"Instructions for a Heatwave" by Maggie O'Farrell

Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O'Farrell tells the story of a man who one morning went out to get the paper, told his wife he would be right back, but didn't come back.  The wife called her three children home to search for dad.  

What makes this book so good is the interaction between the three kids, who have their own problems to be sure, and their mom.  There are plenty of "wow" moments in this, especially at the end.  Great writing!  I loved it!! 
(Gerard's review, 5++ stars)

Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O'Farrell is one Gerard and I have completely opposite feelings about.  I thought this book was very slow moving with no action and was annoyed by how it jumped from one character to another with no transition, most of the book was the characters thinking about the past and very little had to do with finding the missing father which was the big mystery of the book.  I didn't really care about any of the characters who each had their secrets.  

Another thing that was annoying to me was the lack of chapters--it just kept going on and on so there was never a good place to stop.  It just broke sections between a change in the character narration with a row of stars.  I didn't care for the writing at all--it had too much description for my taste with long rambling paragraphs.  The bickering among Gretta's grown children did not hold my interest at all which is what Gerard thought was the best part.  I thought the title was dumb and didn't even like the cover.  The only reason I read this was because Gerard thought it was so good.  Sometimes we agree on books, but not this time.

If I HAD to choose a favorite character, it would be the older sister, Monica, just because I enjoyed her storyline about trying to win over her two stepdaughters, a very small part of the book.  I would not recommend this book to anyone.  Sorry, Maggie.
(Karen's review)
 
Have you read this one? What did you think of it? If you reviewed this too, feel free to share your link to your review in the comments. Happy Reading!

Loved "A Bride For All Seasons--The Mail-Order Bride Collection" by Four Different Authors

Great Beach Read--Very Enjoyable!

Do you like reading clean historical romance books?  Do you enjoy mail-order bride stories?  I do, so when I saw A Bride For All Seasons—The Mail-order Bride Collection, I just had to read it and was not at all disappointed.  In fact, it is a collection of four novellas by four different authors:  And Then Came Spring by Margaret Brownley, An Ever After Summer by Debra Clopton, Autumn’s Angel by Robin Lee Hatcher, and Winter Wedding Bells by Mary Connealy.  I loved them all!

This book is so cool because all four mail-order bride stories are tied together by the common matchmaker, Melvin Hitchcock of The Hitching Post, a mail-order bride catalogue with the highest rate of successful marriages.  None of the couples that were matched up in this book got what they expected because Melvin edited their letters, at times l just omitting something that he felt would prevent the client’s chances of finding a match!  Consequently, all the couples have trust issues to begin with and it was fun to see how the couples get past that and become happily married in time.  (See My two teasers.)

Out of the four authors, I was only familiar with Mary Connealy, but now I have a whole list of books to read by the other three authors as well!  This book is a fun, entertaining read.  There are also three discussion questions for each novella in the back.  This would be a great Book Club read!
(Karen's review)

Check out my progress on learning to Juggle (part 2) using The Great Juggling Kit book.

Have you read this one? What did you think of it? If you reviewed this too, feel free to share your link to your review in the comments. Happy Reading!

Linked up with Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop today for the prompt:  Book review!  What are you reading this summer?

Tuesday Teasers

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should  Be Reading. Anyone can play along, so I thought  I  would play for fun! Just do the following

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page (well, we cheat and choose specific ones)
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on  that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away!   You don’t  want  to  ruin the  book for others!)
• Share the title and author, too, so that other TT participants can  add the book to their TBR  Lists  if they  like your teaser.   

Karen's:

Two hours and twenty-two minutes she'd been waiting!  If her errant fiance bothered showing up at all, it better be on hands and knees.

From page 6 of "And Then Came Spring" by Margaret Brownley, the first novella in A Bride For All Seasons--The mail-order Bride Collection. 

"Our Mathew is scarce on smiles and even more scarce on talk."  She grinned.  "I think with that sparkle of mischief I see in your blue eyes you might just be the one to tug both from the depths of him."

From page 126 of "An Ever After Summer" by Debra Clofton, the second novella in A Bride For All Seasons--The mail-order Bride Collection.

Gerard's:

The car jackknifed, spun sideways, and flipped over at 162 mph.
Airborne.
The stabilizer engine screeched helplessly at the sky.
Or maybe that was the girl.

From page 7 of Proxy by Alex London. (science fiction YA)

Gretta puts her hands on her hips.  She calls her husband's name, once, twice.  The flank of the garden wall throws the sound back to her.

From page 9 of Instructions for a Heatwave by Maggie O'Farrell.

Happy Reading!

Proxy by Alex London is GREAT Science Fiction

Proxy--Some Debts Cannot Be Repaid by Alex London is great! WOW!! Imagine screwing up and having another person take all the punishment. That is what Syd does for Knox, until one day Syd decides that he had enough and takes off, but runs into Knox! What happens then? Just a real page turner with action galore and the ending is fantastic! The writing is SO good too--LOVED IT!
(Gerard's review, 5++ stars)

Have you read this one? What did you think of it? If you reviewed this too, feel free to share your link to your review in the comments. Happy Reading!

A Children's Ebook: "Candy and the Cankersaur"

Image source:  Amazon

Candy and the Cankersaur by Jason Sandberg is a children’s book about a little girl (Candy) who has a very rich father that enjoys giving her lots of things, including a pet dinosaur! The jealous neighbor boy does something very mean but admits to his crime and apologizes. I love stories with happy endings! The illustrations for this ebook are very cute and it shows the strong bond kids can have with their pets. This would be a good bed-time story for toddlers or any boy or girl who likes dinosaurs.
(Karen's review)

Have you read this one? What did you think of it? If you reviewed this too, feel free to share your link to your review in the comments. Happy Reading!