2024 Reading Challenge

2024 Reading Challenge
Jill Elizabeth has read 1 book toward her goal of 285 books.
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2023 Reading Challenge

2023 Reading Challenge
Jill Elizabeth has read 5 books toward her goal of 265 books.
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Book Review: Story Bug Personalized Children’s Books

If you, like me, have a child/children with names that are not common in the vernacular, or are spelled in a way that is less common, you know the devastation that is a child who can never seem to find “their” name in a book. Ditto if you have a child/children (again, like me) who never seem to quite find themselves in the characters they encounter.  Or if you have a reluctant reader, who can’t seem to find any characters that they can relate to on their own. Personalized story books are a fabulous solution to these challenges, and Story Bug is a fabulous source for that solution!

I was contacted by the company to ask if I ever reviewed personalized books. I reported that I had not but would be happy to, and I was invited to order several books for review. My obligation-free review copies were provided directly by Story Bug.

Continue reading Book Review: Story Bug Personalized Children’s Books

Book Review AND Excerpt: One Big Happy Family by Susan Mallery

About the Book

For fans of Mary Kay Andrews, Jenny Bayliss, and Julie Murphy, #1 New York Times bestselling author Susan Mallery’s witty and heartfelt story of a mother who couldn’t love her kids more but hopes that, just this once, they please don’t come home for Christmas. Continue reading Book Review AND Excerpt: One Big Happy Family by Susan Mallery

Excerpt: The Midnight Club by Margot Harrison

About the Book

Four friends. A campus reunion. A dark new way to relive the past.

It’s been twenty-five years since The Midnight Club last convened. A tight-knit group of college friends bonded by late nights at the campus literary magazine, they’re also bonded by something darker: the death of their brilliant friend Jennet junior year. But now, decades later, a mysterious invitation has pulled them back to the pine-shrouded Vermont town where it all began. Continue reading Excerpt: The Midnight Club by Margot Harrison

Excerpt: The Banned Books Club by Brenda Novak

About the Book

For fans of Elin Hilderbrand, a riveting exploration of family, sisterhood, and the transformative power of literature. When two sisters, one a free spirit at the helm of a rebellious book club, the other a conventional woman locked in the clutches of an unhappy marriage are forced into a reluctant reunion by their mother’s illness, they must confront past ghosts that rock the entire community. Continue reading Excerpt: The Banned Books Club by Brenda Novak

Excerpt: The Changing of Keys by Carolyn Jack

About the Book

With his father dead, a gifted, fourteen-year-old pianist finds himself sent away from his Caribbean home against his will, to study classical music in the U.S. with a family friend he’ s never met. His first angry, frightened step away from the controlling mother he’ s never been able to reach becomes a sharp break with her he leaps into the dramatic and cutthroat world of opera. In this high-stakes milieu, his fierce desire to be a star fires both his brilliance and the dark distrust of women and of love that is the legacy of his childhood, a legacy that threatens his career, his impulsive marriage, and the young daughter he never wanted. Continue reading Excerpt: The Changing of Keys by Carolyn Jack