Friday Focus: The Friday 56 and Book Beginnings

It's Friday . . . time to share book excerpts with:

• Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader, where bloggers share the first sentence or more of a current read, as well as initial thoughts about the sentence(s), impressions of the book, or anything else that the opening inspires.  
• The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice, where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an ebook), find one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.

Today I'm featuring my current read, Poison by Galt Niederhoffer.  The excerpts shared are from a hardcover edition I borrowed from the library.

  

Beginning:  Prologue

This story takes place in a home, if such a concept can be trusted, a home in which a family lives and loves one another.  

One

It's Thursday night, just after six, and Cass does the things of a mother.  

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Page 56:  "Daniel leaves, and Cass resumes her previous project.  She opens the sitter site, scrolls through the pics, and emails the feral brunette to set up an appointment."

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My thoughts:  Niederhoffer takes readers behind the scenes of the marriage of a seemingly normal couple that is coming apart at the seams.  Lies, secrecy, and cruelty are major components of this psychological thriller.

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From Goodreads:  Poison is a literary psychological thriller about a marriage that follows minor betrayal into a bubbling stew of lies, cruelty, manipulation, and danger.

Cass and Ryan Connor have achieved family nirvana. With three kids between them, a cat and a yard, a home they built and feathered, they seem to have the Modern Family dream. Their family, including Cass' two children from previous relationships, has recently moved to Portland —a new start for their new lives. Cass and Ryan have stable, successful careers, and they are happy. But trouble begins almost imperceptibly. First with small omissions and white lies that happen daily in any marital bedroom. They seem insignificant, but they are quickly followed by a series of denials and feints that mushroom and then cyclone in menace.

With life-or-death stakes and irreversible consequences, Poison is a chilling and irresistible reminder that the closest bond designed to protect and provide for each other and for children can change in a minute.

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This Friday Focus post was originally written and published by Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com.  It cannot be republished without attribution.  Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are appreciated.   

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph

It's Tuesday . . . time for . . . 

                                                      

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph Tuesday Intros, hosted by Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea, where bloggers post the first paragraph(s) of a book they are currently reading or planning to read sometime soon.

Today I'm featuring the book I just finished, The End We Start From by Megan Hunter, borrowed from the library.  

 

i.

I am hours from giving birth, from the event I thought would never happen to me, and R has gone up a mountain.

When I text him, he sends his friend S to look after me, and starts down the mountain.

What do you think?  Would you continue reading?
This short dystopian novel grabs the reader's attention immediately and doesn't let go.  Not only is the unnamed narrator about to give birth, but she and countless others are subsequently displaced by massive flooding that leaves London underwater and sets people on a trek north for higher ground.  Fragility, hope, and the search for a viable community are all too real themes in this story of survival set in contemporary times.

This First Chapter ~ First Paragraph post was originally composed and/or compiled and published by Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com.  It cannot be republished without attribution.  Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are appreciated.

Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings

It's Friday . . . time to share book excerpts with:

• Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader, where bloggers share the first sentence or more of a current read, as well as initial thoughts about the sentence(s), impressions of the book, or anything else that the opening inspires.  
• The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice, where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an ebook), find one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.

Today I'm featuring an upcoming read, Booked 4 Murder by J.C. Eaton.  The excerpts shared are from a library copy.

 

Beginning:  Office of Sophie Kimball, Mankato Police Deparatment

"I'm telling you, Phee, they were all murdered.  Murdered by reading that book."

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Page 56:  "They all shook their heads.  What followed would have made Agatha Christie shudder."

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My thoughts:  This cozy series is the work of two authors, Ann I. Goldfarb and James E. Clapp, writing as J.C. Eaton.  What attracted me to this particular book is the title and its cast of characters, which includes a book club.  Book 2 in the Sophie Kimball Mystery Series—Ditched 4 Murder—was released last month (November 2017), and book 3, Staged 4 Murder will be published on June 26, 2018.

