Death du Jour by Kathy Reichs

Assaulted by the bitter cold of a Montreal winter, the American-born Dr. Temperance Breman, Forensic Anthropologist for the Province of Quebec, digs for a corpse where Sister Elisabeth Nicolet, dead over a century and now a candidate for sainthood, should lie in her grave. A strange, small coffin, buried in the recesses of a decaying church, holds the first clue to the cloistered nun's fate. The puzzle surrounding Sister Elisabeth's life and death provides a welcome contrast to discoveries at a burning chalet, where scorched and twisted bodies await Tempe's professional expertise. Who were these people? What brought them to this gruesome fate? Homicide Detective Andrew Ryan, with whom Tempe has a combustive history, joins her in the arson investigation. From the fire scene they are drawn into the worlds of an enigmatic and controversial professor, a mysterious commune, and a primate colony on a Carolina island. From Goodreads.



I keep having to tell myself that the TV-series Bones is only loosely based on this book series. The Dr. Temperance Brennan is a very different woman than on TV. She is an ex-alcoholic, mother and quite emotional. I still enjoyed the book and I am definitely going to continue reading this series.

This book qualifies for:
I Love Library Books Reading Challenge 2014
2014 Literary Exploration Reading Challenge (mystery)
2014 Full House Reading Challenge (crime)
Eclectic Reader Challenge 2014
CCC A-Z Authors 2014
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
Crazy Challenge Connection Chinese New Year Challenge (#2)
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss
Sequel Spring Reading Challenge
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Setting Alphabet Reading Challenge
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (K-kestrel)
Crazy Challenge Connection Monopoly
Crazy Challenge Connection Scrabble, anyone?
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Book Buffs’ Battleship
Crazy Challenge Connection 2014 RaT #3

Vinter-Eventyr by Karen Blixen

In Isak Dinesen's universe, the magical enchantment of the fairy tale and the moral resonance of myth coexist with an unflinching grasp of the most obscure human strengths and weaknesses. A despairing author abandons his wife, but in the course of a long night's wandering, he learns love's true value and returns to her, only to find her a different woman than the one he left. A landowner, seeking to prove a principle, inadvertently exposes the ferocity of mother love. A wealthy young traveler melts the hauteur of a lovely woman by masquerading as her aged and loyal servant.
Shimmering and haunting, Dinesen's Winter's Tales transport us, through their author's deft guidance of our desire to imagine, to the mysterious place where all stories are born. From Goodreads.

Not a book for me. I found most of the stories rather depressing. I have not read much by Karen Blixen and if this was the only book I would not read any more but I enjoyed Out of Africa so I won't completely dismiss her.

This book qualifies for:
2014 Quick fix Challenge (259 pages)
I Love Library Books Reading Challenge 2014
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (K-hawk)
Crazy Challenge Connection Scrabble, anyone?
Crazy Challenge Connection 2014 RaT #3

An Unlikely Match by Barbara Dunlop

Morgan Holbrook has a PhD in jet propulsion, a plum research position at CalTech and a sexy, new neighbor who is way out of his league. He’s got all the confidence in the world where it comes to applied physics, but he’s never been the guy who gets the girl.
Cheerleader Amelia Camden has sworn off boyfriends, focusing instead on her budding acting career. But when her nerdy, next door neighbor passes up his high school reunion, party enthusiast Amelia is determined to change his mind.
Wanting his former classmates to appreciate Morgan the way she does, as a brilliant, compassionate, engaging man, she goads him into a haircut, a great suit and a pair of contact lenses. Morgan plays along with the sexy Amelia. Who wouldn’t? But when her flattery turns to flirtation, he knows it’s all part of the act. From Goodreads.




This was sweet. A group of oldies playing matchmakers between their grandchildren, nieces and nephews. The couple Morgan and Amelia are very different but an okay couple. The ones I really like are the scheming oldies. A fun read.

This book qualifies for:
2014 Ebook challenge
2014 Quick fix Challenge (164 pages)
2014 Read Your Freebies! Reading Challenge (free on Amazon.co.uk 15th of March 2014)
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
Romance Readers Reading Challenges: Pass The Parcel Team Challenge
Crazy Challenge Connection Chinese New Year Challenge (Connie's bookshelf- she is a horse)
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss 
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (U-muskox)
Nothing but Reading Challenges - 50 States Challenge (California)
Crazy Challenge Connection Monopoly

