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FREE Audiobooks from Sync YA for Summer 2013! (July 25 – July 31, 2013)
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It’s back! Sync YA is back to distributing FREE audiobooks for Summer 2013! Be sure to bookmark their website’s schedule of releases, so you won’t miss out on any of your favorites!
Here’s what’s up for July 25 – July 31, 2013!
- The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen, read by Charlie McWade (Scholastic Audiobooks)
- The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain, read by Steve West (Blackstone Audio)
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Book Review – The Cuckoo’s Calling by JK Rowling (Writing as Robert Galbraith)
Book Description:
The Cuckoo’s Calling is a 2013 crime fiction novel by J. K. Rowling, published under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith.
A brilliant mystery in a classic vein: Detective Cormoran Strike investigates a supermodel’s suicide.
After losing his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan, Cormoran Strike is barely scraping by as a private investigator. Strike is down to one client, and creditors are calling. He has also just broken up with his longtime girlfriend and is living in his office.Then John Bristow walks through his door with an amazing story: His sister, the legendary supermodel Lula Landry, known to her friends as the Cuckoo, famously fell to her death a few months earlier. The police ruled it a suicide, but John refuses to believe that. The case plunges Strike into the world of multimillionaire beauties, rock-star boyfriends, and desperate designers, and it introduces him to every variety of pleasure, enticement, seduction, and delusion known to man.
You may think you know detectives, but you’ve never met one quite like Strike. You may think you know about the wealthy and famous, but you’ve never seen them under an investigation like this.
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Okay, I never heard of The Cuckoo’s Calling until it leaked out that this was really by JK Rowling writing under a pseudonym. When I found out, of course I had to get my own copy (together with a LOT of her other fans, sending the book up the bestseller lists!)
So, after practically devouring the book for the last three days – what can say? I liked it, really liked it – I forgot that this was written by JK Rowling even. I have no idea how some people are saying that they recognize JK Rowling’s style, since I couldn’t tell at all… Honestly, I’d had liked it even if it really was written by a debut author named Robert Galbraith.
The Cuckoo’s Calling is a good old-fashioned whodunit in the vein of PD James and Agatha Christie, very English – London front and center – with a complex-enough puzzle, plenty of interesting suspects, good characters who I cared about almost from the start, and good story-telling that just sucked me into the page … in short, I really look forward to the next installment!
More reasons why I’m recommending this!
- Very likable detective in the PI Cormoran Strike – he reminded me a bit of Alastor ‘Mad-Eye’ Moody (from the Harry Potter books) but maybe only because I knew this was JK Rowling going in
- Very engaging (and smart!) sidekick in Strike’s temporary secretary Robin (she was my fave character – and I’ve got high hopes that she’ll play a more prominent role in future books)
- Surprise (to me) ending – I had NO IDEA who the killer was (even with the plentiful clues). I like being surprised 🙂
- And, a nice break from the gory details, violence and sex that’s pretty typical of the Scandinavian crime novels I’d been reading recently!
The Cuckoo’s Calling (book 1 of the Cormoran Strike series) by JK Rowling (Writing as Robert Galbraith) (Mulholland Books) is available on the ff sites: Amazon, B&N, Kobo, iTunes iBooks, Diesel, Sony and The Book Depository.
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‘5 Questions’ Interview With Glenn Langohr! @rollcallthebook
Today I’m thrilled to welcome author Glenn Langohr to the blog as part of the ‘5 Questions’ with authors interview series!
If you are an author who would like to participate in the series, fill out the questionnaire here! And if you are a reader who wants to suggest an author for the series, just send me an email!
Describe your book Prison Riot, A True Crime Story of Surviving a Gang War in Prison (Prison Killers- Book 5) in ten words or less
Gangs run the prison – B.J.’s struggle to find redemption.
Where or how did you come up with the idea for your story?
I served prison time on drug charges. I turned my life around by going from addicted to drugs, to addicted to writing my experiences.
In Prison Riot, I was one of the only white inmates on the yard. I quickly found the biggest white inmate I could to work out with. We became friends with a handful of Mexican inmates from southern California who were heavily outnumbered by the northern Mexican inmates. When the riot kicked off, we helped out the southern Mexicans and were falsely labeled southern Mexican’s.
I’m inspired to show that incarcerating petty drug criminals in prison, is breeding an addiction into an affliction much harder to escape, for the inmates and the communities.
