11 September 2014

The Amish Baking Cookbook by Georgia Varozza & Kathleen Kerr Review!

Book Details

  • Spiral-bound: 272 pages
  • Publisher: Harvest House Publishers; Spi edition (September 1, 2014)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0736955380
  • ISBN-13: 978-0736955386

Building on the success of The Homestyle Amish Kitchen (more than 58,000 copies sold), Georgia Varozza partners with experienced baker Kathleen Kerr to give you a cookbook filled with the foods most associated with the Plain and simple life: baked goods. This delicious collection of more than three hundred classic baking recipes for cookies, cakes, pies, bars, and breads inspires you who love Amish fiction and are drawn to the Plain lifestyle to roll up your sleeves and start baking!

Whether you consider yourself a novice or a veteran in the kitchen, Georgia and Kathleen make it easy to make delicious baking recipes such as Amish Nut Balls and Brown Sugar Pie. Find the perfect recipe to prepare for that large weekend potluck, tonight's intimate family dinner, or a fun activity with the kids.


My Thoughts

I love to bake, cookies, cakes and bread. I received a Kitchen Aid for Christmas from hubby and he says that after 32 years of marriage that this the best gift he has ever gotten for me. I have to agree. Years ago I learned how to make bread from our 84 year old landlady, I was recently married and I so wanted to learn how to make pie crust and home made bread. I did learn and was pretty successful at both, but raising a family and working full time pretty much put a halt to my skills, and now that I am retired I love that I have the time to bake again. I have been baking homemade bread since I received the mixer and I am always looking for new recipes. We all love it when I make bread and they turn out, as you have to have the knack for it. I have to say that a fresh loaf of bread does not last long, I am always being asked "is it cool enough to cut?"

When I saw that The Amish Baking Cookbook was available I requested it right away. I love the simplicity of the recipes and the abundance of selections of the different bake goods. I have used quite a few of the recipes and this book is my go to cookbook now and with winter on it's way, what is better than a pot of home made soup or chili and a fresh warm loaf of bread to go with it. Plus any one of the deserts to follow up a great meal. 

I highly recommend this cookbook for the person who loves home made baked items.

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley and was not monetarily compensated for said review.

The Healing Power of Tea by Caroline Dow Review!



Book Details

  • Paperback: 264 pages
  • Publisher: Llewellyn Publications (November 8, 2014)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0738740330
  • ISBN-13: 978-0738740331

For centuries, tea has been used for healing and improved wellness, and now you can learn to rejuvenate your health with The Healing Power of Tea. Whether a new or expert tea drinker, Caroline Dow provides you with "tea-rrific" knowledge, including detailed explanations of different tea types and their advantages, as well as a list of ailments and what blends will alleviate them.

From black to green to oolong, enjoy many aspects of tea and tea culture. Discover the delicious ways tea will improve your life with extensive recipes and an easy-to-use reference guide. From the history of tea to growing a tea garden, this comprehensive book takes you on a fascinating journey into the world of teas and tisanes.



About the Author

Caroline Dow (Boulder, CO) has been a tea-leaf reader and herbalist for thirty years, and conducts popular workshops on tea-leaf reading all over the country. She is the author of fourteen books under various pen names, and is the owner and manager of a successful herbal mail order company. She also holds a Ph.D. in Luso-Brazilian Studies and received a Fulbright Dissertation Research Fellowship to Brazil. Her book Magic from Brazil: Recipes, Spells, and Rituals (Llewellyn, September 2001) chronicles those experiences. She has lived in Mexico, Brazil, England, Scotland, Wales, Portugal, Spain, and Italy, speaks five languages, and has studied esoteric traditions in those lands.

My Thoughts

I am a tea lover as is everyone else in my family, actually we are tea and coffee snobs, meaning that we just don't drink the Lipton or Folger's. We have to have teas that are strong, robust in flavor and good either iced or hot. My daughter and I have recently found black and green matcha teas. So delicious as an iced drink mixed with vanilla or plain soymilk over ice. I will soon be trying the matcha as a hot drink as our weather here in Northern Wisconsin is getting colder.

