First Chapter: The Cartoon Guide to Algebra by Larry Gonick

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The Cartoon Guide to Algebra by Larry Gonick

Published January 20, 2015; William Morrow

Genre: comic, textbook

First paragraph:

Chapter 0: What Is Algebra About?

Before algebra, we learn how to combine numbers by adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing according to the rules of arithmetic. To go in this book, you must know arithmetic.

Cartoon: Piece of Cake

If algebra is about combining numbers, then what is algebra about? To answer this question, begin with some ordinary arithmetic problems.......(cartoon) and rewrite those problems horizontally, along a line. 

To me, this book is ideal for adults wanting to teach their youngsters or for adults like myself needing to learn or freshen up algebra skills. Children who don't already know some algebra might need a bit of help through the cartoons, but it will certainly keep their interest.

What do you think? Would you keep going to tease your memory?

Thanks to the publisher for a review/feature copy of this book.

It's Monday: What Are You Reading?

Visit It's Monday: What Are You Reading hosted by Book Journey, and Mailbox Monday.

A Fright to the Death by Dawn Eastman
Publication April 7, 2015; Berkleyl
Genre: cozy mystery
An Agatha Christie style mystery, it seems, with people holed up in a haunted hotel during a blizzard. There is a mystery to be solved!

Buy a Whisker by Sofie Ryan
Publication April 7, 2015; NAL
Genre: cozy mystery
Sofie Ryan's follow-up to The Whole Cat and Caboodle in the bestselling Second Chance Cat Mystery series

Things have been quiet in the coastal town of North Harbor, Maine, since Sarah Grayson and her rescue cat, Elvis, solved their first murder. Sarah is happy running Second Chance, the shop where she sells lovingly refurbished and repurposed items. But then she gets dragged into a controversy over developing the waterfront. Most of the residents—including Sarah—are for it, but there is one holdout—baker Lily Carter.(amazon)

What's new in the mailbox?

Sunday Salon: It Ought To Be Spring!

Welcome to the Sunday Salon where bloggers share their reading each week. Visit The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer. 

Winter snuck back just when spring had made its entrance, and we were hit with freezing dampness and a scattering of snow/sleet that, with overcast skies, made it seem like early March all over again. Sixties on Wednesday though, and I hope that will last!

Alstroemeria flowers on my table but not in my garden, which is still under winter. Happy Spring and Vernal Equinox!

Two new books to share, one an uncorrected proof and the other a soon to be released cozy.

The Strangler Vine by M.J. Carter is an historical mystery to be published March 31, 2015 by Putnam Sons. 
Calcutta 1837. The East India Company rules India - or most of it; and its most notorious and celebrated son, Xavier Mountstuart, has gone missing. William Avery, a down-at-heel junior officer in the Company's army, is sent to find him, in the unlikely company of the enigmatic and uncouth Jeremiah Blake. A more mismatched duo couldn't be imagined, but they must bury their differences as they are caught up in a search that turns up too many unanswered questions and seems bound to end in failure. (publisher)

A Sticky Situation: A Sugar Grove Mystery by Jessie Crockett, to be published April 7, 2015 by Berkley.
Sugar Grove, New Hampshire, where the Greene family—including Dani's irksome Aunt Hazel—are busy preparing for the annual Maple Festival. But nothing kills the festive spirit like murder…( publisher)

Sounds formulaic, but we will see....

I finished reading two other cozy mysteries: 
Horse of a Different Killer by Laura Morrigan
Death of a Liar (Hamish Macbeth Mystery) by M.C. Beaton
and gave them both four stars! 

What are you reading this week?

Book Review: I REGRET EVERYTHING by Seth Greenland

Also visit Book Beginnings at Rose City Reader.

I Regret Everything: A Love Story by Seth Greenland, Europa Editions (February 3, 2015)
Genre: contemporary romance, literary fiction
Objective rating: 5/5

Book beginning: Jeremy

It would be easy to say my troubles began when a mysterious woman walked into the office but that would ignore the time freshman year in college when Aunt Bren called to let me know my mother had removed all of her clothes in the furniture department at Macy's and been taken to Bellevue...

Jeremy Best, 33, would rather be a poet than a cautious and prudent lawyer. His boss's uncautious 19-year-old daughter, Spaulding, comes from a wealthy but broken home, with an unloving mother and a overly busy father. When she becomes a summer intern at the Manhattan law office, she maneuvers herself into Jeremy's life, an admirer of his poetry. The two become slowly involved through Jeremy's literary bent and interest in books outside of his law practice.

How does Jeremy feel about the non poets he works with in the corporate world of trusts and estates? He shows his poetic frame of mind:

Were they alive to the possibilities of the universe? Had they ever known what it was like to burn incandescently? To exist in a larger, all-encompassing way that would allow them to transcend their flavorless days spent in the pursuit of an ersatz happiness and exist in a more vibrant reality, alert to the lamentations of the cosmos and their brief time as vessels of consciousness? (p. 203)

A foreshadowing of the "brief time" that he and Spaulding may have as friends?

Recommendation: I loved this story showing that similar sensibilities and interests may be more important than age in any relationship. The language of the novel becomes poetic in parts, with some stream of consciousness mixed in with lines of poetry. The story line itself is engaging, two people in an unlikely relationship, helping each other in spite of the odds. The narrative is in the first person, alternating with Spaulding's and Jeremy's points of view.  I rated this novel a 5 out of five, and highly recommend it for poets and non-poets alike.


