Run for your Life

Synopsis

A calculating killer who calls himself The Teacher is taking on New York City, killing the powerful, the arrogant, the don't-give-a-darnst-about-anyone rich. For some New Yorkers it seems that the rich were getting what they deserve at last. For New York's social elite, it is a call to chaos and terror. The Teacher's message to the wealthy is clear: remember your manners or suffer the consequences!
Detective Mike Bennett is assigned the case. Managing the pressure from his Commissioner, the Mayor, and the New York media would be enough for anyone, but Mike also has to care for his 10 children-who are all under 12 and who all have the flu!
Detective Bennett discovers a secret pattern in the Teacher's lessons-and realizes he has just hours to save New York from the greatest disaster in its history. From the #1 bestselling author who introduced readers to Alex Cross and the Women's Murder Club-comes the continuation of his newest, electrifying series. Run for Your Life is his most heart-stopping thriller yet.

Another great novel by James Patterson, fast read with lots of twist and turns. This is another hard to put down book. You want to keep reading to find out what happens next.

Deep Dish by Mary Kay Andrews

Synopsis

"Tasty Southern adventure...[Andrews is] the queen of sass." —Daytona Beach News-Journal

After years of hard work, Gina Foxton, chef extraordinaire and former runner-up Miss Teen Vidalia Onion, is hosting her own show Fresh Start, on Georgia public television. She's also dating the producer. But when Fresh Start goes bad—and her boyfriend is caught in flagrante delicto with the boss's wife—Gina decides it's time to pursue bigger dreams. Namely a gig on national television.

Gina knows she's destined to be the Cooking Channel's next superstar. But the execs also have their eyes on Tate Moody, Mr. "Kill It and Grill It" himself, host of the hunting, fishing, and cooking show Vittles. The ultimate man's man, Tate is a tasty side of beef with a large, swooning female fan base. Gina's loyal devotees consist of her free-spirited college-dropout sister and her mother...who calls every single day.

When the smoke clears there can be only one TV chef standing, and Gina and Tate are ready for the cook-off of their lives.

I really enjoyed this book. Although slow in some places it is a quick and entertaining read.

One Day at a Time by Danielle Steel

Editorial Review:
Just because Coco Barrington is the black sheep in her legendary Hollywood family doesn’t mean her mother, Florence, a mega-bestselling author, and her sister, Jane, an Oscar-nominated producer, don’t love her. Coco must admit, though, dropping out of law school to work as a dog walker didn’t go over very well. What’s more, Coco shuns the whole Hollywood scene—and she’s rebelliously single, while Jane has lived with her partner, Liz, for ten years and widowed Florence has been seeing someone, too—24 years her junior! But when Coco reluctantly agrees to housesit for Jane, her life takes an unexpectedly dramatic turn…. Jane informs Coco that, to avoid a psychotic girlfriend, her friend Leslie will be sharing the house with Coco for the weekend. What she failed to say is that said “Leslie” is actor Leslie Baxter, the very male British heartthrob, who finds Coco’s honesty refreshing and her heart-stopping beauty impossible to resist. Would Coco ever consider a Hollywood relationship? Funny, sexy and wise, Danielle Steel’s wonderful novel explores the meaning of love and family through three very different couples learning to take life one day at a time.

Having read all of Danielle Steel's books the outcome was predictable. As with all of her books I was not able to put it down and read it in two days. It is a quick read and I truly enjoyed it. The characters are entertaining and interesting.

The Grand Finale by Janet Evanovich

Description:

Berry Knudson had a talent for disaster, but when she climbed a tree to rescue a kitten, she wasn't prepared for the scrumptious hunk undressing in a nearby window, or her dive downward that smashed Jake Sawyer's pizza and won his heart! But was there room in her chaotic schedule for a risk-taking inventor with dreams? She took classes, delivered pizzas, and cared for three eccentric old ladies she rescued from the train station. But Jake thrived on a challenge, and he could be very inventive. Could he teach her there was time to make butterscotch pudding and let herself be loved?

This is a fun book to read. The characters are funny and hilarious at times and make you laugh a lot. The book held my interest from start to finish. I wouldn't say it was one of her best but pretty much what I expected from Janet Evanovich.

Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead

Synopsis

The warm, funny, and supremely original new novel from one of the most acclaimed writers in America

The year is 1985. Benji Cooper is one of the only black students at an elite prep school in Manhattan. He spends his falls and winters going to roller-disco bar mitzvahs, playing too much Dungeons and Dragons, and trying to catch glimpses of nudity on late-night cable TV. After a tragic mishap on his first day of high school—when Benji reveals his deep enthusiasm for the horror movie magazine Fangoria—his social doom is sealed for the next four years.
But every summer, Benji escapes to the Hamptons, to Sag Harbor, where a small community of African American professionals have built a world of their own. Because their parents come out only on weekends, he and his friends are left to their own devices for three glorious months. And although he’s just as confused about this all-black refuge as he is about the white world he negotiates the rest of the year, he thinks that maybe this summer things will be different. If all goes according to plan, that is.
There will be trials and tribulations, of course. There will be complicated new handshakes to fumble through, and state-of-the-art profanity to master. He will be tested by contests big and small, by his misshapen haircut (which seems to have a will of its own), by the New Coke Tragedy of ’85, and by his secret Lite FM addiction. But maybe, with a little luck, things will turn out differently this summer.
In this deeply affectionate and fiercely funny coming-of-age novel, Whitehead—using the perpetual mortification of teenage existence and the desperate quest forreinvention—lithely probes the elusive nature of identity, both personal and communal.

Sag Harbor is the first book that I've read by Colson Whitehead and this book brought me back to my own memories growing up. The book started out pretty slow for me and it didn't really grip me until halfway through. As I kept on reading I was able to identify with the characters and actually ended up liking the book.

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe

Synopsis

A spellbinding, beautifully written novel that moves between contemporary times and one of the most fascinating and disturbing periods in American history -- the Salem witch trials.

Harvard graduate student Connie Goodwin needs to spend her summer doing research for her doctoral dissertation. But when her mother asks her to handle the sale of Connie's grandmother's abandoned home near Salem, she can't refuse. As she is drawn deeper into the mysteries of the family house, Connie discovers an ancient key secreted within a seventeenth-century Bible. The key contains a yellowing fragment of parchment with a name written upon it: Deliverance Dane. This discovery launches Connie on a quest to find out who this woman was, and to unearth a rare colonial artifact of singular power: a physick book, its pages a secret repository for lost knowledge of herbs and other, stranger things.

As the pieces of Deliverance's harrowing story begin to fall into place, Connie is haunted by visions of the long-ago witch trials, and begins to fear that she is more tied to Salem's dark past then she could have ever imagined.

Written with astonishing conviction and grace, The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane travels seamlessly between the trials in the 1690s, and a modern woman's story of mystery, intrigue, and revelation.

I was fortunate to read this book as a member of the First Look Book Club and I loved every page. Ms. Howe did an awesome job writing this novel. I have always been interested in the Salem's witch trials and this book is a page turner into the secrets of witchcraft that may or may not have existed in the 1600's. The characters are lively and it feels like you are there. It is a great story and a fast read. I couldn't put this book down and recommend "The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane" to everyone.