Book Reviews and a Book Discussion Coming Your Way

So, where have I been while I've been a bad blogger and neglected this one? I've been reading books and reviewing them over at Bewitched Bookworms. I have several reviews posted, just click below to be redirected to the site.

The Scarpetta Factor by Patricia Cornwell
Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr
The Vampire Diaries: The Return Volume 2 - Shadow Souls by LJ Smith
Some Girls Bite and Friday Night Bites: Chicagoland Vampires Series by Chloe Neill
First Drop of Crimson by Jeaniene Frost

Charlaine Harris' new Sookie Stackhouse book, Dead in the Family, comes out on May 4, 2010. I'll be holding a book discussion on this blog. If you'd like to participate, let me know in the comments below. We'll be discussing this book a few weeks after the book comes out.

New Twilight Saga Novella Announced for Release in June

Stephenie Meyer has thrown us loyal fans a Twilight-sized bone. According to her website, a new novella, The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner, will be published on June 5, 2010. This release is the first new material from Stephenie in two years and is timed perfectly to prepare all of us for the theatrical release of Twilight Saga: Eclipse.

This novella promises to give us an insiders viewpoint of the newborns and Victoria/Riley during Eclipse. Read Stephenie's entire statement and press release on her personal website.

Preorder information is forthcoming and this post will be updated when the information is available. The book has another breathtaking cover, as seen below. Also, one dollar from each book sold out of the first printing will go to the American Red Cross.

What is the best part of this announcement? The book will be available online for free from June 7 through July 5, as a thank you to Stephenie Meyer's fans. You can access the novella at http://www.breetanner.com/.

After your collective sqeeing has died down, what are you looking forward to learning about the newborns? Are you going to preorder a copy or just read it for free online? Or do you say "Who cares about Bree? Where's Midnight Sun already?!?" Let me know your thoughts in the comments.

UPDATE: The novella is available for preorder from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. This price is around $9. I preordered mine!!!

(First posted to the Bewitched Bookworms blog on 3-30-2010 by myself. I'm a lazy if not efficient blogger, lol)

Here's my opinion on the matter. I'm excited that we will be getting some new material out of Stephenie Meyer that is from the Twilight Saga. I am really surprised that this was kept so secret. Everything seems to be leaked on the internet these days. On Stephenie Meyer's website, there is a picture of one of the Eclipse actress' burned and soaked copy of the manuscript. I'm sure Stephenie has learned her lesson with Midnight Sun and had a thick document they had to sign before getting their hot little hands on it.

This gives me hope that Stephenie Meyer has been secretly working on Midnight Sun and it will be sprung on us just like this novella was. Her camp has proven they can keep things quiet and we won't even see it coming. I predict the internet and twitter will simultaneously fail if that press release comes out!

Happy 1st Birthday Baby C!

Happy birthday to my little man, who is one year old today! I can't believe it's been that long, but it has been the best year of my life! Now bring on the cute pics and the Spongebob.



My sister in law made the cakes. The Spongebob face was for Colin to eat by himself.

My SIL made a giant Spongebob cake for the rest of us, complete with Krabby Patty!

Who doesn't love chocolate cake and wishes they could eat it like this? He had no problem digging right in!

A Little Monday Funny For Everyone

I came across a few funny Venn Diagrams for all of you. Check out Fuck Yeah Venn Diagrams for more nerdy fun. Enjoy!

The One Where I Meet OnePushyFox and Two Authors

Alternate Title of This Post: Hi Heather, I'm Heather (sounds like I'm talking crazily to myself doesn't it?)

