:GIVEAWAY WINNER: Mamarazzi: Every Mom's Guide to Photographing Kids

CONGRATS, BARBARA!! 

Watch your mailbox for further details on how to claim your prize.

Even if you weren't a winner this time, your really need to check out this book if you're looking for an fun and functional photography idea book!

You can pick up your very own copy of Mamarazzi for only $19.79 at Amazon.com today!

:GIVEAWAY: Mamarazzi: Every Mom's Guide to Photographing Kids by Stacy Wasmuth

Wiley Publishing has recently received Mamarazzi: Every Mom's Guide to Photographing Kids by Stacy Wasmuth.

Every mom who loves taking pictures of their kids and wants to improve their skills NEEDS to get this guide!

One thing that I loved about this book is the down-to-earth writing style of the author. It felt like I was getting personal (and functional) instruction from a friend...rather than an author who wanted to impress with a bunch of hard-to-understand technical jargon.

Another great aspect of this guide are the stunning photographic example throughout the book. I was inspired to try locations, props and poses just from the initial flip-through!

AMAZON DESCRIPTION:

Moms, if you can't seem to take enough great photos of the children in your life, this is the book for you.  Now you can learn how to photograph children with the style, clarity, color, and beauty you see in professional photographs.  This fun guide combines humor with solid know-how to show you how to compose shots, handle cameras from basic compacts to advanced dSLRs, take portraits or candids, create prints that impress, and even work with kids! Packed with beautiful examples and written in a down-to-earth style from one mom to another, this book will help mamarazzis everywhere take better photos.

• Moms are one of the fastest-growing segments of the camera-toting demographic, and the blogosphere has a term for them, mamarazzis
• Mixes information, inspiration, and fun for women who want to take better photographs of the children in their lives
• Explains how to set up a camera and use the controls on basic compacts up to advanced dSLR cameras
• Covers shot composition, determining settings, exposing images correctly, the essentials of printing images, how to process for clear and bright color, and more
• Includes stunning examples of portraits and candids of children

Become a better mamarazzi with this fun and informative guide!

:GIVEAWAY:
Lucky for you, I have a free copy of Mamarazzi: Every Mom's Guide to Photographing Kids to give away to one lucky AMOM reader! All you have to do to enter is leave a comment to this post by 5 p.m. on Thursday, February 2, 2012 and you'll be entered for your chance!

Random.org will choose and I'll announce the winner on Friday!

GOOD LUCK!

:REVIEW: A Mercy by Toni Morrison

I recently finished reading A Mercy by Toni Morrison.

First...here's a general description from Goodreads...

BOOK DESCRIPTION:
A powerful tragedy distilled into a jewel of a masterpiece by the Nobel Prize-winning author of Beloved and, almost like a prelude to that story, set two centuries earlier.

In the 1680s the slave trade was still in its infancy. In the Americas, virulent religious and class divisions, prejudice and oppression were rife, providing the fertile soil in which slavery and race hatred were planted and took root.

Jacob is an Anglo-Dutch trader and adventurer, with a small holding in the harsh north. Despite his distaste for dealing in “flesh,” he takes a small slave girl in part payment for a bad debt from a plantation owner in Catholic Maryland. This is Florens, “with the hands of a slave and the feet of a Portuguese lady.” Florens looks for love, first from Lina, an older servant woman at her new master’s house, but later from a handsome blacksmith, an African, never enslaved.

There are other voices: Lina, whose tribe was decimated by smallpox; their mistress, Rebekka, herself a victim of religious intolerance back in England; Sorrow, a strange girl who’s spent her early years at sea; and finally the devastating voice of Florens’ mother. These are all men and women inventing themselves in the wilderness.

A Mercy reveals what lies beneath the surface of slavery. But at its heart it is the ambivalent, disturbing story of a mother who casts off her daughter in order to save her, and of a daughter who may never exorcise that abandonment.

Acts of mercy may have unforeseen consequences.