Look for another series from this duo next year, with the publication in March 2018 of A Riesling to Die, the first book in the Wine Trail Mysteries.  
 

Cozy mysteries featuring books and wine—does it get any better than that?

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From Goodreads:  Sophie "Phee" Kimball is not a cop. She's a divorced, middle-aged mom who works as an account clerk for the police department in a small city in Minnesota. But her retired mother, Harriet Plunkett, is convinced Phee is the only one who can solve the mystery of a cursed book. According to Harriet, four members of her book club have already succumbed to the deadly curse. Harriet insists Phee catch the next plane to her retirement community in Sun City West, Arizona, to investigate.

Is her mother just bored and lonely? She does have a new pet—a long-haired chiweenie (half Chihuahua, half Dachshund)—for company and a host of pals (although that number is admittedly dwindling). Phee is certain that their book club selection isn't cursed, but is somebody really knocking off the ladies? As Phee starts to uncover dark secrets hidden in plain sight under the blazing Arizona sun, she'll need to read between the lines before it's someone else's final chapter.... 

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This Friday Focus post was originally written and published by Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com.  It cannot be republished without attribution.  Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are appreciated.  

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph

It's Tuesday . . . time for . . .

                                                      

First Chapter ~ First Paragraph Tuesday Intros, hosted by Diane at Bibliophile by the Sea, where bloggers post the first paragraph(s) of a book they are currently reading or planning to read sometime soon.

Today I'm featuring my current read, Every Breath You Take by Mary Higgins Clark and Alafair Burke, borrowed from the library.  

 

Prologue

Three Years Ago

 

On an unusually cold and wintery Monday evening, sixty-eight-year-old Virginia Wakeling was making her way slowly through the costume gallery of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  As she wandered through the exhibitions, she had no premonition that the glamorous evening would end in tragedy.

 

Or that she had only four hours to live.

 

What do you think?  Would you continue reading?
I'm a huge Mary Higgins Clark fan, and this book follows her signature style of drawing readers in immediately.  The New York City setting is an added bonus for me.


This First Chapter ~ First Paragraph post was originally composed and/or compiled and published by Catherine for bookclublibrarian.com.  It cannot be republished without attribution.  Retweeting and sharing on Google+ are appreciated.

Friday Focus: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings

It's Friday . . . time to share book excerpts with:

• Book Beginnings on Fridays hosted by Rose City Reader, where bloggers share the first sentence or more of a current read, as well as initial thoughts about the sentence(s), impressions of the book, or anything else that the opening inspires.  
• The Friday 56 hosted by Freda's Voice, where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an ebook), find one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.

Today I'm featuring a recent read, Heather, the Totality by Matthew Weiner.  The excerpts shared are from a library copy.

 

  

Beginning:  

Mark and Karen Breakstone got married a little late in life.  Karen was nearly 40 and had given up on finding someone as good as her father and had begun to become bitter about the seven-year relationship she'd had after college with her former Art teacher.  In fact, when she was set up with Mark, she nearly turned the date down because Mark's only prominent quality was his potential to be rich.

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Page 56: "Mark and Heather's sleepy sipping and nibbling was routine and wordless but they were at peace together and this seemed to bring out an energetic pettiness in Karen."

 

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My thoughts: This short novel presents an interesting window into modern urban life and relationships, both intimate and random.  Weiner offers insight into how far some individuals will go to protect their interests and fulfill their desires.

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From Goodreads:  The Breakstone family arrange themselves around their daughter Heather, and the world seems to follow: beautiful, compassionate, entrancing, she is the greatest blessing in their lives of Manhattan luxury. But as Heather grows-and her empathy sharpens to a point, and her radiance attracts more and more dark interest-their perfect existence starts to fracture. Meanwhile a very different life, one raised in poverty and in violence, is beginning its own malign orbit around Heather.

Matthew Weiner-the creator of Mad Men-has crafted an extraordinary first novel of incredible pull and menace. Heather, The Totality demonstrates perfectly his forensic eye for the human qualities that hold modern society together, and pull it apart.