Linda reads : All He Ever Dreamed by Shannon Stacey

May 18, 2013August 27, 2014 / Linda / Leave a comment

The Kowalski family has owned and operated the Northern Star Lodge in Whitford, Maine for four generations. The current generation includes five siblings. Josh is the youngest and only one left living at the Lodge. All his siblings have found other interests and occupations that do not include the running, upkeep, maintenance and all the work that it takes to run the Lodge. Josh feels he is being forced to give up his own dreams of exploring a life outside of Maine and the Lodge. When the family discovers just how upset he is with being stuck at the Lodge, they try to find a way that Josh will be able to leave and fulfill his dreams – even if it means selling the Lodge.

Katie Davis is the daughter of the Lodge’s live-in housekeeper, Rose. Katie grew up with the family and feels like she’s another sibling to them. She owns a barber shop in town. Secretly, she has always been in love with Josh, but he thinks of her as a sister – until late one night when she walks into the kitchen in her pajamas. Suddenly, Josh is not seeing a “sister”.

Everyone in the family and in town can see that Josh and Katie are meant to be together, but Josh can’t see what’s right in front of him. It was fun to watch Josh stumble along when he realizes he’s in love with his “best friend”. Suddenly Josh’s vision of leaving Maine becomes clouded by his feelings for Katie. She is committed to staying in Whitford and has no desire to leave. Josh feels guilty about leaving her and the Lodge and you can really feel his dilemma. The author does an excellent job of keeping the reader guessing what’s going to happen.

There’s a sweet side story between the housekeeper, Rose and her late husband’s best friend Andy. The other Kowalski siblings’ stories are also entertaining and the various townspeople of Whitford, Maine add another layer of interest.

Shannon Stacey has the winning formula for contemporary romances. Her stories are witty, charming, filled with emotion and fun to read!

This is book 6 of The Kowalski Family series. The books do not have to be read in order. Learn about the rest of the Kowalski clan in the previous 5 books:

1. Exclusively Yours

2. Undeniably Yours

3. Yours to Keep

4. All He Ever Needed

5. All He Ever Desired

Erotic Romance vs. Erotica

May 14, 2013May 15, 2013 / Linda / Leave a comment

Erotic fiction has been around for a very long time. One of the most erotic pieces of poetry is the Song of Songs in the Bible. The late 18^th century brought us the French aristocrat, Marquis de Sade whose name gave us the sexual kink of “sadism”. In the early 20^th century, Lady Chatterley’s Lover and Tropic of Cancer helped reform obscenity laws in the United States. In the 1970’s there was a dramatic increase in erotic fiction with Fear of Flying, and My Secret Garden. The 1980’s brought us Anne Rice’s Sleeping Beauty Trilogy. Many new publishers were founded to keep up with the demand of erotic fiction.

Erotic romance gained more ground with the introduction of ebooks. By the mid 2000’s when traditional romance publishers saw the interest in this genre, they launched imprints dedicated to the print publication of erotic romance.

There has always been a strong core of erotic romance readers, but with the introduction of the Fifty Shades trilogy, erotic romance became more main stream. However, it is often confused with erotica. Generally speaking, erotic romance ends with “happily ever after” and erotica does not. Erotic romance has more of a story line, exploring love and emotions and centering on two main characters. It’s all about the romance with the sexual journey second. It differs from mainstream romance because it is more sexually graphic. Erotica is all about sex and little else. It can entail some romance, but the focus is the sex.

The Cheshire Library has been seeing more and more requests for books like Fifty Shades, or erotic romance. In an effort to fulfill our patrons’ requests, we have placed orders for similar books. The second most popular author of this genre is Sylvia Day. She self-published Bared To You and when Berkley Books heard how popular it was, they immediately published it in paper. It was followed by Reflected In You and the third book in the trilogy, Entwined With You, will be released in June.

Megan Hart is another author that is very popular. We own several of her titles.

There are three other trilogies that are “like Fifty Shades” and they have received excellent reviews. They are:

The Submissive Trilogy by Tara Sue Me

The Submissive
The Dominant (due out in August)
The Training (due out in October

The Stark Trilogy by Julie Kenner

Release Me
Claim Me
Complete Me (due out in July)

Breathless Trilogy by Maya Banks

Rush
Fever
Burn (due out in August)

You may place holds on these items. Let us know how you like them and if you’re interested in the library acquiring other titles.

