Back Porchervations

Friday, May 6, 2016

Friday Bookish Post - 6 May 2016

Thanks to Freda from "Freda's Voice" and Gilion at "Rose City Reader" for hosting these bookish link-up! Click one of the buttons to go to the link-up page.

This captivating, breakout novel—told in alternating viewpoints—brings readers from the skies of World War II to the present day, where a woman is prepared to tell her secrets at last.

Estranged from her family since just after World War II, Mary Browning has spent her entire adult life hiding from her past. Now eighty-seven years old and a widow, she is still haunted by secrets and fading memories of the family she left behind. Her one outlet is the writing group she’s presided over for a decade, though she’s never written a word herself. When a new member walks in—a fifteen-year-old girl who reminds her so much of her beloved sister Sarah—Mary is certain fate delivered Elyse Strickler to her for a reason.

Mary hires the serious-eyed teenager to type her story about a daring female pilot who, during World War II, left home for the sky and gambled everything for her dreams—including her own identity.

As they begin to unravel the web of Mary’s past, Mary and Elyse form an unlikely friendship. Together they discover it’s never too late for second chances and that sometimes forgiveness is all it takes for life to take flight in the most unexpected ways.

BOOK BEGINNINGS

"It was my eighty-seventh birthday when my sister Sarah walked into the meeting room of the Carnegie Library. Somehow she was still a young girl of about fifteen, with pale blond hair in a single braid down her back, just as she'd been when she scrambled up the climbing tree in the backyard and tossed apples to me on the ground down below. Of course, I knew it couldn't actually be my sister. Perhaps the Sarah-sighting was yet another side effect of again. After all, the older I've become, the more everyone I come across reminds me of someone I once loved. I had no inkling that the girl with the braid might change everything."

FRIDAY 56

"Who's the blond cartoon character?" I asked, pointing to the patch sewn onto the shoulder - of a little gremlin girl with the blue wings and big, red boots.

"Fifinella, the patron saint of the fly girls. And she's not blond, my dear; that's her golden helmet. Go ahead, try it on," she added, holding out the jacket.

I hesitated for just a second and then allowed her to slip it over my shoulders. I pushed my arms into the sleeves. The jacket fit perfectly."

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Thanks to Billy B at the "Coffee Addicted Writer" and Ramona at "Create With Joy" for hosting these link-ups! Click on the buttons above to go to their blogs.

BOOK BLOGGER HOP

Thanks to Elizabeth at Silver's Reviews for this question of the week:

Why did you start your blog?

Shortly after my daughter was born in 2003, I found a site online called "Maya's Mom". It was a hang-out for moms of all ages, with kids of all ages. It was a special place, and I made a lot of internet friends. A couple of years down the road, Maya's Mom was sold to "BabyCenter". Aside from the change in focus away from including older children, the place did not have the same spirit. So, the time I had put into schmoozing there had to go somewhere. So I started a blog. At first it was a mommy blog. Now I mostly review/promote books.

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Also sharing with:

Thanks to Ramona at Create With Joy and Janice at Mostly Blogging for these fun link-ups! Click on the button to visit the sites to join in! The more the merrier...really! :O)

The Railwayman's Wife by Ashley Hay - #review

Amidst the strange, silent aftermath of World War II, a widow, a poet, and a doctor search for lasting peace and fresh beginnings in this internationally acclaimed, award-winning novel.

When Anikka Lachlan’s husband, Mac, is killed in a railway accident, she is offered—and accepts—a job at the Railway Institute’s library and searches there for some solace in her unexpectedly new life. But in Thirroul, in 1948, she’s not the only person trying to chase dreams through books. There’s Roy McKinnon, who found poetry in the mess of war, but who has now lost his words and his hope. There’s Frank Draper, trapped by the guilt of those his medical treatment and care failed on their first day of freedom. All three struggle to find their own peace, and their own new story.

But along with the firming of this triangle of friendship and a sense of lives inching towards renewal come other extremities—and misunderstandings. In the end, love and freedom can have unexpected ways of expressing themselves.

The Railwayman’s Wife explores the power of beginnings and endings, and how hard it can sometimes be to tell them apart. Most of all, it celebrates love in all its forms, and the beauty of discovering that loving someone can be as extraordinary as being loved yourself.

#IWSG - #WithGritandGrace - May 2016

The Insecure Writers' Support Group is the brainchild of writer Alex J. Cavanaugh and in the fall of this year, they will have been around for 5 years! WOW! If you click on that link up there, you will go to the dedicated site, where you can find out more about the group and see if it is something for you! You can find a lot of writers who are also "Insecure and Proud!"

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It's been so long since I wrote anything on my WIP, "All Gallow's Eve", that I don't even remember the story line I had worked out. I don't even have Scrivener on the computer right now, because it's been lost in one or the other reformats. (Hubs is a computer whiz, though, so if it can be retrieved, he will get at it.)

My question is: Should I try to find and rework what I had or just start over?

On the one hand, if I wait until I find things, I may lose writing time (assuming, of course, that I actually spend time writing) that I could be doing right now. Or should I just start with the title again, re-outline the entire story, begin to write again, and if/when the old programs and files show up, piece those in as necessary?

Does that even make sense? *lol*

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This is my first time participating in this linkup. Click on the button up there to go to a page where there are links to lots of other bloggers participating. You can even sign up for the link-up yourself.

