Hello and welcome to the 19th edition of the Book Review Blog Carnival proudly hosted here at The Symposium this week! This edition features a large number of entries ranging from reviews, news, and even recommended reading lists. I hope you enjoy reading these posts as much as I have.

Joining the carnival is as easy as can be. Simply go to the carnival’s submission page and fill out the appropriate information. The 20th edition of the carnival will be hosted on June 21, 2009 at Book Dads: Fathers That Read!. Now, without further ado, let’s get this edition underway!

Poetry:

• Christina M Rau reviews Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s A Far Rockaway of the Heart.

Children’s Books:

• Tracy reviews The Wackiest, Wildest Weirdest Animals in the World by Jack Hanna.

Fiction:

• KerrieS reviewed Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourn. KerrieS also reviewed Unseen by Mari Jungstedt and Search the Dark by Charles Todd, #3 in the Ian Rutledge series.
• Peter Jones reviews Midnight In Madrid, book two of Noel Hynd’s Russian Trilogy.
• Christa Visperas recommends Wally Lamb’s The Hour I First Believed stating that it’s a great book to curl up with.
• Jeanne reviews Olive Kitteridge - a review of a volume of linked short stories.
• Amy reviews This Song is You.
• Emm Media reviews the Georgina Kincaid series by Richelle Mead. The Georgia Kincaid series is an exciting adult series by Richelle Mead, author of the popular young adult series, Vampire Academy. ‘Succubus Blues’ and ‘Succubus Nights’ are set in the urban fantasy genre and are full of action, adventure, mystery and romance.
• Kristen reviews Storm Glass by Maria V Synder. Kristen also reviewed Anne Bishop’s Dreams Made Flesh and Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris
• switch2life reviews White Man Falling by Mike Stock.
• Jim Murdoch reviews Gentlemen by Klas Östergren. This book tells the story of two unusual brothers who have led unusual lives that come together when they discover a secret that could shake Swedish society if it became public. This is a big book that takes its time getting to it denouement. While its getting there we get an interesting tour of Europe during the sixties and seventies. Östergren is a major writer in Sweden and this book is regarded as his masterpiece.
• Jim Murdoch also reviewed Stick Out Your Tongue by Ma Jian. This collection of short stories presents a stark, dispassionate view of Tibet a million miles away from the idealised picture postcard view that most of us have of the country. It is a harsh place in many ways and the question you’ll find ringing in your head when you’ve finished it is: Is this a society that needs to be preserved? Longevity isn’t reason enough. Some if its practices are barbaric but does that give China the right to run roughshod over them? A book to make you think.

Non-Fiction

• Kakie Fitzsimmons reviews Raising Cain: Protecting the Emotional Life of Boys. This book explores the state of our society today as it relates to raising boys. It explores how it can affect them and give them the emotional literacy to thrive.
• MB presents Financial Book Reviews.
• jim reviews Money Strategies for Tough Times by Matt Bell.
• Rick Sincere presents . The death of the last survivor of the Titanic inspires a re-look at the book, Titanic Legacy.
• Silicon Valley Blogger is giving away copies of 10,001 Ways To Live Large On A Small Budget along with incentives for those who purchase it through Amazon.com.
• GeekMBS360 presents another review of 10,001 Ways to Live Large on a Small Budget.
• Heather Stein reviews John Keegan’s The Mask of Command.
• Ms. SP reviews E=mc2 by David Bodanis and claims that it is actually a “relief to actually understand this concept now”.
• Brett Schulte reviews Southern Storm: Sherman’s March to Sea. This book review covers Noah Andre Trudeua’s Southern Storm, a recent book on Sherman’s famous March to the Sea. I found Trudeau’s work to be especially interesting because it overturns many previously held assumptions about the March.
• jim also reviewed How Successful People Think by John C. Maxwell.
• Bruno Vigneault recommends Zero Limits by Joe Vitale.
• Greg Laden reviews When Your Genes Turn Bad.
• Glowing Face Man reviews Steve Pavlina’s Personal Development For Smart People.
• Srinivas Rao reviews There’s More to Life than a Corner Office.
• Tracy Dear reviews Boundaries by Townsend and Cloud.
• Flea reviews Emergency: This Book Will Save Your Life by Neil Strauss.

