Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week.
Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy,
toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.
Also, every Wednesday, Serena, Leslie, and I will share the
Books that Caught Our Eye from everyone’s weekly links.
My mailbox has been a bit lonely lately, but last week it saw a few books.
The Life And Times Of Richard Musto by Joe Lamport (book tour)
The biography of an eighty-nine year old man living on the streets of New York City, told through free verse and arresting photographs, this books provides a journalistic investigation into the art of survival in America today.
True Blend by Joanne Demaio (book tour)
Vintage bridal shop owner Amy Trewist thinks she’ll never recover her quiet life at her beloved farmhouse on an old country road. Not after her two-year-old daughter Grace is kidnapped in an elaborate crime. On one clear morning, in mere minutes, Grace is gone and Amy’s world spins into a heartbreaking new place.
George Carbone often spends easy time with his brother. Whether at a ballgame or taking a day trip, it’s how they connect. Until one sunny day when the trip is to a bank parking lot and George is drawn into a crime he never sees coming. And into a stricken mother’s life he cannot ignore.
In a summer that simmers with the unsolved crime, George is haunted by a bankroll hidden behind kitchen tiles, by a brother who dragged him into this, and by a father who instilled in him a conscience. A conscience challenged when a young child and beautiful woman crossed paths with him and unexpectedly took hold of his heart.
Set among the red barns, lush cornfields and sparkling wishing fountain of Addison, Connecticut, True Blend is a captivating novel that steals your heart and does not let go. Because like the lace wedding gowns hanging on Amy’s clothesline, waltzing in the summer breeze, love and secrets twist and spin together in their own mesmerizing dance.
Shotgun Lovesongs by Nickolas Butler (from Audiobook Jukebox)
It’s a place like hundreds of others, nothing special, really. But for four friends—all born and raised in this small Wisconsin town—it is home. And now they are men, coming into their own, or struggling to do so.
One of them never left, still working the family farm that has been tilled for generations. But others felt the need to move on, with varying degrees of success. One trades commodities, another took to the rodeo circuit, and one of them even hit it big as a rock star. And then there’s Beth, a woman who has meant something special in each of their lives.
Now all four are brought together for a wedding. Little Wing seems even smaller than before. While lifelong bonds are still strong, there are stresses—between the friends, between husbands and wives. There will be heartbreak, but there will also be hope, healing, even heroism as these memorable people learn the true meaning of adult friendship and love.
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The next group of books didn’t come in my mailbox, but I wanted to tell you about a great deal I found at the flea/farmers market last week. Most everyone knows how much I love Stephen King, and that I’m a cover snob. What you may not know is that not only do I love book covers, I’m also partial to hardcovers. So…you can imagine how happy I was to find 6 SK’s books, all of them in hardcover, and all in like new condition. They still have that crinkly sound when your open them!! The best part is that they were only $2 each!!
Needful Things ~ 690 pages
A new store has opened in the town of Castle Rock, Maine. It has whatever your heart desires…if you’re willing to pay the price. In this chilling novel by one of the most potent imaginations of our time, evil is on a shopping spree and out to scare you witless.
Nightmares And Dreamscapes ~ 816 pages
The Stephen King Amusement Park – an unnerving experience, with rides every which way to hell …and a few to glory.A solitary finger pokes out of a drain. Novelty teeth turn predatory. The Nevada desert swallows a Cadillac. Meanwhile, the legend of Castle Rock returns …and grows on you. What does it all mean? What else could it mean? Stephen King is here with a powerful collection of stories – a vast, many-chambered cave of a volume.The long reach of Stephen King’s imagination will take you on a roller coaster to places you’ve never been before. You will lose sleep. But Stephen King, writing to beat the devil, will do your dreaming for you.
Four Past Midnight ~ 930 pages
Featuring The Langoliers, Secret Window, The Library Policeman and The Sun Dog. The survivors of a plane crash awake in a nightmare, a writer finds himself at the end of an accusing finger, a businessman struggles to uncover the evil driving him mad, and a ravenous dog inhabits a camera, in a horror quartet.
Desperation ~ 690 pages
Something is terribly wrong in Desperation, Nevada — a small mining town just off Route 50 with a played out open pit copper mine. The streets are wind swept and deserted; animals have the run of the town and something horrific is brewing in the now abandoned mine pit. You won’t have a good day in Desperation. — En route to Lake Tahoe for a much anticipated vacation, the Carver family is arrested for blowing out all four tires on their camper. Collie Entragian is the arresting officer, the self-made sheriff of a town called Desperation, Nevada, and the quintessential bad cop.
“You have the right to remain silent”, the big cop said in his robot’s voice. “If you do not choose to remain silent, anything you say may be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. I’m going to kill you. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand your rights as I have explained them to you?”
Unbeknownst to the Carvers, Entragian regularly sniffs out passerbys on this stretch of road, and in fact has done in nearly every resident of his hometown. He can also change form and summon the help of creepy creatures, including scorpions, snakes and spiders.
Though the family seems doomed, an unlikely hero emerges –11-year-old David Carver–who finds his own way to get around the Law.
Skeleton Crew ~ 512 pages
In this brilliant collection of stories, Stephen King takes readers down paths that only he could imagine.
A supermarket becomes the place where humanity makes its last stand against destruction. A trip to the attic becomes a journey to hell. A woman driver finds a scary shortcut to paradise. An idyllic lake harbors a bottomless evil. And a desert island is the scene of the most terrifying struggle for survival ever waged.
Bag Of Bones ~ 529 pages
Stephen King’s most gripping and unforgettable novel, Bag of Bones, is a story of grief and a lost love’s enduring bonds, of a new love haunted by the secrets of the past, of an innocent child caught in a terrible crossfire.
Set in the Maine territory King has made mythic, Bag of Bones recounts the plight of forty-year-old bestselling novelist Mike Noonan, who is unable to stop grieving even four years after the sudden death of his wife, Jo, and who can no longer bear to face the blank screen of his word processor.
Now his nights are plagued by vivid nightmares of the house by the lake. Despite these dreams, or perhaps because of them, Mike finally returns to Sara Laughs, the Noonans’ isolated summer home.
He finds his beloved Yankee town familiar on its surface, but much changed underneath — held in the grip of a powerful millionaire, Max Devore, who twists the very fabric of the community to his purpose: to take his three-year-old granddaughter away from her widowed young mother. As Mike is drawn into their struggle, as he falls in love with both of them, he is also drawn into the mystery of Sara Laughs, now the site of ghostly visitations, ever-escalating nightmares, and the sudden recovery of his writing ability. What are the forces that have been unleashed here — and what do they want of Mike Noonan?
As vivid and enthralling as King’s most enduring works, Bag of Bones resonates with what Amy Tan calls “the witty and obsessive voice of King’s powerful imagination.” It’s no secret that King is our most mesmerizing storyteller. In Bag of Bones — described by Gloria Naylor as “a love story about the dark places within us all” — he proves to be one of our most moving.