Seth Greenland is a novelist, playwright, and a screenwriter. He was a writer-producer on the Emmy-nominated HBO series Big Love, is an award-winning playwright, and the author of the novels The Angry Buddhist, The Bones, and Shining City, which was named a Best Book of 2008 by the Washington Post. Greenland lives in Los Angeles with his family.Visit his website, SethGreenland.com

Amazon | Books-A-Million | Barnes & Noble

Visit TLC Book Tours for more reviews.
Thanks to the author and TLC for a review copy of this book. 

Book Review: DONKEY'S KITE by Liana-Melissa Allen

First Chapter, First Paragraph is hosted weekly by Bibliophile by the Sea. Share the first paragraph of your current read

A Donkey's Kite: Horse Valley Adventure #2 by  Liana-Melissa Allen
Published January 9, 2015; CreateSpace
Genre: picture book for first-second grade children

My comments: NIcely illustrated by the author, A Donkey's Kite shows the value of helping others and pooling effort and talent to produce a good outcome. When Donkey cannot get his homemade kite off the ground, along comes a large white goose named Gusty. Gusty uses its skills to help Donkey and show his friends, the horses, how to work together.

A story with lessons to teach. a colorful picture book for children and adults who can read it to younger children.

 Visit the Tour Schedule for Donkey's Kite, for more reviews and for giveaways.

The author's first book in the series has other lessons to teach: : 

A tale (based on the “Three Little Pigs”) about three little horse brothers who suddenly lose their house that is destroyed by a fire.

First paragraph: Once upon a time, there were three little horses names Lax, Max, and Jack, that lived in the magical land of Horse Valley. They lived in a house near the big dark woods. The woods were avoided by everyone, because it was the home of a big bully donkey who bullied you until you were as scared as a chicken. 

Author's Bio:

Liana-Melissa Allen has written, illustrated and published six books. The lovable cartoon characters, Max, Lax, Jack and Donkey makes them a favorite of first and second grade students. She is now working on her third book of "A Horse Valley Adventure".

Liana-Melissa is also a dedicated classical/jazz pianist. Frequently, Liana will improvise a theme for one of the stories she is writing. Capturing this improvised music ultimately resulted in theme music for "A Horse Valley Adventure". The "Horse Valley" theme will be used for a short animated video featuring her Horse Valley characters.

Please visit her website at www.lmabooks.com  and visit her on Facebook too.
Thanks to iRead Book Tours and the author for a review copy of the book. 

Sunday Salon: The Girl on the Train, and As Chimney Sweepers Come to Dust

Welcome to the Sunday Salon where bloggers share their reading each week. Visit The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer. Also visit It's Monday: What Are You Reading hosted by Book Journey, and Mailbox Monday.

The snow is just about all melted outside, but spring flowers will take some time to pop up. Sparrows and doves are showing up in the backyard again, and we have put out, optimistically, food for the hummingbirds.

A cookbook and two ARCs came in last week for review/feature:

The Cozy Cookbook
Recipes and book excerpts by five cozy mystery writers.

Too Bad to DieAn historical thriller in which British Naval Intelligence officer Ian Fleming attempts to foil a Nazi plot to assassinate FDR, Churchill, and Stalin. 

Capital Dames

Cokie Roberts marks the sesquicentennial of the Civil War by offering a riveting look at Washington, D.C. and the experiences, influence, and contributions of its women during this momentous period of American history

Book bought:

I couldn't wait for The Girl on the Train to be available at the library (long waiting list) so I bought the book. I finished it this morning after reading yesterday and well into the night. I think it's a terrific women's fiction story complicated or complimented by murder and psychological intrigue. Two married women are haunted - one by the inability to have a child and by the resultant break up of her marriage, and the other by a secret she keeps close to her chest. Their lives intersect through a third married woman and all the men in their lives. I don't want to give the plot away, but let me say it was an almost perfect book. I rated it 4.75/5, having just a very few minor reservations. I am not sure Anna was in character at the very end. 

From the library:  

I finished the seventh Flavia de Luce Mystery, As Chimney Sweepers Come to Dust by Alan Bradley. I love this series and see that Bradley has set the stage for Flavia's future career as a spy master in this book. 

I am now reading a couple books for book tours, one of which is I Regret Everything, a love story by Seth Greenland

What's on your reading plate this week?

Book Beginning: A MAP OF BETRAYAL by Ha Jin

The Friday 56: *Grab a book, any book. *Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader  *Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) that grabs you. *Post it. *Add your (url) post in Linky at Freda's Voice. Also visit Book Beginnings at Rose City Reader.

A Map of Betrayal: A Novel by Ha Jin, published November 4, 2014 by Pantheon.
Genre: historical fiction, spy novel

Book beginning:

My mother used to say, "Lilian, as long as I'm alive, you must have nothing to do with that woman." She was referring to Suzie, my father's mistress. 

"Okay, I won't," I would reply. 

Nellie, my embittered mother, had never forgiven my father for keeping another woman, though he'd died many years before. I kept my promise. I did not approach Suzie Chao until my mother, after a tenacious fight against pancreatic cancer, succumbed last winter. Death at eighty - I can say she lived a long life. 

Page 56: 

On the very afternoon he checked into a mall hotel on Queen's Road in downtown Hong Kong, he called Bingwen, who was delighted to hear about his arrival and eager to see him. 

Book description: A tale of espionage and conflicted loyalties that spans half a century in the entwined histories of two families and two countries—China and the United States.

Found at the library, a spy novel I'm looking forward to reading.