Christi's bookshelf: read en-US Sun, 06 Oct 2024 19:23:19 -0700 60 Christi's bookshelf: read 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Final Girls 33154067 Ten years ago, college student Quincy Carpenter went on vacation with five friends and came back alone, the only survivor of a horror movie-scale massacre. In an instant, she became a member of a club no one wants to belong to—a group of similar survivors known in the press as the Final Girls. Lisa, who lost nine sorority sisters to a college dropout's knife; Sam, who went up against the Sack Man during her shift at the Nightlight Inn; and now Quincy, who ran bleeding through the woods to escape Pine Cottage and the man she refers to onlyĚýas Him. The three girls are all attempting to put their nightmares behind them, and, with that, one another. Despite the media's attempts, they never meet.

Now, Quincy is doing well—maybe even great, thanks to her Xanax prescription. She has a caring almost-fiancé, Jeff; a popular baking blog; a beautiful apartment; and a therapeutic presence in Coop, the police officer who saved her life all those years ago. Her memory won’t even allow her to recall the events of that night; the past is in the past.

That is, until Lisa, the first Final Girl, is found dead in her bathtub, wrists slit, and Sam, the second, appears on Quincy's doorstep. Blowing through Quincy's life like a whirlwind, Sam seems intent on making Quincy relive the past, with increasingly dire consequences, all of which makes Quincy question why Sam is really seeking her out. And when new details about Lisa's death come to light, Quincy's life becomes a race against time as she tries to unravel Sam's truths from her lies, evade the police and hungry reporters, and, most crucially, remember what really happened at Pine Cottage, before what was started ten years ago is finished.

*From the Hardcover edition.

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352 Riley Sager Christi 5 3.95 2017 Final Girls
author: Riley Sager
name: Christi
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at: 2024/10/06
date added: 2024/10/06
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The Teacher 198218463 A mind-bending, psychological thriller from Freida McFadden, the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Housemaid!

Lesson #1: trust no one

Eve has a good life. She gets up each day, gets a kiss from her husband Nate, and heads off to teach math at the local high school. All is as it should be. Except�

Last year, Caseham High was rocked by a scandal involving a student-teacher affair, with one student, Addie, at its center. But Eve knows there is far more to these ugly rumors than meets the eye.

Addie can't be trusted. She lies. She hurts people. She destroys lives. At least, that's what everyone says.

But nobody knows the real Addie. Nobody knows the secrets that could destroy her. And Addie will do anything to keep it quiet.

From the New York Times bestselling author Freida McFadden comes a story of twisting secrets and long-awaited revenge.]]>
362 Freida McFadden Christi 4 4.15 2024 The Teacher
author: Freida McFadden
name: Christi
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/08/15
date added: 2024/08/15
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Mansfield Park 45032 488 Jane Austen Christi 5 3.86 1814 Mansfield Park
author: Jane Austen
name: Christi
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1814
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/08/07
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<![CDATA[The Housemaid (The Housemaid, #1)]]> 60556912
Every day I clean the Winchesters� beautiful house top to bottom. I collect their daughter from school. And I cook a delicious meal for the whole family before heading up to eat alone in my tiny room on the top floor.

I try to ignore how Nina makes a mess just to watch me clean it up. How she tells strange lies about her own daughter. And how her husband Andrew seems more broken every day. But as I look into Andrew’s handsome brown eyes, so full of pain, it’s hard not to imagine what it would be like to live Nina’s life. The walk-in closet, the fancy car, the perfect husband.

I only try on one of Nina’s pristine white dresses once. Just to see what it’s like. But she soon finds out� and by the time I realize my attic bedroom door only locks from the outside, it’s far too late.

But I reassure myself: the Winchesters don’t know who I really am.

They don’t know what I’m capable of�

An unbelievably twisty read that will have you glued to the pages late into the night. Anyone who loves The Woman in the Window, The Wife Between Us and The Girl on the Train won’t be able to put this down!]]>
329 Freida McFadden 1803144378 Christi 4 4.31 2022 The Housemaid (The Housemaid, #1)
author: Freida McFadden
name: Christi
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/08
date added: 2024/07/08
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<![CDATA[The Lost Symbol (Robert Langdon, #3)]]> 8421746 An alternate cover edition for ISBN 9781400079148 can be found here.

In this stunning follow-up to the global phenomenon "The Da Vinci Code," Dan Brown demonstrates once again why he is the world's most popular thriller writer. The Lost Symbol is a masterstroke of storytelling--a deadly race through a real-world labyrinth of codes, secrets, and unseen truths . . . all under the watchful eye of Brown's most terrifying villain to date. Set within the hidden chambers, tunnels, and temples of Washington, D.C., The Lost Symbol accelerates through a startling landscape toward an unthinkable finale.

As the story opens, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned unexpectedly to deliver an evening lecture in the U.S. Capitol Building. Within minutes of his arrival, however, the night takes a bizarre turn. A disturbing object--artfully encoded with five symbols--is discovered in the Capitol Building. Langdon recognizes the object as an ancient invitation . . . one meant to usher its recipient into a long-lost world of esoteric wisdom.

When Langdon's beloved mentor, Peter Solomon--a prominent Mason and philanthropist--is brutally kidnapped, Langdon realizes his only hope of saving Peter is to accept this mystical invitation and follow wherever it leads him. Langdon is instantly plunged into a clandestine world of Masonic secrets, hidden history, and never-before-seen locations--all of which seem to be dragging him toward a single, inconceivable truth.]]>
639 Dan Brown Christi 4 3.70 2009 The Lost Symbol (Robert Langdon, #3)
author: Dan Brown
name: Christi
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/06/23
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Sense and Sensibility 298145 Sense and Sensibility was the first Jane Austen published. Though she initially called it Elinor and Marianne, Austen jettisoned both the title and the epistolary mode in which it was originally written, but kept the essential theme: the necessity of finding a workable middle ground between passion and reason. The story revolves around the Dashwood sisters, Elinor and Marianne. Whereas the former is a sensible, rational creature, her younger sister is wildly romantic--a characteristic that offers Austen plenty of scope for both satire and compassion. Commenting on Edward Ferrars, a potential suitor for Elinor's hand, Marianne admits that while she "loves him tenderly," she finds him disappointing as a possible lover for her sister:
Oh! Mama, how spiritless, how tame was Edward's manner in reading to us last night! I felt for my sister most severely. Yet she bore it with so much composure, she seemed scarcely to notice it. I could hardly keep my seat. To hear those beautiful lines which have frequently almost driven me wild, pronounced with such impenetrable calmness, such dreadful indifference!
Soon however, Marianne meets a man who measures up to her ideal: Mr. Willoughby, a new neighbor. So swept away by passion is Marianne that her behavior begins to border on the scandalous. Then Willoughby abandons her; meanwhile, Elinor's growing affection for Edward suffers a check when he admits he is secretly engaged to a childhood sweetheart. How each of the sisters reacts to their romantic misfortunes, and the lessons they draw before coming finally to the requisite happy ending forms the heart of the novel. Though Marianne's disregard for social conventions and willingness to consider the world well-lost for love may appeal to modern readers, it is Elinor whom Austen herself most evidently admired; a truly happy marriage, she shows us, exists only where sense and sensibility meet and mix in proper measure. --Alix Wilber]]>
346 Jane Austen 0553211102 Christi 5 4.05 1811 Sense and Sensibility
author: Jane Austen
name: Christi
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1811
rating: 5
read at: 2008/08/14
date added: 2021/04/15
shelves:
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I could read this over and over! I love Jane!
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Cell 10567 Where were you on October 1st at 3:03 pm?

Graphic artist Clay Riddell was in the heart of Boston on that brilliant autumn afternoon when hell was unleashed before his eyes. Without warning, carnage and chaos reigned. Ordinary people fell victim to the basest, most animalistic destruction.

And the apocalypse began with the ring of a cell phone...]]>
449 Stephen King 1416524517 Christi 0 3.67 2006 Cell
author: Stephen King
name: Christi
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2017/10/09
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The Green Mile 11566
There are more wonders in heaven and hell than anyone at Cold Mountain can imagine and one of those wonders might just have stepped in amongst them.]]>
592 Stephen King 0451933028 Christi 0 4.48 1996 The Green Mile
author: Stephen King
name: Christi
average rating: 4.48
book published: 1996
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2017/10/09
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<![CDATA[The Return of the Witch (The Witch's Daughter, #2)]]> 25584230 320 Paula Brackston 1250028817 Christi 0 3.95 2016 The Return of the Witch (The Witch's Daughter, #2)
author: Paula Brackston
name: Christi
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2017/10/09
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The Midnight Witch 17910080
Lilith is the daughter of the sixth Duke of Radnor. She is one of the most beautiful young women in London and engaged to the city’s most eligible bachelor. She is also a witch.

When her father dies, her hapless brother Freddie takes the title. But it is Lilith, instructed in the art of necromancy, who inherits their father’s role as Head Witch of the Lazarus Coven. And it is Lilith who must face the threat of the Sentinels, a powerful group of sorcerers intent on reclaiming the Elixir from the coven’s guardianship for their own dark purposes. Lilith knows the Lazarus creed: secrecy and silence. To abandon either would put both the coven and all she holds dear in grave danger. She has spent her life honoring it, right down to her charming fiancé and fellow witch, Viscount Louis Harcourt.

Until the day she meets Bram, a talented artist who is neither a witch nor a member of her class. With him, she must not be secret and silent. Despite her loyalty to the coven and duty to her family, Lilith cannot keep her life as a witch hidden from the man she loves.

To tell him will risk everything.