WHAT I THOUGHT:
I read Morrison's novel Beloved years ago (in high school actually, I think). While I don't really even remember what the story line was, I do remember loving the lyrical writing style.

I was a little worried as I started the first chapter as it begins in the voice of Florens, whose dialect is extremely thick. I wasn't sure I'd make it through the whole book in that voice. However, I soon discovered that the voice changes with each chapter and while each is unique, none are quite as difficult as Florens. With that said, even her voice became easier to read (and more lyrical) as the characters and plot lines developed.

Wild is certainly a good word to describe the place and time of this book. While there are certainly examples of goodness and hope in both events and people, there are also a strong presence of corruption and despair as well...the true dichotomy of life in this earlier period of development in our country.

While it's nice to have a nice tidy, happy ending, you won't find it in this novel. What you will find is a novel that is though-provoking and beautiful in its complexity of character and plot.

NEXT ON THE BOOKSHELF:

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

:REVIEW: Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom

I recently finished The Kitchen House: A Novel by Kathleen Grissom.

BOOK DESCRIPTION:
When a white servant girl violates the order of plantation society, she unleashes a tragedy that exposes the worst and best in the people she has come to call her family.

Orphaned while onboard ship from Ireland, seven-year-old Lavinia arrives on the steps of a tobacco plantation where she is to live and work with the slaves of the kitchen house. Under the care of Belle, the master's illegitimate daughter, Lavinia becomes deeply bonded to her adopted family, though she is set apart from them by her white skin.

Eventually, Lavinia is accepted into the world of the big house, where the master is absent and the mistress battles opium addiction. Lavinia finds herself perilously straddling two very different worlds. When she is forced to make a choice, loyalties are brought into question, dangerous truths are laid bare, and lives are put at risk.

The Kitchen House is a tragic story of page-turning suspense, exploring the meaning of family, where love and loyalty prevail.

WHAT I THOUGHT:
Grissom's The Kitchen House is just the kind of historical fiction that I've always loved. To be honest, I would have never guessed that this was her first novel.

I found her characters to be complex and believable. The plot line kept me guessing a bit, but there weren't any ridiculous or forced plot twists that I've found in a few other recent reads that turn me off. It is clear that Grissom did her research in writing this novel.

The narrator of the novel alternates between two of the main character, Lavinia and Belle, with each chapter which I found quite interesting. Both characters are well-defined and offer a unique perspective on the overall story.

The ONLY thing that bothered me (just a little) about the novel, was that the dialect(s) were clear among the  slave characters, however Lavinia's accent is completely absent...even though it is referenced early on in the novel that she can be hard to understand at times because her Irish dialect is so strong. Just seems like one detail that wasn't carried through considering the detail and consistency found in the rest of the novel.

Despite this, if you are a fan of historical fiction, I DO NOT think that you will be disappointed by The Kitchen House!! It's a great read!

NEXT ON THE BOOKSHELF:

A Mercy

:REVIEW: Ape House by Sara Gruen

I just finished reading Ape House: A Novel by Sara Gruen a couple weeks ago.

Although I didn't post a complete review, I did list Gruen's Water for Elephants: A Novel as one of my favorite reads of 2009.

BOOK SUMMARY:
Sam, Bonzi, Lola, Mbongo, Jelani, and Makena are no ordinary apes. These bonobos, like others of their species, are capable of reason and carrying on deep relationships—but unlike most bonobos, they also know American Sign Language.

Isabel Duncan, a scientist at the Great Ape Language Lab, doesn’t understand people, but animals she gets—especially the bonobos. Isabel feels more comfortable in their world than she’s ever felt among humans . . . until she meets John Thigpen, a very married reporter who braves the ever-present animal rights protesters outside the lab to see what’s really going on inside.

When an explosion rocks the lab, severely injuring Isabel and “liberating” the apes, John’s human interest piece turns into the story of a lifetime, one he’ll risk his career and his marriage to follow. Then a reality TV show featuring the missing apes debuts under mysterious circumstances, and it immediately becomes the biggest—and unlikeliest—phenomenon in the history of modern media. Millions of fans are glued to their screens watching the apes order greasy take-out, have generous amounts of sex, and sign for Isabel to come get them. Now, to save her family of apes from this parody of human life, Isabel must connect with her own kind, including John, a green-haired vegan, and a retired porn star with her own agenda.