I digress though, when I saw this book I had to take a look. I think most everyone that drinks tea knows the benefits arrived from this delectable plant. The Healing Power of tea takes the reader through anything you ever wanted to know about tea, the kinds and the benefits of each tea such as black tea, green tea, white tea and much more. There is a section on what type of tea can help in certain ailments from A-Z. Wow, I never knew that these teas helped for so many types of ailments. In this book you can also learn the proper way to brew tea and also where to get these teas, there is also a chapter that deals with herbal and the types of herbs to use for in what teas.

I found this book to be an amazing source of information. The Healing Powers of Tea is not released until November and if I were you and you love tea or want to get that special someone an awesome book for Christmas...this is the one. I highly recommend it.

I received a copy of this book from Netgalley for review and was not monetarily compensated for my review..

Dark Aemilia by Sally O'Reilly Virtual Book Tour Review!


Title: Dark Aemilia: A Novel of Shakespeare’s Dark Lady
Author:
 Sally O'Reilly
Publisher: Picador (Macmillan)
Release Date: May 27, 2014
Acquired Via: Historical Fiction Blog Tours

Publication Date: May 27, 2014
Picador/Macmillan
Formats: eBook, Hardcover
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A TALE OF SORCERY AND PASSION IN SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY LONDON—WHERE WITCHES HAUNT WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE AND HIS DARK LADY, THE PLAYWRIGHT’S MUSE AND ONE TRUE LOVE.

The daughter of a Venetian musician, Aemilia Bassano came of age in Queen Elizabeth’s royal court. The Queen’s favorite, she develops a love of poetry and learning, maturing into a young woman known not only for her beauty but also her sharp mind and quick tongue. Aemilia becomes the mistress of Lord Hunsdon, but her position is precarious. Then she crosses paths with an impetuous playwright named William Shakespeare and begins an impassioned but ill-fated affair.
A decade later, the Queen is dead, and Aemilia Bassano is now Aemilia Lanyer, fallen from favor and married to a fool. Like the rest of London, she fears the plague. And when her young son Henry takes ill, Aemilia resolves to do anything to save him, even if it means seeking help from her estranged lover, Will—or worse, making a pact with the Devil himself.
In rich, vivid detail, Sally O’Reilly breathes life into England’s first female poet, a mysterious woman nearly forgotten by history. Full of passion and devilish schemes, Dark Aemilia is a tale worthy of the Bard.


Selected by O, The Oprah Magazine as one of 17 Books You Won’t Be Able To Put Down!

Praise for Dark Aemilia: A Novel of Shakespeare’s Dark Lady

“A gripping novel that gives feisty feminist voice to the unknown woman who inspired Shakespeare’s sonnets… O’Reilly brings her star-crossed lovers together and drives them apart through plot twists that are, for once, credible outgrowths of the characters’ personalities and beliefs, finally giving them a tender, heartbreaking parting. First-rate historical fiction: marvelously atmospheric and emotionally engaging.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred)

“[Dark Aemilia] mesmerizes with its descriptions of the Bard’s London…O’Reilly casts her story with witches, doomed royals, evil courtiers, and star-crossed lovers, as if it were a Jacobean play. But her finest accomplishment is not the tribute she pays to these historical figures, but the bold imagination she displays in bringing them together.”—Publishers Weekly

“With elegant style, masterly wordplay, and an eye for historical detail, O’Reilly beautifully relates a passionate and tragic love story, worthy of two such well-known figures. With Shakespeare’s 450th birthday approaching this April, fans of historical fiction writers such as Philippa Gregory, Anne Easter Smith, and Tracy Chevalier won’t want to miss this one.” —Library Journal

“O’Reilly’s American debut is an imaginative take on the life of poet Aemilia Layner, a contemporary of William Shakespeare…. This is a lively, vividly rendered novel about the dramatic life of an extraordinary woman.”—Booklist

“Seductive, sharp-witted lady-in-waiting Aemilia Bassano, who later becomes known as England’s first published female poet, falls into a love affair with the Bard himself, loses favor with the court, and resorts to black magic and sorcery to save her child in this textured work of historical fiction.”—O, The Oprah Magazine

