Fiend: A Novel

From Amazon: 
When Chase Daniels first sees the little girl in umbrella socks tearing open the Rottweiler, he's not too concerned. As a longtime meth addict, he’s no stranger to horrifying, drug-fueled hallucinations. But as he and his fellow junkies soon discover, the little girl is no illusion. The end of the world really has arrived. The funny thing is, Chase’s life was over long before the apocalypse got here, his existence already reduced to a stinking basement apartment and a filthy mattress and an endless grind of buying and selling and using. He’s lied and cheated and stolen and broken his parents’ hearts a thousand times. And he threw away his only shot at sobriety a long time ago, when he chose the embrace of the drug over the woman he still loves.  And if your life’s already shattered beyond any normal hopes of redemption…well, maybe the end of the world is an opportunity.Maybe it’s a last chance for Chase to hit restart and become the man he once dreamed of being. Soon he’s fighting to reconnect with his lost love and dreaming of becoming her hero among civilization’s ruins.  But is salvation just another pipe dream?  Propelled by a blistering first-person voice and featuring a powerfully compelling antihero, Fiend is at once a riveting portrait of addiction, a pitch-black love story, and a meditation on hope, redemption, and delusion—not to mention one hell of a zombie novel.


Although I'm convinced the world doesn't need another zombie novel, Fiend twists the genre in an interesting way. The title could refer to zombies, or it could refer to the dope fiends who are the novel's protagonists. They were metaphorical zombies, spending their lives "walking that thin line between suicide and preservation," even before a plague killed everyone and began reanimating corpses. Fiend is about living as a drug addict more than it's about zombies, but it may be necessary these days to add zombies to a novel in order to get it published. In any event, zombies are always good for a laugh, and the early chapters of Fiend offer some very funny moments. At the same time, an addict's misery isn't funny at all. Peter Stenson makes it feel raw and real. The metaphor, addict as zombie, is apt and effective.

Your move, chief.

I am not one to get emotionally upset over a celebrity passing. I don't act like I know them or let my world stop turning because they are gone. I did however, with Robin Williams. The man is a genius. I've grown up laughing and crying with him and his characters. But I think the reason my heart hurts so much for him, is because of his struggle. The struggle that he felt so alone and that life was so bad that he couldn't go on anymore. His world was so dark that he couldn't see any light. That despite being able to make the world laugh, he couldn't find his own happiness. Suicide isn't "giving up" or "giving in". Suicide is a terrible decision made by someone whose pain is so great that they can no longer hold it, and feel they have no other option but to end it. Its a decision you can't take back, and a decision that will affect your friends and family forever. It is not taken lightly. Imagine, if you will, feeling so desperate, so desolate, so incredibly sad and hurt that you honestly cannot see a way out. The feelings leading to suicide are the darkest a human mind can fathom. It’s like being shut into a dark tunnel with no point of light to guide your way. You can hear voices on the outside, but the walls are too thick to get in. And feeling like it’s closing in, like there’s no way out—well, suicide, for that person, is a blessed release. Life, however, is never wasted. Williams did things in his life that touched people to their core. It is a sad, sad loss, but it is not a waste.Suicide is not a weak decision. It is a decision that takes an incredible amount of strength to make, actually. Someone isn’t weak if they end their life. They are desperate. There is a difference. It’s okay to feel angry at the person for dying. It’s okay to question, to rail against the forces that caused this. But it isn’t weakness. Mental illness isn’t weakness. It’s a disease, a pervasive, sometimes awful disease. The person doesn’t deserve anger and skepticism forever. They deserve compassion. Their family deserves compassion.Ending a life is incredibly, incredibly tragic. It represents a lost battle with mental illness. In that, it is no different than cancer, or diabetes, or a heart attack. Where it is different is that suicide is a choice. Whether it is the right or wrong choice for that person is solely the business of that person who commits suicide. But for the family left behind, it is devastating.

Oh captain, my captain, I hope you find peace on the other side. RIP, Robin Williams. 