Biographies and Memoirs:

• Kaylia Marie reviews Don’t Call Me A Crook by Bob Moore. Reading a memoir offers the unique experience of seeing someone’s life through their own eyes…. Which can be both a good and a bad thing…
• Eric Gargiulo reviews Ring of Hell: The Story of Chris Benoit and the Fall of the Pro Wrestling Industry. “One of my favorite pro wrestling books is now available in paperback. Matthew Randazzo V’s Ring of Hell: The Story of Chris Benoit and the Fall of the Pro Wrestling Industry is one of the most powerful books ever written on pro wrestling. Regardless of your level of fandom, Ring of Hell will change the way you look at pro wrestling forever.”
• Susan Gaissert reviews Who Do You Think You Are by Alyse Myers, a memoir [that she claims] is truly a fine and worthwhile book.
• Woman Tribune reviews Kinky Gazpacho by Lori Tharps.
• expatriare reviews Jane Austen: A Life, by Carol Shields. This is a fantastic biography which helps provide great insight for reading Jane Austen’s novels.

And last, but certainly not least One Language would like to present a list of Literary Choices for Students of English as a Second Language

That concludes this edition of the Book Review Blog Carnival. Don’t forget to tune in for the next edition which will be on June 21st, 2009 at Book Dads: Fathers That Read!

Salutations and thank you for visiting The Symposium. If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed or sign up to receive email notifications of new posts.

David Eddings, a much-beloved and acclaimed fantasy author, passed away last Tuesday (June 2nd, 2009) due to natural causes in his home in Carson City, Nevada. Eddings was 77.

Eddings, an American author who was born on July 7th, 1931 in Spokane, Washington, wrote many novels and series. His most well-known series included Belgariad and Malloreon. Eddings’ late wife, Leigh Eddings, was a co-author for the majority of his works but was not credited as such until the late 1990’s.

Eddings’ began his writing career in 1973 with High Hunt, a non-fantasy coming of age novel revolving around four young men hunting deer shortly after the Vietnam War. Eddings contributed his move to fantasy fiction after reading a copy of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, which he was startled to discover was in its 78th edition.

The Witch of Blackbird Pond
by Elizabeth George Speare

During the summer of 1687, Katherine “Kit” Tyler, granddaughter of the now deceased Sir Francis Tyler of Barbados, finds herself buried under the debt her grandfather owed. In order to pay off the creditors, Kit is forced to sale everything that was home or loved by her. From her grandfather’s plantation, the home, even her very own slave girl. With naught but her wardrobe left, Kit sets out to find her only relative still living. Her aunt who has long since married Mathew Wood, a puritan, and made her home in the American colonies.

The lengthy and dreary voyage by ship on the Dolphin is but one of many trials that Kit must face on her journey of self-discovery and foray into adulthood. Before Kit has even step foot in the town that she plans to make her new home; Kit finds herself at odds with the locals and their way of life. As the granddaughter of a wealthy King’s man in Barbados, Kit was well-educated, given plenty of freedom, and taught to voice her opinions because they were of value. On the Dolphin Kit begins noticing that she is not only different from the folks who will soon be her townsfolk, but she’s not entirely welcome either. She’s not a Puritan, she hails from an “island of savages” where she was allowed to “run wild” and never put forth an honest day’s work. She’s a loyalist during a time where the vast majority of the country folk put more stock in the land they work with their bare hands then in a man who sits upon a throne across the ocean.

As mentioned previously, the story opens in 1687, a scant few years before the infamous Salem Witch Trials of 1692. While witch trials were not nearly as prolific in the colonies as they were in Europe, accusations of witchcraft were still taken seriously. It is during this volatile time period that Kit, an exotic and foreign creature settles amongst their midst. Kit is so utterly different from the people whom she wishes to settle down with that it’s almost painful to watch. At the same time however, the reader can’t help but to be proud of Kit and the progress she makes in establishing bonds with her family, community, and friends.