Spanning the opulence of Edwardian London and the dark days of World War I, The Midnight Witch is the third novel from New York Times bestselling author Paula Brackston.]]>
341 Paula Brackston 1250006082 Christi 0 3.45 2014 The Midnight Witch
author: Paula Brackston
name: Christi
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2017/10/09
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The Silver Witch 21853637
On this same lake in Celtic times lived Seren, a witch and shaman. She was respected but feared, kept separate from the community for her strange looks. When a vision came to her of the Prince amid a nest of vipers she warned of betrayal from one of his own. Prince Brynach both loved and revered her, but could not believe someone close to him wished him harm, even as the danger grew.

In her own time, Tilda’s grief begins to fade beside her newfound powers and a fresh love. When she explores the lake’s ancient magic and her own she discovers Seren, the woman in her vision of the boat. Their two lives strangely mirror each others, suggesting a strong connection between the women. As Tilda comes under threat from a dark power, one reminiscent of Seren’s prophecy, she must rely on Seren and ancient magic if death and disaster are not to shatter her life once more.]]>
308 Paula Brackston 1250028795 Christi 0 3.82 2015 The Silver Witch
author: Paula Brackston
name: Christi
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2017/10/09
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Modern Persuasion 31183432 This story of second chances is inspired by Jane Austen’s Persuasion.

She chose work over passion. He turned his pain into a masterpiece. When their story starts anew, will it lead to a Hollywood ending?

Emma Shaw doesn’t need more stress. Although the New York editor loves her job, her father’s constant overspending requires a move out of the city and all her energy as the family caregiver. And it’s the last straw when her publisher pairs her with the man whose fame came from the very screenplay he used to trash her�

Fredrick Wentworth can’t decide whether to celebrate or rage. Obliged to partner on his book-signings with the woman who left him for her career, the celebrity author can’t stop old feelings flooding back. And as the two forcibly reconnect while traveling the nation, he wonders if fate has handed him a second chance.

Shocked when it’s revealed her boss is holding her back and she gets offered a position in a friend’s firm, Emma is torn between her sensibility and her rekindled emotions for the man who once proposed. But as the smoldering looks between them threaten to catch fire, Fredrick fears his beloved will hurt him all over again.

Can the wounded couple turn the page and start a new chapter together?

Modern Persuasion is the charming first book in the 21st Century Austen romance series. If you like classics made contemporary, low heat, and undeniable chemistry, then you’ll adore Sara Marks� lighthearted tale.

Buy Modern Persuasion to witness a love rewritten today!]]>
228 Sara Marks Christi 5 3.23 2017 Modern Persuasion
author: Sara Marks
name: Christi
average rating: 3.23
book published: 2017
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2017/07/06
shelves:
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<![CDATA[My Lady Jane (The Lady Janies, #1)]]> 22840421 This comical, fantastical, romantical, New York Times bestselling, (not) entirely true story of Lady Jane Grey is “an uproarious historical fantasy that’s not to be missed� (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

In My Lady Jane, coauthors Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows have created a one-of-a-kind YA fantasy in the tradition of The Princess Bride, featuring a reluctant king, an even more reluctant queen, a noble steed, and only a passing resemblance to actual history—because sometimes history needs a little help.

At sixteen, Lady Jane Grey is about to be married off to a stranger and caught up in a conspiracy to rob her cousin, King Edward, of his throne. But those trifling problems aren’t for Jane to worry about. Jane gets to be Queen of England.

Like that could go wrong.]]>
474 Cynthia Hand 0062391798 Christi 0 4.00 2016 My Lady Jane (The Lady Janies, #1)
author: Cynthia Hand
name: Christi
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2016/10/26
shelves:
review:

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The Never List 16158525
For years, best friends Sarah and Jennifer kept what they called the “Never List�: a list of actions to be avoided, for safety’s sake, at all costs. But one night, against their best instincts, they accept a cab ride with grave, everlasting consequences. For the next three years, they are held captive with two other girls in a dungeon-like cellar by a connoisseur of sadism.

Ten years later, at thirty-one, Sarah is still struggling to resume a normal life, living as a virtual recluse under a new name, unable to come to grips with the fact that Jennifer didn’t make it out of that cellar. Now, her abductor is up for parole and Sarah can no longer ignore the twisted letters he sends from jail.

Finally, Sarah decides to confront her phobias and the other survivors—who hold their own deep grudges against her. When she goes on a cross-country chase that takes her into the perverse world of BDSM, secret cults, and the arcane study of torture, she begins unraveling a mystery more horrifying than even she could have imagined.

A shocking, blazingly fast read, Koethi Zan’s debut is a must for fans of Karin Slaughter, Laura Lippman, and S.J. Watson.]]>
303 Koethi Zan 0670026514 Christi 0 3.62 2013 The Never List
author: Koethi Zan
name: Christi
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2016/06/13
shelves:
review:

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I Was Here 18879761 Cody and Meg were inseparable.
Two peas in a pod.
Until . . . they weren’t anymore.
Ěý
When her best friend Meg drinks a bottle of industrial-strength cleaner alone in a motel room, Cody is understandably shocked and devastated. She and Meg shared everything—so how was there no warning? But when Cody travels to Meg’s college town to pack up the belongings left behind, she discovers that there’s a lot that Meg never told her. About her old roommates, the sort of people Cody never would have met in her dead-end small town in Washington. About Ben McAllister, the boy with a guitar and a sneer, who broke Meg’s heart. And about an encrypted computer file that Cody can’t open—until she does, and suddenly everything Cody thought she knew about her best friend’s death gets thrown into question.
Ěý
I Was HereĚýis Gayle Forman at her finest, a taut, emotional, and ultimately redemptive story about redefining the meaning of family and finding a way to move forward even in the face of unspeakable loss.]]>
270 Gayle Forman 0451471474 Christi 0 finished-book-challenge 3.74 2015 I Was Here
author: Gayle Forman
name: Christi
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2016/06/11
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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Neverfall (Everneath, #1.5) 15726305
Jack is trapped for eternity in the Tunnels while Nikki has managed to evade Cole's grasp . . . for now. But Cole is more desperate than ever to find answers about Nikki, his best chance for taking over the throne of the underworld. How did she survive the Feed? Can Cole find another Forfeit like her who can survive it too?

Cole's quest leads him to the other side of the world, to a mysterious, dangerous society known as the Delphinians, whose price for information might be higher than Cole can pay—a price that could destroy Nikki. But when Cole attempts to steal the answers instead, his mission ends in disaster. Faced with centuries in a Delphinian dungeon, Cole is confronted with questions he's been too scared to ask himself: Is he really obsessed with the throne—or is he obsessed with Nikki? And can she really give him a new beginning as the Everneath's king . . . or will she instead bring about his tragic end?]]>
96 Brodi Ashton 0062236415 Christi 4 finished-book-challenge 3.85 2012 Neverfall (Everneath, #1.5)
author: Brodi Ashton
name: Christi
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2015/07/09
date added: 2015/07/14
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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Everbound (Everneath, #2) 13115995
Desperate for answers, Nikki turns to Cole, the immortal bad boy who wants to make her his queen � and the one person least likely to help. But his heart has been touched by everything about Nikki, and he agrees to assist her in the only way he can: by taking her to the Everneath himself.

Nikki and Cole descend into the Everneath, only to discover that their journey will be more difficult than they’d anticipated � and more deadly. But Nikki vows to stop at nothing to save Jack � even if it means making an incredible sacrifice of her own.

In this enthralling sequel to Everneath, Brodi Ashton tests the bonds of destiny and explores the lengths we’ll go to for the ones we love.]]>
358 Brodi Ashton 0062071165 Christi 4 finished-book-challenge 4.05 2013 Everbound (Everneath, #2)
author: Brodi Ashton
name: Christi
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2015/07/14
date added: 2015/07/14
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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Everneath (Everneath, #1) 9413044
She has six months before the Everneath comes to claim her, six months for good-byes she can’t find the words for, six months to find redemption, if it exists.

Nikki longs to spend these months reconnecting with her boyfriend, Jack, the one person she loves more than anything. But there’s a problem: Cole, the smoldering immortal who first enticed her to the Everneath, has followed Nikki to the mortal world. And he’ll do whatever it takes to bring her back- this time as his queen.

As Nikki’s time grows short and her relationships begin slipping from her grasp, she’s forced to make the hardest decision of her life: find a way to cheat fate and remain on the Surface with Jack or return to the Everneath and become Cole’s...]]>
370 Brodi Ashton 0062071130 Christi 4 finished-book-challenge 3.76 2012 Everneath (Everneath, #1)
author: Brodi Ashton
name: Christi
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2015/07/09
date added: 2015/07/09
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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The Magician's Lie 21897317 Water for Elephants meets The Night Circus in The Magician’s Lie, a debut novel in which the country’s most notorious female illusionist stands accused of her husband's murder --and she has only one night to convince a small-town policeman of her innocence.

The Amazing Arden is the most famous female illusionist of her day, renowned for her notorious trick of sawing a man in half on stage. One night in Waterloo, Iowa, with young policeman Virgil Holt watching from the audience, she swaps her trademark saw for a fire ax. Is it a new version of the illusion, or an all-too-real murder? When Arden’s husband is found lifeless beneath the stage later that night, the answer seems clear.

But when Virgil happens upon the fleeing magician and takes her into custody, she has a very different story to tell. Even handcuffed and alone, Arden is far from powerless—and what she reveals is as unbelievable as it is spellbinding. Over the course of one eerie night, Virgil must decide whether to turn Arden in or set her free� and it will take all he has to see through the smoke and mirrors.]]>
312 Greer Macallister 1402298684 Christi 0 finished-book-challenge 3.65 2015 The Magician's Lie
author: Greer Macallister
name: Christi
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2015/07/08
date added: 2015/07/08
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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Fallen (Fallen, #1) 6487308
Mysterious and aloof, he captures Luce Price’s attention from the moment she sees him on her first day at the Sword & Cross boarding school in sultry Savannah, Georgia. He’s the one bright spot in a place where cell phones are forbidden, the other students are all screw-ups, and security cameras watch every move.