One Sweet Moment by Maggie Craig

It's 1822 and Scotland's capital is a city of both splendour and squalor. Kate Dunbar is worked like a slave all day and preyed upon at night in the gloomy vaults that lurk under the Old Town's South Bridge but never gives up hope of a better life for herself and her beloved young brother Andrew.
When wealthy young medical student Richard Hope walks into her life, Kate knows that his interest in her could lead them both into danger. Yet it's not long before the two of them have fallen head-over-heels in love.
Others are watching the young lovers. Radical booksellers Peggy and Nathaniel Henderson have Kate and Andrew's best interests at heart. Their greedy and grasping uncle doesn't, and he soon soon starts laying his own evil plans.
Kate and Richard's passionate and poignant romance intertwines with the richly-imagined colour and pageantry of King George IV's historic visit to Edinburgh in 1822, and culminates in the heart-stopping drama of the Great Fire of Edinburgh of 1824.
Can their love affair have a happy ending or will fate, the evil that threatens them and the rigid rules of class and society allow them only one sweet moment of happiness? From Goodreads.

This is a very sad romance. I like the main character Kate a lot, she does what it takes to survive and care for her brother. Her uncle and aunt are awful but there are good people around. Richard, a wealthy medical student, finds out how the poor of Edinburgh live and finds love. Do not reed this if you only like books with a happy ending.

This book qualifies for:
2014 Ebook challenge
Read Scotland 2014
Meet the Protagonist Reading Challenge 2014
CCC A-Z Book Titles 2014
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
The Challenge Factory Spell It Out - Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (O)
Romance Readers Reading Challenges: 2014 Chubby Chunkster (452 pages)
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (O-coyote)

Seduction and Snacks by Tara Sivec

Claire is a twenty-something, single mom that grudgingly helps her best friend sell sex toys while she attempts to make enough money to start her own business to give her foul-mouthed, but extremely loveable (when he's asleep) toddler a better life.
When Carter, the one-night-stand from her past that changed her life forever, shows up in her hometown bar without any recollection of her besides her unique chocolate scent, Claire will make it a point that he remembers her this time.
With Carter's undisguised shock at suddenly finding out he has a four-year-old son and Claire's panic that her stretch marks and slim to none bedroom experience will send the man of her dreams heading for the hills, the pair will do whatever they can to get their happily ever after. From Goodreads.





I read this because I saw a review which said the reader giggled the whole way through. I didn't. My humour must be very different to hers. Having the word vagina in every other sentence whether it is said by an adult or a 4 year old is, to me, not funny.
I do like a nice romance, but this was too crude.

This book qualifies for:
2014 Ebook challenge
2014 Quick fix Challenge (257 pages)
2014 Literary Exploration Reading Challenge (erotica)
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
Crazy Challenge Connection Chinese New Year Challenge (AndaM's bookshelf - she is a ox)
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (S-kestrel)

Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams

What do a dead cat, a computer whiz-kid, an Electric Monk who believes the world is pink, quantum mechanics, a Chronologist over 200 years old, Samuel Taylor Coleridge (poet), and pizza have in common? Apparently not much; until Dirk Gently, self-styled private investigator, sets out to prove the fundamental interconnectedness of all things by solving a mysterious murder, assisting a mysterious professor, unravelling a mysterious mystery, and eating a lot of pizza – not to mention saving the entire human race from extinction along the way (at no extra charge). To find out more, read this book (better still, buy it, then read it) – or contact Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency. ‘A thumping good detective-ghost-horror-whodunnit-time travel-romantic-musical-comedy epic.’ From Goodreads.

Written by Douglas Adams I should have known it would be quite weird. It is also a bit confusing in the beginning where it jumps from character to character without making any sense until it finally start fitting together.

This book qualifies for:
2014 Ebook challenge
2014 Literary Exploration Reading Challenge (Science Fiction)
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
Crazy Challenge Connection Chinese New Year Challenge (humour)
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (G-gecko)
CCC-Read your age

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

In The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman has created a charming allegory of childhood. Although the book opens with a scary scene--a family is stabbed to death by "a man named Jack” --the story quickly moves into more child-friendly storytelling. The sole survivor of the attack--an 18-month-old baby--escapes his crib and his house, and toddles to a nearby graveyard. Quickly recognizing that the baby is orphaned, the graveyard's ghostly residents adopt him, name him Nobody ("Bod"), and allow him to live in their tomb. Taking inspiration from Kipling’s The Jungle Book, Gaiman describes how the toddler navigates among the headstones, asking a lot of questions and picking up the tricks of the living and the dead. In serial-like episodes, the story follows Bod's progress as he grows from baby to teen, learning life’s lessons amid a cadre of the long-dead, ghouls, witches, intermittent human interlopers. A pallid, nocturnal guardian named Silas ensures that Bod receives food, books, and anything else he might need from the human world. Whenever the boy strays from his usual play among the headstones, he finds new dangers, learns his limitations and strengths, and acquires the skills he needs to survive within the confines of the graveyard and in wider world beyond. From Goodreads.