Ape House delivers great entertainment, but it also opens the animal world to us in ways few novels have done, securing Sara Gruen’s place as a master storyteller who allows us to see ourselves as we never have before.

What I thought:

I LOVED Water for Elephants and honestly, was looking forward to reading Ape House. Same author...it should be just as good, if not better, right?

Not right. And now that I've read a few reviews from others, it seems I'm not the only one who was more than a little disappointed. 

I'm sure that Gruen was trying to keep the plot line moving with all her twists and turns, but it all ended up feeling trite and some of the 'coincidences' that she used to connect characters (like a contrived paternity plot that was just silly from the start) were just TOO forced. Nothing seemed to develop naturally.

If the characters weren't totally and completely cliche (the monstrous mother-in-law, the Russian prostitute, the rebellious college intern), they completely whiny and inconsistent - or consistently whiny - like John and his wife, Amanda.

The ONLY parts of the book that I honestly enjoyed featured the bonobos. This is one area where you could tell the author had done her homework. I had not been aware of the Great Ape Trust and the amazing things that are going on there. It's actually not even that far away from where I live (about 5 hours). 

I only wish she would have given the rest of her characters the same attention and took a little more time to make her plot lines a bit more believable.

I have higher hopes for the book I just started...hopefully this one's a winner.

NEXT ON THE BOOKSHELF:

The Kitchen House: A Novel by Kathleen Grissom

:REVIEW: Alice Bliss by Laura Harrington

I actually am a bit behind on my book reviews...I have a couple to catch up, so we'll start with Alice Bliss: A Novel by Laura Harrington.

I don't really like breaking down the synopsis of each book, so we'll let Amazon do that part. :-)

Description from Amazon:
When Alice Bliss learns that her father, Matt, is being deployed to Iraq, she's heartbroken. Alice idolizes her father, loves working beside him in their garden, accompanying him on the occasional roofing job, playing baseball. When he ships out, Alice is faced with finding a way to fill the emptiness he has left behind.

Matt will miss seeing his daughter blossom from a tomboy into a full- blown teenager. Alice will learn to drive, join the track team, go to her first dance, and fall in love, all while trying to be strong for her mother, Angie, and take care of her precocious little sister, Ellie. But the smell of Matt is starting to fade from his blue shirt that Alice wears everyday, and the phone calls are never long enough.

Alice Bliss is a profoundly moving coming-of-age novel about love and its many variations--the support of a small town looking after its own; love between an absent father and his daughter; the complicated love between an adolescent girl and her mother; and an exploration of new love with the boy-next- door. These characters' struggles amidst uncertain times echo our own, lending the novel an immediacy and poignancy that is both relevant and real. At once universal and very personal, Alice Bliss is a transforming story about those who are left at home during wartime, and a teenage girl bravely facing the future.

Now, for what I thought:
If I were using a star rating, I think the highest that I could go on this one would be 2.5.

While I greatly empathized with the hardship, and later grief, that this family was going through and realize that this has been and still is a reality for far too many families in our country, there were several character development issues that I couldn't quite get passed.

Not that I am any expert on child behavior, but I couldn't get past the feeling that the author hasn't spent much time around children and/or teenagers. The 8-year-old daugther in the novel, Ellie, was a bit too precocious to be believable. In response to some of words and actions of Alice and other same-age characters, I just found myself furrowing my brow and thinking to myself, "Really?"

Then, there is the mother, Angie. I felt like I was being led (by the author) to empathize with her as well, but couldn't feel anything but a slight disgust for her as this supposedly adult, professional women basically fell apart and completely neglected her children. Not that I don't believe that this can happen...I am very well aware that there are mothers who certainly do neglect their children. However, I didn't feel that the author had  offered enough evidence in Angie's character leading up to the event that made this response believable.

