Sweet Salt Air by Barbara Delinsky - Giveaway

I received a free copy of Sweet Salt Air from St. Martin's Press for my honest review. That review will appear on 8/27/13. I received no compensation for posting this giveaway.

One lucky US reader will win a copy of Barbara Delinsky's brand new book, Sweet Salt Air. I will be reviewing the book in August but for now here is all you need to know:

About the Book:

On Quinnipeague, hearts open under the summer stars and secrets float in the Sweet Salt Air... 

Charlotte and Nicole were once the best of friends, spending summers together in Nicole's coastal island house off of Maine. But many years, and many secrets, have kept the women apart. A successful travel writer, single Charlotte lives on the road, while Nicole, a food blogger, keeps house in Philadelphia with her surgeon-husband, Julian. When Nicole is commissioned to write a book about island food, she invites her old friend Charlotte back to Quinnipeague, for a final summer, to help. Outgoing and passionate, Charlotte has a gift for talking to people and making friends, and Nicole could use her expertise for interviews with locals. Missing a genuine connection, Charlotte agrees. 

But what both women don't know is that they are each holding something back that may change their lives forever. For Nicole, what comes to light could destroy her marriage, but it could also save her husband. For Charlotte, the truth could cost her Nicole’s friendship, but could also free her to love again. And her chance may lie with a reclusive local man, with a heart to soothe and troubles of his own.

About the Author:

BARBARA DELINSKY is a New York Times bestselling author with more than thirty million copies of her books in print. She has been published in twenty-eight languages worldwide. A lifelong New Englander, Delinsky earned a B.A. in psychology at Tufts University and an M.A. in sociology at Boston College. Delinsky enjoys knitting, photography, and cats. She lives in Needham, Massachusetts.


You can purchase Sweet Salt Air on Amazon.com

You can read an excerpt of Sweet Salt Air

Be sure to come back on August 27th and see what my thoughts are on Sweet Salt Air!

How do you win? It's easy! Just hop on the Rafflecopter. Good luck everyone!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Disclosure: I received a free copy of Sweet Salt Air from St. Martin's Press for my honest review. That review will appear on 8/27/13. I received no compensation for posting this giveaway.

Astor Place Vintage by Stephanie Lehmann - Book Reveiw

I received a free copy of Astor Place Vintage from the publisher for my honest review.

About the Book:

Amanda Rosenbloom, proprietor of Astor Place Vintage, thinks she’son just another call to appraise and possibly purchase clothing from a wealthy, elderly woman. But after discovering a journal sewn into a fur muff, Amanda gets much more than she anticipated. The pages of the journal reveal the life of Olive Westcott, a young woman who had moved to Manhattan in 1907. Olive was set on pursuing a career as a department store buyer in an era when Victorian ideas, limiting a woman’s sphere to marriage and motherhood, were only beginning to give way to modern ways of thinking. As Amanda reads the journal, her life begins to unravel until she can no longer ignore this voice from the past. Despite being separated by one hundred years, Amanda finds she’s connected to Olive in ways neither could ever have imagined.

About the Author:

Stephanie Lehmann received her BA at UC 
Berkeley and a MA in English from New York University. She has taught novel writing at Mediabistro and online at Salon.com, where her essays have been published. She currently lives in New York City. Visit her online at StephanieLehmann.com and AstorPlaceVintage.com.

My Opinion:

This novel takes place in two different time periods and truly has three protagonists; Amanda, the owner of a vintage clothing store in the present day, Olive, a young woman just recently moved to the city with her father  and the city itself - New York. The book would not be nearly as compelling without the history of Manhattan woven into the lives of the women who love it so.

Olive experiences the ups of being a young lady living in the city for the first time as she believes she can pursue a career but soon learns that life for a woman of her time is harsh.  Amanda, while believing herself independent lives under a cloud of bad decisions and an inability to move forward in her life.  New York continues to change, grow and yet somehow stay the same exciting, vibrant city that so many flock to in search of their dreams.

I enjoyed the circular nature of the book as Amanda goes through some vintage clothes offered for sale and discovers Olive's diary and the story moves back and forth between the lives of the two women. Both were very engaging characters but I found Olive to be the more likable. She really pulled up her bootstraps and just did what needed doing!

It was a perfect beach read for the upcoming summer or a book just to be enjoyed for the fun it provides.

Rating:

4

You can purchase Astor Place Vintage on Amazon.com

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of Astor Place Vintage from the publisher for my honest review. I received no compensation for this post.

Once Upon a Gypsy Moon by Michael Hurley - Book Review

I received a free copy of Once Upon a Gypsy Moon for my honest review from Hachette Book Group.

About the Book:

Michael Hurley watched his world unravel in the wake of infidelity, divorce and failure. In August 2009, he was short of money, out of a job, and seeking to salvage a life that had foundered. Deeply in need of perspective, he took to the open seas in a 32-foot sailboat, Gypsy Moon. The story of his 2-year outward odyssey, deterred by rough weather and mechanical troubles, combines keen observation, poignant thoughts, and deeper introspection with glorious prose. 

Once Upon a Gypsy Moon also presents a rare and much-needed point of view on the familiar spiritual-journey narrative. It offers a star-crossed love story wrapped inside a rollicking good sea tale, but it also has something important to say to the reader about relationships, faith and disbelief, life and death, love and marriage, and what really matters.

About the Author:

A lifelong outdoor enthusiast, Michael Hurley has practiced law since 1984. He is the author of Letters from the Woodsand several essays about "slices of life." He lives in Raleigh, North Carolina with his wife Susan and three dogs. Together they have four children.

My Opinion:

This memoir relates the tale of man running off on a dream - a dream I know my own husband had - to sail off and explore. The reason the book appealed to me was because I listened to my husband wax poetic about said sailing off for the first half of our marriage. We had an ocean going sailboat but when he finally realized that my seasickness was not a dream we pursued land based ways of sailing off - and we did.  Fortunately for me, my husband did not decide to sleep with another woman as Mr. Hurley did.

Their is a romanticism to the sea that many people find engaging; they love watching her, they love sailing upon her but she is not an easy mistress. Trust me, I know. Mr. Hurley spares nothing in his book as he shares his life before his affair (this is a minimal part of the book as the focus is the sailing adventure) and then his sailing off on his boat, the Gypsy Moon.

The stories are fine - I enjoyed them. My problem was the writing style. Perhaps Mr. Hurley was attempting to be "old style" in presenting his tale of finding his white whale, I don't know, but it was just too florid? Stylized? Overdone? It was just too much!

The memoir could have been told with fewer words and better. I found myself putting it down and reading another book in between; something I rarely do. I just couldn't handle to much of this book at one time.

Rating:
3

You can purchase Once Upon a Gypsy Moon from Amazon.com

Disclosure:  I received a free copy of Once Upon a Gypsy Moon for my honest review from Hachette Book Group.  I received no compensation for this post.