Those of you that know me in real life, even on Twitter, know that I rarely seem excited. I’m one of those people that always keeps cool as a cucumber and laid back even under extreme stress. When Heather (OnePushyFox) tweeted me to let me know that the authors of Beautiful Creatures, Margaret Stohl and Kami Garcia, would be in the area for a book signing, I didn’t hesitate to accept her invitation. Celebrities and authors don’t faze me after working at an outdoor concert venue in the south suburbs for four years as the assistant box office manager while I was in college. After dealing with the jerks that are their management team and walking through a crowd of 20,000 people with 100 grand in cash stuffed in my pants, I don’t think of them as anything than ordinary people with an extraordinary job. But even I did get a little nervous right before I met Heather, Margaret, and Kami.

I left work an hour early, hopped a different train (almost freak free except for the youngin’ that decided he needed to sit one seat away, even though the entire top of the train was empty) and headed for home. I got to eat a rushed dinner with my son, husband, mom, and nephews before I left my house 10 minutes late.

I was worried I wasn’t going to get there by 6 o’clock, the time that we agreed to get to Anderson’s Bookshop in Downers Grove. I didn’t quite drive like I was in Days of Thunder, but the speed limit on Chicagoland interstates is 55 mph and you get ran over if you actually drive 55 (And yes that was a nod to my husband who got pulled over for speeding after watching that movie as a teenager). I was only 10 minutes away when Heather called to say she had arrived. I’m so glad I didn’t make her wait long, my real life peeps know that I haven’t been on time for anything since I had baby C last March (Holy crap, he’s going to be one next month! Time flies. Too bad the baby weight didn’t fly off, lol).

I was really excited to meet Heather, we live about 45 minutes from each other so it wasn’t that big of a deal to meet up. I recognized her instantly from the picture on The Lemon Sister’s blog post where Heather and Kristen (uhyesplease) met in person (It helped that hardly anyone was there that early). All it took was a smile and a hug for us to feel like old friends (and I’m always uncomfortable around new people). I bought my untainted book to be signed and sat down to get to know one another better while we waited for the authors to arrive. Since this week was my time to host the discussion of the Beautiful Creatures chapters I was assigned over at Fragile’s blog, my original copy is full of large post-it notes and the Edward Cullen book mark that HoudinisBox sent me in The Lemon Sister’s Secret Santa swap. That would be an awesome scenario: Hey sign my book that’s full of crap and a book mark for a series by a hugely successful young adult author. BTW, isn’t he hot?) I didn’t lug that battered copy to the store and just bought a crisp, new copy that also bought me a numbered place in line to get it signed.

After chatting and battering Heather with my verbal vomit for over a half hour, the authors arrived. By this time the small area in the shop where the discussion would take place was very full, I was thankful that she wanted to meet an hour early and we had claimed seats. Kami and Margi just jumped right in, with Kami reading some of chapter 1 from the book. After the reading, they asked each other their own set of FAQs. Kami is very much the straight laced one and attempts to keep Margi reined in, but Margi is very energetic and has a very quirky, big personality. You can really tell that these two women are good friends, and that shows in the way they interact with each other. The whole ordeal it just seemed like a discussion amongst good friends.

When the authors finished with questions from the audience, it was time to get our books signed. Heather and I were chatting so much that neither one of us heard our numbers being called. Heather went first and told them her bloggy/twitter name, Margi recognized her right away. After hugging, Margi asked “Where’s your friend?” meaning me. She even knew my Twitter name! It is really sweet that they interact with us on Twitter, even remembering who says they are going to show up to what signing. I was thrilled to be remembered! The authors genuinely appreciate their fans and give us the same support right back. They retweet every week about our Beautiful Creatures discussion.

Heather had 3 copies of the book to get signed and a print out of the week she and Kristen recapped their chapters of the book on Fragile’s blog. Both Kami and Margi said they loved the blog and they keep a copy of every post. Heather really did a good job making a screen capture look great on photo paper with Fragile’s dark colored blog layout. The four of us took a picture together that should be appearing on the Beautiful Creatures website under the blog section. Look for it soon! (Who am I kidding, you know Heather and I will post the crap out of that shiz). I got my book signed and it was time to leave.

