Book Review: Dancing Shadows, Tramping Hooves

Katie May 7, 2014 2 Comments

Dancing Shadows, Tramping Hooves is a collection of short stories by Dianne Ascroft.  I liked the book because if I wanted to I could read one story at a time when I had a few free minutes and not have to worry about forgetting what was going on in the story because in a few minutes I could read one whole story. (Or, if you’d rather read the whole thing in one go – the stories are all different enough that you won’t be getting them mistaken for one another – lots of different characters although most of them have an Irish connection.)

The stories were all previously published on their own – but have all been put together in this wonderful collection of heartwarming stories about life.

I received a free e-copy of this book in order to write this review and participate in the blog tour. I was not otherwise compensated.

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Dancing Shadows, Tramping Hooves Book Summary:

Book Review: 201 Killer Cover Letters

Katie May 6, 2014 0 Comments

If you’ve spent any time looking for a job lately (like I have been) you know about the importance of not only a great resume – but a great cover letter.  201 Killer Cover Letters gives you a lot of tips and information not only on how to write a killer cover letter – but also where you should be looking for work and how you should be networking to try and find work.  While the basis of the cover letter has been the same for ages – the book also has information about more modern technologies such as email, social media and online postings.  I know that I do most of my networking on Facebook – but another popular site is LinkedIn.  I haven’t made the plunge for a personal professional account on that site yet, but I do have one for this blog which has brought me a few connections since I set it up just a couple of months ago (and that’s without me doing much work on my own to find connections.)

In addition to cover letters – this book should be able to help my fellow bloggers write pitch emails to companies as well. You want to be able to sell yourself and your assets to make sure that you will get the product reviews and sponsorship you are looking for and I think that the tips in this book can be used for that as well as if you’re looking for a job.  There’s also tips on writing Thank You letters which really can go for anyone, not just after a job interview. This is a great resource.

If you are looking for a job or think that you may want to start looking in the not so distant future – you should definitely check out this book and brush up on the tips and make sure that your cover letter makes you stand out against all the other applicants for a job.  I know there is often a lot of competition out there for positions so you want to make sure that you can do all you can to show that you are the best person for the job! This book will definitely help with that.

I received a free e-copy of this book in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.

About the Book

The bestselling guide to writing cover letters that make you stand out from the competition

Updated with important new insights into email, social media, and online postings

For anyone applying for a job, networking, requesting a reference, or writing a thank-you letter, this new edition of the go-to guide addresses new developments in technology and communication and how they affect the cover letter writing process.

New content includes how and when to use email and/or “snail mail”; how social media and other technologies have transformed the job search process; and new letters/e-mails for innovative industries such as IT, social media, branding, cybersecurity, and website design.

Sandra Podesta is President of eBusinessWriting.com and the founder and host of live, online ResumeRoom.com workshops, through which she helps job hunters craft high-quality resumes.
Andrea Paxton is a recruiter and human resources executive who has worked extensively with every phase of the interview, selection, hiring, and training processes.

Book Review: Assured Destruction: With Zombies

Katie May 5, 2014 0 Comments

I have to say that I am totally bummed that this is the last Assured Destruction book. I absolutely loved these book and the characters and am sad that it is over! (You can check out my reviews of Books 1 and 2 on the blog)  The book once again follows Janus and everything that she’s got going on in her life.  Right now her mom is in the hospital, she’s still banged up with injuries from the book before this one but is still trying to keep her family business afloat.  She realizes that before her Dad left, he had quite a few more customers than they have now, so she decides to try and get in contact with them to see if they’ll come back so that she can make more money for her family.  Meanwhile, a crazy virus seems to be taking over everywhere, Jan’s network, the school network, all over Ottawa seems to be affected by this Zombie Worm.  The more that Jan digs, the more that she realizes that she might be in trouble.  This of course becomes completely evident when she wakes up to find that the building was set on fire.

Jan ends up in the hospital and insurance thinks that she set fire to the building so they won’t pay.  It is now that Jan realizes who her friends really are, as while she is in the hospital her boyfriend and other friends put together a kickstarter campaign to help build everything up again.  But will it matter if Jan and her mom can’t pay the mortgage for December and January?