Even though Daniel wants nothing to do with Luce—and goes out of his way to make that very clear—she can’t let it go. Drawn to him like a moth to a flame, she has to find out what Daniel is so desperate to keep secret� even if it kills her.]]>
464 Lauren Kate 0385738935 Christi 5 3.73 2009 Fallen (Fallen, #1)
author: Lauren Kate
name: Christi
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at: 2015/06/30
date added: 2015/06/30
shelves: ya-books, finished-book-challenge
review:

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<![CDATA[Interview with the Vampire (The Vampire Chronicles, #1)]]> 43763
Louis and Claudia travel Europe, eventually coming to Paris and the ragingly successful Theatre des Vampires--a theatre of vampires pretending to be mortals pretending to be vampires. Here they meet the magnetic and ethereal Armand, who brings them into a whole society of vampires. But Louis and Claudia find that finding others like themselves provides no easy answers and in fact presents dangers they scarcely imagined.

Originally begun as a short story, the book took off as Anne wrote it, spinning the tragic and triumphant life experiences of a soul. As well as the struggles of its characters, Interview captures the political and social changes of two continents. The novel also introduces Lestat, Anne's most enduring character, a heady mixture of attraction and revulsion. The book, full of lush description, centers on the themes of immortality, change, loss, sexuality, and power.
source: annerice.com]]>
346 Anne Rice 0345476875 Christi 5 finished-book-challenge 4.04 1976 Interview with the Vampire (The Vampire Chronicles, #1)
author: Anne Rice
name: Christi
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1976
rating: 5
read at: 2015/06/21
date added: 2015/06/26
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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<![CDATA[The Witch's Daughter (The Witch's Daughter, #1)]]> 8694522 My name is Elizabeth Anne Hawksmith, and my age is three hundred and eighty-four years. Each new settlement asks for a new journal, and so this Book of Shadows begins.

In the spring of 1628, the Witchfinder of Wessex finds himself a true Witch. As Bess Hawksmith watches her mother swing from the Hanging Tree she knows that only one man can save her from the same fate at the hands of the panicked mob: the Warlock Gideon Masters, and his Book of Shadows. Secluded at his cottage in the woods, Gideon instructs Bess in the Craft, awakening formidable powers she didn't know she had and making her immortal. She couldn't have foreseen that even now, centuries later, he would be hunting her across time, determined to claim payment for saving her life.

In present-day England, Elizabeth has built a quiet life for herself, tending her garden and selling herbs and oils at the local farmers' market. But her solitude abruptly ends when a teenage girl called Tegan starts hanging around. Against her better judgment, Elizabeth begins teaching Tegan the ways of the Hedge Witch, in the process awakening memories—and demons—long thought forgotten.

Part historical romance, part modern fantasy, The Witch’s Daughter is a fresh, compelling take on the magical, yet dangerous world of Witches. Readers will long remember the fiercely independent heroine who survives plagues, wars, and the heartbreak that comes with immortality to remain true to herself, and protect the protégé she comes to love.]]>
305 Paula Brackston 031262168X Christi 0 finished-book-challenge 3.61 2008 The Witch's Daughter (The Witch's Daughter, #1)
author: Paula Brackston
name: Christi
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2015/06/10
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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The Lost Sisterhood 18077814
Oxford lecturer Diana Morgan is an expert on Greek mythology. Her obsession with the Amazons started in childhood when her eccentric grandmother claimed to be one herself—before vanishing without a trace. Diana’s colleagues shake their heads at her Amazon fixation. But then a mysterious, well-financed foundation makes Diana an offer she cannot refuse.

Traveling to North Africa, Diana teams up with Nick Barran, an enigmatic Middle Eastern guide, and begins deciphering an unusual inscription on the wall of a recently unearthed temple. There she discovers the name of the first Amazon queen, Myrina, who crossed the Mediterranean in a heroic attempt to liberate her kidnapped sisters from Greek pirates, only to become embroiled in the most famous conflict of the ancient world—the Trojan War. Taking their cue from the inscription, Diana and Nick set out to find the fabled treasure that Myrina and her Amazon sisters salvaged from the embattled city of Troy so long ago. Diana doesn’t know the nature of the treasure, but she does know that someone is shadowing her, and that Nick has a sinister agenda of his own. With danger lurking at every turn, and unsure of whom to trust, Diana finds herself on a daring and dangerous quest for truth that will forever change her world.

Sweeping from England to North Africa to Greece and the ruins of ancient Troy, and navigating between present and past, The Lost Sisterhood is a breathtaking, passionate adventure of two women on parallel journeys, separated by time, who must fight to keep the lives and legacy of the Amazons from being lost forever.]]>
585 Anne Fortier 0345536223 Christi 4 finished-book-challenge 3.86 2014 The Lost Sisterhood
author: Anne Fortier
name: Christi
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/05/29
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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<![CDATA[Sun Tzu for Women: The Art of War for Winning in Business]]> 9504741 224 Becky Sheetz-Runkle 1598699075 Christi 3 finished-book-challenge 3.84 2010 Sun Tzu for Women: The Art of War for Winning in Business
author: Becky Sheetz-Runkle
name: Christi
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2010
rating: 3
read at: 2015/05/29
date added: 2015/05/29
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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Juliet 6718608
Twenty-five-year-old Julie Jacobs is heartbroken over the death of her beloved aunt Rose. But the shock goes even deeper when she learns that the woman who has been like a mother to her has left her entire estate to Julie’s twin sister. The only thing Julie receives is a key—one carried by her mother on the day she herself died—to a safety-deposit box in Siena, Italy.

This key sends Julie on a journey that will change her life forever—a journey into the troubled past of her ancestor Giulietta Tolomei. In 1340, still reeling from the slaughter of her parents, Giulietta was smuggled into Siena, where she met a young man named Romeo. Their ill-fated love turned medieval Siena upside-down and went on to inspire generations of poets and artists, the story reaching its pinnacle in Shakespeare’s famous tragedy.

But six centuries have a way of catching up to the present, and Julie gradually begins to discover that here, in this ancient city, the past and present are hard to tell apart. The deeper she delves into the history of Romeo and Giulietta, and the closer she gets to the treasure they allegedly left behind, the greater the danger surrounding her—superstitions, ancient hostilities, and personal vendettas. As Julie crosses paths with the descendants of the families involved in the unforgettable blood feud, she begins to fear that the notorious curse—“A plague on both your houses!”—is still at work, and that she is destined to be its next target. Only someone like Romeo, it seems, could save her from this dreaded fate, but his story ended long ago. Or did it?

From Anne Fortier comes a sweeping, beautifully written novel of intrigue and identity, of love and legacy, as a young woman discovers that her own fate is irrevocably tied—for better or worse—to literature’s greatest star-crossed lovers.]]>
447 Anne Fortier 0345516109 Christi 5 finished-book-challenge 3.92 2010 Juliet
author: Anne Fortier
name: Christi
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2015/05/29
date added: 2015/05/29
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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A Reliable Wife 4929705
What Catherine Land did not realize was that the enigmatic and lonely Ralph Truitt had a plan of his own. And what neither anticipated was that they would fall so completely in love.

Filled with unforgettable characters, and shimmering with color and atmosphere, A Reliable Wife is an enthralling tale of love and madness, of longing and murder.]]>
291 Robert Goolrick 1565125967 Christi 5 finished-book-challenge 3.27 2009 A Reliable Wife
author: Robert Goolrick
name: Christi
average rating: 3.27
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at: 2015/05/13
date added: 2015/05/13
shelves: finished-book-challenge
review:

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<![CDATA[Twilight (The Twilight Saga, #1)]]> 41865
First, Edward was a vampire.

Second, there was a part of him - and I didn't know how dominant that part might be - that thirsted for my blood.

And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.

Deeply seductive and extraordinarily suspenseful, Twilight is a love story with bite.]]>
498 Stephenie Meyer 0316015849 Christi 3 3.66 2005 Twilight (The Twilight Saga, #1)
author: Stephenie Meyer
name: Christi
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2005
rating: 3
read at: 2008/10/01
date added: 2015/04/16
shelves:
review:
I loved this book. I am currently waiting to get the next book in the series.
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<![CDATA[New Moon (The Twilight Saga, #2)]]> 49041 There is an alternate cover edition for ISBN13 9780316160193 here.

I knew we were both in mortal danger. Still, in that instant, I felt well. Whole. I could feel my heart racing in my chest, the blood pulsing hot and fast through my veins again. My lungs filled deep with the sweet scent that came off his skin. It was like there had never been any hole in my chest. I was perfect - not healed, but as if there had never been a wound in the first place.

I FELT LIKE I WAS TRAPPED IN ONE OF THOSE TERRIFYING NIGHTMARES, the one where you have to run, run till your lungs burst, but you can't make your body move fast enough.... But this was no dream, and, unlike the nightmare, I wasn't running for my life; I was racing to save something infinitely more precious. My own life meant little to me today.

FOR BELLA SWAN THERE IS ONE THING more important than life itself: Edward Cullen. But being in love with a vampire is even more dangerous than Bella could ever have imagined. Edward has already rescued Bella from the clutches of one evil vampire, but now, as their daring relationship threatens all that is near and dear to them, they realize their troubles may be just beginning....