“I just finished this, and I’m jumping at this opportunity to recommend it to book lovers far and wide… Dark Aemilia is a must-read for all lovers of Shakespeare and old England, and while it is written from the perspective of a woman, I am confident men will enjoy it, too. I am usually careful with my books, but this one quickly became a victim of dog ears and pencil-marks, because O’Reilly touches on so many crucial historical moments and writes with such intelligent elegance.” —Anne Fortier, BookPage

“We all know Shakespeare wrote love sonnets. Now, O’Reilly’s new novel brings us the Bard’s sonnet-writing lover and sonnet-inspiring muse.”—The New York Post

“Draped in the lure of magic and fantasy that weaved its way through many of Shakespeare’s plays, Dark Aemilia lives and breathes the late 16th century ….O’Reilly’s debut novel is a sweeping success, a tale full of action and intrigue and as deep as any ocean. Live vicariously through the eyes of one of the first proto-feminists to have lived. See as the author steps into her head and creates a world that is more realistic than the one outside your window. Let this book redefine the way you see love.”—Bookreporter

Buy the Book

About the Author

Sally O’Reilly has received numerous citations for her fiction, which has been shortlisted for the Ian St James Short Story Prize and the Cosmopolitan Short Story Award. A former Cosmopolitan New Journalist of the Year, her work has appeared in The Guardian, The Sunday Times, the Evening Standard, and the New Scientist. She teaches creative writing at the Open University and the University of Portsmouth in England. Dark Aemilia is her U.S. debut.
For information and news please visit Sally O’Reilly’s website and the Dark Aemilia Facebook Page.

My Thoughts
Aemilia Bassano ( later known as Lanyer) was the first English lady who wrote and published poetry, which was no easy feat for a woman in Queen Elizabeth I's time. She was the mistress for a time of Henry Carey, 1st Baron Hunsdon, cousin of the queen, until she became pregnant supposedly not Hunsdon's, Hunsdon paid her dowry and bought her a house so she was married to Alfonso Lanyer. In this novel, Aemilia and William Shakespeare have an affair that results in her pregnancy of her son Henry, whether this is true or not has not been proven. 

This is a novel that has well known figures from history, William Shakespeare, Astrologer Simon Forman, Moll Cutpurse, King James I who succeeds Queen Elizabeth after her death, events such as the Gunpowder Plot and the building or the Globe Theater being burned to the ground and rebuilt and of course the Plague or Black Death. 

This novel is well researched by the author and written very poetically with a lot of quotes from Aemilia Bassano and William Shakespeare themselves. At times I had to go back and reread some entries as I was never one much for poetry. That aside I did truly love this novel and everything about it. There was a bit of supernatural and witchcraft woven throughout the story as well. Of course there was always a lot of superstition in the medieval era so the addition of this doesn't surprise me. I think that if you love historical fiction and William Shakespeare you will enjoy this novel about a little known woman( at least to me) who was ahead of her time. I highly recommend it.

Dark Aemilia Blog Tour Schedule
Monday, August 18
Review at The Bookworm
Tuesday, August 19
Review & Giveaway at Unshelfish
Spotlight & Giveaway at So Many Precious Books, So Little Time
Wednesday, August 20
Guest Post at Bibliophilia, Please
Thursday, August 21
Spotlight at Princess of Eboli
Monday, August 25
Review at The Mad Reviewer
Review & Giveaway at Curling Up By the Fire
Tuesday, August 26
Review & Giveaway at Poof Books
Thursday, August 28
Review at Ageless Pages Reviews
Sunday, August 31
Review at Carole’s Ramblings
Monday, September 1
Review at Book Drunkard
Giveaway at Carole’s Ramblings
Tuesday, September 2
Guest Post & Giveaway at Passages to the Past
Wednesday, September 3
Review & Giveaway at Bibliophilia, Please
Friday, September 5
Review at Awesome Book Assessment
Tuesday, September 9
Review at Just One More Chapter
Wednesday, September 10
Guest Post at Just One More Chapter
Thursday, September 11
Review at CelticLady’s Reviews
Tuesday, September 16
Review & Giveaway at Bookish
Wednesday, September 17
Review & Giveaway at Casual Readers
Friday, September 19
Review & Giveaway at Book Nerd
Monday, September 22
Review at A Book Geek
Tuesday, September 23
Review & Giveaway at Beth’s Book Reviews
Wednesday, September 24
Review & Giveaway at Peeking Between the Pages
Friday, September 26
Review at A Chick Who Reads
Sunday, September 28
Review at WTF Are You Reading?
Monday, September 29
Review at 100 Pages a Day – Stephanie’s Book Reviews
Review & Giveaway at Book Dilettante

Damascena by Holly Lynn Payne book Spotlight!



