Mailbox Monday was created by The Printed Page. It is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their home last week.
Mailbox Monday is currently on tour, hosted by a different blog each month. The September host is Amused By Books.
Here’s what I received last week:
For review from the publisher through Amazon Vine:
Essential Pépin: More Than 700 All-Time Favorites from My Life in Food
by Jacques Pépin
In his more than sixty years as a chef, Jacques Pépin has earned a reputation as a champion of simplicity. His recipes are classics. They find the shortest, surest route to flavor, avoiding complicated techniques. Essential Pepin spans the many styles of Jacques’s cooking: homey country French, haute cuisine, fast food Jacques-style, and fresh contemporary American dishes. Many of the recipes are globally inspired, from Mexico, across Europe, or the Far East.
A win from The Back of the Book Competition at Leeswammes’ Blog:
A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True
by Brigid Pasulka
On the eve of World War II, in a place called Half-Village, a young man nicknamed the Pigeon falls in love with a girl fabled for her angelic looks. To court Anielica Hetmanská he offers up his “golden hands” to transform her family’s modest hut into a beautiful home, thereby building his way into her heart. Then war arrives to cut short their courtship, delay their marriage, and wreak havoc in all their lives, even sending the young lovers far from home to the promise of a new life in Kraków.
Pop Culture Nerd hosts a fun annual meme called My Life as a Book. She has been doing this for several years but I just found out about it yesterday while reading Cathy’s post at Kittling: Books.
It sounds like fun so I’m joining in. It’s easy to play. Complete the sentences below using titles of books you’ve read this year. Since I only read a book or two a week, I stretched the rules to include a few books I read last year.
My Life as a Book
One time at band/summer camp, I: (saw) Domestic Violets (Matthew Norman)
Weekends at my house are: From the Land of the Moon (Milena Agus)
My neighbor is: The Revenge of the Radioactive Lady (Elizabeth Stuckey-French)
My boss is: Lost in Shangri-la (Mitchell Zuckoff)
My ex was: The White Devil (Justin Evans)
My superhero secret identity is: The Postmistress (Sarah Blake)
You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry because: My Name Is Memory (Ann Brashares)
I’d win a gold medal in: Sex on the Moon (Ben Mezrich)
I’d pay good money for: The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise (Julia Stuart)
If I were president, I would: (be) A Lesson in Secrets (Jacqueline Winspear)
When I don’t have good books, I: Blackout (Connie Willis)
Loud talkers at the movies should be: Packing for Mars (Mary Roach)
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Now it’s your turn! Play along in the comments if you wish or leave a link to your own post. I’m having fun with this.
The Common Grackle is a large, noisy blackbird with bad manners that usually gathers in large flocks. They inhabit most of North America and Canada east of the Rocky Mountains and are short distance migrants. Grackles that nest in Canada and the Great Plains will spend their winters in the central and southern US.
Migration is the only time I get a lot of Grackles at my feeders. When they do show up, they bring their friends and family and will eat anything they can get their beaks on. They are larger than the other birds at the feeders and will push the smaller ones aside to get at the food.
This is a photo I took last September. There are 27 Grackles and one Sparrow at the feeders and more Grackles in the trees. The larger Woodpeckers will argue with them but most of the other birds back off. Grackles prefer to eat on the ground and I’ve found that sprinkling a small amount of seed on the ground will help keep them off the feeders.
A few days ago I spotted a youngster and an adult male at the feeder. I can only assume dad was teaching him where to find food. That’s the youngster to the left and dad below. (Click photos for sharper images.)
Grackles appear black from a distance but up close the male has a glossy iridescent body, a purplish head and bright yellow eyes. Females are brownish black and less iridescent with the same yellow eyes. Juveniles are a dull brown color with dark eyes that will turn yellow as they age.
Interesting Facts:
- In winter, Common Grackles forage and roost in large communal flocks. These flocks can number in the millions of individuals.
- Grackles, not Crows, are the number one threat to cornfields. They will eat ripening corn and can have a multimillion dollar impact.
- Grackles are resourceful foragers. They will eat mice, wade into water to catch small fish, steal worms from American Robins, raid nests, and kill and eat adult birds.
For more bird photos check out my previous Weekend Birding posts.
I link up my bird photos on Saturday Snapshot hosted by Alyce at At Home With Books. Visit her blog to see more great photos or add your own.
For the 6th year Stainless Steel Droppings is hosting the
R.eaders I.mbibing P.eril Challenge
Affectionately known as the R.I.P. Challenge.
There are multiple levels of participation (Perils) from as little as reading one book (for the time-challenged) to reading four books, participating in group discussions and even watching movies. Choose as many perils as you wish.
The challenge runs from September 1st through October 31st.
I’m choosing to participate at:
Peril the Second:
Read two books of any length that you believe fit within the challenge categories.
