Are You Sleeping Little One?

Title: Are You Sleeping Little One?
Publisher: Abeville press
Pub Date: August 14th, 2012
Author: Hans-Christian Schmidt and Cynthia Vance
Received From: NetGalley



Introduce young children to how baby animals sleep with this whimsical board book. With lyrical bedtime rhymes, it describes the sleeping habits of over a dozen animals, including species both common and rare, from ducklings to sloths, bats to giraffes! Its gentle rhymes and sweet, soothing pictures are the perfect way for little ones to end the day.

C's Review- This is a cute book, I liked to see all the babies with their mommies. It is interesting that not all of the babies have a specific name separate from their mom. Like a baby kangaroo is a joey but a baby sloth is just a sloth. I liked all of the rhymes and pictures in this book too. 

Mom's Review- This was a really good little book for young ones because as I have learned repetition is great but many books cover the same animals over and over again. In this story we get to see some of the traditional Parent/Child animal combo but there are new ones as well and quite a few of them. I love getting to share with my kids that bats and bees are not just scary but also loving parts of families. While we are past most board books this one is long enough the entertain a young preschooler and mine enjoyed it thoroughly. 

How Lucky You Are

Title: How Lucky You Are
Publisher:Grand Central Publishing
Pub Date: September 4th, 2012
Author: Kristen Kusek Lewis
Received From: NetGalley


In the tradition of Emily Giffin and Marisa de los Santos, HOW LUCKY YOU ARE is an engaging and moving novel about three women struggling to keep their longstanding friendship alive. Waverly, who's always been the group's anchor, runs a cozy bakery but worries each month about her mounting debt. Kate is married to a man who's on track to be the next governor of Virginia, but the larger questions brewing in their future are unsettling her. Stay-at-home mom Amy has a perfect life on paper, but as the horrific secret she's keeping from her friends threatens to reveal itself, she panics. 
As life's pressures build all around them, Waverly knows she has some big decisions to make. In doing so, she will discover that the lines between loyalty and betrayal can become blurred, happy endings aren't always clear-cut, and sometimes you have to risk everything to gain the life you deserve.

Nothing really warms my heart like true friendship. I have been the lucky recipient of it more times than I can count and I know that it is a true blessing. In How Lucky You Are we meet three friends, Waverly a bakery owner who is struggling with money and worried in her life. Amy a stay at home mother to a young girl who's husband a doctor seems to have a secret. Kate a young woman on the verge of protecting her husband and furthering his political career. From the get go I can see that Waverly feels that she needs some rescuing, but in reality as you will find maybe she has a bit more of the rescuer in her than she thought. Things aren't quite what they seem in her two friends home. As I well know it is often those you least suspect going through the most. Watching these three women handle their challenges and triumph over some hard obstacles was heartwarming and true!

The Fine Color of Rust

Title: The Fine Color of Rust
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Pub Date: September 4th, 2012
Author: P.A. O'Reilly
Received From: NetGalley


Loretta Boskovic never dreamed she would end up a single mother with two kids in a dusty Australian country town. She never imagined she’d have to campaign to save the local primary school. She certainly had no idea her best friend would turn out to be the crusty old junk man. All in all, she’s starting to wonder if she took a wrong turn somewhere. If only she could drop the kids at the orphanage and start over...
     But now, thanks to her protest letters, the Education Minister is coming to Gunapan, and she has to convince him to change his mind about the school closure. And as if facing down the government isn’t enough, it soon becomes clear that the school isn’t the only local spot in trouble. In the drought stricken bushland on the outskirts of town, a luxury resort development is about to siphon off a newly discovered springwater supply. No one seems to know anything, no one seems to care.
     With a dream lover on a Harley unlikely to appear out of nowhere to save the day, Loretta needs to stir the citizens of Gunapan to action. She may be short of money, influence, and a fully functioning car, but she has good friends. Together they can organize chocolate drives, supermarket sausage sizzles, a tour of the abattoir—whatever it takes to hold on to the scrap of world that is home.
     A delightful novel for fans of Jennifer Weiner, Fannie Flagg, and Maeve Binchy, The Fine Color of Rust is a wonderful reminder that sometimes it really does take a village—and a healthy dose of humor—to change the world. 

The lifestyle in this book is something so foreign to me that the characters which are so lovable really made the book interesting. A woman carrying on her life after a man has left her it's always a story that warms my heart.  I love to see perseverance and this is for sure a theme. Loretta is a single mother raising two kids and working to save the school in her town. The lovely neighbor next-door Norm  an older man who has befriended her adds so much to this tale. With his son who has just returned home and some issues of his own. When  the school issue is resolved and the  husband returns with his new "friend" I anticipated some good drama, the calmness here really made me see the depth of Loretta. She has been burned a time or two but she continues on! With some humor and interesting traditions this is a book I couldn't pass up.

The Booby Trap

Title: The Booby Trap
Publisher: Pixel Entertainment
Pub Date: September 1st, 2012
Author: Anne Browning Walker
Received From: NetGalley

Welcome to The Booby Trap, a seedy bar where waitresses' skirts are high, necklines are low and customers show up for the eye candy.

When brainy, beautiful, Harvard Ph.D. candidate Bambi Benson wants to study the women of the the Booby Trap for her dissertation, she goes undercover and joins them.  All is going well for Bambi until handsome local celebrity Trip Whitley enters the scene.

Hoping to shock his high-society family by dating a bimbo, Trip offers to pay Bambi to pretend to be his girlfriend.  She accepts his offer and bides her time, waiting for the right moment to reveal her true identity and teach Trip not to judge based on appearances.