Which of your characters (in this book) is closest to your heart and why?
I’m biased, B.J. is my favorite character. He represents the discarded drug addicts and orphans of poverty who strive with all their heart to find a redemptive way out.
What was your favorite part to write and why?
My favorite part to write wasn’t the actual riot, I got busted up a little. We went to solitary confinement with over one hundred Mexicans and the prison administration put a blue stamp on our cell. We soon found out that stamp signified we were southern Mexicans! It was fun to write about how hard it was to prove we were white inmates just helping out our new friends.
Do you have a day job? If yes, tell us about it and how did that affect your writing / publishing process?
I also help inspire other prisoners to make a change through writing and art. I give a voice to the voiceless as much as I can and am starting a clothing line that uses inmate art. When I get it all the way up and running I want to give a percentage to victim restitution so the inmates are giving back, and finding some level of redemption.
Bonus Question! Fill in the blank: If you like ___, you’ll probably like my book too!
If you like James Patterson or Elmore Leonard, you’ll love my books. I write fast paced crime thrillers from the inside of the criminal justice system out. Kirkus Discoveries Nielson Media related my first drug war novel Roll Call to the blockbuster movie Traffic.
Thanks again for stopping by, Glenn Langohr! You can learn more about the author via his blog: rollcallthebook, Facebook: lockdownpublishingdotcom, and Twitter: @rollcallthebook.
Prison Riot, A True Crime Story of Surviving a Gang War in Prison (Prison Killers- Book 5) is available on Amazon (Kindle).
Check out Glenn Langohr’s Amazon author page for more info!
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Meme: Musing Mondays (July 22)
The weekly Musing Mondays meme (via the Should Be Reading blog):
Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
I just bought Annexed by Sharon Dogar.
I read The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank when I was a tween, and it was one of the most moving things I’d ever read.
I was intrigued when I read that Annexed was a fictionalized account of Anne’s stay in the Annex and the events after her capture, but told in the POV of Peter (Van Pels) – the young boy who was also in hiding in the Annex with Anne and her family. I wondered if the author was able to pull it off – and best way to tell is to read it for myself!
Here’s the product description!
Everyone knows about Anne Frank and her life hidden in the secret annex – but what about the boy who was also trapped there with her?
In this powerful and gripping novel, Sharon Dogar explores what this might have been like from Peter’s point of view. What was it like to be forced into hiding with Anne Frank, first to hate her and then to find yourself falling in love with her? Especially with your parents and her parents all watching almost everything you do together. To know you’re being written about in Anne’s diary, day after day? What’s it like to start questioning your religion, wondering why simply being Jewish inspires such hatred and persecution? Or to just sit and wait and watch while others die, and wish you were fighting.
As Peter and Anne become closer and closer in their confined quarters, how can they make sense of what they see happening around them?
Anne’s diary ends on August 4, 1944, but Peter’s story takes us on, beyond their betrayal and into the Nazi death camps. He details with accuracy, clarity and compassion the reality of day to day survival in Auschwitz – and ultimately the horrific fates of the Annex’s occupants.
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Weekly Photo Challenge: Fresh
My take on WordPress.Com’s ‘Weekly Photo Challenge‘ meme
In a new post specifically for this challenge, share a photo which means FRESH to you!
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This is a screenshot of a page from the Quirk Books published William Shakespeare’s Star Wars by Ian Doescher. It’s a really FRESH retelling of Star Wars in iambic pentameter, and it’s AMAZING. When I read an excerpt of this (the ‘These are not the droids you are looking for’ scene), I just had to go and order a copy 🙂
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FREE Audiobooks from Sync YA for Summer 2013! (July 18 – July 24, 2013)
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It’s back! Sync YA is back to distributing FREE audiobooks for Summer 2013! Be sure to bookmark their website’s schedule of releases, so you won’t miss out on any of your favorites!
Here’s what’s up for July 18 – July 24, 2013!
- Grave Mercy by Robin LaFevers, read by Erin Moon (Recorded Books)
- Hamlet by William Shakespeare, read by a Full Cast (L.A. Theatre Works)
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Twitter Deal Alert! Barnes & Noble NOOK Simple Touch is $49.99! #BestBuy
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Download Five Years of Tor.com’s Original Fiction for Free!
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