All of this left me wondering if the author was a mother herself, so I did a little research and could not find any reference to her having children anywhere.

I cannot say that I was surprised.

NEXT ON THE BOOKSHELF:

Ape House: A Novel by Sara Gruen

:REVIEW: The Katyn Order by Douglas W. Jacobson

Book Description for The Katyn Order: A Novel by Douglas W. Jacobson:
The German war machine is in retreat as the Russians advance. In Warsaw, Resistance fighters rise up against their Nazi occupiers, but the Germans retaliate, ruthlessly leveling the once-beautiful city. American Adam Nowak has been dropped into Poland by British intelligence as an assassin and Resistance fighter. During the Warsaw Uprising he meets Natalia, a covert operative who has lost everything—just as he has. Amid the Allied power struggle left by Germany’s defeat, Adam and Natalia join in a desperate hunt for the 1940 Soviet order authorizing the murders of 20,000 Polish army officers and civilians. If they can find the Katyn Order before the Russians do, they just might change the fate of Poland.

A die-hard fan of historical fiction, this book was right up my alley. While this book is fiction, it is important to not that the Katyn Order - the murder of Polish officers and civilians - does exist and did happen. I especially enjoy fiction that weaves in truth and it was obvious that Jacobson has done his research.

Previously, I had not know of this particular piece of WWII history and found the details both interesting and disturbing. 

This book is a wonderful, non-stop thriller that I could easily imagine being made into a movie. The characters are real and complex and the action is exciting and engaging.

I must admit, there was quite a twist at the end of the novel. However, considering the events of this particular period of our history, I probably should not have been as surprised as I found myself to be.

My only criticism of the book is the relationship that develops between Adam and Natalia. Somehow it just seemed somewhat forced to me. While I found Natalia to be a believable character in the novel apart from her interactions with Adam, there were times that I found her behavior uncharacteristic and inconsistent when she was with Adam.

However, their relationship only takes up a small portion of the novel, so it is hardly a reason not to read the book. In my opinion, it came across as any great action movie that has to have a little romance thrown in for good measure. :-)

NEXT ON THE BOOKSHELF:

Alice Bliss: A Novel by Laura Harrington

:BOOKSHELF: Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson

I usually read before I go to sleep...not every night, but most...generally just a chapter or two.

However, with Before I Go to Sleep: A Novel by S.J. Watson, I had a hard time putting it down each night. There always seemed to be some twist around the corner that I found myself wanting to read 'just one more chapter'!

Here's an overview from Publisher's Weekly:
Memories—real, false, and a bit of both—are at the heart of British author Watson's haunting, twisted debut. Christine Lucas awakens each morning in London with no idea who she is or why she's in bed with a strange man, until he tells her that his name is Ben and they've been married for 22 years. Slowly, Christine learns that she has amnesia and is unable to remember her past or retain new memories: every night when she falls asleep, the slate is wiped clean. Dr. Nash, her therapist, has encouraged her to write in a journal that she keeps secret from Ben. Christine realizes how truly tangled—and dangerous—her life is after she sees the words "don't trust Ben" written in her journal, whose contents reveal that the only person she can trust is herself. Watson handles what could have turned into a cheap narrative gimmick brilliantly, building to a chillingly unexpected climax.

While in the end I ended up LOVING this book, it the first few chapters, I did have a nagging concern.

Basically, every chapter starts the same. Christine wakes up and doesn't know where she is and thinks she is 20+ years younger than she is, but is soon confronted with the fact that nothing is as she thinks. I thought, "How can the author possibly relive this realization in every chapter of the book and keep it from getting painfully redundant.

Well, it didn't take me long to realize that Watson is an amazing storyteller and there is nothing redundant about the unraveling of this plot line. In fact, it's hard to believe that this is Watson first novel, but it is.

I have to admit, I thought that I had the 'don't trust Ben' plot twist figured out about half way through the book, but still had an inkling of doubt that made me keep reading. In the end, the twist was totally NOT what I thought it was and something oh so much more sinister (and genius!).