"So if I asked you about art, you’d probably give me the skinny on every art book ever written. Michelangelo, you know a lot about him. Life’s work, political aspirations, him and the pope, sexual orientations, the whole works, right? But I’ll bet you can’t tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You’ve never actually stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling; seen that. If I ask you about women, you’d probably give me a syllabus about your personal favorites. You may have even been laid a few times. But you can’t tell me what it feels like to wake up next to a woman and feel truly happy. You’re a tough kid. And I’d ask you about war, you’d probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, “once more unto the breach dear friends.” But you’ve never been near one. You’ve never held your best friend’s head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I’d ask you about love, you’d probably quote me a sonnet. But you’ve never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn’t know what it’s like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything, through cancer. And you wouldn’t know about sleeping sitting up in the hospital room for two months, holding her hand, because the doctors could see in your eyes, that the terms “visiting hours” don’t apply to you. You don’t know about real loss, ’cause it only occurs when you’ve loved something more than you love yourself. And I doubt you’ve ever dared to love anybody that much. And look at you… I don’t see an intelligent, confident man… I see a cocky, scared shitless kid. But you’re a genius Will. No one denies that. No one could possibly understand the depths of you. But you presume to know everything about me because you saw a painting of mine, and you ripped my fucking life apart. You’re an orphan right? … You think I know the first thing about how hard your life has been, how you feel, who you are, because I read Oliver Twist? Does that encapsulate you? Personally… I don’t give a shit about all that, because you know what, I can’t learn anything from you, I can’t read in some fuckin’ book. Unless you want to talk about you, who you are. Then I’m fascinated. I’m in. But you don’t want to do that do you sport? You’re terrified of what you might say. Your move, chief."

So What Wednesday

Go say hello to Shannon at Life After I "Dew". Her So What Wednesday posts have always been my favorite and I think I'll jump back into the blogging world by making this my first post! 

Today I'm saying So What to... 

1. The fact that school starts tomorrow and my kids haven't practiced going to bed early or waking up before 10am yet. Oops! Tomorrow is gonna suck. 

2. Since moving into our new forever (or until I'm ready to move again) home, I haven't set up my office and I start my online classes today. Nothing like being unorganized and last minute. 

3. Balancing my checkbook and putting it off for 1 more day. Or two. 

4. People being dramatic and causing issues because they are lonely and feel bad about themselves. I won't let them bring me down. 

What are you saying So What to? 

2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas

From Amazon: 
Madeleine Altimari is a smart-mouthed, rebellious nine-year-old who also happens to be an aspiring jazz singer. Still mourning the recent death of her mother, and caring for her grief-stricken father, she doesn’t realize that on the eve of Christmas Eve she is about to have the most extraordinary day—and night—of her life. After bravely facing down mean-spirited classmates and rejection at school, Madeleine doggedly searches for Philadelphia's legendary jazz club The Cat's Pajamas, where she’s determined to make her on-stage debut. On the same day, her fifth grade teacher Sarina Greene, who’s just moved back to Philly after a divorce, is nervously looking forward to a dinner party that will reunite her with an old high school crush, afraid to hope that sparks might fly again. And across town at The Cat's Pajamas, club owner Lorca discovers that his beloved haunt may have to close forever, unless someone can find a way to quickly raise the $30,000 that would save it. As these three lost souls search for love, music and hope on the snow-covered streets of Philadelphia, together they will discover life’s endless possibilities over the course of one magical night. A vivacious, charming and moving debut, 2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas will capture your heart and have you laughing out loud.This is a unique book about what happens to several characters over the course of one day and night, Christmas Eve Eve, as they make their way through Philadelphia to a jazz club called The Cat's Pajamas. The City of Philadelphia gets top billing along with Madeleine, a nine-year old jazz singer; her teacher Miss Greene; Miss Greene's high school crush, Ben; Lorca, the club owner; Alex, his son; Pedro, the dog; Mrs. Santana, his owner; a snarky cockroach, Clarence; and so on and on.

I'll be honest. I'm still not sure what to think about the book. I alternated between delighted (with the spare, quirky prose, the detailed settings, and authentic characters) and frustrated (with the authentic characters) and occasionally confused (with the random fantastical element) while reading it. I stayed up finishing it later than I planned (a good recommendation), but I couldn't put a conclusion into words when I finished. That's not a bad thing, unless like me, you like to put things, like answers and endings, in their place. I'm glad I read it, and I'll be recommending it to my reader friends. I hope I get a taker because I want to discuss it with someone.