LEGIONS OF READERS ENTRANCED BY THE New York Times bestseller Twilight are hungry for the continuing story of star-crossed lovers Bell and Edward. In New Moon, Stephanie Meyer delivers another irresistible combination of romance and suspense with a supernatural spin. passionate, riveting, and full of surprising twists and turns, this vampire love saga is well on its way to literary immortality.]]>
563 Stephenie Meyer 0316160199 Christi 3 3.61 2006 New Moon (The Twilight Saga, #2)
author: Stephenie Meyer
name: Christi
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2006
rating: 3
read at: 2008/10/15
date added: 2015/04/16
shelves:
review:

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The Thirteenth Tale 40440
The enigmatic Winter has spent six decades creating various outlandish life histories for herself -- all of them inventions that have brought her fame and fortune but have kept her violent and tragic past a secret. Now old and ailing, she at last wants to tell the truth about her extraordinary life. She summons biographer Margaret Lea, a young woman for whom the secret of her own birth, hidden by those who loved her most, remains an ever-present pain. Struck by a curious parallel between Miss Winter's story and her own, Margaret takes on the commission.

As Vida disinters the life she meant to bury for good, Margaret is mesmerized. It is a tale of gothic strangeness featuring the Angelfield family, including the beautiful and willful Isabelle, the feral twins Adeline and Emmeline, a ghost, a governess, a topiary garden and a devastating fire.

Margaret succumbs to the power of Vida's storytelling but remains suspicious of the author's sincerity. She demands the truth from Vida, and together they confront the ghosts that have haunted them while becoming, finally, transformed by the truth themselves.

The Thirteenth Tale is a love letter to reading, a book for the feral reader in all of us, a return to that rich vein of storytelling that our parents loved and that we loved as children. Diane Setterfield will keep you guessing, make you wonder, move you to tears and laughter and, in the end, deposit you breathless yet satisfied back upon the shore of your everyday life.]]>
406 Diane Setterfield 0743298020 Christi 5 review-books 3.96 2006 The Thirteenth Tale
author: Diane Setterfield
name: Christi
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Book Thief 19063 Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here

It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will be busier still.

By her brother's graveside, Liesel's life is changed when she picks up a single object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger's Handbook, left behind there by accident, and it is her first act of book thievery. So begins a love affair with books and words, as Liesel, with the help of her accordian-playing foster father, learns to read. Soon she is stealing books from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor's wife's library, wherever there are books to be found.

But these are dangerous times. When Liesel's foster family hides a Jew in their basement, Liesel's world is both opened up, and closed down.

In superbly crafted writing that burns with intensity, award-winning author Markus Zusak has given us one of the most enduring stories of our time.

(Note: this title was not published as YA fiction)]]>
592 Markus Zusak Christi 5 review-books 4.38 2005 The Book Thief
author: Markus Zusak
name: Christi
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Someone Else's Love Story 17349119
Shandi doesn’t know that her blond god Thor has his own complications. When he looked down the barrel of that gun he believed it was destiny: It’s been one year to the day since a tragic act of physics shattered his universe. But William doesn’t define destiny the way other people do. A brilliant geneticist who believes in science and numbers, destiny to him is about choice.

Now, he and Shandi are about to meet their so-called destinies head on, in a funny, charming, and poignant novel about science and miracles, secrets and truths, faith and forgiveness,; about a virgin birth, a sacrifice, and a resurrection; about falling in love, and learning that things aren’t always what they seem—or what we hope they will be. It’s a novel about discovering what we want and ultimately finding what we need]]>
320 Joshilyn Jackson 0062105655 Christi 1 3.63 2013 Someone Else's Love Story
author: Joshilyn Jackson
name: Christi
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2013
rating: 1
read at: 2015/02/19
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:

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The Bell Jar 6514 294 Sylvia Plath 0571268862 Christi 1 review-books 4.05 1963 The Bell Jar
author: Sylvia Plath
name: Christi
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1963
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Awakening 4726870 102 Kate Chopin 1438260997 Christi 1 review-books 3.47 1899 The Awakening
author: Kate Chopin
name: Christi
average rating: 3.47
book published: 1899
rating: 1
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Rebecca 12873 Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again...

Working as a lady's companion, the heroine of Rebecca learns her place. Her future looks bleak until, on a trip to the South of France, she meets Max de Winter, a handsome widower whose sudden proposal of marriage takes her by surprise. She accepts, but whisked from glamorous Monte Carlo to the ominous and brooding Manderley, the new Mrs de Winter finds Max a changed man. And the memory of his dead wife Rebecca is forever kept alive by the forbidding housekeeper, Mrs Danvers...

Not since Jane Eyre has a heroine faced such difficulty with the Other Woman. An international bestseller that has never gone out of print, Rebecca is the haunting story of a young girl consumed by love and the struggle to find her identity.]]>
428 Daphne du Maurier 1844080382 Christi 2 review-books 4.19 1938 Rebecca
author: Daphne du Maurier
name: Christi
average rating: 4.19
book published: 1938
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Prozac Nation 227603 368 Elizabeth Wurtzel 1573225126 Christi 2 review-books 3.64 1994 Prozac Nation
author: Elizabeth Wurtzel
name: Christi
average rating: 3.64
book published: 1994
rating: 2
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Shack 1812457
In a world where religion seems to grow increasingly irrelevant The Shack wrestles with the timeless question, "Where is God in a world so filled with unspeakable pain?" The answers Mack gets will astound you and perhaps transform you as much as it did him. You'll want everyone you know to read this book!]]>
248 William Paul Young 0964729237 Christi 3 review-books 3.73 2007 The Shack
author: William Paul Young
name: Christi
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Room 7937843
Told in the inventive, funny, and poignant voice of Jack, Room is a celebration of resilience—and a powerful story of a mother and son whose love lets them survive the impossible.

To five-year-old Jack, Room is the entire world. It is where he was born and grew up; it's where he lives with his Ma as they learn and read and eat and sleep and play. At night, his Ma shuts him safely in the wardrobe, where he is meant to be asleep when Old Nick visits.

Room is home to Jack, but to Ma, it is the prison where Old Nick has held her captive for seven years. Through determination, ingenuity, and fierce motherly love, Ma has created a life for Jack. But she knows it's not enough ... not for her or for him. She devises a bold escape plan, one that relies on her young son's bravery and a lot of luck. What she does not realize is just how unprepared she is for the plan to actually work.

Told entirely in the language of the energetic, pragmatic five-year-old Jack, Room is a celebration of resilience and the limitless bond between parent and child, a brilliantly executed novel about what it means to journey from one world to another.]]>
321 Emma Donoghue Christi 4 4.04 2010 Room
author: Emma Donoghue
name: Christi
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2010
rating: 4
read at: 2015/01/17
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:

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Girl with a Pearl Earring 2865
Girl with a Pearl Earring centers on Vermeer's prosperous Delft household during the 1660s. When Griet, the novel's quietly perceptive heroine, is hired as a servant, turmoil follows. First, the 16-year-old narrator becomes increasingly intimate with her master. Then Vermeer employs her as his assistant—and ultimately has Griet sit for him as a model.]]>
233 Tracy Chevalier 0452287022 Christi 4 review-books 3.93 1999 Girl with a Pearl Earring
author: Tracy Chevalier
name: Christi
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1999
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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<![CDATA[The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time]]> 1618 226 Mark Haddon 1400032717 Christi 4 review-books 3.89 2003 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
author: Mark Haddon
name: Christi
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2003
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Dark Places 5886881
Since then, she has been drifting. But when she is contacted by a group who are convinced of Ben's innocence, Libby starts to ask questions she never dared to before. Was the voice she heard her brother's? Ben was a misfit in their small town, but was he capable of murder? Are there secrets to uncover at the family farm or is Libby deluding herself because she wants her brother back?

She begins to realise that everyone in her family had something to hide that day... especially Ben. Now, twenty-four years later, the truth is going to be even harder to find.

Who did massacre the Day family?]]>
424 Gillian Flynn 0307341569 Christi 4 review-books 3.95 2009 Dark Places
author: Gillian Flynn
name: Christi
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Austenland (Austenland, #1) 248483 197 Shannon Hale 1596912855 Christi 4 review-books 3.55 2007 Austenland (Austenland, #1)
author: Shannon Hale
name: Christi
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Paris Wife 8683812
Though deeply in love, the Hemingways are ill prepared for the hard-drinking and fast-living life of Jazz Age Paris, which hardly values traditional notions of family and monogamy. Surrounded by beautiful women and competing egos, Ernest struggles to find the voice that will earn him a place in history, pouring all the richness and intensity of his life with Hadley and their circle of friends into the novel that will become The Sun Also Rises. Hadley, meanwhile, strives to hold on to her sense of self as the demands of life with Ernest grow costly and her roles as wife, friend, and muse become more challenging. Despite their extraordinary bond, they eventually find themselves facing the ultimate crisis of their marriage—a deception that will lead to the unraveling of everything they’ve fought so hard for.

A heartbreaking portrayal of love and torn loyalty, The Paris Wife is all the more poignant because we know that, in the end, Hemingway wrote that he would rather have died than fallen in love with anyone but Hadley.]]>
314 Paula McLain 0345521307 Christi 4 3.81 2011 The Paris Wife
author: Paula McLain
name: Christi
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2015/03/06
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:

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Defending Jacob 11367726
Andy Barber has been an assistant district attorney in his suburban Massachusetts county for more than twenty years. He is respected in his community, tenacious in the courtroom, and happy at home with his wife, Laurie, and son, Jacob. But when a shocking crime shatters their New England town, Andy is blindsided by what happens next: His fourteen-year-old son is charged with the murder of a fellow student.]]>
421 William Landay 0385344228 Christi 4 WOW... just WOW. 3.99 2012 Defending Jacob
author: William Landay
name: Christi
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2015/01/14
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:
WOW... just WOW.
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Eleanor & Park 15745753 "So did Jerry Lee Lewis," Eleanor answers.
"I'm not kidding," he says.
"You should be," she says, "we're 16."
"What about Romeo and Juliet?"
"Shallow, confused, then dead."
"I love you," Park says.
"Wherefore art thou," Eleanor answers.
"I'm not kidding," he says.
"You should be."

