Clubs Books

Three dimensional characters with real life problems drive this heartwarming story from beginning to end. Readers can't help but falling in love, and desperately rooting for Kitty from page one. This author's dry sense of humor added light comedic relief to some of the more intense scenes, and this reader appreciated it. Be sure to keep a box of tissues on hand :)

Salon owner Kitty Murphy has poured years of blood, sweat and tears into her business. There's no way she's going to sit back and allow some developers to come in and destroy everything she worked so hard to build. That isn't the only problem she's having - her son, Josh, is fighting an uphill battle against drug addiction. When the handsome entrepreneur, Harrison Wentworth III, begins to court her, she's sure it's a ploy to get her to agree to sign away her business, but what if he's genuinely interested?

Harrison Wentworth III owns the vast majority of Wentworth Development Group. While he does need her to sign a contract which would deed her shop over to his company, that isn't his primary objective in courting her. He's drawn to her stubborn nature and warmhearted personality but convincing her of his sincerity is far more challenging then he anticipated.

Kittens which were left at Kitty's house are the catalyst that starts THE KITTEN CLUB. Kitty knows she can't keep them all but insists that the ones she adopts out go to good homes. Three of the kittens go to friends and Kitty opts to meet periodically so that the cats can `visit' and so that she can be sure they're receiving the care they deserve. Finding them good homes will be one less worry off her mind. Her real concern lies with her son Josh. He's just moved back in with her and he swears that he's quit using drugs. Kitty prays that he's telling the truth but she isn't about to take him at his word. What she doesn't know is that Josh has a girlfriend, Brooke, who's pregnant. What will happen to her and the baby if he resorts back to drug use?

Kitty doesn't deny her attraction to Harrison but she's realistic and knows that there could never be any chance of a serious relationship between them. Their backgrounds are just too different and don't mesh well. Getting involved in a relationship of any sort with a man who wants to destroy her business isn't a good idea, but Harrison is persistent and she may not be able to resist him for long. What will his reaction be when he learns about Josh's drug problem and that Kitty is singlehandedly doing everything in her power to save him?

Grab yourself a box of tissues before you start reading Dara Edmondson's THE KITTEN CLUB. With larger than life characters and realistic situations that will pull at your heartstrings this is one story you won't be able to put down until you've read every last word. Kitty and Harrison definitely make a wonderful couple. They're both strong willed and their battle over her salon is just the beginning of what turns out to be a relationship full of ups and downs. Josh's drug addiction plays a major role in this storyline with some very unexpected results. I felt so bad for Kitty - as a mother, you try to do everything possible to help your kids and always end up feeling like you failed. Josh's girlfriend and her pregnancy provided a fascinating twist to the story that I hadn't expected - but I really admired her. There is just so much that goes on in this story, from the members of THE KITTEN CLUB to the going ons in Kitty's life it's full of nonstop action that always has you wondering just what will happen next. Absolutely loved it!

Chrissy Dionne (courtesy of Romance Junkies)

Dara Edmondson gives us a great read with an unpredictable ending. Her story is sweet, funny and poignant, and I'm looking forward to her next book.

When Kristy heard that Derek is making a movie called "Mystery train" they think it's great. This book is connected to Kristy and the missing child. Because now Derek is missing. Now Nicky and Derek's friends have to find him.

ISBN 0590691783 - First off, let's clear this up... I don't think our friendly reviewer the Book Addict actually reads the things he reviews, because no one is missing, least of all a child.

Kristy and Abby are trying to run baseball practice when Derek Masters, child star, rolls back into town. He hasn't forgotten his old friends and invites Nicky to come along on a 3-day train ride from Boston to Charleston to promote his new movie. Derek's father invites even more friends along to surprise him - including a few babysitters. Of course, things begin to happen almost right away as drama surrounds the adult stars of Derek's film. It's all small stuff, until Kristy witnesses a man pushed from the train. Now it looks like murder!

Who's behind this? And why? Can the killer be stopped before they kill again? Fun stuff, not the best BSC Mystery I've read, but they're all good. Martin, as usual, does a great job of remembering the history of her characters, which is one of the best reasons to read these books!

This book was really really good! It was also very scary! Derek Masters has come back to Stoneybrook for a visit! He also just completed a new movie that takes place on a mystery train. For a special publicity the stars of the movie can take a trip on it with some guests. Kristy, Stacey, and Abby get to fo along with Nicky Pike and some of Derek's other friends. Then on the train some weird things start to happen and someone is even thrown overboard! The Baby-sitters have to solve this before something happens to Derek!