Info:Skywriter Books
Fiction-Literary, Historical
ISBN (paperback) 978-0-9822797-4-8
Publication date:   June 1, 2014
348 pages | 88,000 words


Summary

Holly Payne's spellbinding tale brings the unparalleled poet, Mevlana Rumi, to life, and transports readers to the enchanting world of 13th century Persia. Simply but elegantly told, the story unravels the mystery surrounding a legendary orphaned girl, who discovers her gift of turning roses into oil. Named after the flowering rosa damascena, the girl reluctantly assumes the role of a living saint for the miracles she performs-longing for the only one that matters: finding her mother. Deeply wounded by the separation since birth, Damascena undergoes a riveting transformation when she meets Rumi and finally discovers the secret of the rose.    Imbued with rich historical research and inspired by the devastating disappearance of Rumi's most lauded spiritual companion, Shams of Tabriz, Holly Payne has courageously opened herself to receive Rumi's teachings and offer a timeless love story. 


AUTHOR BIO:
Holly Lynn Payne is an internationally published novelist in ten countries whose work has been translated into eight languages. Dutton/Plume published her first two novels, The Sound of Blue andThe Virgin’s Knot, her debut novel, selected as a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers and Border’s Original Voices book. Her third book, Kingdom of Simplicity, won the Benjamin Franklin Award, a Marin Arts Council Grant, Grand Prize for the Writers Digest Self-Published Book Awards and was nominated for a National Book Award in Belgium. It was published in Taiwan, China and the Netherlands.  A native of Pennsylvania, Payne graduated from University of Richmond with a degree in journalism and earned a MFA from University of Southern California. She has taught throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, serving on the faculty at California College of the Arts and Stanford.  She lives in Northern California with her young daughter and serves the literary community as a writing coach, editor and volunteer producer for Litquake. 


Damascena is a stunner. Holly Payne takes us into the yearning at the heart of the mystic’s search. 
She turns the Sufi quest for connection with God into a human drama that is both moving and soaring.”
 
Tamim Ansary, author of Games without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of AfghanistanHolly Payne has deftly captured the magic, beauty, and ecstatic energy of the Sufi's ancient sema dance with her story about a girl, Damascena, whose 
life transcends her own world, and ours. The prose transports the reader creating astonishing characters and at times, a thriller-like the plot, carrying 
us into a world that is part hallucination and part real as Payne weaves in themes of loss, beauty, devotion, evil, struggle, magic, and, ultimately, love. “
David Ewing Duncan, best-selling author of Experimental Man: What one man's body reveals about his future, your health, and our toxic world
“Holly Payne's latest novel touches Jelaluddin Rumi's essential beauty within the fragrance of 13th century Turkey and the rich tapestry of his life as a 
mystic, poet and honored scholar. Payne exposes the very human challenges Rumi encountered as he grew into one of the greatest poets of all time.”
Murshida Mariam Baker, author of Woman as Divine: Tales of the Goddess senior teacher, Sufi Ruhaniat International and the Mevlevi Order of America
This is one of the most gorgeous novels I've ever read. Payne’s research was so thorough. It makes me want to learn more about the dervishes, their religious 
practices, and about Rumi and his achingly beautiful poetry. The themes of forgiveness, spirituality and all the different forms of love resonated with me on every page.”
Laura Marquez, Emmy Winner and former ABC News Correspondent

London Calling by James Craig Spotlight!