Set over one school year in 1986, Eleanor & Park is the story of two star-crossed misfits—smart enough to know first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try.]]>
328 Rainbow Rowell 1250012570 Christi 4 3.92 2012 Eleanor & Park
author: Rainbow Rowell
name: Christi
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2015/02/27
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:

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The Goldfinch 17333794 WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE

"The Goldfinch is a rarity that comes along perhaps half a dozen times per decade, a smartly written literary novel that connects with the heart as well as the mind....Donna Tartt has delivered an extraordinary work of fiction."--Stephen King, The New York Times Book Review

Theo Decker, a 13-year-old New Yorker, miraculously survives an accident that kills his mother. Abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. Bewildered by his strange new home on Park Avenue, disturbed by schoolmates who don't know how to talk to him, and tormented above all by his longing for his mother, he clings to the one thing that reminds him of a small, mysteriously captivating painting that ultimately draws Theo into the underworld of art.

As an adult, Theo moves silkily between the drawing rooms of the rich and the dusty labyrinth of an antiques store where he works. He is alienated and in love--and at the center of a narrowing, ever more dangerous circle.

The Goldfinch is a mesmerizing, stay-up-all-night and tell-all-your-friends triumph, an old-fashioned story of loss and obsession, survival and self-invention, and the ruthless machinations of fate.]]>
718 Donna Tartt 0316248673 Christi 4 4.01 2013 The Goldfinch
author: Donna Tartt
name: Christi
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2015/01/21
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:

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<![CDATA[The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society]]> 2728527
“Treat yourself to this book, please - I can’t recommend it highly enough.� (Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love)

“I wonder how the book got to Guernsey? Perhaps there is some sort of secret homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers.�

January 1946: London is emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, and writer Juliet Ashton is looking for her next book subject. Who could imagine that she would find it in a letter from a man she’s never met, a native of the island of Guernsey, who has come across her name written inside a book by Charles Lamb....

As Juliet and her new correspondent exchange letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of this man and his friends - and what a wonderfully eccentric world it is. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - born as a spur-of-the-moment alibi when its members were discovered breaking curfew by the Germans occupying their island - boasts a charming, funny, deeply human cast of characters, from pig farmers to phrenologists, literature lovers all. Juliet begins a remarkable correspondence with the society’s members, learning about their island, their taste in books, and the impact the recent German occupation has had on their lives. Captivated by their stories, she sets sail for Guernsey, and what she finds will change her forever.

Written with warmth and humor as a series of letters, this novel is a celebration of the written word in all its guises and of finding connection in the most surprising ways.

Praise for The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society

“A jewel... Poignant and keenly observed, Guernsey is a small masterpiece about love, war, and the immeasurable sustenance to be found in good books and good friends.� (People)

“A book-lover’s delight, an implicit and sometimes explicit paean to all things literary.� (Chicago Sun-Times)

“A sparkling epistolary novel radiating wit, lightly worn erudition and written with great assurance and aplomb.� (The Sunday Times [London])

“Cooked perfectly à point: subtle and elegant in flavour, yet emotionally satisfying to the finish.� (The Times [London])]]>
277 Mary Ann Shaffer 0385340990 Christi 4 review-books 4.13 2008 The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
author: Mary Ann Shaffer
name: Christi
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2008
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Sarah's Key 556602
Paris, May 2002: On Vel' d'Hiv's sixtieth anniversary, Julia Jarmond, an American journalist, is asked by her Paris-based American magazine to write an article about this black day in France's past. Julia has lived in Paris for nearly twenty-five years, married a Frenchman, and she is shocked both by her ignorance about the event and the silence that still surrounds it. In the course of her investigation, she stumbles onto a trail of long-hidden family secrets that connects her to Sarah. Julia finds herself compelled to retrace the girl's ordeal, from the terrible days spent shut in at the Vel' d'Hiv' to the camps and beyond. As she probes into Sarah's past, she begins to question her own place in France and to reevaluate her marriage and her life.

Writing about the fate of her country with a pitiless clarity, Tatiana de Rosnay offers us a brilliantly subtle, compelling portrait of France under occupation and reveals the taboos and denial surrounding this painful episode in French history.
(front flap)]]>
294 Tatiana de Rosnay 0312370830 Christi 5 review-books 4.18 2006 Sarah's Key
author: Tatiana de Rosnay
name: Christi
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Time Traveler's Wife 14050 537 Audrey Niffenegger 0965818675 Christi 5 review-books 3.90 2003 The Time Traveler's Wife
author: Audrey Niffenegger
name: Christi
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:
I loved this book it was exciting and sad. All at the same time. I will have to read this again.
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We Need to Talk About Kevin 80660 The gripping international bestseller about motherhood gone awry.

Eva never really wanted to be a mother - and certainly not the mother of the unlovable boy who murdered seven of his fellow high school students, a cafeteria worker, and a much-adored teacher who tried to befriend him, all two days before his sixteenth birthday. Now, two years later, it is time for her to come to terms with marriage, career, family, parenthood, and Kevin's horrific rampage in a series of startlingly direct correspondences with her estranged husband, Franklin. Uneasy with the sacrifices and social demotion of motherhood from the start, Eva fears that her alarming dislike for her own son may be responsible for driving him so nihilistically off the rails.

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400 Lionel Shriver 006112429X Christi 5 4.07 2003 We Need to Talk About Kevin
author: Lionel Shriver
name: Christi
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at: 2015/04/14
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:

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A Thousand Splendid Suns 128029
With the passing of time comes Taliban rule over Afghanistan, the streets of Kabul loud with the sound of gunfire and bombs, life a desperate struggle against starvation, brutality and fear, the women's endurance tested beyond their worst imaginings. Yet love can move people to act in unexpected ways, lead them to overcome the most daunting obstacles with a startling heroism. In the end it is love that triumphs over death and destruction.

A Thousand Splendid Suns is a portrait of a wounded country and a story of family and friendship, of an unforgiving time, an unlikely bond, and an indestructible love.]]>
372 Khaled Hosseini 1594489505 Christi 5 review-books 4.44 2007 A Thousand Splendid Suns
author: Khaled Hosseini
name: Christi
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:
I really enjoyed this book! I can't wait to talk about it tonight @ our book club meeting.
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Never Let Me Go 6334 288 Kazuo Ishiguro 1400078776 Christi 5 review-books 3.85 2005 Never Let Me Go
author: Kazuo Ishiguro
name: Christi
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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<![CDATA[Snow Flower and the Secret Fan]]> 1103
As the years pass, Lily and Snow Flower send messages on fans, compose stories on handkerchiefs, reaching out of isolation to share their hopes, dreams, and accomplishments. Together, they endure the agony of foot-binding, and reflect upon their arranged marriages, shared loneliness, and the joys and tragedies of motherhood. The two find solace, developing a bond that keeps their spirits alive. But when a misunderstanding arises, their deep friendship suddenly threatens to tear apart.]]>
269 Lisa See 0812968069 Christi 5 review-books 4.06 2005 Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
author: Lisa See
name: Christi
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Color Purple 11486
Then her husband's lover, a flamboyant blues singer, barreled into her world and gave Celie the courage to ask for more - to laugh, to play, and finally - to love.]]>
295 Alice Walker Christi 5 review-books 4.22 1982 The Color Purple
author: Alice Walker
name: Christi
average rating: 4.22
book published: 1982
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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Lolita 7604 Librarian's note: Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780141182537.

Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Dolores Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.]]>
368 Vladimir Nabokov 0679723161 Christi 5 review-books 3.87 1955 Lolita
author: Vladimir Nabokov
name: Christi
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1955
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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When Rabbit Howls 760941 400 Truddi Chase 0515103292 Christi 5 review-books 4.05 1987 When Rabbit Howls
author: Truddi Chase
name: Christi
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1987
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Last Lecture 2318271
When Randy Pausch, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon, was asked to give such a lecture, he didn't have to imagine it as his last, since he had recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer. But the lecture he gave, 'Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams', wasn't about dying. It was about the importance of overcoming obstacles, of enabling the dreams of others, of seizing every moment (because time is all you have and you may find one day that you have less than you think). It was a summation of everything Randy had come to believe. It was about living.

In this book, Randy Pausch has combined the humour, inspiration, and intelligence that made his lecture such a phenomenon and given it an indelible form. It is a book that will be shared for generations to come.]]>
206 Randy Pausch 1401323251 Christi 5 review-books 4.25 2008 The Last Lecture
author: Randy Pausch
name: Christi
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2008
rating: 5
read at: 2008/10/01
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:

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The Lovely Bones 12232938
So begins the story of Susie Salmon, who is adjusting to her new home in heaven, a place that is not at all what she expected, even as she is watching life on earth continue without her -- her friends trading rumors about her disappearance, her killer trying to cover his tracks, her grief-stricken family unraveling. Out of unspeakable tragedy and loss, The Lovely Bones succeeds, miraculously, in building a tale filled with hope, humor, suspense, even joy.]]>
372 Alice Sebold 0316166685 Christi 5 review-books 3.87 2002 The Lovely Bones
author: Alice Sebold
name: Christi
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2002
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
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<![CDATA[The Eyre Affair (Thursday Next, #1)]]> 27003
Hades' real target is the beloved Jane Eyre, and it's not long before he plucks her from the pages of Bronte's novel. Enter Thursday Next. She's the Special Operative's renowned literary detective, and she drives a Porsche. With the help of her uncle Mycroft's Prose Portal, Thursday enters the novel to rescue Jane Eyre from this heinous act of literary homicide. It's tricky business, all these interlopers running about Thornfield, and deceptions run rampant as their paths cross with Jane, Rochester, and Miss Fairfax. Can Thursday save Jane Eyre and Bronte's masterpiece? And what of the Crimean War? Will it ever end? And what about those annoying black holes that pop up now and again, sucking things into time-space voids . . .

