Book Blogger Hop 4/22-4/25

In the spirit of the Friday Follow, the Book Blogger Hop is a place just for book bloggers and readers to connect and find new blogs that we may be missing out on! This weekly BOOK PARTY is an awesome opportunity for book bloggers to connect with other book lovers, make new friends, support each other, and generally just share our love of books! It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs that they may not know existed! So, grab the logo, post about the Hop on your blog, and start HOPPING through the list of blogs that are posted in the Linky at Crazy-For-Books!!

The Hop lasts Friday-Monday every week, so if you don't have time to Hop today, come back later and join the fun!

This is a weekly event!

This week's question comes from Christina who blogs atThe Paperback Princesses. She asks:

"If you find a book you love, do you hunt down other books by the same author?"

My answer: Yes, definitely! Once I'm hooked on an author, I tend to work my way through their backlist and continue to buy their new titles as well.

Heads You Lose is Hilarious!

I dragged Mike to another book signing recently. He would say dragged, but I suspected he would enjoy himself. I think he did.

It was Lisa Lutz and David Hayward at Tattered Cover this go-around, talking about their collaborative mystery, Heads You Lose.

In the book, pot growing siblings Paul and Lacey discover a headless body on their property. Of course they can't call the police, so they dump it and destroy the evidence, but then it comes back. Soon their small town of Mercer has a string of murders to its name and Paul and Lacey are determined to solve the case(es).

Funny thing is, there are two stories going on here. There's the mystery itself, which the authors alternated writing "blind" chapters. And then there's the authors themselves. Their notes and comments to one another along the way catapult this book from the mainstream mystery category into something completely different -- and hilarious. I mean laugh out loud snark fests! If you're looking for something to lighten your mood, you've got to read it. I would say this is one book so far this year that I don't think anyone should miss!

For a taste, check out this promo video the authors did:

Song of the Silk Road by Mingmei Yip -- And a Giveaway

(Yes, there's a giveaway today! Dets at the bottom.)

What would you do if you had the chance to inherit three million dollars? Lily Lin must answer this very question. When she receives word that she is to receive this rather large inheritance from an aunt she has never met, she is skeptical, to be sure. But when she's told that the money comes with one very big stipulation: that she travel the Silk Road completing a series of tasks laid out by this aunt before she can collect the money, Lily is sure that it can't be real. But the $50,000 she's given to start her trip is very real indeed and Lily has always wanted to visit the land of her ancestors. As she travels throughout China, completing the tasks in questions, she also has the chance to experience love and loss, and learn more than she ever expected about herself and where she comes from.

Mingmei Yip's latest is an interesting read: a book club type pick with a humorous tongue-in-cheek style I associate with folk tales. It's a quick read and an utterly fascinating look at Chinese culture. And there are some twists and some surprises along the way as well.

Yip is an accomplished novelist, poet, and artist. Song of the Silk Road is her third novel to be published here in the United States. For more on Mingmei Yip, Song of the Silk Road, and Yip's previous titles, visit her website at: www.mingmeiyip.com

And you can view the trailer for Song of the Silk Road here.

Now for the fun part. Kensington books is giving away one copy to one of my readers here. To enter to win, leave me a comment (with your email) before midnight April 25. (Tweet or post elsewhere for extra entry points. 1 point for each link you send me.) I will announce the winner on Tuesday, April 26. The book is coming directly from the publisher, so US only and no PO boxes, please.

Good luck and happy reading!

Pre-Pub Book Buzz: A Dark Dividing by Sarah Rayne

So remember in my updates post the other day, I mentioned that Sarah Rayne would be making her official US debut this summer? It's true. Back when High Crimes was a brick and mortar store, I discovered Sarah Rayne in their imports section. I've been special ordering her new releases from the UK through Cynthia ever since. But now Felony & Mayhem has picked up A Dark Dividing and is releasing it in June. Yippee!

I actually have not read Dividing yet (I've read Roots of Evil, Spider Light, and The Death Chamber so far). Here's the synopsis from Sarah Rayne's official site:

Two pairs of twins. Born a hundred years apart. United by a chilling secret

At first, journalist Harry Fizglen is sceptical when his editor asks him to investigate the background of Simone Anderson, a new Bloomsbury artist. But once he's met the enigmatic Simone, Harry is intrigued.

Just what did happen to Simone's twin sister who disappeared without trace several years before? And what is the Anderson sisters' connection to another set of twin girls, Viola and Sorrel Quinton, born in London on 1st January 1900?

All Harry's lines of enquiry seem to lead to the small Shropshire village of Weston Fferna and the imposing ruin of Mortmain House, standing grim and forbidding on the Welsh borders. As Harry delves into the violent and terrible history of Mortmain, in an attempt to uncover what happened to Simone and Sonia, and, one hundred years before them, to Viola and Sorrel Quinton, he finds himself drawn into a number of interlocking mysteries, each one more puzzling – and sinister – than the last.

I've not seen the final cover art, but the book's official release is set for 6/16/11. Mark your calendars and definitely add Rayne to your must try list. Dark and creepy is what she specializes in and her plots are oh, so twisty!

No word just yet on whether F&M will be doing future Rayne titles as well. The UK editions are available online for purchase. I'm guessing this will be a sort of test title for Felony & Mayhem (all the more reason for me to help spread the word!).