I absolutely love ALL of Ray Fraser's books and can honestly say I have never had a disappointing read. This also holds true for Labryinth: A Maze of Metaphysical Mysteries. The stories contained within will leave you wanting more! Ray Fraser has done it again!

It was worth the wait. I had heard for some time that Ray was going to release his collections of short stories. It was worth the wait. These stories would make a great television series. Each story made me want to read the next. Labyrinth was a great read. Very professionally and suspensefully done.

All I have to say is "WOW" I am completely enchanted by this writer's book and ideas. These short stories are so suspenseful and addicting, I want to read and read, keep turning the page after page and the next thing you know, you've read more than half the night away and you have to get up bright and early to tend to the kids. LOL Really, this is one talented writer and this is one great book and it has something in it for everybody. I don't want to give anything about it away but it is one of my new favorites, you'll love it.

This is quite an imaginitive story. League will take you places you have never been and you will meet characters like no others you have met. Arax Kermani has a knack for telling a story and this book will not disappoint the young reader.
There is plenty of action for any reader. I liked the character of Xerxes and felt sorry for him because he seems lost, but he has a lot of inner strengths and convictions and I like that in a character.
This has a surprise ending so keep a box of tissue nearby.

I loved this book. It is a story about a teenager Xerxes who is raised by an avil man, Sin (who you like later on) and Xerxes goes in hunt of evil spirits which he captures in a jeweled sword. I didn't understand some of the foreign language used in the book but it made the story more exotic.
I was facsinated by all of the places he visited and the myths about them. There is plenty of adventure but be prepared to cry in the end.
I loved League of the Spirit Hunters and I think any teen will tell you it is a great story!

I loved this book. It is about a teenager Xerxes who is raised by an evil man, Sin (who you like later on) and he goes in search of evil Spirits and captures them in jeweled swords. Some of the dialogue written in another language was hard for me to understand but it made the book more exotic.
I felt a lot of emotion for Xerxes as I followed him on his journey but all he really wanted to be was an ordinary kid. The ending will make you cry so be careful when you read it.
All in all it is a really good book that any teen will enjoy.

Whenever I hear talk of Walt Whitman, 90% of the time it has something to do with his homosexuality, and very little or nothing to do with his poetry. And when I do hear people talking about or reading writings on his poetry, it is the same cliched talk of the roistering, life-embracing, obscene (for the times) poet of democracy...Whatever exactly that may mean....This deathbed edition gives the lie to this absurdly one dimensional view of a poet who, as it turns out, is actually just as or more concerned with death as with life. Consider some of the following quotes: "And I will show that nothing can happen more beautiful than death"(p.16)..."And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier."(p.25)..."Has anyone supposed it lucky to be born? I hasten to inform him or her that it is just as lucky to die..."(p.25)..."What indeed is finally beautiful except death and love?"(p.87)..."O Soul....pondering the themes that thou lovest best, Night, sleep, death and the stars."(p.360)-These are but a few of the quotes that led me to appreciate Walt Whitman as a poet and not some sort of advertising agent for his own ego. The common conception based on a few lines of a few of his poems does him a serious injustice.-This deathbed edition gives us the full scope of his poetic gift. I recommend it to all who are willing to take the time to understand the multidimensional quality of Whitman and his poetry.

not only the greatest selling poet who has been dead for more than fifty years, not only the poet whose translations are regularly read abroad, not only the poet whose name has in-spired countless others, not only the poet who freed us from the manacles of rhyme and decapitated the tyranny of meter but also a man of enthusiasm, a titan, a man whose soul floods with belch, fume and quake, a man who confronts the ravenous centaurs of humdrum and blugeons them swiftly in a spasmo of frenzy-fire, a wanderer, a searcher, one whose mind travels vig-orously throughout the cosmimosa and embellishes it with jac-inths of thought and blooms of popy! not only a man of gargan-tuan passions, one who rages in the face of metallic storm but also a man whose depressions, fogs, glooms and sensitivity to flowers, softness and the defenseless bloom in stark heart-throb. no doubt he is a poet well worth a place beside such other titano-giants such as goethe, milton and homer, for he too sings the song of war, his book is a chanson of bellum for he sings of the battle of the passions, the climaximum of the emo-ceans, he challenges the raw specters of gash, their eyes oozing of slime-drab and rather than succumb to the oxen of indiffer-ence he instead triumphs over the gray and his book thus re-sounds in shinning claria! his is an adventure of thought sur-real in its gusto, jumping in its excitica and wild in its leap of ideas! thank celestium that he liberated us poets from the ab-surd manacles of rhyme and meter and we can now surge through horiza with countless new devices, metaphors and similies awaiting in our platoons! he is the cougar of innova-tion, the lion of spasmo and the giant of vision.