Suspenseful and outlandish, absorbing and fun, The Eyre Affair is a caper unlike any other and an introduction to the imagination of a most distinctive writer and his singular fictional universe.]]>
374 Jasper Fforde 0142001805 Christi 5 review-books 3.89 2001 The Eyre Affair (Thursday Next, #1)
author: Jasper Fforde
name: Christi
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at: 2010/11/03
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:
I love this book so Far! I am totally reading the rest of the Thursday Next series!
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Water for Elephants 43641
Beautifully written, Water for Elephants is illuminated by a wonderful sense of time and place. It tells a story of a love between two people that overcomes incredible odds in a world in which even love is a luxury that few can afford.]]>
368 Sara Gruen 1565125606 Christi 5 review-books 4.11 2006 Water for Elephants
author: Sara Gruen
name: Christi
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
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<![CDATA[Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, #1)]]> 5899779 “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.�

So begins Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, an expanded edition of the beloved Jane Austen novel featuring all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie mayhem. As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton—and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she’s soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers—and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield. Can Elizabeth vanquish the spawn of Satan? And overcome the social prejudices of the class-conscious landed gentry? Complete with romance, heartbreak, swordfights, cannibalism, and thousands of rotting corpses,]]>
320 Seth Grahame-Smith 1594743347 Christi 5 review-books 3.32 2009 Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, #1)
author: Seth Grahame-Smith
name: Christi
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
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<![CDATA[Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption]]> 8664353
The lieutenant’s name was Louis Zamperini. In boyhood, he'd been a cunning and incorrigible delinquent, breaking into houses, brawling, and fleeing his home to ride the rails. As a teenager, he had channeled his defiance into running, discovering a prodigious talent that had carried him to the Berlin Olympics and within sight of the four-minute mile. But when war had come, the athlete had become an airman, embarking on a journey that led to his doomed flight, a tiny raft, and a drift into the unknown.

Ahead of Zamperini lay thousands of miles of open ocean, leaping sharks, a foundering raft, thirst and starvation, enemy aircraft, and, beyond, a trial even greater. Driven to the limits of endurance, Zamperini would answer desperation with ingenuity; suffering with hope, resolve, and humor; brutality with rebellion. His fate, whether triumph or tragedy, would be suspended on the fraying wire of his will.]]>
475 Laura Hillenbrand 1400064163 Christi 5 4.38 2010 Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption
author: Laura Hillenbrand
name: Christi
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2015/03/12
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
review:

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Gone Girl 21480930 560 Gillian Flynn 0553418351 Christi 5 review-books 4.05 2012 Gone Girl
author: Gillian Flynn
name: Christi
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2014/08/14
date added: 2015/04/15
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review:

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The Eight (The Eight, #1) 113310 598 Katherine Neville 0345366239 Christi 5 review-books
I just read it again a few weeks ago because Katherine finally wrote the Sequel! ]]>
3.94 1988 The Eight (The Eight, #1)
author: Katherine Neville
name: Christi
average rating: 3.94
book published: 1988
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: review-books
review:
I loved this book! I can easily say that it was one of my favorite reads and each time I read it(3 times) I learn something new or Find a clue that I completely missed the last time!

I just read it again a few weeks ago because Katherine finally wrote the Sequel!
]]>
The Fault in Our Stars 11870085
Insightful, bold, irreverent, and raw, The Fault in Our Stars is award-winning author John Green's most ambitious and heartbreaking work yet, brilliantly exploring the funny, thrilling, and tragic business of being alive and in love.]]>
313 John Green Christi 5 review-books 4.13 2012 The Fault in Our Stars
author: John Green
name: Christi
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at:
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The Chaperone 13056159 The Chaperone is Ěýa captivating novel about the woman who chaperoned an irreverent Louise Brooks to New York City in 1922 and the summer that would change them both.
Ěý
Only a few years before becoming a famous silent-film star and an icon of her generation, a fifteen-year-old Louise Brooks leaves Wichita, Kansas, to study with the prestigious Denishawn School of Dancing in New York. Much to her annoyance, she is accompanied by a thirty-six-year-old chaperone, who is neither mother nor friend. Cora Carlisle, a complicated but traditional woman with her own reasons for making the trip, has no idea what she’s in for. Young Louise, already stunningly beautiful and sporting her famous black bob with blunt bangs, is known for her arrogance and her lack of respect for convention. Ultimately, the five weeks they spend together will transform their lives forever.
Ěý
For Cora, the city holds the promise of discovery that might answer the question at the core of her being, and even as she does her best to watch over Louise in this strange and bustling place she embarks on a mission of her own. And while what she finds isn’t what she anticipated, she is liberated in a way she could not have imagined. Over the course of Cora’s relationship with Louise, her eyes are opened to the promise of the twentieth century and a new understanding of the possibilities for being fully alive.
Ěý
Drawing on the rich history of the 1920s,â€�30s, and beyond—from the orphan trains to Prohibition, flappers, Ěýand the onset of the Great Depression to the burgeoning movement for equal rights and new opportunities for women—Laura Moriarty’s The Chaperone illustrates how rapidly everything, from fashion and hemlines to values and attitudes, was changing at this time and what a vast difference it all made for Louise Brooks, Cora Carlisle, and others like them.]]>
367 Laura Moriarty 1594487014 Christi 5 3.85 2012 The Chaperone
author: Laura Moriarty
name: Christi
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2015/02/25
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
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Still Life with Bread Crumbs 17884042 Still Life with Bread Crumbs begins with an imagined gunshot and ends with a new tin roof. Between the two is a wry and knowing portrait of Rebecca Winter, a photographer whose work made her an unlikely heroine for many women. Her career is now descendent, her bank balance shaky, and she has fled the city for the middle of nowhere. There she discovers, in a tree stand with a roofer named Jim Bates, that what she sees through a camera lens is not all there is to life.
Ěý
Brilliantly written, powerfully observed, Still Life with Bread Crumbs is a deeply moving and often very funny story of unexpected love, and a stunningly crafted journey into the life of a woman, her heart, her mind, her days, as she discovers that life is a story with many levels, a story that is longer and more exciting than she ever imagined.]]>
252 Anna Quindlen 1400065755 Christi 5 3.62 2014 Still Life with Bread Crumbs
author: Anna Quindlen
name: Christi
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2014
rating: 5
read at: 2015/03/18
date added: 2015/04/15
shelves: finished-book-challenge, review-books
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<![CDATA[Shadow of Night (All Souls, #2)]]> 11559200 A Discovery of Witches� cliffhanger ending, Shadow of Night takes Diana and Matthew on a trip through time to Elizabethan London, where they are plunged into a world of spies, magic, and a coterie of Matthew’s old friends, the School of Night. As the search for Ashmole 782 deepens and Diana seeks out a witch to tutor her in magic, the net of Matthew’s past tightens around them, and they embark on a very different—and vastly more dangerous—journey.]]> 584 Deborah Harkness 0670023485 Christi 5 4.04 2012 Shadow of Night (All Souls, #2)
author: Deborah Harkness
name: Christi
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2014/01/02
date added: 2015/04/14
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<![CDATA[From Dead to Worse (Sookie Stackhouse, #8)]]> 2233407
It's clear that things are changing whether the weres and vamps of her corner of Louisiana like it or not. And Sookie, Friend to the Pack and blood-bonded to Eric Northman, leader of the local vampire community is caught up in the changes.

In the ensuing battles, Sookie faces danger, death, and once more, betrayal by someone she loves. And when the fur has finished flying and the cold blood finished flowing, her world will be forever altered.]]>
368 Charlaine Harris 0441015891 Christi 3 4.02 2008 From Dead to Worse (Sookie Stackhouse, #8)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2008
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[Dead Until Dark (Sookie Stackhouse, #1)]]> 301082
Maybe having a vampire for a boyfriend isn't such a bright idea.]]>
292 Charlaine Harris 0441008534 Christi 3 3.98 2001 Dead Until Dark (Sookie Stackhouse, #1)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2001
rating: 3
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date added: 2015/03/14
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<![CDATA[Living Dead in Dallas (Sookie Stackhouse, #2)]]> 110494
The point is: they saved her life. So when one of the bloodsuckers asks for a favor, she obliges - and soon Sookie's in Dallas, using her telepathic skills to search for a missing vampire. She's supposed to interview certain humans involved, but she makes one condition: the vampires must promise to behave and let the humans go unharmed. But that's easier said than done, and all it takes is one delicious blonde and one small mistake for things to turn deadly....]]>
291 Charlaine Harris 1841493007 Christi 3 3.98 2002 Living Dead in Dallas (Sookie Stackhouse, #2)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2002
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[Dead to the World (Sookie Stackhouse, #4)]]> 140077 291 Charlaine Harris 0441012183 Christi 3 4.13 2004 Dead to the World (Sookie Stackhouse, #4)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2004
rating: 3
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date added: 2015/03/14
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<![CDATA[Club Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #3)]]> 140082 274 Charlaine Harris Christi 3 4.03 2003 Club Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #3)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2003
rating: 3
read at:
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<![CDATA[Dead as a Doornail (Sookie Stackhouse, #5)]]> 170210 295 Charlaine Harris 0441013333 Christi 3 4.01 2005 Dead as a Doornail (Sookie Stackhouse, #5)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2005
rating: 3
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date added: 2015/03/14
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<![CDATA[Definitely Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #6)]]> 140079 or Hadley's possessions. And they're prepared to do anything in their power to stop her. Whoever it is, they're definitely dangerous - and Sookie's life is definitely on the line...]]> 324 Charlaine Harris 0441014917 Christi 3 4.02 2006 Definitely Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #6)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2006
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[All Together Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #7)]]> 140075
The summit is a tense situation. The vampire queen of Louisiana is in a precarious position, her power base weakened by hurricane damage to New Orleans. And there are some vamps who would like to finish what nature started. Soon, Sookie must decide what side she'll stand with. And her choice may mean the difference between survival and all-out catastrophe.