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Title: London Calling
Genre: Police Procedural/Adult
Series: Inspector Carlyle Mystery
Author: James Craig
Publish Date: Sept 9, 2014
Publisher:  HarperCollins   



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Synopsis:
Edgar Carlton is rich, handsome, and in line to be the next Prime Minister. But his rise to the top takes a steep turn downwards when somebody begins murdering alumni of the 1984 Merrion Club, an exclusive Cambridge University society to which he belongs. Bullheaded Inspector Carlyle is tasked with handling this delicate case and, to discover the killer, he must question all the members of the 1984 Merrion Club. But finding the truth proves difficult when this group of powerful men is so determined to let events of the past remain in the dark…

Goodreads

Buy the Book

                                         Amazon | Barnes and Noble | iBooks | HarperCollins

About the Author

JAMES CRAIG has worked in London as a journalist and as a consultant for almost thirty years. He lives in Covent Garden with his wife and daughter.

Connect with the Author

Website and Twitter 




10 September 2014

Triden'ts First Gleaming by Stephen Templin Book Spotlight!




Trident’s First Gleaming Synopsis

Former SEAL Chris Paladin leaves SEAL Team Six to become a pastor, but CIA spook Hannah Andrade pulls him back into Special Operations Group, the ultra-secret unit that SEAL Team Six operators and others served under to eliminate bin Laden. Chris and Hannah are joined by Delta Force’s Sonny Cohen to stop a new terrorist threat from launching a deadly cyber-terror against the United States.

PRAISE FOR STEVE'S BOOKS:

“As action packed as a Tom Clancy thriller…harrowing…adrenaline-laced.”
Michiko KakutaniThe New York Times

“Pulses with the grit of a Jerry Bruckheimer production…”
Stephen LowmanThe Washington Post

Praise for Trident’s Last Gleaming
Another great novel reflecting our Spec Ops forces’ global capabilities. Written by a proven and insightful master storyteller.”
Howard E. Wasdin, SEAL Team Six Sniper and NYT Bestselling Author of SEAL Team Six: Memoirs of an Elite Navy SEAL Sniper

“Stephen Templin’s Trident’s First Gleaming is a muscular thrill ride that’s rich with detail and full of heart and energy. A stand out in the ranks of modern action-adventure thrillers, Trident’s First Gleaming is a blast.”
Mark Greaney, #1 NYT Bestselling Coauthor of Command Authority, by Tom Clancy with Mark Greaney.

“There are few authors who have as deep an understanding of the shadowy world of global special operations as Stephen Templin. And there are fewer still who can synthesize that knowledge into a thrilling narrative so deftly. In Trident’s First Gleaming, Stephen weaves a tale that reflects today’s complicated reality, where motives and allegiances are rarely black and white and there are no easy answers. Even more impressively, he manages to do this while still bringing plenty of visceral gunfights and car chases.”
Chris Martin, Bestselling Author of Beyond Neptune Spear and Shaping the World from the Shadows

For release on September 9, 2014

About Stephen

STEPHEN TEMPLIN completed Hell Week, qualified as a pistol and rifle expert, and blew up things during Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training. After the Navy, he volunteered as a missionary and attended college. Then he lectured as a tenured university professor in Japan for fourteen years, where he also practiced the martial art aikido. Currently, he lives in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Connect With Stephen


Pre-order the Book

09 September 2014

Change of Season Giveaway!


I just love fall, the changing and falling leaves, the fresh crisp smell in the air, going for rides in our Corvette just looking at the colors. I also love giveaways and I cam across this one today. As I was entering the giveaway I came across some very interesting blogs and websites on Pinterest, Etsy etc. I do intend to go back and visit more of them and you should too!! In the meantime go and enter this great giveaway! I just love the picture above, don't you??? 


Entering is easy, log into the entry form using your email address or facebook and click on the first entry on the rafflecopter form. Then read the terms and conditions and write yes. Follow Katherines Corner and the blog Partners and enter as many bonus entries as you would like. Open to all over 18. Giveaway starts today and ends September 30th.

To enter follow this link: http://katherinescorner.com/2014/09/05/change-season-giveaway/

Unexpected Gifts by S.R.Mallery Virtual Book Tour Review!