Left to Right: Margaret Stohl, Me, Kami Garcia

As soon as we hit the front door, we couldn’t believe it had snowed while we were inside. That’s lovely lake effect snow for you. And by the way, downtown Downers Grove does not get plowed in a timely fashion. I about did a donut turning the corner and I drive an all-wheel drive Explorer, WTF? (And yeah, I know, bad for the environment, blah blah blah. You try being 5’11’’ and getting in and out of a car that’s practically scraping the ground)

In summary since I not only have verbal diarrhea in person, I have it in written form as well, the authors are kick ass cool women. Make sure you check out their blogs and buy all of their books. Heather is super sweet and didn’t seem all fan girl in my opinion, she was cool just like me! Thanks to her husband for remembering that this blog chick lives close by! And come June, I’m going to try and drag her to the Printer’s Row Book Fair in the loop if there are any authors we want to hear talk. (*cough*you really need to read all four of Jen Lancaster’s autobiographies, I can lend them to you. She’s hilarious in person and is at the fair every year since she lives in Chicago!*cough*)

News Galore!!!!

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know I've been MIA. Work, family, etc. you all know the drill. But there are quite a few new things in the works here folks!

Beautiful Creatures Book Discussion hosted by Fragile Little Human





Beautiful Creatures is a great book written in the POV of a teenage boy about his life in a small Southern town. We've been discussing four chapters a week over at Fragile's blog. This is week five and it is my week to discuss some chapters. Hop on over and catch some of the discussion. There are still about 300 pages left, so there is plenty of time to pick up the book and join the discussion. I promise you won't be disappointed with this book!

Beautiful Creatures inspired bracelet giveaway hosted by Mrs. Vanquish of Let's Ride the Vanquish






Mrs. Vanquish along with Mary Tippett Designs are giving away a Beautiful Creatures inspired bracelet. You can earn entries by posting about the giveaway on your blog, tweeting about it, etc. See Mrs. V's post on her blog for the full contest rules.

Bewitched Bookworms is live!



I'm very excited to announce that we (i.e. me, One Pushy Fox, UhYesPlease, Fragile Little Human, Mrs. Vanquish, Annie Christina, Fire Crotch, and Cutie) have started a blog where we can review the books that we read. This site will be full of book reviews and recommendations on what to read next! We have a forum where you can go to discuss the books we've reviewed in further depth including spoilers. This site has sprung up from our love for books and reading and it's a lot of fun to share our passion with everyone.

Dead in the Family Book Discussion hosted in this blog - coming soon!
I'm hosting a book discussion similar to the Beautiful Creatures book discussion hosted by Fragile for the tenth Sookie Stackhouse book, Dead in the Family. The book hits stores on May
4, 2010. We'll be discussing this book leading up to our meetup for the Twilight Saga: Eclipse premiere in Chicago on June 30, 2010.



I'm sure there are a few other things in the works, but leave it to me to forget!

2009 Year in Review

This past year was a life changing year for me. I started out the year until March like this....
Baby C finally decided to make his appearance a week late towards the end of March. Here he is 1 day old, all wrinkly and dry from getting cooked an extra week. Here Baby C is enjoying his bath time as a 3 month old. And finally at 9 months old and at his first Christmas.

Time has flown by, first seeming like the baby would never come out, then growing like a weed throughout the year. He started out at 7 lbs 7 oz and 19.5 inches and is now 28 inches at 18 lbs 13 oz as of December 30.

During my 3 month maternity leave, I finally read the Twilight Saga books that I had gotten for Christmas in 2008 from my sister. I read the first 3 books very quickly but the fourth book tweeked my post-partum mind out and took about a month to finish. Once I was done, I started looking at Twilight related blogs. Eventually through commenting and Twitter, I've made many wonderful online friends. I can't wait to meet so many of you in Chicago in 6 short months for the Eclipse premiere.

Here's to a wonderful 2010, full of laughter, fun, and prosperity.