PERSONAL

go to the dentist (I've been putting this off because I have dentistophobia bag.)

MARRIAGE

celebrate our 19th anniversary on the 9th!

FAMILY

trim the number of furry family members by at least 5.

SPIRITUAL

choose one of the nearby churches to attend

PROFESSIONAL

learn to start a virtual book tour company/site.

WRITING

dedicate some time to writing each day and stick to it at least 4 days out of every 7.

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So, are you insecure and proud too?

What are your goals for the month of May?

A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles by Mary Elizabeth Williams - #review

A wry, witty account of what it is like to face death—and be restored to life.

After being diagnosed in her early 40s with metastatic melanoma—a “rapidly fatal” form of cancer—journalist and mother of two Mary Elizabeth Williams finds herself in a race against the clock. She takes a once-in-a-lifetime chance and joins a clinical trial for immunotherapy, a revolutionary drug regimen that trains the body to vanquish malignant cells. Astonishingly, her cancer disappears entirely in just a few weeks. But at the same time, her best friend embarks on a cancer journey of her own—with very different results. Williams’s experiences as a patient and a medical test subject reveal with stark honesty what it takes to weather disease, the extraordinary new developments that are rewriting the rules of science—and the healing power of human connection.

Someone at Professor Laura Murphy’s college appears to be playing a joke on her by planting sexually explicit stories in her research results, but the joke turns deadly when one story details the recent stabbing murder of a coed. Laura’s close friend, Detective Derrick Pasquis from the local police, asks for her help in interviewing the prickly suspects who resist intervention from outside the campus community. Eager to search out clues, Laura ignores warning signs that playing amateur sleuth may jeopardize her newly developing romance with Guy. And of course her usual intrusive manner puts her at odds with everyone on campus—colleagues, the college administration, the head of campus security and fraternity members. Is there no one Laura can’t offend in her eagerness to find the truth? The closer she gets to solving the crime, the more it appears that the past—the coed’s, that of a prominent faculty member and Laura’s own—is the key to the murder. Caught in an early winter blizzard, Laura must choose between wandering the mountains and freezing to death or taking her chances with a killer clever enough to make murder look like the work of an innocent student.

Between the Boards - Bloggers Over 50

Many thanks to Katerine from Katherine's Corner blog for coming up with this series. I didn't grow up with the Internet, like kids do today. But I've been on it since the days of 286 processing speed and amber or green colored text on a black background. No pictures. No videos. No Facebook time suck.

On the other hand, the Internet is responsible for me being where I am today. I met my husband online during the Internet Stone Age in an RPG (role-playing game). My character was a vampire and his was a shaman. That was in 1993. We met face to face for the first time in March of 1995. And six days from now we will have our 19th anniversary. And we have three children, all of whom know more about computers than I do.

If you notice #3 above, that's me! :O) You can click on the "Between the Lines" banner above and go to Katherine's Corner to see a little bit about each of the bloggers behind the blogs listed above.

When I was little, I used to think about what age I would be in the year 2000...it was 38 for most of the year. That sounded so old!

Then, my father passed away when he was 47, during my senior year in high school. As I neared the age of 47, I thought a lot about the 'rest of my life', however long that might be. Now, I've been on the Earth seven years longer than my father. He would be 85 this year, if he had lived.

Back Porchervations started out as a 'mommy blog' in July of 2007. I did not post with any kind of regularity. Sometimes the gaps were months at a time.

But then, at the end of 2013 (cue the movie music), I 'discovered' reading challenges. Now, I hadn't read for pure pleasure for y.e.a.r.s. Most everything I read was either for a class at college, a job, or for one of the kids. I joined way too many reading challenges for my own sanity, and in 2014 I was off to the races.

Secondly, I discovered that sometimes, authors offered one of their books free or low-cost on Amazon and other online retail booksellers.

Last, but so very very far from least, there were things called 'virtual book tours', where you could sign up to review books on your blog and get a copy of the book to read. I've gotten so many print books, my husband had to build more bookshelves for me! And e-books? Oy! I'm surprised my Kindle hasn't had a stroke, and that's all I'm going to say about that!

Then there are sites like "NetGalley" and "Edelweiss" that offer books in exchange for reviews. Sometimes they are just available for the asking, and other times you have to wait to be approved.

Recently, I've begun looking at ways to 'monetize' my blog, joining some affiliate programs and the like. I'm probably average at Social Media, but you can find me on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Bloglovin', GoodReads, Instagram, Tumblr and probably a few others that escape me at the moment. The one thing that truly mystifies me about blogging and websites is SEO.

So, tell me a little about you!

Monday, May 2, 2016

Monday Bookish Post - May 2, 2016

Thanks to Tynga of Tynga's Reviews, Kathryn at Book Date, Ramona at Create With Joy and Janice at Mostly Blogging for hosting these respective link-ups! (Click on the buttons to go to the respective blogs.)

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STACKING THE SHELVES

Here are some of the books I got this past week:

Without a Doubt is reviewed on my blog today! Click on the cover to see the review.

Failure is Fatal will be review here on Wednesday, May 4th. Cover goes to GoodReads.

A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles: A True Story of Love, Science, and Cancer will be reviewed here on Wednesday, May 4th. The cover is linked to GoodReads.

The Secrets of Flight will be reviewed here on Tuesday, May 10th. This cover (and the following two) go to GoodReads.