kyle foley, author of Lorelei Pursued and Wrestles with God

Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" took various forms during the poet's lifetime. The 1855 lst edition was a thin pamphlet of 12 poems; the great final edition encompassed more than 300. It is the 1892 edition of "Leaves of Grass" commonly called "the Deathbed Edition"-that remains the bard's definitive version of what is indisputably and American classic. This special edition of "Leaves of Grass has been prepared in observance of the 100th anniversary of Whitman's death (March 26, 1892) and contains the entire "Deathbed Edition."

In Leaves of Grass Witman abandoned traditonal Victorian poetic forms and language, handled decidedly unvonventional sujects & themes, and evoked so personal a tone and so candid a voice that in the book offended the few people who read it in the first voice that the book offended the few people who read it in the first edition. Only Ralph Waldo emerson hailed Whitman "at the beginning of a great careet." Today Whitman is revered for his accomplishment, and many of his poems are admired as among America's finest: the exquisite personal meditation of "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking"; the celebraton of the human body & spitit in song of Myself; the paeans to companionship of the Calamus poems; and the landmark elegy for Abraham Lincoln, "When Lilacs Last in the dooryard Bloom'd. Throughout Leaves of Grass we glimpse the sublime beauty of the natural world and fel Whitman's lovoing embrace of the common man.

This is a lovely story set in a town in Ohio during the '40s. Lentil learns to play a harmonica and there are sweet scenes of small town life as well as a marching band. My 3.5 year old son loves this book, along with all of McCloskey's books. What has been wonderful for us about this book is the character of "Old Sneep", who grumbles and does mean things. This has really hit home with my son regarding our teaching of having a joyful heart and not complaining. Great literature at its best.

As a retired preschool/ daycare administrator I never hesitate to say that McCloskey is one the all-time great writers . Lentil has always been one of the best books to read at story time . You can't go wrong with buying this story for your favorite 4 or 5 year old, but even my 9 year old grandsons love this tale, and it got them interested in playing a harmonica!

This is an excellent book for the musically inclined child whose singing voice is a little less than melodious. In the book, the vocally challenged Lentil finds his mantra through the harmonica and ends up saving the day with it. My father gave me this book along with a harmonica when I was seven years old in response to my wobbly warbling, and I've been playing harmonica and many other instruments ever since. I just can't 'harp' enough on how great of inspiration this book was to me and could be for other vocally vexed children. -stephen

I've just finished Book I of Cellini's two book autobiography. I have Symonds' translation in a single volume published by the Book League of America in 1937. Having been to Florence, Rome and Milan recently, Cellini's stories about himself and his adventures become truly vivid. At first, I could not imagine anyone being so self-agrandizing and so unabashedly boastful about his intentions, his artistic abilities and his view of his world. The man becomes so endearing through his writing, however, that I was not put off; rather, I found myself chuckling at his gall and style. His relationships and adventures with Popes Clement VII and Paul III, the Medici families, other artists, cardinals, dukes and jailors make for hilarious reading. His genius comes through and lingers as the reader ponders the historic figures and politics of Renaissance Italy. I'm beginning Book 2 today with great anticipation. What an ego! Symonds translation in 1937 is fine. He offers footnotes that aid the reader's following of the chronology. Further, Symonds often gives the phrase as Cellini wrote it, should there be different nuances in translation.

One of the first and yet one of the greatest autobiographies of all time. Any celebrity or would be celebrity thinking of dashing off a quick "life" or apologia pro vita sua could do worse than start by reading or re-reading this fantastically intense and life-enhancing book

This piece is an excellent portrayal of life during the Italian Renaissance, but more importantly, the book is purely entertaining. Benvenuto Cellini tells the story of his life in a vivid tale of kings and prostitutes, artists and dukes, soldiers and necromancers, all the while proclaiming himself the absolute protagonist of his world. Cellini's autobiography is filled to capacity with egotism, but this only makes the story more interesting. In a good piece of literature of this type, a person wants to see a main character with absolute confidence in himself; a superhero if you will. Benvenuto may not be a superhero, but he tells his life story as if he was the greatest of all such legendary folk heroes. If children read this book or were read this book during their childhood, perhaps on the playground at recess, kindergartners would say: "Hey let's play superheroes, I get to be Superman, I get to be Benvenuto Cellini." With the master goldsmith's stories about fending off six armed men with a single dagger, without a thought of fear in his mind, who wouldn't be solidly entertained?