After a series of dates carefully orchestrated for their publicity value, Bambi's trap is set.  But there's one problem: the predator might have fallen in love with her prey.

This has to be one of the funniest titles for a book that I had no real idea where it was going. Bambi is not who you think she will be While she plays a waitress at a hooters type restaurant she is really a Ph.D. Candidate using her work here as research . But I love the idea of her getting into the craft to determine how to study the woman who do it. Trip is the stereotypical man you expect him to be and I had a hard time really loving him as a character. The relationship between these two is a banter back and forth and some of them each using and playing one another. There are some great laughable moments in this book but it just didn't WOW me!

Last Chance Bride

Title: Last Chance Bride
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Pub Date: September 4th, 2012
Author: Hope Ramsay
Received From: NetGalley 

Dear Reader,

My boy Stone has always been the quiet one in the family, but now he's got the whole town talking.  He and his long-time sweetheart Sharon are crazy about each other, but suddenly they can't see eye-to-eye on their future. Sharon thought they were going to go to college, then get married. But Stone had other plans--plans he didn't share with anyone.

So it looks like our resident matchmaker Miriam is going to be wrong for the first time ever. She swears Sharon and Stone are true soul mates. Well, I think between the broken promises and Sharon's meddling mother, these two kids are going to need a miracle to make it down the aisle. . . 

There's Arlene-I just need to finish her trim and then I can head over to the Watermelon Festival. Be sure to stop back by the Cut 'n' Curl for hot rollers, free coffee-and the best gossip in town.

See you real soon, 

Ruby Rhodes


I never really know what to expect when I head back into Last Chance. I've enjoyed many of Hope Ramsay's books. but I just didn't fall in love with Last Chance Bride. As a Novella or short story I knew I wouldn't get a lot of character detail or back story. But I was really expecting just a bit more. As always the story was one of interest. Stone and Sharon are younger and in love, but Stone makes the decision to head off to the marines instead of college as he and Sharon had planned. There are some moments of great story telling, like Stone having a conversation with his Aunt Arlene about his thoughts, plans and futures. If I could change one thing in this book it would really be to add just a bit more. Show the reader how this ends, or at least moves forward!

Cedar Creek Seasons

Title: Cedar Creek Seasons
Publisher: Barbour Publishing
Pub Date: September 1st, 2012
Author: Eileen key, Becky Melby, Rachal Phillips, Cynthia Ruchti
Received From: NetGalley


Charming Cedarburg, Wisconsin—perched on the banks of Cedar Creek and picturesque in every season—sets the mood for a new Romancing America four-in-one. Follow free-spirited forty-something Willow, who meets her opposite; twenty-five-year-old musician Francesca, who’s working with a man who sings off-key; silver-haired Claire, who gets surprised by a long-ago love; and thirty-something Beth, a shop owner who really doesn’t have time for a relationship. For these four women, there’s something magical about Cedarburg—it pulls people together, plucks the strings of their hearts, and writes a love song.

Four lovely romances all in one pretty package! I love books that contain stories of a similar nature and this one didn't disappoint. Set in a small town in Wisconsin, the four stories each take on a setting of a season of the year. It really made me think about how different times of years and acts of nature shape our lives and the things we do and feel during those times!
We begin in the winter with Willow and Wilson in a story titled A contest of Wills this is such a reat name! We are taken down a path of artists, adventure, contests, and of course love. Two ecentric characters you can't help but fall in love with yourself. As we move into the spring I feel the growth of young love and man does this story deliver. In Tune with You is the tale of Chesca and Seth, who are working together on an Easter Sunday production. They have some fun, some silly farm animals and in the end a lasting relationship. The third story Silvery Summer is a great tale of love but it adds something when those falling in love are in their senior years and a rekindling is happening. Eli and Claire once had it all, lost it along the way and through some fate and divine intervention find it again. Then we head into our final season and story. Maybe us is the tale of two working people on the same street. Beth and Derrick are beginning to like one another when a secret could stand to destroy them. this last story adds some drama but just enough for intrigue. I really love how all four books tie together without sharing a character!

When Lightening Strikes

Title: When Lightning Strikes
Publisher: Harlequin
Pub Date: August 28th , 2012
Author: Brenda Novak
Received From: NetGalley



Welcome to Whiskey Creek- Heart of the Gold Country! Simon O'Neal's causing trouble again. And it's up to Gail DeMarco to stop him. Gail DeMarco left Whiskey Creek, California, to make a name  for herself in Los Angeles. Her PR firm has accumulated a roster  of A-list clients, including the biggest box office hit of all- sexy and unpredictable Simon O'Neal. But Simon, who's just been through a turbulent divorce, is so busy self-destructing he won't listen to anything she says. She drops him from her list-and he retaliates by taking the rest of her clients with him. Desperate to save her company, Gail has to humble herself by making a deal with Simon. The one thing he wants is custody  of his son, but that's going to require a whole new image.  He needs to marry some squeaky-clean girl who'll drag him  off to some small, obscure place like Whiskey Creek.... Gail's the only one he can trust. She agrees to become his wife-reluctantly. But she isn't reluctant because he's too hard to like.  It's because he's too hard not to love

I flat out loved this book! at first I had a bit of a hard time following the fast paced world of Public relations in Hollywood. But within a few chapters I was hooked. The characters of Simon and Gail are the true essence of work relationships changing. It was so fun to watch them enter into a contract, see what's out there and then change their relationship. The one thing I had a hard time with was Simon's Ex wife. I really wish he would have shared more with Gail on what was happening there and how it all went down. What a jerk that woman is! The life they built for themselves up in Whiskey Creek and the house were all things written so well I could picture them in my mind. These factors make for a great romantic read and a fun one!