Friday, May 16, 2014

Read: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Title: The Night Circus

Author: Erin Morgenstern

Release Date: 2011

Genre: Fantasy

Book Description:  The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night.

But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway: a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them both, this is a game in which only one can be left standing. Despite the high stakes, Celia and Marco soon tumble headfirst into love, setting off a domino effect of dangerous consequences, and leaving the lives of everyone, from the performers to the patrons, hanging in the balance.

 

Buy Links: Amazon * Bookdepository



Author Bio:

Erin Morgenstern is a writer and a multimedia artist, who describes all her work as "fairy tales in one way or another." She grew up in Marshfield, Massachusetts. She currently lives in Boston, Massachusetts with two very fluffy cats.
 
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Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Read: Jack Glass by Adam Roberts

Title: Jack Glass

Author: Adam Roberts

Release Date: 2012

Genre: Science Fiction

Book Description:  Jack Glass is the murderer. We know this from the start. Yet as this extraordinary novel tells the story of three murders committed by Glass the reader will be surprised to find out that it was Glass who was the killer and how he did it. And by the end of the book our sympathies for the killer are fully engaged.

Riffing on the tropes of crime fiction (the country house murder, the locked room mystery) and imbued with the feel of golden age SF, JACK GLASS is another bravura performance from Roberts. Whatever games he plays with the genre, whatever questions he asks of the reader, Roberts never loses sight of the need to entertain and JACK GLASS has some wonderfully gruesome moments, is built around three gripping HowDunnits and comes with liberal doses of sly humour.

Roberts invites us to have fun and tricks us into thinking about both crime and SF via a beautifully structured novel set in a society whose depiction challenges notions of crime, punishment, power and freedom. It is an extraordinary novel.


Buy Links: Amazon * Bookdepository



Author Bio:

Adam Roberts (born 1965) is an academic, critic and novelist. He also writes parodies under the pseudonyms of A.R.R.R. Roberts, A3R Roberts and Don Brine. He also blogs at The Valve, a group blog devoted to literature and cultural studies.

He has a degree in English from the University of Aberdeen and a PhD from Cambridge University on Robert Browning and the Classics. He teaches English literature and creative writing at Royal Holloway, University of London. Adam Roberts has been nominated twice for the Arthur C. Clarke Award: in 2001, for his debut novel, Salt, and in 2007, for Gradisil.

 
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Monday, May 12, 2014

Read: Prince of Thorns (The Broken Empire #1) by Mark Lawrence

Title: Prince of Thorns

Series: The Broken Empire #1

Author: Mark Lawrence

Release Date:  2011

Genre:  Fantasy

Book Description:  When he was nine, he watched as his mother and brother were killed before him. At thirteen, he led a band of bloodthirsty thugs. By fifteen, he intends to be king...

It's time for Prince Honorous Jorg Ancrath to return to the castle he turned his back on, to take what's rightfully his. Since the day he hung pinned on the thorns of a briar patch and watched Count Renar's men slaughter his mother and young brother, Jorg has been driven to vent his rage. Life and death are no more than a game to him--and he has nothing left to lose. But treachery awaits him in his father's castle. Treachery and dark magic. No matter how fierce his will, can one young man conquer enemies with power beyond his imagining?



Buy Links: Amazon * Bookdepository



Author Bio:

Mark Lawrence is married with four children, one of whom is severely disabled. His day job is as a research scientist focused on various rather intractable problems in the field of artificial intelligence. He has held secret level clearance with both US and UK governments. At one point he was qualified to say 'this isn't rocket science ... oh wait, it actually is'.

Between work and caring for his disabled child, Mark spends his time writing, playing computer games, tending an allotment, brewing beer, and avoiding DIY.

 
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Friday, May 9, 2014

Read: The Shadow of the Wind (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books #1) by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Title: The Shadow of the Wind

Series: The Cemetery of Forgotten Books #1

Author: Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Release Date:  2001

Genre: Contemporary, Literary, Fantasy

Book Description: Barcelona, 1945: A city slowly heals in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, and Daniel, an antiquarian book dealer’s son who mourns the loss of his mother, finds solace in a mysterious book entitled The Shadow of the Wind, by one Julián Carax. But when he sets out to find the author’s other works, he makes a shocking discovery: someone has been systematically destroying every copy of every book Carax has written. In fact, Daniel may have the last of Carax’s books in existence. Soon Daniel’s seemingly innocent quest opens a door into one of Barcelona’s darkest secrets--an epic story of murder, madness, and doomed love.



Buy Link: Amazon * Bookdepository



Author Bio:

Carlos Ruiz Zafón is a Spanish novelist. Born in Barcelona in 1964, he has lived in Los Angeles, United States, since 1994, and works as a scriptwriter aside from writing novels.

His first novel, El príncipe de la niebla (The Prince of Mist, 1993), earned the Edebé literary prize for young adult fiction. He is also the author of three more young-adult novels, El palacio de la medianoche (1994), Las luces de septiembre (1995) and Marina (1999).

In 2001 he published the novel La sombra del viento ("The Shadow of the Wind"), his first "adult" novel, which has sold millions of copies worldwide. Since its publication, La sombra del viento has garnered critical acclaim around the world and has won numerous international awards. Ruiz Zafón's works have been published in more than 40 countries and have been translated into more than 30 languages.

