Waiting on Wednesday - Game of Secrets; Dawn Tripp

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that we are eagerly anticipating! Want to participate? Post your own WOW entry on your blog, and leave your link at Breaking the Spine. Here's my pick for this week:

Game of Secrets; Dawn Tripp

July 5, 2011 - Random House

(Amazon Website)

"Game of Secrets is at once a beautiful, old-fashioned love story and a heart-stopping literary thriller, full to the brim with the most compelling characters you’ll meet this side of Charles Dickens and Jane Austen.  At the center of this gorgeously-written novel is Marne, just back from California to the remote corner of coastal New England where she was raised, and not at all ready to fall in love.  Until, that is, she does, with the son of the woman whose illicit romance with Marne’s bootlegging grandfather triggered a long-time family feud..... Game of Secrets is Dawn Tripp’s best novel to date, reminiscent of the fiction of Richard Russo and William Faulkner in the way it brings to life an entire community.  I came away from Game of Secrets amazed, delighted, and utterly persuaded that yes, you certainly can go home again, but you’d better do it with your eyes and heart open.  Earthy, funny, moving, and constantly surprising, Game of Secrets will take you to a whole new universe, one where all you can be truly sure of is the everlasting power of love.  It’s a masterwork." --Howard Frank Mosher, author of Walking to Gatlinburg

The Little Stranger; Sarah Waters

Title: The Little Stranger
Author: Sarah Waters
Publication Year: 2009
Publisher: Riverhead
Edition: eBook/Kindle
Source: Purchase
Date Completed: 4/4/2011
Setting: England
Rating: 4/5 stars
Recommend: yes

A crumbling old manor house in a small Warwickshire, England town is the setting for creepy, atmospheric story, which takes place just after World War II. The story is narrated by Doctor Faraday, who was familiar with the once grand, Hundred's Hall from his childhood days.  Now the Ayre family fortune has vanished, the family has been selling off parcels of land, and Hundreds Hall has fallen into a state of disrepair. The place is still inhabited by the elderly Mrs. Ayre, her son Roderick, a twenty-something, who was wounded during the war, and Caroline an older, plain-Jane, still unmarried, daughter. Once the place bustled with servants, which even included Doctor Faraday's own mother. Now Betty, a young girl in her teens, is the only servant that remains.

Doctor Faraday is called to Hundred's Hall to tend to Betty, the servant who is sick with some type of stomach ailment. It appears that she might just be homesick, but something is certainly upsetting her. Soon after he returns to the house and begins treating Roderick, from the physical and psychological aftereffects of war, using some sort of electrical therapy. Before long his return visits to the old manor are more frequent, and it is clear that Faraday's interest in Caroline have turned to thoughts of romance.

Little by little strange happenings at the crumbling mansion are becoming more frequent. The family dog, always gentle, attacks a young girl visiting, and the dog is later put to sleep. Then there is a suspicious fire, objects move by themselves, writing appears on walls, and Roderick psychological state worsens. There are more strange happenings, however I don't want to spoil the story for those of you who have not read this one yet.

The story starts off a bit slow, but I never lost interest. The author knows how to set the stage for maximum creep effect. The characters are well developed and strange in their own way. I really loved the fact that the "house", took on a major role of its own. I wasn't sure about the ending at first, but the more I thought about it, I felt satisfied. This Gothic gem is different from the two other Water's books that I read and enjoyed: Fingersmith, and Tipping the Velvet, but very good in it's own way. It's the perfect, atmospheric book to read of damp, rainy day. It would make a great book club discussion book as well.

Now You See Her; Joy Fielding (DNF)

 

Title: Now You See Her

Author: Joy Fielding

Publication Year: 2011

Publisher: Brillance Audio

Edition: audiobook

Reader: Justine Eyre (good)

Source: Library

Date Completed: DNF

Setting: Ireland; Canada

Rating: DNF

Recommend: No

Book Description from Amazon website - Fifty-year-old Marcy Taggart’s life is in shambles. Two years ago, her twenty-one-year-old daughter, Devon, perished in a canoeing accident. Her body was never found in the icy waters of Georgian Bay, and as a result Marcy has never fully accepted her death. She continues to see the young woman’s face in crowds and has even stopped strangers on the street, certain she has finally discovered her long lost daughter.

Now in Ireland, on what was originally intended to be a celebration of her twenty-fifth wedding anniversary—if, that is, her husband had not left her for another woman—Marcy yet again thinks she sees her daughter, casually strolling past her on the sidewalk. So begins Marcy’s desperate search to find Devon, to find herself, and to find the disturbing truth that might, in the end, be her only salvation.