And with HBO's launching of an all-new show, True Blood, based on the Southern Vampire novels, the demand for Charlaine Harris and Sookie Stackhouse is bigger than ever.

]]>
336 Charlaine Harris 0441014941 Christi 3 4.06 2007 All Together Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #7)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2007
rating: 3
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Insurgent (Divergent, #2) 11735983
Tris's initiation day should have been marked by celebration and victory with her chosen faction; instead, the day ended with unspeakable horrors. War now looms as conflict between the factions and their ideologies grows. And in times of war, sides must be chosen, secrets will emerge, and choices will become even more irrevocable—and even more powerful. Transformed by her own decisions but also by haunting grief and guilt, radical new discoveries, and shifting relationships, Tris must fully embrace her Divergence, even if she does not know what she may lose by doing so.

New York Times bestselling author Veronica Roth's much-anticipated second book of the dystopian DIVERGENT series is another intoxicating thrill ride of a story, rich with hallmark twists, heartbreaks, romance, and powerful insights about human nature.]]>
525 Veronica Roth 0007442912 Christi 4 3.97 2012 Insurgent (Divergent, #2)
author: Veronica Roth
name: Christi
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2013/07/08
date added: 2015/03/14
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<![CDATA[Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles, #1)]]> 6304335
Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town's oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything.]]>
563 Kami Garcia 0316042676 Christi 4 3.78 2009 Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles, #1)
author: Kami Garcia
name: Christi
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2009
rating: 4
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<![CDATA[Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6)]]> 1 652 J.K. Rowling Christi 5 4.57 2005 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6)
author: J.K. Rowling
name: Christi
average rating: 4.57
book published: 2005
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[Dead in the Family (Sookie Stackhouse, #10)]]> 7091488
Sookie Stackhouse is dealing with a whole host of family problems, ranging from her own kin (a non-human fairy and a telepathic second cousin) demanding a place in her life, to her lover Eric's vampire sire, an ancient being who arrives with Eric's 'brother' in tow at a most inopportune moment. And Sookie's tracking down a distant relation of her ailing neighbour (and ex), Vampire Bill Compton.

In addition to the multitude of family issues complicating her life, the werewolf pack of Shreveport has asked Sookie for a special favour, and since Sookie is an obliging young woman, she agrees. But this favour for the wolves has dire results for Sookie, who is still recovering from the trauma of her abduction during the Fairy War.]]>
320 Charlaine Harris 0441018645 Christi 5 3.90 2010 Dead in the Family (Sookie Stackhouse, #10)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2010
rating: 5
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<![CDATA[Dead and Gone (Sookie Stackhouse, #9)]]> 5161066
The great revelation goes well at first - then the horribly mutilated body of a were-panther is found in the parking lot of Merlotte's, and Sookie agrees to use her telepathic talent to track down the murderer. But there is a far greater danger than this killer threatening Bon Temps: a race of unhuman beings, older, more powerful, and far more secretive than the vampires or the werewolves, is preparing for war. And Sookie is an all-too-human pawn in their ages-old battle...]]>
320 Charlaine Harris 0441017150 Christi 3 4.02 2009 Dead and Gone (Sookie Stackhouse, #9)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2009
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[After Dead: What Came Next in the World of Sookie Stackhouse]]> 17239876 Dead Ever After marked the end of the Sookie Stackhouse novels—a series that garnered millions of fans and spawned the hit HBO television show True Blood. It also stoked a hunger that will never die…a hunger to know what happened next.

With characters arranged alphabetically—from the Ancient Pythoness to Bethany Zanelli—bestselling author Charlaine Harris takes fans into the future of their favorite residents of Bon Temps and environs. You’ll learn how Michele and Jason’s marriage fared, what happened to Sookie’s cousin Hunter, and whether Tara and JB’s twins grew up to be solid citizens.

This coda provides the answers to your lingering questions—including details of Sookie’s own happily-ever-after�

The book will feature extensive interior art by acclaimed Sookie artist Lisa Desimini, including a Sookieverse Alphabet, color endpapers, and several full-page black and white interior illustrations.]]>
195 Charlaine Harris 0425269515 Christi 3 2.95 2013 After Dead: What Came Next in the World of Sookie Stackhouse
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 2.95
book published: 2013
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[Dead Ever After (Sookie Stackhouse, #13)]]> 15985348 There are secrets in the town of Bon Temps, ones that threaten those closest to Sookie—and could destroy her heart...

Sookie Stackhouse finds it easy to turn down the request of former barmaid Arlene when she wants her job back at Merlotte’s. After all, Arlene tried to have Sookie killed. But her relationship with Eric Northman is not so clearcut. He and his vampires are keeping their distance…and a cold silence. And when Sookie learns the reason why, she is devastated.

Then a shocking murder rocks Bon Temps, and Sookie is arrested for the crime.

But the evidence against Sookie is weak, and she makes bail. Investigating the killing, she’ll learn that what passes for truth in Bon Temps is only a convenient lie. What passes for justice is more spilled blood. And what passes for love is never enough...]]>
352 Charlaine Harris 193700788X Christi 3 3.50 2013 Dead Ever After (Sookie Stackhouse, #13)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2013
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[Deadlocked (Sookie Stackhouse, #12)]]> 10407279
There's a thing or two she'd like to say about that, but she has to keep quiet--Felipe de Castro, the vampire king of Louisiana (and Arkansas and Nevada), is in town. It's the worst possible time for a human body to show up in Eric's front yard--especially the body of the woman whose blood he just drank.

Now it's up to Sookie and Bill, the official Area Five investigator, to solve the murder. Sookie thinks that, at least this time, the dead girl's fate has nothing to do with her. But she is wrong. She has an enemy, one far more devious than she would ever suspect, who's set out to make Sookie's world come crashing down.]]>
327 Charlaine Harris 0575096578 Christi 3 3.72 2012 Deadlocked (Sookie Stackhouse, #12)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2012
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[Dead Reckoning (Sookie Stackhouse, #11)]]> 7981206 here.

With her knack for being in trouble's way, Sookie witnesses the firebombing of Merlotte's, the bar where she works. Since Sam Merlotte is now known to be two-natured, suspicion falls immediately on the anti-shifters in the area. Sookie suspects otherwise, but her attention is divided when she realizes that her lover Eric Northman and his "child" Pam are plotting to kill the vampire who is now their master. Gradually, Sookie is drawn into the plot-which is much more complicated than she knows...]]>
336 Charlaine Harris Christi 3 3.82 2011 Dead Reckoning (Sookie Stackhouse, #11)
author: Charlaine Harris
name: Christi
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2011
rating: 3
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What Alice Forgot 6469165
Alice is twenty-nine. She adores sleep, chocolate, and her ramshackle new house. She’s newly engaged to the wonderful Nick and is pregnant with her first baby.

There’s just one problem.
All that was ten years ago �

Alice has slipped in a step aerobics class, hit her head and lost a decade. Now she’s a grown-up, bossy mother of three in the middle of a nasty divorce and her beloved sister Elisabeth isn’t speaking to her. This is her life but not as she knows it.

Clearly Alice has made some terrible mistakes.
Just how much can happen in a decade?

Can she ever get back to the woman she used to be?]]>
487 Liane Moriarty 0141043768 Christi 3 4.06 2010 What Alice Forgot
author: Liane Moriarty
name: Christi
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2010
rating: 3
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date added: 2015/02/25
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The Great Gatsby 4671 The only edition of the beloved classic that is authorized by Fitzgerald’s family and from his lifelong publisher.

This edition is the enduring original text, updated with the author’s own revisions, a foreword by his granddaughter, and with a new introduction by National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward.

The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s third book, stands as the supreme achievement of his career. First published by Scribner in 1925, this quintessential novel of the Jazz Age has been acclaimed by generations of readers. The story of the mysteriously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan is an exquisitely crafted tale of America in the 1920s.]]>
180 F. Scott Fitzgerald 0743273567 Christi 3 3.93 1925 The Great Gatsby
author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
name: Christi
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1925
rating: 3
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<![CDATA[Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders]]> 105992 687 Vincent Bugliosi 0393322238 Christi 3 4.05 1974 Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders
author: Vincent Bugliosi
name: Christi
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1974
rating: 3
read at: 2005/10/01
date added: 2013/07/08
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The Marriage Plot 10964693
As Madeleine tries to understand why "it became laughable to read writers like Cheever and Updike, who wrote about the suburbia Madeleine and most of her friends had grown up in, in favor of reading the Marquis de Sade, who wrote about deflowering virgins in eighteenth century France," real life, in the form of two very different guys, intervenes. Leonard Bankhead - charismatic loner, college Darwinist, and lost Portland boy - suddenly turns up in a semiotics seminar, and soon Madeleine finds herself in a highly charged erotic and intellectual relationship with him. At the same time, her old "friend" Mitchell Grammaticus - who's been reading Christian mysticism and generally acting strange - resurfaces, obsessed with the idea that Madeleine is destined to be his mate.