Like the greatest music, the best poetry comes straight from the creator's heart and soul. Luke Kurtis' book is a revealing trip into the author's emotions and lays bare his passion for life and love. "with all the world against my back, and nothing but a prayer in my hand, i walk away in hopes of seeing you." I hope we'll see more poetry in the future by this talented poet.

The next best think to sitting down and having a conversation with Luke, is reading his book. For someone who really is not fond of poetry, I must say, it was a pleasure to read. My personal favorites were: "Welcome Here", "Good Morning Dear Heaven", "Animal Crackers", and "The Timbre of her Heart". There were more, but I can't go on forever. "Like an Angel Dead in your Arms" is a wonderfull addition to my already crammed bookshelves.

Luke's book, his first, is deep and provocative. Since my first inclination when reading poetry is to try and "get it right", I was especially grateful for his "instructions" in the introduction reminding me that there is no right or wrong way to read and understand his poetry. Not only does his work give you an insight into his mind, but it makes you see into your own.

I have finished The Lobotomy Club and Liquid Earth, two of the four books in Pickover's Neoreality series. I can't say which book I like better. The Lobotomy Club was cool. In this book, people perform brain surgery on themselves to allow them to see religious visions and a "truer" or "higher" reality. As they explore a world filled with monstrous Biblical visions, Adam, Sayori, and their friends encounter a vast conspiracy and hellish dangers. Like Liquid Earth, this book had a fast pace and is filled with quirky, serious, and funny tidbits. One of my favorite scenes occurred in Sayori's high-tech apartment in which Adam meets the other members of the Lobotomy Club. They all have special talents, and many seem to be named after items you'd find on a sushi menu! Other favorite scenes involve a large insectile creature that stalks throughout much of the book.

As with Liquid Earth, Pickover's books make you question reality. The books in the series also make you wonder about religion and how we might open our minds so that we can reason beyond the limits of our brain. Pickover has a way of getting inside your head and scrambling it. Quirky, mind-expanding, emotional, creative, fun. (People who like The Lobotomy Club will also like Pickover's Liquid Earth, Heinlein's Job and Number of the Beast, Greg Egan's Diaspora, Philip K Dick's Ubik, and Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash.)

Lobotomy Club is a wonderful sci fi novel that will attempt to entertain you and push your notions of reality all at the same time. The subtle blending of truth with fiction will leave you contemplating how much of what you have read is true, and how much is part of the wonderful environment you have been drawn into. One of the greatest parts of this book is its strong use of allusion which displays Pickover's adeptness with more subtle humor.
This is a wonderful read for most levels. You can take it at face value for a wonderful ride through a bizzare sci-fi adventure, or you can delve deeper and be rewarded with various little treasures for your efforts.

In The Lobotomy Club, a "cerebral Mobius strip" (brain rewiring) lets people have strange visions. This book has something for people with different tastes, from UFOs to insectile aliens to prodromic dreams, to reality shifts. The lead woman has an artificial arm that is quite versatile, as you'll soon find out. I'm trying to determine which member of the Lobotomy Club intrigues me most -- probably it's the woman who always wears sushi jewelry.

To appreciate the Neoreality book series, I found that I had to open myself up to the strange sensations I felt while reading them. Go with the flow. Enjoy the oddness. Don't bother reading these books if you just want a standard novel. But if you enjoy fun and strange concepts, these are certainly a delight.

Love, Miracles & Medicine Men is an energetic account of how two spirited friends explore the unfamiliar. Their extraordinary journies lead them to incredible encounters with the yet inexplicable. Their Medicine Man possesses benevolence as well as a sence of humor. With love, respect and much perserverance these brave women find vision, trust, confidence and truth in miracles.

If you are a non-fiction reader that enjoys a true human experiece that opens doors for you that you didn't even know exsisted. THIS BOOK IS FOR YOU. I read the book in 1 day on an airplane in flight. Now I think my next trip will be going out to the Native American Grounds to visit with some of these fascinating people.

I was lucky enough to get a copy last month and read it straight through in one evening. It was recommended to me by a friend who had read it and was amazed at what insights into healing the Native American Culture has to offer. Above all, it was very informative to the non-native American. I grew up trusting in doctor's and hospitals, not knowing about any other alternatives. Native American's treat illnesses in a holistic way, healing the mind, body, and spirit. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in how other cultures approach the healing process. Especially to non-native American's such as myself who grew up without a clue to alternative medecine.!