This was very good and quite different. An orphaned boy who grows up in a graveyard and is looked after by ghosts. There is a very dark side to this story but nothing too graphic. It is a children's book so an easy read.

This book qualifies for:
2014 Ebook challenge
2014 Literary Exploration Reading Challenge (children's book)
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
Crazy Challenge Connection Chinese New Year Challenge (Pigletto's bookshelf - she is a dragon)
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Ten Book Author Train Challenge
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (G-eagle)
CCC-Read your age
Crazy Challenge Connection 2014 RaT #2
Dansk Readathon March 2014

Two Weeks with a SEAL by Theresa Marguerite Hewitt

Rhea Griggs has had a hard life. Growing up with an abusive father who's now in jail, her older brother, Randy, was a source of strength, along with his best friend Chad, who Rhea has been in love with since childhood. When her brother and Chad go off in the Navy, eventually becoming SEALs, Rhea thinks she'll never be with Chad. What she doesn't know is that Chad has loved her for just as long, keeping his feelings at bay out of respect and fear of his best friend.
When heartbreak strikes Rhea, Chad knows he has to let her know how he feels or lose her forever to a no good redneck. Can two weeks be enough time to bring their hearts together as they should be? Can Rhea handle what comes with loving a SEAL? From Goodreads.

Unfortunately another just okay romance. Rhea and Chad have loved each other since they were children just never told each other as such. It is rather predictable, of course they get around to saying it. Then there is the "bad guy", Rhea's on-off one night stand who suddenly, but not very convincingly, wants her. It's emotional and is also a lot about loss.

This book qualifies for:
2014 Ebook challenge
2014 Women Challenge
CCC A-Z Book Titles 2014
You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge 2014
The Challenge Factory Spell It Out - Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (T)
Romance Readers Reading Challenges: Pass The Parcel Team Challenge
Romance Readers Reading Challenges: Yahtzee Challenge
Crazy Challenge Connection Chinese New Year Challenge (Amy's bookshelf - she is a dog)
Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss
Goodreads Reading Challenge 2014
Nothing but Reading Challenges - Spell it Out - Animal Alphabet (T-coyote)
Nothing but Reading Challenges - 50 States Challenge
Crazy Challenge Connection 2014 RaT #2
Dansk Readathon March 2014

Crazy Challenge Connection March 2014 Scavenger Challenge - Dr. Seuss Start

Crazy Challenge Connection - Dr. Seuss hosted by Crazy Challenge Connection on Goodreads.

When you ask folks to name an author of children's books, Dr. Seuss is likely to be one of the first responses you get. Since this month is the 110th anniversary of his birth, we decided to base this month's challenge on Dr. Seuss. Have fun!

MARCH 2014 SCAVENGER - DR. SEUSS
DURATION: March 1- March 31, 2014

1. Theodor Seuss Geisel, better known to the world as the beloved Dr. Seuss, was born on March 2, 1904, on Howard Street in Springfield, Massachusetts. Geisel died of throat cancer on September 24, 1991, at his home in La Jolla, California, at the age of 87.
Read a book set in Massachusetts or California OR a book with a character who has a major illness.

2. Ted left Springfield as a teenager to attend Dartmouth College, where he became editor-in-chief of Jack-O-Lantern, Dartmouth's humor magazine. His father wanted him to be a college professor, so Ted went on to Oxford University in England after graduation. Academic studies bored him, and he decided to tour Europe instead. He did not graduate, but while at Oxford, he met, Helen Palmer, who later became his wife.
Read a book shelved as “humor” OR a book set in England OR a book in which a wedding takes place.

3. Geisel's first work signed "Dr. Seuss" was published in Judge magazine in 1927. The first book that he both wrote and illustrated, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, was rejected 27 times before finally being published by Vanguard Press in 1937. His last book, published the year before his death, was Oh, the Places You'll Go! , which became a popular gift for graduating students.
Read a book by an author who publishes under more than one name OR a book with a 2 and a 7 in its total number of pages OR a book that was published after the author’s death, but still under his/her name.

4. Geisel's most famous pen name is regularly pronounced /ˈs(j)uːs/, an anglicized pronunciation of his German surname (the standard German pronunciation is [ˈzɔʏ̯s]). He himself noted that it rhymed with "voice" (his own pronunciation being /ˈsɔɪs/). Alexander Liang, one of his collaborators on the Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern, wrote:
You're wrong as the deuce
And you shouldn't rejoice
If you're calling him Seuss.
He pronounces it Soice
Geisel switched to the anglicized pronunciation because it "evoked a figure advantageous for an author of children's books to be associated with -— Mother Goose" and because most people used this pronunciation.
Read a book with a “foreign” word in its title OR a book where the first letter of EVERY WORD in the title (all words count!) can be found in MOTHERGOOSE. Titles must be at least three words long, and to use a letter more than once, it must appear more than once in the phrase.

