FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — MARCH 29

Welcome to some bookish fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

If you have been wanting to participate, but haven’t yet tried, now is the time!

What better way to spend a Friday?

Today I’ve chosen a book from next week’s stack:  The Time of My Life, by Cecelia Ahern, is an ARC, so excerpts may be different in the final copy.

Beginning:  Chapter One

Dear Lucy Silchester,

You have an appointment for Monday 30 May.

I didn’t read the rest.  I didn’t need to, I knew who it was from.  I could tell as soon as I arrived home from work to my studio apartment and saw it lying on the floor, halfway from the front door to the kitchen, on the burned part of the carpet where the Christmas tree had fallen—and landed—two years ago and the lights had singed the carpet hairs.

***

56:  “Okay, so if I was to say that I won the lottery then that would be a barefaced lie because I’d clearly have no money but I would have to live my life as if I was a millionaire which would be complicated to say the least, but if I say I quit my job it doesn’t matter because I no longer work there so I don’t have to keep up the pretence of going there every day.

***

Wow!  This “narrator” talks in long, convoluted sentences!  lol

***

Amazon Description:  Lucy Silchester keeps receiving this strange appointment card and sweeping its gold embossed envelope under the rug. Literally. She busies herself with a job she doesn’t like, helping out friends, fixing her car, feeding her cat, and devoting her time to her family’s dramas. But Lucy is about to find out that this is one appointment she can’t miss, when Life shows up at her door, in the form of a sloppy but determined man.

Life follows her everywhere – from the office, to the bar, and to her bedroom – and Lucy learns that some of the choices she has made and the stories she has told aren’t what they seem. Now her half-truths are about to be revealed, unless Lucy tells the truth about what really matters to her.

***

I have enjoyed several books by this author, so I’m looking forward to this one.  What are the rest of you sharing today?  Come on by and let’s chat.

Ireland Vignette & Photos in my Ireland Room

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — THE LION IS IN — MARCH 15

Welcome to some bookish fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

If you have been wanting to participate, but haven’t yet tried, now is the time!

What better way to spend a Friday?

Today I’m excerpting from The Lion is In, by Delia Ephron.  I’ve always enjoyed books by the Ephron sisters, so I’m looking forward to this one.

 

Beginning:  Three hours south of Baltimore.  Six p.m. or so.  June third.  Two young women stand by the side of a rural two-lane highway.  They are not sure what the road is or where it goes.

***

56:  He never saw the women because he never went into the men’s room.  He never noticed the open window, either, probably because he was preoccupied.  He was homesick.

***

Amazon Description:  “‘There are no miracles,” says Rita …. ‘Miracles are simply misunderstandings. Or worse, cons.’” –The Lion Is In

Tracee is a runaway bride and kleptomaniac. Lana’s an audacious beauty, a recovering alcoholic. Rita is a holy-roller minister’s wife, desperate to escape her marriage. One warm summer’s night, these three women go on the lam together. Their car breaks down on a rural highway in North Carolina and they’re forced to seek shelter in a seemingly abandoned nightclub. Which is where they meet Marcel. And soon everything changes. Marcel, you see, is a lion.

Written with the deftness, humor, and sparkling wit that mark her books, plays, and movies, Delia Ephron’s The Lion Is In is an unforgettable story of friendship, courage, love—and learning to salsa with the king of the jungle.

***

Sounds like a book I’m going to enjoy.  What are you sharing today?

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — FEB. 22

Welcome to some bookish fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

If you have been wanting to participate, but haven’t yet tried, now is the time!

What better way to spend a Friday?

Here’s my pick for today!  Blast from the Past, by Lauren Carr, is another Mac Faraday mystery.

 

Beginning:  Prologue – Campus Library, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland — Twelve Years Ago

Kendra Douglas could have sworn that she heard someone walking up in the library stacks.  While her head told her that the footsteps she had heard were only her imagination, the pounding in her heart insisted that someone was hiding up there, and that he likely had a knife—a big sharp knife.

Yikes!  I can feel it, too!

***

56:  She shoved him back into the limousine.  While all of the men stood in shock at the petite, little blonde’s display, she picked up Gnarly’s leash and headed back down Spencer Lane to home.

***

Amazon Description:  In this fourth mystery on Deep Creek Lake; Mac Faraday finds himself up to his eyeballs with mobsters and federal agents. After an attempted hit ends badly with two of his men dead, mobster Tommy Cruze arrives in Spencer, Maryland, to personally supervise the execution of the witness responsible for putting him behind bars—Archie Monday! Mac Faraday believes he has his work cut out for him in protecting his lady love from one of the most dangerous leaders in organized crime; but when bodies start dropping in his lakeshore resort town, things may be hotter than even he can handle.