Book Blogger Hop

In the spirit of the Twitter Friday Follow, the Book Blogger Hop, hosted by Crazy for Books, is a place just for book bloggers and readers to connect and share our love of the written word! This weekly BOOK PARTY is an awesome opportunity for book bloggers to connect with other book lovers, make new friends, support each other, and generally just share our love of books! It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs to read! So, grab the logo, post about the Hop on your blog, and start HOPPING through the list of blogs that are posted in the Linky list at Crazy for Books!!

Here's the question of the week:

"Pick a character from a book you are currently reading or have just finished and tell us about him/her."

Hm, I just finished reading Graham Joyce's The Silent Land. In the book, a couple barely survives being buried in an avalanche. Or did they? Husband and wife Jake and Zoe trek down the mountain back to the ski lodge they've been staying at, only to find that everyone else is gone. They first assume that the town has been evacuated because of avalanche danger. But anytime they try to leave the town, they find that they can't. Jake and Zoe are a strong couple, though, and Zoe has a secret that she's been trying to tell Jake. As they stick it out and hope for rescue, their fears about their new reality begin to come true.

So, head over to Crazy for Books and join the hop. And if you're visiting from the hop, thanks for stopping by!

Action, Adventure, and Planes

We had to make an emergency trip home a few weeks back. I talk about it a lot and I agonize over it a lot, but picking travel reads is an ordeal in my house. Not a painful ordeal, mind you, just an ordeal. Trying to find the best read for a trip can literally consume me.

I've come to learn that certain contingencies have to be planned for -- massive delays can mean a finished book before you even board for the plane (Clive Barker's Thief of Always kept a teenage me occupied in the New Orleans airport when our plane was delayed 8 hours!) and family visits mean almost no reading during the trip itself, so I've been trying to find the right balance and pack less.

This trip was no exception in terms of length of time spent trying to pick the right reads, but I ended up bringing just three books. That was quite a bit of progress! Course I knew that the plane would be pretty much the only reading I was doing on this trip.

And picking the wrong plane read can be disastrous. Flying is annoying, uncomfortable, and highly distracting, making it very hard for me to concentrate (sucks, I seem to have lost the ability to tune out everything and zone into my reads). Fortunately, Jeremy Robinson came to my rescue. The first in his Jack Sigler series is straight out of a video game or blockbuster action movie. No matter how many screaming kids, flight update announcements, and loud conversations flew at me, I was able to finish most of Pulse on the first set of plane rides.

In Pulse, the chess team is on leave for one week, giving Sigler time to head to Peru and help with security on a friend's archaeological dig. The discovery is a unique one that could blow the Hercules myth straight out of the water and right into the realm of reality. But the rumored resting spot of the Hydra is of interest to groups outside of academia as well. The dig is ambushed and Sigler's friend is kidnapped. Now, Sigler and his team are on the trail of a dangerous scientist whose singular goal is eternal life at any cost.

While I did think the story could have been more -- there were definitely some opportunities for Robinson to build more depth -- it was a super fun read. And, as mentioned, a great pick for a plane. So far there are two more installments to the series, Instinct and Threshold, both of which are in my TBR stack.

For more on Robinson and the Chess Team, hit the link above. There's even a trailer for the newly released Threshold.

Updates And Stuff

Hi, all! First off, holy moly! Amanda Stevens's The Restorer was fantastic! I mean it. If you see it in the bookstore, snatch it up. Seek it out! It's awesome. Dark mystery with ghosts. Loved it! And, if you're a ebook fan, the prequel novella, The Abandoned, is available at Harlequin for free right now.

If you haven't been watching The Killing, then you should get on it. I am quite literally dying to know who the killer is. I think the show is fabulous -- probably the best thing on TV right now.

And speaking of, another best thing on TV is the "reboot" of BBC's Upstairs Downstairs playing on Masterpiece Theater. I'm a little young for the original, but I'll be adding it to the rental queue now.

Upcoming on Masterpiece is a new crime series based on the Zen series by Michael Dibdin.

Also, if you're watching Starz's Camelot, you may be on the fence like me about whether or not it's working. I think I'm holding out hope that it will get better considering how much I've enjoyed Arthurian Legend stuff in the past. Gillian Bradshaw's trilogy is one that I remember quite fondly and highly recommend, though it looks like they're slowly coming back in print. Some patience may be in order. (Hawk of May, Kingdom of Summer, In Winter's Shadow)

Stephen King's new book is set for November release. I can't wait!

And, get this, if you buy the new paperback release of Justin Cronin's The Passage, you get a sneak peak at 2012's The Twelve. I'll have to wait since those teasers drive me nuts until I can get the book. EW's article here was eye opening (love the cover).

What else?

If you're a fan of the UK Being Human (so much better than SyFy), Mitchell's Aidan Turner is to play a dwarf in The Hobbit. Big change from sexy vamp. Hm.

And if you're a longtime reader, then you know how big a fan of dark UK thrillers I am. Sarah Rayne will be making her official US debut with A Dark Dividing this summer as part of Felony and Mayhem's new release list. So exciting!

And finally, stay tuned here on the blog. I've got some giveaways coming! First one up is Sunday.