I've read some great books, but I do think Before I Go to Sleep is my favorite so far for 2011! I definitely recommend this novel who is looking for a suspenseful page-turner.

NEXT ON THE BOOKSHELF:

The Katyn Order: A Novel by Douglas W. Jacobson

:BOOKSHELF: Water Ghosts by Shawna Yang Ryan

I just finished a very interesting read called Water Ghosts: A Novel by Shawna Yang Ryan.

My edition has a different cover than the one currently available on Amazon and from what I have read, this book was also previously published under another name (Locke 1928).

Here's the story summary from Booklist:

On a foggy morning in 1928, the arrival of a boat carrying three women upsets the equilibrium of Locke, a small California community created by Chinese immigrants in which the minister’s wife is the only white women not a prostitute. No life is more altered than that of Richard Fong, manager of the Lucky Fortune Gambling Hall, who left his wife, Ming Wai, in China 10 years earlier to make his fortune in America and has yet to return to see her. One of many men in Locke without a woman, he consorted first with brothel operator and seer Madame Poppy See, then with one of her younger girls—until he finds that a worn Ming Wai is one of the women in the boat. Poppy, who still loves Richard and is disturbed by the arrival of the women, must determine whether her concerns are dreams fueled by jealousy or premonitions of danger.

The story is intriguing, no doubt, and while there several things that I really liked about this book, there were a few things that I mildly disliked as well.

Let's start with what I liked.

First of all, the prose is SO beautiful...often quite poetic which was a feast for my imagination. The scenes and characters really came to life as I was reading.

I have always been a fan of cultural and historical novels and this one fits both. There is a very strong infusion of the Chinese culture even though the novel is set primarily in California. The entire novel has overtones of the Chinese myth of water ghosts which adds and ethereal quality to the story. I also liked the fact that there is some fact to the fiction. While these precise characters and story are fictional, Locke was a real community populated by Chinese immigrants; primarily men who had to leave their women behind in China.

Okay, now for the things that keep me from giving this novel 5 stars...

First of all, the character from which the story is told changes from chapter to chapter and while this does help to develop each of the characters at a deeper level, it did make it a little harder to get a grasp on the story in the early part of the book.

On top of that, the author also shifts time periods throughout the book...same issue...just makes the story a little hard to follow at times.

My only other complaint is that there are no quotation marks! Sometimes I found myself thinking, "Did they (the character) say that...or just think it?" (See, quotations help!)

Despite my last few comments, I have to say that due to the haunting story, the complex characters and the lovely prose, I am still quite happy that I saw this novel through to the end.

LET'S TALK:

Have you read Water Ghosts: A Novel (or Locke, 1928)? If so, what did you think? Have you read any other historical novels involving the Chinese culture that you enjoyed?

:BOOKSHELF: Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri

When I started reading Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri, I didn't realize that it was actually a collection of short stories.

I was confused for a bit into the second story because I kept looking for a connection to what I thought was the previous chapter.

However, while the characters are different, the themes are all very similar. Each of the stories is related to families from India who have moved to America to raise their children and pursue careers...and all seem to be dealing with various types of great loss.

The title story, Unaccustomed Earth, follows the story of Ruma who has moved to Seattle for her husband career. Her mother has passed away and she is struggling with her feelings of obligation to 'take care' of her father while unaware that he has very much moved on with his life.

My favorite part of the book is actually a collection of stories that follows Hema and Kaushik at different periods of their lives. In "Once in a Lifetime", Lahiri explores how the two met as children and the connection of their families due primarily to their similar origins through Hema's voice.

In the second story, "Year's End", Hema disappears and Kaushik (as a young adult) shares the death of his mother and the story unfolds to explain his choice to lead a rather nomadic life.

In the final installment, Hema and Kaushik meet again in Italy about 20 years later and reconnect under interesting circumstances. This last story has an omniscient narrator and tells of Hema's life as a college professor and impending arranged marraige. Kaushik, on the other had, has been traveling the world and become quite a successful photojournalist.