Blogging for Books- The Opposite of Maybe: A Novel

From Amazon: 
Jonathan and Rosie have been together so long they finish each other’s sentences—so when he (finally) proposes and asks her to move across the country with him, everyone is happily surprised.
But when things suddenly unravel, Rosie sends Jonathan packing and moves back home with Soapie, the irascible, opinionated grandmother who raised her. Now she has to figure out how to fire Soapie’s very unsuitable caregiver, a gardener named Tony who lets her drink martinis, smoke, and cheat at Scrabble.
It’s meant to be a temporary break, of course—until Rosie realizes she’s accidentally pregnant at 44, completely unequipped for motherhood, and worse, may be falling in love with Tony, whose life is even more muddled than hers. When Soapie reveals a long-hidden secret, Rosie wonders if she has to let go of her fears, and trust that the big-hearted, messy life that awaits her just may be the one she was meant to live.
This is one of the most unique novels I've read in years. Within the first few pages, I was so quickly engaged in the lives of these characters that I laughed aloud while reading and woke my husband, then woke him again when I started sniffing and weeping later in the book. This deceptively simple novel is written with heart and generosity for even the most flawed characters (like the boyfriend who obsesses about starting a teacup museum, of all things). You'll be left wanting to dance, and maybe even feeling like you want to open your arms to forgive even the most churlish, petty people you've been mad at for years. THE OPPOSITE OF MAYBE is marketed as women's fiction, but it's the best kind of universal literature, with wit, depth, and a refreshingly humorous perspective on what it means to be human and pursue passion with joy and determination.

The Execution of Noa P. Singleton

From Amazon: 
    Noa P. Singleton never spoke a word in her own defense throughout a brief trial that ended with a jury finding her guilty of first-degree murder. Ten years later, having accepted her fate, she sits on death row in a maximum-security penitentiary, just six months away from her execution date. 
Seemingly out of the blue, she is visited by Marlene Dixon, a high-powered Philadelphia attorney who is also the mother of the woman Noa was imprisoned for killing. Marlene tells Noa that she has changed her mind about the death penalty and Noa’s sentence, and will do everything in her considerable power to convince the governor to commute the sentence to life in prison, in return for the one thing Noa is unwilling to trade: her story.
      Marlene desperately wants Noa to reveal the events that led to her daughter’s death – events that Noa has never shared with a soul. With death looming, Marlene believes that Noa may finally give her the answers she needs, though Noa is far from convinced that Marlene deserves the salvation she alone can deliver. Inextricably linked by murder but with very different goals, Noa and Marlene wrestle with the sentences life itself can impose while they confront the best and worst of what makes us human in this haunting tale of love, anguish, and deception.

The story was good and kept me involved until the end, but the descriptive writing style is the reason I gave this 5 stars. I found myself rereading paragraphs just to admire the mental image that Silver could create. The story is intense and compelling. One can believe that it actually happened even though it is a fiction. 

Blogging for Books

I recently stumbled upon Blogging for Books because of another blog friend. I am already in love. Books and reading are my passion. I don't have a favorite genre, and tend to spend way too much money on my Amazon account because I'm always downloading new books to my kindle. Blogging for books is great in the fact that all they ask is a book review in exchange for a free book. You can download the book directly to your Kindle (or other reading device) or they will send it to you in the mail. I chose Mother, Mother. 

From Goodreads: 
Josephine Hurst has her family under control. With two beautiful daughters, a brilliantly intelligent son, a tech-guru of a husband and a historical landmark home, her life is picture perfect. She has everything she wants; all she has to do is keep it that way. But living in this matriarch’s determinedly cheerful, yet subtly controlling domain hasn’t been easy for her family, and when her oldest daughter, Rose, runs off with a mysterious boyfriend, Josephine tightens her grip, gradually turning her flawless home into a darker sort of prison. Resentful of her sister’s newfound freedom, Violet turns to eastern philosophy, hallucinogenic drugs, and extreme fasting, eventually landing herself in the psych ward. Meanwhile, her brother Will shrinks further into a world of self-doubt. Recently diagnosed with Aspergers and epilepsy, he’s separated from the other kids around town and is homeschooled to ensure his safety. Their father, Douglas, finds resolve in the bottom of the bottle—an addict craving his own chance to escape. Josephine struggles to maintain the family’s impeccable façade, but when a violent incident leads to a visit from child protective services, the truth about the Hursts might finally be revealed

I haven't read too many psychologically thrillers, but I really should more often. Mother, Mother is a book that's impossible not to enjoy; with an unconventional perspective on what it means to be a doting mother, it at once left me greatly disturbed and deeply satisfied, which is an emotive pairing I never expected myself to feel. Talk about a family with major issues and secrets. This book is not for the faint hearted. Mother, Mother is is brilliantly twisted and engrossing.