***

Now I’m off to see what the rest of you are excerpting.  Come on by and let’s chat.

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — JAN. 11

Welcome to some bookish fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

If you have been wanting to participate, but haven’t yet tried, now is the time!

What better way to spend a Friday?

Today I’ve pulled a book from my ever-growing stacks.  That Old Cape Magic, by Richard Russo, will be my first dive into this author’s work.

Beginning:  Though the digital clock on the bedside table in his hotel room read 5:17, Jack Griffin, suddenly wide awake, knew he wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep.  He’d allowed himself to drift off too early the night before.  On the heels of wakefulness came an unpleasant realization, that what he hadn’t wanted to admit yesterday, even to himself, was now all too clear in the solitary, predawn dark.

I’m familiar with those feelings!  I wonder what his are about?

***

56:  (One summer, after meeting the next door neighbor’s son)

“Have fun,” his parents said, by which they meant, Leave us in peace.

Except, wait, that wasn’t true, at least not in the beginning.

***

Following Bridge of Sighs—a national best seller hailed by The Boston Globe as “an astounding achievement” and “a masterpiece”—Richard Russo gives us the story of a marriage, and of all the other ties that bind, from parents and in-laws to children and the promises of youth.

Griffin has been tooling around for nearly a year with his father’s ashes in the trunk, but his mother is very much alive and not shy about calling on his cell phone. She does so as he drives down to Cape Cod, where he and his wife, Joy, will celebrate the marriage of their daughter Laura’s best friend. For Griffin this is akin to driving into the past, since he took his childhood summer vacations here, his parents’ respite from the hated Midwest. And the Cape is where he and Joy honeymooned, in the course of which they drafted the Great Truro Accord, a plan for their lives together that’s now thirty years old and has largely come true. He’d left screenwriting and Los Angeles behind for the sort of New England college his snobby academic parents had always aspired to in vain; they’d moved into an old house full of character; and they’d started a family. Check, check and check.

But be careful what you pray for, especially if you manage to achieve it. By the end of this perfectly lovely weekend, the past has so thoroughly swamped the present that the future suddenly hangs in the balance. And when, a year later, a far more important wedding takes place, their beloved Laura’s, on the coast of Maine, Griffin’s chauffeuring two urns of ashes as he contends once more with Joy and her large, unruly family, and both he and she have brought dates along. How in the world could this have happened?

That Old Cape Magic is a novel of deep introspection and every family feeling imaginable, with a middle-aged man confronting his parents and their failed marriage, his own troubled one, his daughter’s new life and, finally, what it was he thought he wanted and what in fact he has. The storytelling is flawless throughout, moments of great comedy and even hilarity alternating with others of rueful understanding and heart-stopping sadness, and its ending is at once surprising, uplifting and unlike anything this Pulitzer Prize winner has ever written.

***

Like most books on my stacks, I picked this one up happily, hoping to read it soon.  And then time passed….

What are you sharing today?  I hope you’ll pop in here and take a peek, and add some comments.

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — JAN. 4

Welcome to some bookish fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

If you have been wanting to participate, but haven’t yet tried, now is the time!

What better way to spend a Friday?

Fridays are our time to reflect on what’s ahead, like books we’ll be reading soon.

I’ve already planned out next week’s reads, and the book I’ve chosen is from that pile.

So I’m sharing from a book on my stacks called There Was an Old Woman, by Hallie Ephron (an ARC).

Beginning:  Mina Yetner sat in her living room, inspecting the death notices in the Daily News.  She got through two full columns before she found someone older than herself.  Mina blew on her tea, took a sip, and settled into her comfortable wing chair.

Wow!  I love it….and I see my future in just a few years (lol).

***

56:  Boxes were clustered near some old car batteries on the floor by the car door.  One box contained cigarette cartons.  Another was nearly full of liquor bottles.

***

Amazon Description: There Was An Old Woman by Hallie Ephron is a compelling novel of psychological suspense in which a young woman becomes entangled in a terrifying web of deception and madness involving an elderly neighbor.

When Evie Ferrante learns that her mother has been hospitalized, she finds her mother’s house in chaos. Sorting through her mother’s belongings, Evie discovers objects that don’t quite belong there, and begins to raise questions.