I don’t want to say too much more because I really love these books and definitely think you should read them.  The book has a LOT of action it in and I love how it is written with each chapter starting with a Tweet from one of Jan’s personalities. (Or is it?) It’s a pretty quick and easy read (I knocked it out in 2 hours but I’m a bit crazy with reading, if you couldn’t tell by the sheer volume of reviews I post here!) and I know you’ll be sucked in just as much as I am!  I love Jan and if she we real I know for sure we would be BFFs.  (In fact, I put some coding I was frustrated with aside to read this book in hopes that some of Jan’s smarts would rub off on me.  It must have worked because shortly after finishing the book I managed to get the code I was working on to actually work! Hooray! Thanks Jan!)

I received a free e-copy from NetGalley in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.

About the Book
The final book in the Assured Destruction series! Those requesting this book will receive a followup email with the first two books in the series attached.

Jan Rose may already be expunged from the police department’s High Tech Crime Unit. Her mother’s hospitalized, and Assured Destruction’s on the cusp of bankruptcy. But Jan doesn’t wait on anything, she seeks out the customers who used to keep the family business afloat. That’s when everything starts to go wrong.

A computer virus–aka the Zombie Worm–threatens not only her school and Shadownet, but the entire city. A skull with a chain running through its socket links a powerful gang to her former customers, and holds the secrets to why her father left and the identity of her mother’s boyfriend.

To save her family and the business, Jan must determine who is friend and who is foe. And decide what type of hacker she wishes to become: Gray, white, or black. Not only her life hangs in the balance.

Book Review: Knowing Vera

Katie May 4, 2014 0 Comments

Knowing Vera is the 3rd book in the Chance for Love series (I had previously read and reviewed Hidden Under Her Heart and Broken Build).  This book follows some characters who we were introduced to in earlier books – Zach and Vera.  Zach and Vera are casually dating – but then Vera realizes that the woman that Vera believes that her father killed was Zach’s mother.  Zach lost his leg in an accident and is dealing with going from being an Olympic athlete to learning how to do things with his prosthetic leg.  But are they falling for each other?  It sure seems that way – but she doesn’t know what will happen when Zach realizes that it was her father who killed his mother.  Or was it?

That of course brings the murder mystery aspect into the picture.  Vera was with her father when he jumped from the bridge, but at only 7 years old she doesn’t remember what happened.  When she starts getting postcards, text messages and comments on her YouTube page that seem like they are coming from her father – she decides to investigate things.

Similar to the other books there is an on again off again with Vera and Zach.  She isn’t ready for a commitment, he is, or is he? and that adds some drama to the story as well. (Which some may argue is not needed.)  Vera also believes that Zach is a player and has a fiance so that of course is not helping matters with her trying to distance herself from him.

Vera ends up kidnapped and when Zach comes to her rescue it seems that he has been set up.  Vera is determined to find out who killed Zach’s mother if not her father to get him off the hook and get answers for Zach.  Will they figure it out in time and end up happily ever after?

Of the 3 books in this series, this one was probably my second favorite (behind Broken Build), the books are all very well written and are quick reads that you just get enveloped in and want to read until you can finish – or in my case – until your Nook battery dies!

Also worth nothing – this is a series but you don’t have to read them in order if you don’t want to.  HOWEVER – there are certainly some spoilers in this book in relation to things that happen in the other two books so if you think you might want to read them all – its probably best to start with Hidden Under Her Heart.  If you’re just looking for a one-off book then certainly consider Knowing Vera on its own.

I received a free e-copy of this book from the author in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.

About the Book

Vera’s dating Zach, casually, not committed, when she discovers her long-departed father is the killer of Zach’s mother many years ago.

Meanwhile, Zach reevaluates his life after losing his leg in a tragic accident and realizes he’s falling in love with Vera.

Can their timing be so wrong? Vera knows the relationship is doomed, but she cannot resist the tugging of her heart and Zach’s panty-melting grin.

Caught in a web of family secrets and hidden agendas, Vera and Zach must depend on each other for survival. A dangerous killer is on the loose, and Vera must find the truth, wherever it leads, even if it destroys her chance for love forever.

Knowing Vera is a suspenseful, cross-cultural romance mixing an unsolved murder, adventure, and hot, steamy love scenes

Book Review: John Wayne

Katie May 2, 2014 0 Comments

John Wayne – The Life and Legend – tells the story of John Wayne using interviews that the author conducted with John before he died.  In addition to the interviews with John himself, the author Scott Eyman also conducted interviews with John’s family, friends, co-stars and other acquaintances to accurately put together a biography of John Wayne.  I decided to check out this book because John’s granddaughter, Jennifer Wayne, is currently on the Amazing Race and I met her and her band (now ex band) Stealing Angels when they were doing a radio tour a few years back and it got me interested in finding out more about John.