Over the next year, as the members of the triangle in this amazing, spellbinding novel graduate from college and enter the real world, events force them to reevaluate everything they learned in school. Leonard and Madeleine move to a biology laboratory on Cape Cod, but can't escape the secret responsible for Leonard's seemingly inexhaustible energy and plunging moods. And Mitchell, traveling around the world to get Madeleine out of his mind, finds himself face-to-face with ultimate questions about the meaning of life, the existence of God, and the true nature of love.

Are the great love stories of the nineteenth century dead? Or can there be a new story, written for today and alive to the realities of feminism, sexual freedom, prenups, and divorce? With devastating wit and an abiding understanding of and affection for his characters, Jeffrey Eugenides revives the motivating energies of the Novel, while creating a story so contemporary and fresh that it reads like the intimate journal of our own lives.]]>
406 Jeffrey Eugenides 0374203059 Christi 1 Blah... 3.46 2011 The Marriage Plot
author: Jeffrey Eugenides
name: Christi
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2011
rating: 1
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date added: 2013/07/08
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Blah...
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Divergent (Divergent, #1) 13335037
During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles alongside her fellow initiates to live out the choice they have made. Together they must undergo extreme physical tests of endurance and intense psychological simulations, some with devastating consequences. As initiation transforms them all, Tris must determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes exasperating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers unrest and growing conflict that threaten to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves . . . or it might destroy her.]]>
487 Veronica Roth 0062024035 Christi 5 4.13 2011 Divergent (Divergent, #1)
author: Veronica Roth
name: Christi
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2011
rating: 5
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date added: 2013/04/29
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<![CDATA[The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II]]> 95784
This book tells the story from three perspectives: of the Japanese soldiers who performed it, of the Chinese civilians who endured it, and of a group of Europeans and Americans who refused to abandon the city and were able to create a safety zone that saved many.]]>
290 Iris Chang 0140277447 Christi 4 4.23 1997 The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II
author: Iris Chang
name: Christi
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1997
rating: 4
read at: 2011/06/01
date added: 2012/05/27
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Well written but disturbed that this even happened. They say that human beings are civilized, if we went by what happened in Nanking I would say that we are no better then the beasts in the woods.
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Midnight Sun [2008 Draft] 4502877 The record for the completed novel can be found here.

Midnight Sun is the much anticipated retelling of Twilight from Edward Cullen's perspective. An unedited partial draft was illegally leaked onto the internet in 2008; consequently, author Stephenie Meyer put the project on indefinite hold. Shortly afterward, she posted a letter to her fans on her website including a link to the entire partial draft of the book so that those who wanted to read it could do so legally and with her consent.

Note: Do not add a cover. Do not add translations. Do not add any other editions. Do not combine with editions of the full work. Do not add this book record to any series.]]>
264 Stephenie Meyer Christi 4 4.01 2008 Midnight Sun [2008 Draft]
author: Stephenie Meyer
name: Christi
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2008
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/04/06
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Eat, Pray, Love 19501
Around the time Elizabeth Gilbert turned thirty, she went through an early-onslaught midlife crisis. She had everything an educated, ambitious American woman was supposed to want—a husband, a house, a successful career. But instead of feeling happy and fulfilled, she was consumed with panic, grief, and confusion. She went through a divorce, a crushing depression, another failed love, and the eradication of everything she ever thought she was supposed to be.

To recover from all this, Gilbert took a radical step. In order to give herself the time and space to find out who she really was and what she really wanted, she got rid of her belongings, quit her job, and undertook a yearlong journey around the world—all alone. Eat, Pray, Love is the absorbing chronicle of that year. Her aim was to visit three places where she could examine one aspect of her own nature set against the backdrop of a culture that has traditionally done that one thing very well. In Rome, she studied the art of pleasure, learning to speak Italian and gaining the twenty-three happiest pounds of her life. India was for the art of devotion, and with the help of a native guru and a surprisingly wise cowboy from Texas, she embarked on four uninterrupted months of spiritual exploration. In Bali, she studied the art of balance between worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence. She became the pupil of an elderly medicine man and also fell in love the best way—unexpectedly.

An intensely articulate and moving memoir of self-discovery, Eat, Pray, Love is about what can happen when you claim responsibility for your own contentment and stop trying to live in imitation of society’s ideals. It is certain to touch anyone who has ever woken up to the unrelenting need for change.]]>
368 Elizabeth Gilbert 0143038419 Christi 1 3.64 2006 Eat, Pray, Love
author: Elizabeth Gilbert
name: Christi
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2006
rating: 1
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Chosen (House of Night, #3) 1326258 307 P.C. Cast 0312360304 Christi 4 3.92 2008 Chosen (House of Night, #3)
author: P.C. Cast
name: Christi
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2008
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/03/21
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<![CDATA[Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (Bridget Jones, #2)]]> 363752 352 Helen Fielding 0140298479 Christi 4 3.64 1999 Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (Bridget Jones, #2)
author: Helen Fielding
name: Christi
average rating: 3.64
book published: 1999
rating: 4
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date added: 2011/03/21
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Death of a Salesman 12898 'For a salesman, there is no rock bottom to life. He don't put a bolt to a nut, he don't tell you the law or give you medicine. He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine.'

Willy Loman has been a salesman for 34 years. At 60, he is cast aside, his usefulness now exhausted. With no future to dream about he must face the crushing disappointments of his past. He takes one final brave action, but is he heroic at last?, or a self-deluding fool?]]>
144 Arthur Miller 0435233076 Christi 1 3.57 1949 Death of a Salesman
author: Arthur Miller
name: Christi
average rating: 3.57
book published: 1949
rating: 1
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Lost 24929 Winifred Rudge, a bemused writer struggling to get beyond the runaway success of her mass-market astrology book, travels to London to jump-start her new novel about a woman who is being haunted by the ghost of Jack the Ripper. Upon her arrival, she finds that her stepcousin and old friend John Comestor has disappeared, and a ghostly presence seems to have taken over his apartment in the nineteenth-century rowhouse once owned by Winnie's great-great-grandfather. Is it the spirit of this ancestor, who, family legend claims, was Charles Dickens's childhood inspiration for Ebenezer Scrooge? Could it be the ghostly remains of Jack the Ripper? Or a phantasm derived from a more arcane and insidious origin?

Winnie begins to investigate, but John's erstwhile girlfriend, Allegra, is aggressively unhelpful, and his downstairs neighbor, the cat-obsessed Mrs. Maddingly, is growing stranger by the day. Gripped by inspiration and desperation alike, Winnie finds herself the unwilling audience for a drama of specters and shades, some from her family's peculiar history and some from her own unvanquished past.

In the spirit of A. S. Byatt's Possession, with dark overtones echoing from A Christmas Carol, Lost presents a rich fictional world that will enrapture Gregory Maguire's eager audience.

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340 Gregory Maguire 0060988649 Christi 4 2.84 2001 Lost
author: Gregory Maguire
name: Christi
average rating: 2.84
book published: 2001
rating: 4
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<![CDATA[The Hobbit, or There and Back Again]]> 5907 Written for J.R.R. Tolkien’s own children, The Hobbit met with instant critical acclaim when it was first published in 1937. Now recognized as a timeless classic, this introduction to the hobbit Bilbo Baggins, the wizard Gandalf, Gollum, and the spectacular world of Middle-earth recounts of the adventures of a reluctant hero, a powerful and dangerous ring, and the cruel dragon Smaug the Magnificent. The text in this 372-page paperback edition is based on that first published in Great Britain by Collins Modern Classics (1998), and includes a note on the text by Douglas A. Anderson (2001).]]> 366 J.R.R. Tolkien Christi 4 4.29 1937 The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
author: J.R.R. Tolkien
name: Christi
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1937
rating: 4
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<![CDATA[Bridget Jones’s Diary (Bridget Jones, #1)]]> 227443 a. lose 7 pounds
b. stop smoking
c. develop Inner Poise

"129 lbs. (how is it possible to put on 4 pounds in the middle of the night? Could flesh have somehow solidified becoming denser and heavier? Repulsive, horrifying notion), alcohol units 4 (excellent), cigarettes 21 (poor but will give up totally tomorrow), number of correct lottery numbers 2 (better, but nevertheless useless)..."

"Bridget Jones' Diary" is the devastatingly self-aware, laugh-out-loud daily chronicle of Bridget's permanent, doomed quest for self-improvement � a year in which she resolves to: reduce the circumference of each thigh by 1.5 inches, visit the gym three times a week not just to buy a sandwich, form a functional relationship with a responsible adult - and learn to program the VCR.

Over the course of the year, Bridget loses a total of 72 pounds but gains a total of 74. She remains, however, optimistic. Through it all, Bridget will have you helpless with laughter, and � like millions of readers the world round � you'll find yourself shouting, "Bridget Jones is me!"]]>
288 Helen Fielding 014028009X Christi 5 3.81 1996 Bridget Jones’s Diary (Bridget Jones, #1)
author: Helen Fielding
name: Christi
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1996
rating: 5
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Sex and the City 7455 304 Candace Bushnell 0446617687 Christi 1 3.45 1996 Sex and the City
author: Candace Bushnell
name: Christi
average rating: 3.45
book published: 1996
rating: 1
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date added: 2011/03/21
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House of Sand and Fog 359770 365 Andre Dubus III 0375727345 Christi 2 3.72 1999 House of Sand and Fog
author: Andre Dubus III
name: Christi
average rating: 3.72
book published: 1999
rating: 2
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date added: 2011/03/21
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