Speare’s The Witch of Blackbird Pond is an, almost unbearably, short but wonderfully executed tale that allows readers to take a step back in time to a world long past but not forgotten. While the book is undeniably written with a young adult audience in mind, readers of all ages will nevertheless find enjoyment and adventure in this tale. The light touch of romance is enough to add spice to the story without detracting from the overall development of characters. Kit is a lovable, bratty, and very real protagonist that will force her way into your heart. The secondary and minor characters are well thought out, although a few do remain rather flat and two-dimensional. This caused me to have a very hard picturing these characters in my mind and took a bit of the enjoyment out of certain scenes since it was difficult to feel much more than mild amusement at their follies or mild indignation for their trespasses. This was a bit of a disappointment considering the fact that some of those flat characters play pivotal roles in moving major events along.

Overall though, I found The Witch of Blackbird Pond to be a highly enjoyable and engaging read that I strongly recommend to anyone looking to pick up a well written and quick-paced read. Especially if you’re a fan of historical fiction or young adult reads.

Joana’s Rating: (4 out of 5 stars)

The Dead Man
book 2 of the Jack Davis series
by Joel Goldman

The Dead Man is the second book of Goldman’s Jack Davis series and is written in the first-person point of view and Goldman does a wonderful job of allowing his readers to delve into the mind of his protagonist Jack Davis. The book opens with a gruesome double-murder set in December of 1959. A sheriff arrives on the scene in time to find a man covered in blood clutching a little girl to him. The girl is Maggie Brennan and the blood covered male is her uncle. Little Maggie had just witnessed a man killing her parents and only barely managed to escape herself. The case was unsolved and the culprits were never caught.

The scene changes again and the readers are given the chance to see the lone survivor, Maggie Brennan, in the present time. Sixty years later, Maggie does not seem to have gotten over the murder of her parents. She dreams of a man who has come to finish what he started. And yet, after awakening from her nightmare she wonders why it is so easy to kill yet hard to die. The thought sends a shiver down the reader’s spine and delivers a hint of suspense and foreshadowing.

Flash forward to the present day; Jack Davis is a former FBI agent who was let go by the bureau as he suffers from a movement disorder, the cause and cure of which is unknown, that gives him chronic shakes which makes him no longer fit for duty. Davis’ friend, Simon Alexander, however has a job that he thinks he’s perfect for.

The Harper Institute of the Mind, owned and run by billionaire Milo Harper, is primarily aiming to find a cure for Alzheimer’s and Parkinson disease. In the process, the institute is running many different tests and studies examining and attempting to understand the workings of the mind. One such study happens to be focusing on dreams and the people involved are dying. They’re not dying of natural causes either, because each one has died exactly how they dreamed they would. Now the Institute is facing a lawsuit that could shut them down. Harper needs someone to look into the study and the people involved and find out just what is going on. Jack Davis is his man.

Now, there are more than enough hints and foreshadowing throughout the book that the revelation of the murderer is not a surprise. In fact, by about halfway through the book, the identity of the murderer becomes rather glaringly obvious. This resulted in the creation of points in the story where the pace seemingly slowed down before once again picking back up. The reader, from the numerous clues and hints given, can already piece together ultimate conclusion while the protagonist is still stumbling along trying to solve the puzzle. This is, ultimately, what lead to the slowing of the story’s pace, and while it was irksome in some parts, it did not detract too much from the overall tale. The actual motivations of the killer were, however, quite a surprise and will definitely send a shiver down the reader’s spine.

Despite some segments where the story unfortunately began to lag, for the most part, Goldman’s The Dead Man is a well-paced, thrilling, and suspense-filled ride that refuses to let the reader go until the last word is read.

Joana’s Rating: (3 out of 5 stars)