Evie renews a friendship with Mina, an elderly neighbor who might know more about her mother’s recent activities, but Mina is having her own set of problems: Her nephew Brian is trying to persuade her to move to a senior care community. As Evie investigates her mother’s actions, a darker story of deception and madness involving Mina emerges.

In There Was an Old Woman, award-winning mystery author Hallie Ephron delivers another work of domestic noir with truly unforgettable characters that will keep you riveted.

***

Now I’m off to see what the rest of you are sharing!

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — DEC. 7

Welcome to some bookish fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

If you have been wanting to participate, but haven’t yet tried, now is the time!

What better way to spend a Friday?

Curl up and enjoy!  Today I’m featuring a book from next week’s stack:  The Good Woman, by Jane Porter.  I have preordered The Good Daughter, the next book in the series, so I thought I’d better read this one.

Beginning:  He was good.

Meg Roberts stood in the open doors of the Dark Horse Winery’s tasting room and watched her boss, Chad Hallahan, co-owner of the Napa Winery and VP of sales and marketing, work his magic on the women clustered around him.  There were quite a few clustered around, too.  But when weren’t there?

Okay…not the best opener.  But we get a hint of the characters and their personalities.

***

56:  Sarah craved security.  Nothing in her life felt stable right now.

***

Amazon Description:  Is it possible to leave it all behind?

The firstborn of a large Irish-American family, Meg Brennan Roberts is a successful publicist, faithful wife, and doting mother who prides herself on always making the right decisions. But years of being “the good woman” have taken a toll and though her winery career thrives, Meg feels burned out and empty, and more disconnected than ever from her increasingly distant husband. Lonely and disheartened, she attends the London Wine Fair with her boss, ruggedly handsome vintner, Chad Hallahan. It’s here, alone together in an exotic city, far from “real” life, that Chad confesses his long-standing desire for Meg.

Overwhelmed, flattered, and desperately confused, Meg returns home, only to suddenly question every choice she’s ever made, especially that of her marriage. For Meg, something’s got to give, and for once in her life she flees her responsibilities—but with consequences as reckless and irreversible as they are liberating. Now she must decide whether being the person everyone needs is worth losing the woman she was meant to be.

***

What are you sharing today?  Come on by and leave some comments and links!

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — NOV. 30

Welcome to some bookish fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

If you have been wanting to participate, but haven’t yet tried, now is the time!

What better way to spend a Friday?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today I’m featuring The Search, by Nora Roberts.

 

Beginning:  On a chilly morning in February with a misty rain shuttering the windows, Devin and Rosie Cauldwell made slow, sleepy love.  It was day three of their week’s vacation—and month two of their attempt to conceive a second child.  Their three-year-old son, Hugh, was the result of a long weekend on Orcas Island in the San Juans and—Rosie was convinced—a rainy afternoon and a bottle of Pinot Noir.

I love this scene!  It opens with such a dreamy feeling…and I just know that their idyllic world is about to crash and burn.

***

56:  “A woman went missing mid-January back in California.  Sacramento area.  Went out for a jog one morning and didn’t come back….”

***

Amazon Description:  To most people, Fiona Bristow seems to have an idyllic life-a quaint house on an island off Seattle’s coast, a thriving dog-training school, and a challenging volunteer job performing canine search and rescues. Not to mention her three intensely loyal Labs. But Fiona got to this point by surviving a nightmare…

Several years ago, Fiona was the only survivor of the Red Scarf serial killer, who shot and killed Fiona’s cop fiancé and his K-9 partner.

On Orcas Island, Fiona found the peace and solitude she needed to rebuild her life. But all that changes on the day Simon Doyle barrels up her drive, desperate for her help. He’s the reluctant owner of an out-of-control puppy, foisted upon him by his mother. Jaws has eaten through Simon’s house, and he’s at his wit’s end.

To Fiona, Jaws is nothing she can’t handle. Simon, however, is another matter. A newcomer to Orcas, he’s a rugged and in-tensely private artist, known for the exquisite furniture he creates from wood. Simon never wanted a puppy-and he most definitely doesn’t want a woman. Besides, the lanky redhead is not his type. But tell that to his hormones.

As Fiona embarks on training Jaws, and Simon begins to appreciate both dog and trainer, the past tears back into Fiona’s life. A copycat killer has emerged out of the shadows, a man whose bloodlust has been channeled by a master with one motive: to reclaim the woman who slipped out of his hands…

***

Okay…it’s time to chat!  I hope you’ll come on by and share your featured books…or whatever.

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — APRIL 20

Welcome to a potpourri of fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

Today I’ve grabbed a book from my TBR stacks; it will be on next week’s reading list.  The Accidental, by Ali Smith, explores the nature of truth, the role of fate, and the power of storytelling.