Hema finally develops the relationship with Kaushik that she dreamed about as a child, but she is faced with a choice between two men. Her choice...and the ending of this story...are quite dramatic.

While Lahiri is clearly a talented writer, I found her prose to be somewhat dry at times. And, I am sure that this has to do with the short-story format, but I often left the stories wanting more...as though the story was not finished.

LET'S TALK:
Have you read Lahiri's Unaccustomed Earth? What were your thoughts? Also, I do believe that Lahiri has some full-length novels as well. If you have read any of these, which were they and what were your impressions?

:BOOKSHELF: The True Memoirs of Little K by Adrienne Sharp

I recently finished reading The True Memoirs of Little K by Adrienne Sharp and while it certainly fits into the category of my favorite genre of historical fiction, it was still a first for me.

I don't think that I've ever read a novel based in Russia before.

Despite my lack of knowledge when it comes to all things Russian, it wasn't far into the novel that I started recognizing certain names and references such as the czar Nicholas Romanov, Anastasia, Rasputin and more.

I'm not sure if I'm proud to say that this recognition came mainly from the Disney adaptation of Anastasia.

Regardless, it had me immediately curious as to how much of this novel was fact and how much was fiction.

With just a little bit of research, it wasn't hard to discover that Disney's version wasn't quite an accurate description of what truly happened to Anastasia and the Romanov family.

As far as dates, names and historical events, Sharp's rendition was actually quite filled with fact.

It was with the personal relationships and behind-closed-doors occurrences with which she took a more creative approach.

The book is written from the voice of Mathilde Kschessinska, a very REAL person, as a 99-year-old women recounting her long and exciting life.

Kschessinska, in real life, was a famous ballerina for the Imperial Russian Ballet in the late 1800's and early 1900's.

This fact certainly takes center stage in the novel, but Little K, as Czar Nicholas was known to call her, also recounts her period as his mistress and the advantages, as well as disadvantages, the relationship brought her at various points throughout the rest of her life.

The result is an extremely engaging and fascinating read.

While this may have been my first taste of Russian-based literature, I am certain it will not be my last.

Here's a few others that I have added to my reading list: Russian Winter: A Novel (P.S.), The Red Scarf, The Bronze Horseman, and Anya: A Novel.

NEXT ON THE BOOKSHELF:
Unaccustomed Earthby Jhumpa Lahiri

LET'S TALK:
Have your read The True Memoirs of Little K: A Novel or any of the other Russian-based historical novels I mentioned? Thoughts?

:BOOKSHELF: 2010 Reading List...

As I've said earlier, I am going to start sharing the books I'm reading with you as I read them...partly to keep a better record of what I've read and partly to keep my motivation for reading going. I have always been a book lover, but there have been several long periods over the years where I lost my reading motivation.

I've got it back and want to keep it.

I've also discovered that many other scrapbookers tend to be big readers as well. After all, we do love a good story, don't we. So, who better to share my reads with but you!?

I so enjoyed sharing my 2009 reading list and the comments that stemmed from it. I also got a couple great recommendations that I've already added to my list.

So, to catch up, here's my reading list for 2010...

1. Half Broke Horses: A True-Life Novel by Jeannette Walls
2. The Good Mother: A Novel by Sue Miller
3. Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel by Lisa See
4. The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
5. Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger
6. The Awakening by Kate Chopin
7. We Were the Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates
8. Say You're One of Them by Uwen Akpan
9. Where the River Ends by Charles Martin

Honestly, I have to say that I am not as 'in-love' with my list of 2010 reads as I was with those in 2009.

However, there are some definite standouts. My three favorites (and the ones that I did love) were Half Broke Horses: A True-Life Novel, The Good Mother: A Novel, and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel.

I was especially disappointed with The Awakening and Where the River Ends. I thought I'd give Chopin's classic a go, but just couldn't get into it and I nearly didn't finish Where the River Ends at all.

The others fall somewhere in between.

LET'S TALK:
See any titles you recognize? What did you think? Do you have favorites among this list.