Giveaways in Blogland

by Carol3 Comments
I thought I’d let you know some of the giveaways I ran across this week. If you have one you want added to next week’s list, let me know in the comments. As always, my current giveaways are listed on my sidebar. Last Night in Montreal by Emily St. John Mandel (gently-read ARC), at Drey's Library (ends June 17) Secrets to Happiness by Sarah Dunn, at A Bookworm's World (ends July 8, US and Canada, no PO boxes) The 19th Wife by David Ebershoff, at A Novel Menagerie (ends June 19) Blogiversary Giveaway at Bermudaonion's Weblog (ends June 22, US and Canada, no PO boxes) Secrets to Happiness by Sarah Dunn, at Booking Mama (ends June 26, US and Canada) Jack with a Twist by Brenda Janowitz, at Drey's Library (ends June 18, US) A Summer Affair by Elin Hilderbrand, at Peeking Between the Pages (ends June 30, US and Canada, no PO boxes)...
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Game Night- Foosball

by Carol2 Comments
Most game nights at our house begin and end with foosball. Granted only four people can play at once, but when we play, winners stay at the table and play the next two people who want to play. Unless of course one team keeps winning and winning and winning, then we have to split up teams, or change who's playing offense and who's playing defensive. We only play singles once in a while. I know that initial cost of a foosball table seems high, but you'll get years of fun from it and never get bored. People of any age can play, as long as they're tall enough to see. Our table was originally a gift and we've had to replace some of the guys that broke, but we've been playing at least once a week for like six years now. It' s not the one pictured. Ours is cheaper and now the guys are mismatched, but keep an eye out. You may find one on...
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The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

by Carol14 Comments
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath Description: I was supposed to be having the time of my life. As it turns out, Esther Greenwood--brilliant, talented, successful, and increasingly vulnerable and disturbed--does have an eventful summer. The Bell Jar follows Esther, step by painful step, from her New York City June as a guest editor at a fashion magazine through the following, snow-deluged January. Esther slides ever deeper into devastating depression, attempts suicide, undergoes bungled electroshock therapy, and enters a private hospital. In telling her own story--based on Plath's own summer, fall, and winter of 1953-1954--Esther introduces us to her mother, her boyfriend Buddy, her fellow student editors, college and home-town acquaintances, and fellow patients. She scrutinizes her increasingly strained relationships, her own thoughts and feelings, and society's hypocritical conventions, but is defenseless against the psychological wounds inflicted by others, by her world, and by herself. Pitting her own aspirations against the oppressive expectations of others, Esther cannot keep the airless bell jar of depression and despair...
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Booking through Thursday

by Carol7 Comments
There are certain types of books that I more or less assume all readers read. (Novels, for example.) But then there are books that only YOU read. Instructional manuals for fly-fishing. How-to books for spinning yarn. How to cook the perfect souffle. Rebuilding car engines in three easy steps. Dog training for dummies. Rewiring your house without electrocuting yourself. Tips on how to build a NASCAR course in your backyard. Stuff like that. What niche books do YOU read? I can't think of any niche books that I read off-hand, which is now striking me as kind of sad. Do I not have any unusual interests? I've read a lot of animal books with my daughter, but that's her interest, not mine. My husband has a few pirate books around the house, but I've only glanced at them. Looking at the list of books I've read recently, I do have several that are food-related, whether they be memoirs or mysteries,  like  Murder Uncorked by Michele...
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Wondrous Words Wednesday

by Carol10 Comments
I ran across a few new-to-me words this week. calumniate- to make false and malicious statements about; slander. " They are calumniated, and are vindicated." (pg. 78, Trinity by Joseph F. Girzone) dirndl- full, gathered skirt attached to a waistband or hip yoke; any skirt with gathers at the waistband. "The skirt was a green dirndl with tiny black, white and electric-blue shapes swarming across it." (pg. 113, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath) corrasable- "erasable" "I counted out three hundred and fifty sheets of corrasable bond from my mother's stock in the hall closet." (pg 120, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath) Play along at Bermudaonion's Weblog....
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