Blurb:  Arresting and wonderful, “The Accidental” pans in on the Norfolk holiday home of the Smart family one hot summer. There, a beguiling stranger called Amber appears at the door bearing all sorts of unexpected gifts, trampling over family boundaries and sending each of the Smarts scurrying from the dark into the light. A novel about the ways that seemingly chance encounters irrevocably transform our understanding of ourselves, “The Accidental” explores the nature of truth, the role of fate, and the power of storytelling. This book will change you.

***

Beginning:  My mother began me one evening in 1968 on a table in the cafe of the town’s only cinema.

Okay…since it’s a bit startling, I’m pulled right in.  It makes me wonder why this book has been languishing on my stacks for so long!

***

p. 56:  She has him by the leg; she is holding very tightly round it with both her arms.  Her arms are bare.  The leg she is holding is shaking against her chest; her face.

***

What will the rest of you tempt me with today?  Come on by and share, please!

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — APRIL 13

Welcome to a potpourri of fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

Today, (Friday the 13th!), I’m excerpting from one of next week’s review books:  Come Home, by Lisa Scottoline.

Amazon Description:

Jill Farrow is a typical suburban mom who has finally gotten her and her daughter’s lives back on track after a divorce. She is about to remarry, her job as a pediatrician fulfills her—though it is stressful—and her daughter, Megan, is a happily over-scheduled thirteen-year-old juggling homework and the swim team.

But Jill’s life is turned upside down when her ex-stepdaughter, Abby, shows up on her doorstep late one night and delivers shocking news: Jill’s ex-husband is dead. Abby insists that he was murdered and pleads with Jill to help find his killer. Jill reluctantly agrees to make a few inquiries and discovers that things don’t add up. As she digs deeper, her actions threaten to rip apart her new family, destroy their hard-earned happiness, and even endanger her own life. Yet Jill can’t turn her back on a child she loves and once called her own.

Come Home reads with the breakneck pacing of a thriller while also exploring the definition of motherhood, asking the questions: Do you ever stop being a mother? Can you ever have an ex-child? What are the limits to love of family? 

***

Beginning:  Jill stopped on the stairway, listening.  She thought she heard a voice calling her from outside, but she’d been wrong before.  It was probably the rushing of the rain, or the lash of the wind through the trees.  Still, she listening, hoping.

Now I’m curious…what or who is she waiting for?  What led up to these moments?

***

p. 56:  “You’re so wacky, Mom.

“I know, I get it from you.“

***

What are the rest of you excerpting today?  I hope you’ll come on by and share….

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: BOOK BEGINNINGS & THE FRIDAY 56 — APRIL 6

Welcome to a potpourri of fun today as we share Book Beginnings, hosted by Rose City Reader; and as we showcase The Friday 56 with Freda’s Voice.

To join in, just grab a book and share the opening lines…along with any thoughts you wish to give us; then turn to page 56 and excerpt anything on the page.

Then give us the title of the book, so others can add it to their lists!

Today I’m excerpting from a book from next week’s list:  A Silence of Mockingbirds, by Karen Spears Zacharias.

Amazon Description:  This is not a simple love story. It is the troubling tale of a father’s love for the daughter he was unable to protect.  Investigative journalist and author Karen Spears Zacharias never anticipated that she would become one of the characters involved in a high-profile murder. But when she reconnects with a young woman named Sarah, who lived in the Zacharias home at one time and was treated like family, Karen discovers that something unspeakable has happened to Sarah’s daughter, Karly. Compelled to consider her own culpability in this tragic case, Karen pieces together what happened to Karly through court documents, investigators’ interviews, and interviews with friends, family, law enforcement officials, and key witnesses.

***

Beginning:  The envelope on my desk is addressed to Inmate 16002306.  Inside is a letter of request.  It is not the first one I’ve sent, and I don’t expect it will be the last.  I am tempted to mail one every day until I get what I want:  a face-to-face interview.

While this opener may not be the most exciting one I’ve read, I also see in it the determination the narrator will need in order to achieve her goals.  I like that.

***

P. 56:  David’s sky-blue eyes grew misty several times during our visit as he spoke of Karly.  He recalled that he took his daughter to Ireland twice during her brief life.

***

I know that this story is going to be a sad one; I can feel my eyes misting up just reading this excerpt.

 

What are the rest of you excerpting?  I missed last week, caught up as I was in Bloggiesta; I’m looking forward to seeing what you’re sharing today.