While I enjoyed this authors earliest books, for me, listtening to this audio book felt like I was watching paint dry (no fault of the reader). Nothing happened in this book after listening to (3) cds, except for Marcy being dumped by her husband, and several times when she was sure she saw her daughter who was presumed dead.....but, then each time she would lose sight of her in a crowd of people before she could get a closer look. I could not finish this one: my first DNF for 2011.

Mailbox Monday ~ April 4th

Hosted in April at Passages To The Past

Here are the new books that arrive by mail last week:

 

Guilty Splurges

 

• They Knew Mr. Knight; Dorothy Whipple (Persephone)
• Miss Buncle's Book; D.E. Stevenson (Persephone)

• The Empty Family; Colm Toibin (paperbackswap)
• 22 Britannia Road; Amanda Hodgkinson (Viking)
• Alone With You; Marisa Silver (paperbackswap)

• The White Devil; Justin Ryans (May 2011 - Shelf Awareness)
• Imperfect Endings; Zoe Fitzgerald Carter (Simon and Schuster)
• Create Great iPhone Photos; Allan Hoffman (Amazon Vine)

World and Town; Gish Jen

Title: World and Town
Author: Gish Jen
Publication Year: 2010
Publisher: Knopf
Edition: ARC
Source: Amazon
Date Completed: 4/2/2011
Setting: Vermont
Rating: 4/5 stars
Recommend: yes

In World and Town, Gish Jen introduces us to Hattie Kong, a 68 year old retired Biology teacher who was born in China but came to America after the Communist takeover. Her father was a descendent of Confucius. After Hattie loses both her husband, and her best friend to cancer in a period of two years, she moves to the fictional Vermont town of Riverlake, where she lives in the mountains along with her three dogs. She has a small circle of walking friends, she paints, yet her days are still lonely. Her son Josh calls now and then to make sure all is well, but they rarely have very much to say to one another.

Before long an immigrant family from Cambodia, also trying to start a new and more peaceful life, move into town near Hattie.  The Chhung family is living in a trailer on church property. The family consists of a mother, father, teenage daughter and son and also an infant son here in Vermont. They also have two additional girls who were placed in foster homes prior to the family moving this area. While other members of the community struggle to sort out what their duty to the newcomers should be, Hattie has both the time and the willingness to assist this family in their transition to life in Vermont. Although the family is reluctant to let an outsider into their circle, Hattie takes to Sophy, the fifteen year old girl, who begins to open up and share with her the Chhung family's painful past. When another neighbor, Ginny introduces Sophy to an extremist church,  Sophy becomes obsessed with the its teachings and she begins to cool her relationship with Hattie, who is opposed to their preachings.

Just as the Chhungs arrival to the area had changed Hattie's life, so had the arrival of a former lover from her youth, Carter Hatch. He, like Hattie and the Chhungs moved to the area to start a new life. Carter and Hattie worked together, had a relationship and married other people. Now Carter is retired, a former neuroscientist is back in the picture in an on again, off again sort of way. For me, this was the least satisfying part an otherwise terrific novel.

Gish Jen is a new author for me, but I thought that she did a great job with this novel. The writing had me invested in the story early on, but there is certainly more darkness in this story than I expected.  The characters are fully fleshed out, so that I felt like some of the many characters, could be people found in most any town in America these days. This immigrant story paints mostly painful portrait of life, yet I was happy I read the book.

Saturday Snapshot - April 2nd

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Alyce of At Home With Books .  If you are interested in participating, just post a photo (new or old), but make sure it's not one that you found online. Add your link to Alyce's Saturday post for all to enjoy.

(3/29/2011)

Freckles (the one in the tub) meows constantly until my husband runs the faucet or tub for him. Lily, watches from the sidelines generally, wondering why he enjoys getting his face wet so much.

April Book Giveaway ~ Such a Pretty Face; Cathy Lamb

In anticipation of Cathy Lamb's 2011 release, The First Day of the Rest of My Life, (July 26, 2011 - Kensington Books), I decided to give away a nearly new trade size softcover of her 2010 book, Such a Pretty Face.  I adored this book. You can read my review HERE.

If you haven't read anything by Cathy Lamb, you are in for a treat.

• To Enter - Just leave a comment with an email address in case you win.
• US or International shipping is available
• Winner will be selected on Sunday - April 17th
• Good Luck to all who enter!