5. In May 1954, Life magazine published a report on illiteracy among school children, concluding that children were not learning to read because their books were boring. As a result, William Ellsworth Spaulding, the director of the education division at Houghton Mifflin, compiled a list of 348 words he felt were important for first-graders to recognize and asked Geisel to cut the list to 250 words and write a book using only those words. Nine months later, Geisel, using 236 of the words given to him, completed The Cat in the Hat, probably the defining book of his career. It maintained the drawing style, verse rhythms, and all the imagination of Geisel's earlier works, but because of its simplified vocabulary, could be read by beginning readers.
Read a non-fiction book dealing with literacy OR a book with the word CAT or HAT in its title OR a book whose title includes only words that are no more than five letters long. ALL WORDS COUNT, and titles must be at least three words long.

6. At the time of his death, he had written and illustrated 44 children's books, including such all-time favorites as Green Eggs and Ham, Oh, the Places You'll Go, Fox in Socks, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas. His books had been translated into more than 15 languages, and over 200 million copies had found their way into homes and hearts around the world. His works have spawned numerous adaptations, including 11 television specials, four feature films, a Broadway musical and four television series.
Read a book that has been made into a movie, a TV special or a TV series OR a book with two (or more) rhyming words in its title OR a book with a 4 in its original publication date.

7. Dr. Seuss has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, but, although he received numerous awards during his career, he never won the Caldecott Medal or the Newbery Medal. His honors included two Academy awards, two Emmy awards and a Peabody award. In 1984, he won a special Pulitzer Prize citing his "contribution over nearly half a century to the education and enjoyment of America's children and their parents." In 2004, U.S. children's librarians established the annual Theodor Seuss Geisel Award to recognize "the most distinguished American book for beginning readers published in English in the United States during the preceding year." Geisel's birthday, March 2, has been adopted as the annual date for National Read Across America Day, an initiative on reading created by the National Education Association.
Read a book that has won an award (be sure to post a link to the award site where the book is listed) OR a book written by or about a celebrity OR a book you got from the library.

8. Geisel also wrote a pair of books for adults: The Seven Lady Godivas, a retelling of the Lady Godiva legend that included nude depictions; and You're Only Old Once!, which chronicles an old man's journey through a clinic.
Read a book originally published in the 1980s OR a book that is outside an author’s usual genre (example: David Baldacci is known for his adult thriller books, but he also writes books for children)

Yes I have joined yet another challenge but who can resist Dr. Seuss.

My list of books: (which might change)

1. ✔ Read a book set in Massachusetts or California OR a book with a character who has a major illness. An Unlikely Match by Barbara Dunlop 
2. ✔ Read a book shelved as “humor” OR a book set in England OR a book in which a wedding takes place. Seduction and Snacks by Tara Sivec
3. ✔ Read a book by an author who publishes under more than one name OR a book with a 2 and a 7 in its total number of pages OR a book that was published after the author’s death, but still under his/her name. - Vinter-Eventyr by Karen Blixen. (Isak Dinesen, Pierre Andrézel and more).
4. ✔ Read a book with a “foreign” word in its title OR a book where the first letter of EVERY WORD in the title (all words count!) can be found in MOTHERGOOSE. Titles must be at least three words long, and to use a letter more than once, it must appear more than once in the phrase. One Sweet Moment by Maggie Craig
5. ✔ Read a non-fiction book dealing with literacy OR a book with the word CAT or HAT in its title OR a book whose title includes only words that are no more than five letters long. ALL WORDS COUNT, and titles must be at least three words long. - Two Weeks with a SEAL by Theresa Marguerite Hewitt
6. ✔ Read a book that has been made into a movie, a TV special or a TV series OR a book with two (or more) rhyming words in its title OR a book with a 4 in its original publication date. - Death du Jour by Kathy Reichs. (TV-series Bones)
7. ✔ Read a book that has won an award (be sure to post a link to the award site where the book is listed) OR a book written by or about a celebrity OR a book you got from the library. - The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (2009 Hugo Award Winner)
8. ✔ Read a book originally published in the 1980s OR a book that is outside an author’s usual genre (example: David Baldacci is known for his adult thriller books, but he also writes books for children). Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams

Books:

1. Two Weeks with a SEAL by Theresa Marguerite Hewitt
2. The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (2009 Hugo Award Winner) 
3. Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams
4. Seduction and Snacks by Tara Sivec
5. One Sweet Moment by Maggie Craig 
6. An Unlikely Match by Barbara Dunlop 
7. Vinter-Eventyr by Karen Blixen 
8. Death du Jour by Kathy Reichs