The Kari AnnAlysis

Posts Tagged ‘netgalley’

Ah I can’t believe it’s been a year since I got my little buddy, my Nook. It was my birthday present when I turned 24. It took a lot of pro-con lists to decide which e-reader I wanted and boy am I glad I chose my Nook, which is called Kari’s Nook Book, thanks to my husband.

Like I am with most new technological advances, I don’t know what I did without it. Well, I do, but I don’t like thinking about it. My little Nook has been great the past year for my reading. When I’ve went on trips, I can just load it up and get on the road and not have to worry about taking an armful of books to get me through. It was really helpful last winter when it was snowy and I wasn’t sure how long I would be staying in hotels because I couldn’t make it home. I could just download a book in an instant and not have to worry about running out to the store to grab a new read.

The Nook has also expanded my reading horizons. Before I got my book, I got onto NetGalley, but didn’t’ really get to spend as much time reading from it as I wanted. It is fine to read on your laptop while you are relaxing at home, but it’s not enjoyable lugging your laptop around so you can keep up with your latest read. I have read so many NetGalley books in the past year. It’s definitely become one of my favorite websites. I also got on the Simon & Schuster Galley Grab letter. This is the same deal. You can read them on your computer, but it’s much easier to download them to your Nook and go about your life, reading happily anywhere you want to go.

Now I haven’t shut real books out of my life completely. I have 50+ on my TBR shelf, with about 50 on my NetGalley TBR shelf. So, it’s about half and half.

I would say though that I am not following one of my New Year’s Resolutions. That was to “Read What You Want.” I have a dozen books on my bookshelf that are fun reads that I have bought, but haven’t’ dove into. I have been spending a lot more time requesting NetGalley books and reviewing those by their publication date (or very close to it) than just reading to read. I know this is an easy fix, but I just can’t stand up to the temptation of all the new books added to NetGalley. What can I say? It’s my weakness.

Now at one point, I wasn’t sure I made the right decision about my Nook. I thought that maybe I should have gone a different direction and gotten an iPad. The only reason I thought this was because with an iPad, you can just download all the e-reader apps and have much more to choose from. That way you can read Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Kobo. I have all these apps on my iPhone, but it’s not the same reading on your phone. I recently talked to a friend who has the iPad though who said she had a hard time with it at the beach because of the glare of the sun. That made me happy about my decision 100%. There is no glare with my Nook Book and she enjoyed the beach very much this summer!

Do you love your e-reader as much as I do?

If you don’t have one, and you’re an avid reader, why? Is it because you love holding the book itself? I was the same way and held out for a long time, but now I’m glad I finally made the splurge. I love, love, love it!

On My Book is my own little twist on In My Mailbox, hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren.

I am horrible about doing this on a weekly, or even monthly basis. I get most of my books through NetGalley or the Nook library, and don’t physically get them in the mail, so I always forget about this.

I am going to try to stay on top of this meme because I love seeing it on other blogs. I am a very nosy person and love to see what others are scooping up on a weekly basis.

So this week, I got three books.

Library Audiobook:

“Meredith and Nina Whitson are as different as sisters can be. One stayed at home to raise her children and manage the family apple orchard; the other followed a dream and traveled the world to become a famous photojournalist. But when their beloved father falls ill, Meredith and Nina find themselves together again, standing alongside their cold, disapproving mother, Anya, who even now, offers no comfort to her daughters. As children, the only connection between them was the Russian fairy tale Anya sometimes told the girls at night. On his deathbed, their father extracts a promise from the women in his life: the fairy tale will be told one last time—and all the way to the end. Thus begins an unexpected journey into the truth of Anya’s life in war-torn Leningrad, more than five decades ago. Alternating between the past and present, Meredith and Nina will finally hear the singular, harrowing story of their mother’s life, and what they learn is a secret so terrible and terrifying that it will shake the very foundation of their family and change who they believe they are.”

 
Simon & Schuster Galley Grab:

  
“Nellie Clay married Hobbs Pritchard without even noticing he was a spell conjured into a man, a walking, talking ghost story. But her mama knew. She saw it in her tea leaves: death. Folks told Nellie to get off the mountain while she could, to go back home before it was too late. Hobbs wasn’t nothing but trouble. He’d even killed a man. No telling what else. That mountain was haunted, and soon enough, Nellie would feel it too. One way or another, Hobbs would get what was coming to him. The ghosts would see to that. . .” 

“Together for over a decade, Kyra and David Winter are happier than they ever thought they could be.  They have a comfortable home, stable careers, and a young son, Michael, who they love more than anything.  Yet because of their complicated histories, Kyra and David have always feared that this domestic bliss couldn’t last – that the life they created was destined to be disrupted.  And on one perfectly average summer day, it is: Michael disappears from his own backyard.

The only question is whose past has finally caught up with them: David feels sure that Michael was taken by his troubled ex-wife, while Kyra believes the kidnapper must be someone from her estranged family, someone she betrayed years ago.

As the Winters embark on a journey of time and memory to find Michael, they will be forced to admit these suspicions, revealing secrets about themselves they’ve always kept hidden.  But they will also have a chance to discover that it’s not too late to have the family they’ve dreamed of; that even if the world is full of risks, as long as they have hope, the future can bloom.”

 Did you guys get any good grabs this week???

I actually had planned on making this a much longer post because I went to Borders Friday after work planning on bringing home a half dozen books. I originally picked up four, then put one down and walked around looking for more goodies and ended up with only one book, on my way to the checkout. Then, I saw the line wrapped around the store. I just couldn’t wait that long. It was 40% off, but I just couldn’t do it. What is wrong with me??? I did the same thing when I originally went and books were only 10% off. Needless to say, I walked out with nothing but hopes that they will slash the price again and I will finally bring home the books I have been eying.