Author Profile/Book Review: Against the Edge by Kat Martin

May 11, 2013August 27, 2014 / Linda / 1 Comment

Kat Martin is a New York Times bestselling author of over fifty historical and contemporary romance suspense novels. She currently lives in Missoula, Montana with her husband. Kat is a graduate of the University of California where she majored in Anthropology and studied History. Before starting her writing career in 1985, she was a real estate broker. That’s where she met her husband, Larry Jay Martin, author of more than 20 westerns and mysteries.

Most of her ideas for books just pop up in her head, but she does occasionally get ideas from newspapers and television. Her books are published in twenty foreign countries.

Against the Edge is book number eight in the Against series. You don’t need to read the others in any order as they stand alone just fine.

Former Navy SEAL Ben Slocum receives the shock of his life when a stranger appears on his doorstep announcing that a child he didn’t even know he had is missing. Claire Chastain is a friend of the boy’s late mother and is desperate to find him and seeks Ben’s help. They band together to track down the kidnapper, all the while trying to fight the attraction they feel for each other. Ben enlists the help of his fellow private investigators and end up traveling through several states in search of an off grid survivalist group who might have his son, Sam. To add an interesting twist to the story, Claire’s old boyfriend shows up with his own trouble that Claire gets drawn into.

This book is filled with drama, suspense, action, romance, and likeable characters. It is fun to watch Ben and Claire’s relationship take hold. The author weaves a believable story of both characters’ pasts that adds great interest to the book. The secondary characters (some have been introduced in past Against books) add another enjoyable layer.

Why Gone With the Wind Is My Favorite Book

May 8, 2013May 6, 2013 / Jenn / 3 Comments

On May 3rd, 1937, more than 76 years ago, Margaret Mitchell won the Pulitzer

Gone With the Wind

Prize for Fiction for her epic Gone With the Wind. 76 years later, GWTW is still a powerful book, read anew by readers young and old.

My husband had recommended for a long time that I read GWTW, and it was on my to-read list for some time. We had distractedly watched the first half of the movie sometime in spring 2010, but I did not start reading the book until April 2011 for our Classics Club here at the library.

GWTW can appear to be a daunting book for those who do not typically read lengthy tomes. But from that opening page, when we are introduced to the indomitable Scarlett, on her way to a party, and we are drawn into a world we will never want to leave, or stop reading.

Oh, Scarlett, Scarlett. Some who have read the book or seen the movie, simply “can’t stand Scarlett.” Well, that’s the point. We are not meant to like Scarlett. She’s perhaps literature’s most misunderstood character. When we first meet Scarlett, she is an impetuous 16 year old lusting after Ashley and looking for excitement. Scarlett stumbles on her journey, making terrible choices, wrong decisions, and sometimes ruining the lives of others (and sometimes purposely). She can be annoying, manipulative, and deceiving. But Scarlett at her core loves her home and her family. By the end, Scarlett has realized how her foibles have affected others. She has lost everything.

My husband has rightly pointed out that Scarlett is representative of “the Old South” before the Civil War. The South had to lose everything in the war, including some of that impetuousness like Scarlett has, before they can learn from their mistakes and rebuild. Scarlett is torn down, lost everything, just like the South was during the Civil War, but together the two can start anew.

We rewatched GWTW while I was reading it for Classics Club, and I’ll never forget the ending. I had not reached that part in the book yet, and I yelled at the tv. “What! What! This is not right! This is not how it happens in the book! It can’t be!” And I ran up the stairs, grabbed the book and read the ending. Oh my. It was how the book ended. I’m still indignant over the ending. But I have two sequels to make the story complete, in my eyes.

GWTW is, in my opinion, our American novel. It speaks to our American experience in terms of struggle, triumph, and the American dream. It’s an epic novel about a society that no longer exists, a way of life that will never be again. GWTW is about more than Scarlett, it’s about a way of life that was destroyed and a people who have to find their way in an unfamiliar world.

GWTW is one of the few books I give 5 stars.