The categories to choose from are:
Mystery.
Suspense.
Thriller.
Dark Fantasy.
Gothic.
Horror.
Supernatural.
I have chosen The Lantern as my first book. I haven’t decided on my second book yet. I have quite a few on my shelf to choose from and I’m always open to suggestions.
Sex on the Moon
The Amazing Story Behind the Most Audacious Heist in History
by Ben Mezrich
Genre: Narrative Non-Fiction
Publisher: Doubleday
Publish Date: July 12, 2011
Format: Hardcover | 320 pages
Rating: 3½ of 5
The true story of Thad Roberts, a brilliant young NASA co-op intern, who steals moon rocks from NASA’s Johnson Space Center and tries to sell them on the internet.
After Thad confides in his girlfriend and another female friend about his scheme to steal the rocks, they agree to help him. NASA has two sets of moon rocks: those that have become contaminated through experimentation and research and those that are still untouched. Since the contaminated rocks are considered trash by NASA, they don’t see the harm in taking them.
The book reads more like a mild thriller than a narrative based on a true story. While not action-packed or suspenseful (we know he steals the moon rocks), the story is an entertaining adventure and an easy read. It moves along at a medium pace until almost the end when the real action begins.
Once it became apparent how and why Thad was going to steal the rocks I kept asking myself, “Are you kidding me? How can someone this smart be so stupid? And why did he think he could possible get away with this?” Thad is not a likable character. I found him to be arrogant and annoying, always wanting to be the center of attention. He threw away a brilliant career with NASA to impress his girlfriend with little thought about the wife he left back home.
I’ve always been a huge fan of the space program, space exploration and science in general. If I had a job like that there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell I’d do anything to jeopardize it, which is why I had trouble relating to this level of idiocy. But it didn’t stop me from reading on. On the contrary, I continued reading, puzzling over the revelation that intelligence and common sense do not necessarily go hand in hand, and trying to comprehend it.
Overall a good book and it would probably make a good movie. The fact that it’s a true story makes it more interesting than if it were fiction. I found the background information on NASA and NASA Operations at the Johnson Space Center to be interesting and insightful while not getting technical. The authors acknowledges that some names and places were changed for privacy reasons and that some conversations were re-created, but essentially the details and the chronology are true.
Two Copies to Giveaway
Thanks to Doubleday Books, I have two copies of Sex on the Moon to give away to my readers. There are still a few more days to enter. Fill out the form for a chance to win a copy. Deadline to enter is Sunday, September 4th. I will draw the winners using random.org when I turn on my computer Monday morning. US addresses only as the books are shipped by the publisher.
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Review copy provided by Doubleday Books.
Almost Wordless: This is a Heliopsis Helianthoides also called False Sunflower. Another one of the wildflowers I put in the new garden last year. They have been blooming since July and are very low maintenance.
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More Wordless Wednesday.
Mailbox Monday was created by The Printed Page. It is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their home last week.
Mailbox Monday is currently on tour, hosted by a different blog each month. The August host is Staci at Life in the Thumb.
Two books and two audiobooks this week for review.
For review from Simon and Schuster:
A Thousand Lives: The Untold Story of Hope, Deception, and Survival at Jonestown
by Julia Scheeres
They left America for the jungles of Guyana to start a better life. Yet what started as a Utopian dream soon devolved into a terrifying work camp run by a madman, ending in the mass murder-suicide of 914 members in November 1978.
For review from Crown Publishing Group:
Death in the City of Light: The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris
by David King
Death in the City of Light is the gripping, true story of a brutal serial killer who unleashed his own reign of terror in Nazi-Occupied Paris. As decapitated heads and dismembered body parts surfaced in the Seine, Commissaire Georges-Victor Massu, head of the Brigade Criminelle, was tasked with tracking down the elusive murderer in a twilight world of Gestapo, gangsters, resistance fighters, pimps, prostitutes, spies, and other shadowy figures of the Parisian underworld.
Two audiobooks for review from HarperAudio:
Love Lies Bleeding
by Jess McConkey
To what lengths would you go to keep a past buried? Samantha Moore is the golden girl—with a perfect job, a perfect man, a perfect life—until a random act of violence changes everything. Unconscious for two months, Sam awakens from her coma a different person—bitter, in constant pain, and forced to endure medications that leave her nauseous, paranoid, and struggling to keep a grip on reality.
The Most Dangerous Thing
by Laura Lippman
Years ago, they were all the best of friends. But as time passed and circumstances changed, they grew apart, became adults with families of their own, and began to forget about the past—and the terrible lie they all shared. But now Gordon, the youngest and wildest of the five, has died and the others are thrown together for the first time in years. Could their long-ago lie be the reason for their troubles today?
Under My Apple Tree 