alan the Beadle. The book is filled with interesting characters and period details and a glossary to help you on your way. If you enjoy historical fiction this would be one you might want to give a try.

The Friday 56, The Pencil

Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of Storytime with Tonya and Friends.
*Post a link along with your post back to Storytime with Tonya and Friends.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

Did I make it? Is it still Friday? Okay so I'm a little late but better late than never, right? The book this week is The Pencil by Henry Petroski. And yes, it is actually a book about pencils. Some of it is rather dry but some of it is interesting. I never knew that counterfeit pencils were such a big problem or that some were once made with a mouthpiece for people who held the pencil in their mouth.

The sentence:

But that is not to say that all pencils were bought already fabricated. As late as 1714 a London broadsheet could depict an itinerant hawker whose cry suggests that he did not sell fabricated pencils as we know them, but rather still peddled the marking substance itself, suitable for the purchaser to insert in an appropriate holder:

Buy marking stones, marking stones buy
Much profit in their use doth lie;
I've marking stones of colour red,
Passing good, or else black Lead.


Now if that didn't get you to buy a 'pencil' what would? I must say I have a new appreciation for the pencil now.

Looking for Adventure?

Today’s Adventure turns 1!! And to celebrate there is going to be a huge giveaway!

Some of the things you can win include:

PRIZE PILE #1 (finished copies)

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Blu-ray, still in shrink wrap)
Numbers - Rachel Ward (HB)
Timothy and the Dragon's Gate -Adrienne Kress (PB)
Lips Touch - Laini Taylor (HB)
Ransom My Heart - Meg Cabot (PB)
Grave Sight - Charlaine Harris (PB)
Poetry Speaks Who I Am edited by Elise Paschen (HB, with audio CD)
Burn - Ted Dekker and Erin Healy (HB)
Bad Girls Don't Die - Katie Alender (HB)
Song of the Sparrow - Lisa Ann Sandell (HB)
The Prophecy of the Sisters - Michelle Zink (HB)

PRIZE PILE #2 (ARCS)

Everlasting - Angie Frazier
The Deadly Sister - Eliot Schrefer
The Keepers' Tattoo - Gill Arbuthnott
Shiver - Maggie Stiefvater
Beautiful Creatures - Garcia/Stohl
Possessed - Kate Cann
Scarlett Fever - Maureen Johnson
Smile - Raina Telgemeier
Wish - Alexandra Bullen
Merlin's Harp - Anne Eliot Crompton
Stolen - Lucy Christopher

There will be three winners:

Winner #1 gets to choose one book valued $20 or less from The Book Depository. They also get to pick 2 books from each Prize Pile.

Winner #2 gets to choose one book valued $20 or less from The Book Depository. They also get to pick 1 book from each Prize Pile (after #1 picks).

Winner #3 gets to pick 1 book from each Prize Pile (after #2 picks).

Plus, if Today’s Adventure reaches 450 followers before the contest is over, there will be another winner who will get 1 book from each Prize Pile.

The contest will be open worldwide, but winners outside the US and Canada will only be eligible to win the Book Depository prizes. This contest will be open the entire month of April, with winners announced on May 2, or there abouts.

Just fill out the form to enter.

You can get extra entries for being a follower of Today’s Adventure, tweeting about the giveaway and including the ID @NotNessie, following @NotNessie on twitter, linking the contest in your sidebar, and making a blog post about it.

Good Luck!!

Books I Finished in March

Only 7 this month, and one of them was only 90 pages long. I have been informed by a handy new gadget on Shelfari that I am behind my pace. So nice of them to point it out.


Wondrous Strange by Lesley Livingston
More YA fantasy. Fairies and selkies and Shakespeare and all that. Good if you like this sort of thing but I have not put the sequel at the top of my list.

The Book of Joby by Mark J. Ferrari
Retelling of the story of Job. Sort of. I was just reading a story and not looking for it to be strictly biblical so I could enjoy it on that level but it started to lose me when King Arthur and Lancelot got involved.

Dead and Buried by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
Creepy and dark without being too gory and gross.

Dino Vicelli by Lori Weiner
This was the 90 pages one. Cute, quirky, but with some flaws I think.

The Dangerous Days of Daniel X by James Patterson
Hmmm… I don’t know. I expected better. I know that it was written for kids (a younger audience than I had supposed when I picked it up) but still I expected some menace from the bad guys and what I got was corny. It might appeal to young children (probably more boys) but it isn’t one of those books you can say is for all ages.

Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde
As you can imagine from the title this future doesn’t have much color. It is a society where everyone conforms and things are the way they are and no one can remember why and such. It isn’t as bleak as it sounds. It has some wit and humor. I liked it and will read the next two but I’m getting tired of trilogies and kind of wish it was just one book.

The Firm by John Grisham
Suspenseful. A good thriller.