I live in a relatively rural area, had several acres of land to play on as a kid, and as an adult I dream of living a real country life - as impractical as it may be in reality - growing my own veggies, raising fiber animals, rescuing stray animals. I requested this book to read from net galley (in exchange for my honest review) because I started my own vegetable garden last year, and am still obsessed with all things farming/gardening.

The book takes you through the seasons, the jobs and the chores of living life on a farm, a life that's just so distant from our current lives. It's similar, yet different, from the blog.

This book is gorgeous, well designed, great stories, escape reading at its best, and a very quick read - just one sitting. I especially liked reading about the bees (not anything I'd want on my dream farm) and just the day to day adventures on Cold Antler Farm.

I requested this book to read from netgalley as I'm a huge YA/magic/witches/Tudor freak - all of these things in one book? Score!

Unfortunately, all in all, the book fell a little short of my expectations.

The book is mainly about Meg, who's taught by her aunt to become a witch. The book being called "Witchstruck" I thought there was going to be a lot more magic, and there's really very little. Meg talks a lot about being proud to be a witch, but rarely performs any magic other than using the powers of her voice to convince people to do stuff.

Meg is a servant to Elizabeth, who's imprisoned by her sister, Queen Mary, aka Bloody Mary. I thought there'd be a lot more to that side of the story, considering Queen Mary regularly killed both Catholics and "witches" a like, but this doesn't come to play at all.

There's a small romance subplot between Meg and Alejandro - a young priest in training - if I had to rate just that part of the novel, I'd give it one star because the romance felt very fake, very forced, like an afterthought that was written into the novel.

I read and love YA - read a lot of YA - but the age on this felt more middle school than teens - so I was slightly disappointed there, but I take no "points" off the book for that, just one personal thought.

All in all, I'd rate this 3.5 stars if I could. Everything was GOOD just not quite what I was hoping for. I'm not sure if I'll read the rest of the series / more by this author.

I received this book to read and review from netgalley. Being a big history buff - WWII is one of my interests - and getting more and more into gardening and eating better, I was thrilled with the idea of a book like this.

That being said, the book really falls short.

First, there's a lot of typos and grammatical errors, things that really should have been caught.

Second, there's so much repetition. I understand in any book like this, there is going to be some summaries and back info, but it just seemed like alot of the same information was repeated more often then was necessary.

The history section was a bit slow going, I already knew most of the history and was disappointed not to learn anything new. The recipes were interesting to read and to think about, but nothing I would try on my own. The memoirs section was by far the most interesting part of the book and by far my favorite as well, and the section I would recommend. I honestly thought more of the book was going to be like this section, so perhaps my own bias and preconceived notions colored my impressions of the book.

I'm rating the book 3 stars because the book was good, I just was left wishing there was more to the book (and not in a good way, like at the end of a particularly good novel).

When I first requested this book to read through netgalley, I thought it was going to be more of a how-to guide. Getting into gardening more and more - and canning, and freezing my garden goodies, and preserving, and probably dehydrating as well next spring, I was thrilled at the idea of reading about foraging. I did a little of that this year, digging up and using lots of wild garlic that's been growing on my parents property for as long as I can remember, and hearing stories of my family eating dandalion greens as kids.

This isn't a how to book. It's still good, it's just not what i was expecting.

The book is chatty, like sharing stories with a friend over a cup of coffee, yet interesting and informative and makes you want to get up and see what you can find in the jungles of your own neighborhood, yet it reads like a memoir.

My husband grew up in Worcester, where this book takes place, and is obsessed with the work police and fire do. I'm rather surprised it took us both this long to read this, but I'm glad we finally did. Hubby, who's not a big reader, read this in less than a week & I finished it in one setting. We watched the news coverage non stop while this happened, and I was able to go to see the funeral procession, something I'll never forget.

This is the true story of the bad building, the fire that killed 6 brave men, and the firefighters in the surrounding areas who tried to save them, and then later to pull the bodies out of the building in order for the families to have closure.

I borrowed this book from the library to read on the kindle, because since Sookie ended, I'm looking for a new vampire/witchy type of series to read. As much as I love the genre of paranormal, I don't really read a ton of it. Unfortunately I didn't realize this book jumps in the middle of a bunch of series - anyone who reads my reviews regularly knows that's a personal pet peeve of mine, both with books, and tv/movies. So that dimensions my feelings of the book.

That being said, I did enjoy all of the books, or really shorter shorties within the book. Enough that I will mostly likely read more by the authors, though none of them overwhelmed me so much that I had to get another book by any one of them right now. You can certainly read any of the these stories as a stand alone book, but I felt like I was missing something in each one of these stories.

The first book in a series, this is an author I've never read before.

Merit is just living her life, when she's attacked & turned into a vampire, and plunged into a world of vampire houses, good looking men, and suddenly having ninja like reflexes.

One of the reasons why I liked the Sookie Stackhouse books so much is because she had flaws - pretty and smart and talented, yes, but she could be vain, she made mistakes, she was sometimes jealous or envious, and she just seemed so real - and relatable - because of her flaws. Merit just seemed a little too perfect all the time, other than her slow reluctance to face her new reality of being a vampire, and it made her very unrelatable, as did the romance storyline.

And her whole relationship with her roommate Mallory, also struck me as just so unrealistic FAKE. Merit comes home a vampire and Mallory not once questions her safety, but just unconditionally accepts her and is just so cheerleader excited about the whole thing.



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borrowed this book from the library as an e-book

A series of stories about mass murderers/killers, and the people who survived.

Franscell's writing style is not my favorite - more a tabloid, sensationalist style, then plain face, but the subject is interesting. His writing style does make the book very readable, though this isn't a book you are going to read in one or two evenings - it's too horrible. There's a similarity between all of the murderers and the aftermath and how the survivors all coped.

Reading a book like this makes one wonder how quickly your whole life can change, and really makes me want to step up my game today, because tomorrow may never come.

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borrowed from the library as an e-book

This book is the second in a series, the first of which I did not read. I sat on reading this book for a while, meaning to get a copy of the first book, but couldn't get one through interlibrary loan and so I procrastinated...

I finally picked it up to read and review. It does read as a stand alone, though I did feel as if I was missing half of the story, which drives me completely and utterly crazy. I hate feeling like I miss the back story.

There's a neat twist right at the very beginning of the story, which gets you to turn each page and sets the pace for the rest of the book.

It's a great love story with Christian elements.


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I received a copy of this book to read and review through the blogging for books program and was not paid for my review.