When you think of high school, there’s a good chance you probably think of the popularity ladder. What rung were you on? Did you step up and down or were you on the highest step? What if you had a chance to be where ever on that ladder you wanted?

Well Cara has that chance. She is starting a new school her junior year. So she and her best friend make a plan to get Cara at the top of that ladder as a Populazzi, the most beloved in the school. But you can’t just start there. You have to start at the bottom and earn your way up.

But when Cara gets to the top, it may not be what she had in mind. It may be fun, but it may also put her back at the bottom run before she can even blink an eye.

Populazzi is a great representation of the popularity ladder in high school. When I was in high school, I don’t feel like it was as pronounced as in this book. At least in my grade. I think the grade above me had a true populazzi. I think I was in a bunch of different groups. I played sports and hung out with the pretty girls and I was smart. I talked to everyone and thought I was pretty social all along the ladder, but others may have thought differently.

Allen’s story is a great example of the grass isn’t always greener. Yes, you may be popular and hang out with the pretty and shiny but the interior may not be as shiny as the exterior seems. I think this is definitely a great book for high school girls to read. It’s a good story to teach that you should be who you are and not who the popular kids say you should be. It also teaches that you shouldn’t give up the things you like to impress others. I can’t say much on this topic without being hypocritical. Throughout high school and college I transformed into who people wanted to be. It wasn’t until my senior year in college that I realized what I liked to do, like reading and writing and watching Hallmark and Lifetime movies and spending time with three of my cousins who quickly became three of my best friends. I think you are always going to make some changes to fit into your surroundings, like Cara going emo for a guy. That’s not really her thing, but we’ve all done it. I’ve become way more conservative about my clothing and I’ve picked up some new hobbies and learned about the ones my husband likes. I haven’t changed myself, but grew and I think that’s the moral of Populazzi.

I highly recommend this book to anyone with teenage daughters (if they are old enough to know about losing virginity because that is brought up in this book). I give Populazzi 5 bookmarks.

I am also kind of excited because I found an article today on TV Guide talking about casting for a Populazzi show. Could it be the next YA book to become a series and join Gossip Girl, Pretty Little Liars and The Lying Game, which starts this week?

I also learned today, while doing some research on Elise Allen, that she helped Hillary Duff write Elixir. That was one of the first books I bought on my Nook, but havent’ gotten around to reading it yet. I saw on Allen’s website that a sequel to the book is coming out in October. Looks like I need to start reading so I can be ready for it.

ISBN: 978-0547481531
Release Date: August 1, 2011
Author Website
Kari got this book from NetGalley

Ethan  Clark has lived through more hurt than most people in their entire lives. While undercover with the FBI, trying to bust a  human trafficking ring, Clark’s wife and son were killed in an explosion… or so he thought.

He takes a less stressful job policing Florida’s waterways… or so he thought. Everything changes when he is sent a picture of a baby and GPS coordinates.

He finds a baby, but also finds that this baby may just open up a wound he thought was already healed over.

He has some help, retracing a painful past, but has some help along the way from a social worker and his well-trained law enforcement family.

Well, this isn’t the typical read that I pick up. For some reason, it drew me in. Who doesn’t want to save a baby? It was actually a pretty great suspense story with a little love thrown in. There are always couples in books that you are gunning for. Newton gave us that couple almost from the get-go.

She also gave us the man-candy that every girl looks for when reading a book. The strong, protective type. That’s Ethan in a nutshell.

This book had the great mix of serious and fun and lovin’, the complete package. And I am just finding out that this is the 7th in the Emerald Coast 911 series. The first couple in the series are actually about Ethan’s brothers, other men who you will fall in love with in this book. Maybe I need to do some backtracking myself and read these other books. Have I found a new series to immerse myself in (like I can remember all of the ones I’ve started anyway).

I give The Baby’s Bodyguard 4 bookmarks.

ISBN: 978-0373444533
Release Date: August 2, 2011
Author Website
Kari got this book from NetGalley

Funeral homes all remind us of that one special person we have lost and that memory, of the dreadful day is normally pretty vivid in our imagination and time we ever have to go back to a funeral home. For Donna, that person was her dad.

When she returns to the funeral home for the death of a classmate, she feels a pull toward the home and a passion that she hasn’t felt since her father died. And the decision is easy. Instead of going to the University of Dayton, where she’s been accepted, she’s changing her life plan and going to school to be a mortician.

But that’s not the only major change in Donna’s life. She has a new, adventurous best friend, a college boyfriend, her mom has a new boyfriend (on the sly) and her brother is getting married. Oy vey! That’s a lot for someone who does go on the planned path.

But Donna is bound and determined to follow her heart and ends up happily ever after and the drama just makes her stronger.

As weird as this may be to say, I am starting to be drawn to books that are primarily set in funeral homes. It started last year with Nancy Mehl’s Missing Mabel that I found on NetGalley. Then when the sequel came out, I had to read it. I don’t ever think working in a funeral home is a job I could do. I think it would be peaceful and I would like that, but I don’t think I could be part of the preps or be an anchor for those in mourning. I think I am drawn to these books because I respect the people that work in this field.

I love books where I can relate with the character. I was able to do that with Donna. I remember making the decision about what I wanted to do with my life after college. I remember waiting on the letter to let me know I made it. I remember the first college boy I dated. I remember my first time I walked onto my college campus. I remember the first man my mom dated after her divorce. These were all thinks I could relate to with Donna because I knew those feelings.

The characters were all likable, in their own way and all played such great supporting roles.

I give Putting Makeup on Dead People 4 bookmarks.

ISBN:  978-1423134817
Published: May 24, 2011
Kari got this book on NetGalley