Book Feature: The China Gambit by Allan Topol

Title: The China Gambit, a Craig Page Thriller
Published January 1, 2012; Vantage Press

Craig Page—a daring and resourceful former CIA agent, now fighting terrorism in Europe—is determined to find out who killed his daughter, Francesca, a young American reporter about to publish an explosive story about a conspiracy of international proportions. Joined by the gutsy Elizabeth Crowder, Francesca’s editor, Craig peels back the conspiracy layer by layer.

The action moves from Canada to Tehran, Beijing and Washington, and finally to Aspen, with Craig and Elizabeth narrowly escaping repeated attacks in their attempt to prevent a catastrophe for the United States. Craig must bury his personal loss, as he confronts his adversaries. (Publisher's description).

This book is a complimentary review copy.

Skinnydipping by Bethenny Frankel: Teaser

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme hosted by MizB; choose sentences at random from your current read. Identify the author and title for readers.

Was I really that fat? I was five foot seven and I weighed 134 pounds. Wasn't that...relatively normal? (ch. 9)

Title: Skinnydipping: A Novel by Bethenny Frankel

A hilarious romantic novel about a struggling actress and aspiring businesswoman’s pursuit of  a wildly successful career, the perfect man, and an amazing body. Written by bestselling author and reality star, Bethenny Frankel. (publisher's description)

I received this book as a complimentary review copy.

Books: In a Cozy Mood

I've been in a cozy-mystery reading mood lately.

A Spirited Gift

I finished Madelyn Alt's Home for a Spell, a Bewitching Mystery series, yesterday and am now in the middle of A Spirited Gift, a Missing Pieces Mystery by Joyce and Jim Lavene.

Home for a Spell

Both books have an element of the paranormal to give the mystery stories a bit of spice.

The Wild Wood Enquiry

Next on my list will be The Wild Wood Enquiry by Ann Purser, one of the Ivy Beasley Mystery series. No spirits or witches here, I don't think.

Read any cozies lately?

Sunday Salon: Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all of you wonderful moms!
Enjoy the day, relax, read a good book;
hope you don't lift a finger today, and be pampered!

The Friday 56: One Red Bastard by Ed Lin

Welcome to The Friday 56  hosted by Freda's Voice

Rules:*Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56.
*Find any sentence (or a few) that grabs you.
*Post it.
*Add your (url) post to the Friday 56 Linky.  It's that simple.

Here's a page 56 quote from my current read:

"The later editions of the Chinese newspapers reported Mr. Chen's death. The Taiwan-based paper declared that Communist agents had gotten to him. The Hong Kong-based rag lamented how unsafe Chinatown had become ever since those lowlifes from Fujian province started coming into the country."

Title:One Red Bastard: A Mystery by Ed Lin
Minotaur Books; April 24, 2012

Book Review: Lulu in the Sky by Loung Ung

Title: Lulu in the Sky: A Daughter of Cambodia Finds Love, Healing and Double Happiness by Loung Ung
Published April 17, 2012; HarperCollins paperback
Rating: 5/5

Lulu in the Sky is the third book in a trilogy memoir by Loung Ung, a refugee from war torn Cambodia who came to the U.S. as a child with her oldest brother and his wife, settling in Vermont. Now an adult who is dedicated to Cambodia's future and working to ban landmines all over the world, she finally married her college sweetheart Mark. This happened after many years of putting off her commitment to personal happiness - to deal with the memory of her parents' and sisters' death in Cambodia during the war and leaving behind part of her family when she left Cambodia.

These experiences are the topic of the author's two previous memoirs, First They Killed My Father and Lucky Child. The two books detail the excesses of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, when millions of Cambodians were killed or executed, including Loung's parents and tells about the author's escape and arrival in America. In Lulu in the Sky, Loung tells us how she came to be reconciled with the past, to live in the present and continue into the future.

I don't need anyone. Even as I whispered this to myself, I knew I was lying.
"Why do you want to be with me when I'm such a mess?" I asked.
"Because you're brave and passionate and tender; you're a child and a wise woman."
"But I'm broken..."
"You're not broken. Not to me. Never to me."
Mark's kindness and compassion were what drew me to him in the beginning of our relationship. (ch. 18)

Loung exorcises the ghosts that haunt her by talking to a therapist, by writing about her experiences, and becoming an activist for international justice. She eventually finds happiness in her work and in her marriage to Mark.

For nine months, I revisited my childhood in Cambodia. With Mark and my friends at my side, I poured my love, anger, and hate into the computer. And in the midst of this writing, I traveled back and forth to Cambodia as a spokesperson for VVAF, leading delegations of supporters and public figures to tour our centers. (ch. 19)

The author continues to give lectures around the country and to talk to book clubs and other groups about her experiences and her international work. Her memoir is very moving. The detail in her books and her extraordinary memory, her clear writing, makes this book and the first two a must for those who know about the brutal history of Cambodia and for those who want to know more.

Loung Ung is an author, lecturer, and activist. She has advocated for equality, human rights, and justice in her native land and world wide for more than fifteen years. Ung lives in Cleveland, Ohio with her husband.

For other tour stops and reviews of this book, visit Lulu in the Sky Book Tour, sponsored by TLC Book Tours.

Thanks to TLC and the author, publisher, for a complimentary review copy of this book. 

A Place of Secrets by Rachel Hore

Opening sentences of a book can give a taste of the writer's style, a sense of the story. Here are the beginning sentences for A Place of Secrets.

The night before it begins, Jude has the dream again.She is stumbling through a dark forest, lost and crying for her mother. She always wakes before the end so she never knows whether she finds her, but it is very vivid. She feels the loamy earth, hears twigs crack under her feet and smells the rich, woody fragrances that are always strongest at night, when the trees are breathing. It's chilly. Brambles catch at her hair. And the panic, the despair, they're real enough as she claws her way to consciousness; she scrabbles for the light switch and lies waiting for her sobbing breaths and racing heart to slow.

Title: A Place of Secrets: A Novel by Rachel Hore
Paperback: 400 pages; Holt Paperbacks; January 31, 2012
Publisher's description:

An historical mystery in the tradition of Kate Morton. 

Auction house appraiser Jude leaves London for her dream job at Starbrough Hall, an estate in the countryside, examining and pricing the manuscripts and instruments of an eighteenth-century astronomer. She is welcomed by Chantal Wickham and Jude feels close to the old woman at once: they have both lost their husbands. Hard times have forced the Wickham family to sell the astronomer's work, their land and with it, the timeworn tower that lies nearby. The tower was built as an observatory for astronomer Anthony Wickham and his daughter Esther, and it served as the setting for their most incredible discoveries.

Though Jude is far away from her life in London, her arrival at Starbrough Hall brings a host of childhood memories. She meets Euan, a famed writer and naturalist who lives in the gamekeeper's cottage at the foot of the tower, where Jude's grandfather once lived. And a nightmare begins to haunt her six-year-old niece, the same nightmare Jude herself had years ago. Is it possible that the dreams are passed down from one generation to the next? What secrets does the tower hold? And will Jude unearth them before it's too late?

Rachel Hore is the author of novels including The Glass Painter's Daughter and The Memory Garden. She worked in London publishing before moving to Norwich, where she teaches publishing at the University of East Anglia. She is married to the writer D. J. Taylor.