This book is incredibly thorough and has everything you’d want to know about the actor – it is just under 700 pages total – with almost 600 of those being the meat of the book and the interesting content that isn’t notes and citations.

The book is broken down by years – going in chronological order of John’s life – starting in 1907 and ending in 1979.

If you are a fan of John Wayne or just want to know more about the legendary actor – this is the book for you to check out!

I received a free e-copy of this book in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.

About the Book

Book Review: Signed, Sealed, Delivered

Katie May 2, 2014 0 Comments

Signed, Sealed, Delivered is a book about the joys of letter writing.  For me, it didn’t deliver as I was expecting to read more letters than book and that is not what happened.  The author talks about her love for letter writing (Call me old fashioned, but I love it too) as well as the first letter she ever received from her son, some letters that she found in a trunk when she bought a new house and other letters through history.

I guess I was hoping for it to be more “hands on” with the letters throughout the book instead of just Nina’s talking about the letters.  Great historical aspect to the book, but that’s not usually my thing.

The bibliography did list several other books that are supposed to contain letters so maybe I will find what I was looking for in one of those books instead.

If you go in to this book for the historical aspect of letters and how they are special, and don’t expect to see more than some excerpts of letters then I think you will enjoy this book just fine.  It was a quick and interesting read once I realized what it was was not what I was expecting!

I received a free e-copy in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.

About the Book

The author of the much-admired Tolstoy and the Purple Chairgoes on a quest through the history of letters and her own personal correspondence to discover and celebrate what is special about the handwritten letter.

Witty, moving, informative, and inspiring, Signed, Sealed, Delivered begins with Nina Sankovitch’s discovery of a trove of 100-year-old letters written by a Princeton freshman to his mother in the early 1900s. Nina’s own son is heading off to Harvard and she wants him to write to her, as the Princeton student wrote his mother and as Nina wrote hers. But times have changed. Before Nina can persuade her child of the value of letters, she must first understand herself exactly what it is about letters that makes them so special.

Sankovitch sets off on a quest through the history of letter writing—from the ancient Egyptians to the medieval lovers Abelard and Heloise, from the letters received by President Lincoln after his son’s death to the correspondence of Edith Wharton and Henry James. Sankovitch looks at the power of letters through epistolary novels, her husband’s love letters, and dozens more sources—including her son’s brief reports from college on the weather and his allowance.

In this beautifully written book, Sankovitch reminds us that letters offer proof and legacy of what is most important in life: love and connection. In the end, she finds, the letters we write are even more important than the ones we wait for.

Book Review: Fix You

Katie May 2, 2014 0 Comments

Fix You is about Hanna Vincent, a 17 year old girl who meets Richard Larsen, who is a college student, while working with her mother at a party at Richard’s parents house.

A friendship begins to bloom and Hanna becomes Richard’s younger sister’s babysitter so they see each other when he is in London visiting his father and step-mother (he is attending college in New York City).

The book actually starts with Hanna telling Richard that they had a baby – so it was always in the back of my mind that they would be hooking up, but I never really knew when.  The book goes from 1999 – 2012 (and then travels to the future for the epilogue) and follows their relationship.

What I liked was that their story seemed more real than a lot of other books I read.  They had real problems  – like Hanna’s mother getting ill and Hanna shutting everyone out.  They were not together from the moment they met, there were a lot of things that would keep them apart.  Hanna was big into music and worked as a music journalist and blogger, which of course I enjoyed reading about that as well.

This was probably one of my favorite books that I’ve read in a really long time! I laughed, I cried, I felt connected to the characters.  Definitely 5 stars!

I received a free e-copy of this book in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.

About the Book

“Richard, we had a baby.”

31st December 1999. Seventeen-year-old Brit, Hanna Vincent, meets New Yorker, Richard Larsen; a Columbia student and step-son of scion Leon Maxwell. Divided by wealth, distance and a common language, an unconventional friendship grows between the two.

From London to New York, from 1999 to 2012, Fix You follows the story of quirky, music-loving Hanna and handsome, driven Richard as they fall in love and are torn apart. Their tempestuous relationship leads to an explosive revelation that threatens to destroy them both.

Emotional and touching, this is a story of second chances. Is their love shattered beyond repair?