 
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Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Read: Falling Free (Vorkosigan Saga #1) by Lois McMaster Bujold

Title: Falling Free

Series:  Vorkosigan Saga #1

Author: Lois McMaster Bujold

Release Date:  1988

Genre: Science Fiction

Book Description: Leo Graf was an effective engineer...Safety Regs weren't just the rule book he swore by; he'd helped write them. All that changed on his assignment to the Cay Habitat. Leo was profoundly uneasy with the corporate exploitation of his bright new students till that exploitation turned to something much worse. He hadn't anticipated a situation where the right thing to do was neither save, nor in the rules...

Leo Graf adopted 1000 quaddies, now all he had to do was teach them to be free.



Buy Link: Amazon * Bookdepository



Author Bio:

One of the most respected writers in the field of speculative fiction, Lois McMaster Bujold burst on to the scene in 1986 with Shards of Honor, the first of her tremendously popular Vorkosigan Saga novels. She has received numerous accolades and prizes, including two Nebula Awards for Best Novel (Falling Free and Paladin of Souls), four Hugo Awards for Best Novel (Paladin of Souls, The Vor Game, Barrayar, and Mirror Dance), as well as the Hugo and Nebula Awards for her novella The Mountains of Mourning. She has, in fact, won more Hugo Awards for Best Novel than any other author with the exception of Robert A. Heinlein. The mother of two, Bujold lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

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Friday, May 2, 2014

Spotlight: 99 activities & VERY SIMPLE crafts to do for ALL DADS who want SPEND TIME with THEIR CHILD by Alex Richards

Title: 99 activities & VERY SIMPLE crafts to do for ALL DADS who want SPEND TIME with THEIR CHILD

Author: Alex Richards

Release Date: 2014

Genre: How To Guide

Book Description:  What kid in you? (Yes, yes, he's there!)

Be the companion of your child's play, to build a satisfying relationship with him! 

Being a good parent is a difficult thing. But there are various way to be a good dad. One of them revolves across the game if in addition to taking time for yourself, you are taking the opportunity to provide time to your child in moments of shared complicity? 

This practical guide will allow all dads who wish to create a long-lasting bond with their child, play with him via 99 activities and crafts to do together from 5 years. 

No DIY, writer, father of 2 children, offer simple to build projects to be able to captivate your kid (catapult marshmallows, explosive bag, miniature crossbow...). Activities, largely free, are diverse both indoors and outdoors, round 9 themes (it's sunny, raining, moving...). 

You wish to read this ebook if:

·         you need to create a long-lasting relationship father-youngster
·         you search of ideas to make activities and crafts
·         you want to play together with your child on a restricted budget

Buy Link: Amazon
Free between May 2nd - May 6th 2014! 

Author Bio:

RICHARDS Alex lives in France and his books translated into English. He old about forty years, and is the father of two children: a daughter born in 2005 and a boy born in 2008 He worked at home since 2008 and can therefore involve 100% in the education of his children.

Why a guide for fathers ? Simply because we are talking about what we know.

The author had the opportunity to do many activities being young, but always independently without much paternal presence. His father was of the generation of fathers who can do everything by yourself, but that is not capable of interacting with their children before they reach (at least) adulthood.

For the author, this is quite different! It is almost incapable of making anything complex, but was very present in the lives of her children. In the quest facing each father in activities and crafts to do with a child, it happens sooner or later we find ourselves frustrated by his lack of knowledge about something to do.

To circumvent this problem, and continue to be a superdad, same model manual dexterity in the eyes of his children, he had to think exclusively in activities for Dummies DIY , for those who like him, shuddering at the thought to open a toolbox and discover the instruments it contains...

Dummies fathers will therefore find yourself in this ebook about 99 ideas for activities and crafts to make with their children, who do not ask to buy a jigsaw risk losing fingers.
 
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Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Read: Of Love and Other Demons by Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez

Title: Of Love and Other Demons

Author: Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez

Release Date: 1994

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Book Description:  On her twelfth birthday, Sierva Maria, the only child of a decaying noble family in an eighteenth-century South American seaport, is bitten by a rabid dog. Believed to be possessed, she is brought to a convent for observation. And into her cell stumbles Father Cayetano Delaura, who has already dreamed about a girl with hair trailing after her like a bridal train. As he tends to her with holy water and sacramental oils, Delaura feels something shocking begin to occur. He has fallen in love, and it is not long until Sierva Maria joins him in his fevered misery. Unsettling and indelible, Of Love and Other Demons is an evocative, majestic tale of the most universal experiences known to woman and man.


Buy Links: Amazon * Bookdepository



Author Bio:

Gabriel José de la Concordia Garcí­a Márquez was a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist. Garcí­a Márquez, familiarly known as "Gabo" in his native country, was considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century. In 1982, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

He studied at the University of Bogotá and late worked as a reporter for the Colombian newspaper El Espectador and as a foreign correspondent in Rome, Paris, Barcelona, Caracas and New York. He wrote many acclaimed non-fiction works and short stories, but is best-known for his novels, such as One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967) and Love in the Time of Cholera (1985). His works have achieved significant critical acclaim and widespread commercial success, most notably for popularizing a literary style labeled as magical realism, which uses magical elements and events in order to explain real experiences. Some of his works are set in a fictional village called Macondo, and most of them express the theme of solitude.

 
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