Publication Date: April 16, 2013
Mockingbird Lane Press
Formats: eBook, Paperback
Genre: Historical Fiction
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Can we learn from our ancestral past? Do our relatives’ behaviors help mold our own? In “Unexpected Gifts,” that is precisely what happens to Sonia, a confused college student, heading for addictions and forever choosing the wrong man. Searching for answers, she begins to read her family’s diaries and journals from America’s past: the Vietnam War, Woodstock, and Timothy Leary era; Tupperware parties, McCarthyism, and Black Power; the Great Depression, dance marathons, and Eleanor Roosevelt; the immigrant experience and the Suffragists. Back and forth the book journeys, linking yesteryear with modern life until finally, by understanding her ancestors’ hardships and faults, she gains enough clarity to make some right choices.

Watch the Book Trailer


Praise for Unexpected Gifts

“S.R. Mallery has caught the defining moments in the lives of one working class, upward striving family, as each one of them benefits from and contributes to the growth and setbacks of America itself…A rich and involving book, the author has written a gem. –Dorothy Salisbury Davis, A Gentle Murderer, Lullaby of Murder, The Pale Betrayer, etc.
“S.R. Mallery, with her strong sense of history and deft narrative skills, shows us one American family’s fascinating journey through flashpoints of American history, as a modern day young woman discovers the spirited narratives of her forbears, and is inspired to take charge of her own life…. an impressive, wonderfully thought out and well-told first novel.” –Carla Davidson, former Senior Editor at American Heritage Magazine.

Buy the Book

About the Author

S.R. Mallery has worn various hats in her life.
First, a classical/pop singer/composer, she moved on to the professional world of production art and calligraphy. Next came a long career as an award winning quilt artist/teacher and an ESL/Reading instructor. Her short stories have been published in descant 2008, Snowy Egret, Transcendent Visions, The Storyteller, and Down In the Dirt.
“Unexpected Gifts”, her debut novel, is currently available on Amazon. “Sewing Can Be Dangerous and Other Small Threads”, her collection of short stories, Jan. 2014, both books by Mockingbird Lane Press.
For more information please visit S.R. Mallery’s website. You can also find her onFacebookTwitter and Goodreads.

My Thoughts
I am sure everyone at one point in their lives has wondered about the lives of their ancestors. I know I have and have often thought about what my ancestors did in their lives, of course I will never know because my family was not known for sharing events to me as a child. But can you imagine having a whole trunk full of mementos and journals?? How awesome would that be? Sonia is a college student who is dating the wrong man, has a crippled angry father, a submissive mother and is very confused as to what the future holds for her. Her mother shares a trunk with her and there she learns about her ancestors through the journals. The journals take us to the Vietnam era and what it was like to be a soldier in that war, Woodstock, the drug culture. The journals go back even further to the the Depression era, and even further back to the Suffragette movement and what it was like to be an immigrant in a country that was supposed to be the land of opportunity. 

As I am of an age for a lot of the scenarios in the story, I could relate to a lot. I grew up during the Vietnam era, very familiar with Woodstock, Timothy Leary and I even lived the hippie life for awhile. I found this story to be a remarkable in how it was written, to some it may seem like a lot of going back and forth with the different ancestors of Sonia's, but it is written is such a way that the different journal entries flow together seamlessly to tell a very poignant tale of a very normal family with hopes and dreams. A bit of nostalgia for me, loved it! I highly recommend this book.

A copy of this book was received for review and was not monetarily compensated for said review.

Unexpected Gifts Blog Tour Schedule.

Monday, September 1
Review at Bookish
Review at Unshefish
Wednesday, September 3
Review at Reading Room Book Reviews
Guest Post at Just One More Chapter
Thursday, September 4
Review at WTF Are You Reading?
Friday, September 5
Spotlight at What Is That Book About
Monday, September 8
Guest Post & Giveaway at Passages to the Past
Tuesday, September 9
Review at Beth’s Book Reviews
Review at CelticLady’s Reviews
Thursday, September 11
Review at Book Nerd
Friday, September 12
Review at A Book Geek
Spotlight at From the TBR Pile
Spotlight & Giveaway at So Many Precious Books, So Little Time

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