The BookFetish Blog

I’m really excited to be a part of Erik Atwell’s Blog Tour for Thank You For Flying Air Zoe. I decided to take a different approach to reviewing this one. I’m going to give you a list of the reasons I liked the book. As a bonus, Erik graciously answered a few questions I sent to him, and I’m giving you the details on those as well, tomorrow.

What I loved about Thank You For Flying Air Zoe

1) Our heroine, Zoe, is not an almost-thirty-something-looking-for-the-love-of-her-life, as so many chick lit heroines are. Not that there’s anything wrong with that type of heroine. But once you’re no longer almost thirty, or if you’ve found Mr. Right, then you look for something else in a heroine, and Zoe delivers. She’s looking at her life and saying, “Really? Is this all there is?” And I know many, many people who have asked that question.

2) The book references some great 80’s music. When I was very young, the Go-Go’s were my first favorite band, and the first GIRL BAND I was aware of and loved. It’s fun to have that bit of nostalgia.  In fact, for days after reading the book, the Go-Go’s were in near constant rotation on my iPod.

3) Air Zoe also references U2, in a good way. And  I love U2, so I was thrilled to see the reference.  But I don’t want to say anything else about their appearance in the story, because I don’t want to be at all spoiler-y.

4) I laughed out loud while I was reading the book. On an airplane. More than once. People looked at me funny. I like to laugh, and this is the first book in a long time that made me laugh out loud.  It’s a credit to Erik Atwell hitting perfectly on a woman’s sense of humor and quirkiness.

5) The friendship between Zoe and her friends feels authentic.  Anyone who has created her tribe of friends, the people who know the good and bad about you and still hang out with you anyway, will appreciate the zaniness of the friendship.

6) Erik Atwell is extremely approachable. We traded a few emails as I was reading the book, and having an opportunity to interact with an author makes me feel a deeper connection to the books.

7) The book made me hopeful. Zoe takes a chance on her dreams.  She quits her job and leaps without a long term net. That’s a really scary thing to do. As I was reading, I found myself dreaming a little bit about what it would be like to have the courage to follow all my own dreams, to tell the practical side of myself to just shut the hell up for once, and DREAM BIG.

Check back tomorrow, and I’ll post the answers Erik was gracious enough to give to a few questions I had for him.  Happy Reading!

The plot of Blank Slate Kate – a thirty-something woman wakes up naked in a strange bed and can’t remember the last fifteen years- could have been filled with predictability and cliches. Could have been. But wasn’t.

Of course there’s the husband that Kate doesn’t remember. But Heather Wardell gives “Kate” a number of options. She doesn’t send Kate immediately back into the arms of her husband, nor into the arms of a potential lover.

Instead, she lets Kate find herself naturally, revealing the stress that leads to Kate’s depression and memory loss in bits and pieces. And it is totally something I didn’t see coming, which you know I love.

Wardell’s trademark is to give us likeable heroines with whom we identify. They are women we either wouldn’t mind being, or would want to be friends with.   With Kate, Heather strikes just the right balance of Kate wanting to discover the things that comprised her pre-amnesia life with the desire to be true to herself as Kate, whomever she might be.

I haven’t read a book from Heather Wardell yet that I didn’t like. Blank Slate Kate doesn’t disappoint. It kept me turning pages and reading, because I wanted to know what happened next.

If you’re a chick lit fan, and you haven’t checked out Heather Wardell yet, go do it. Now.  I thoroughly enjoyed Blank Slate Kate and it is my selection for my February ChickLitPlus  Challenge read.

I’ll be posting my review of the page-turning thriller, Lovesick,  later this month. But the blog tour starts today and it’s also a scavenger hunt. Check out this link for details, and happy hunting:

http://booktrib.com/?page_id=152303&preview=true

I’m participating in a blog tour for Legacy of Eden.  I’ll be posting a Q and A and guest post later this month, but check this out now for your chance  to play along with the tour in a scavenger hunt.

Happy Reading, and be sure to click the link at the end of the post for your scavenger hunt. Happy Hunting!

To understand what it meant to be a Hathaway you’d first have to see our farm, Aurelia.

If my family’s name is familiar to you, it may be that you have either already seen it, or at least know something of its reputation. In its day our farm was notorious for being one of the most prosperous estates in our county in Iowa. An infamy only surpassed in time by that of the family who owned it.

I have spent the past seventeen years trying to forget it, forget my family and forget my past. For seventeen years I was given a reprieve, but after that length of time, you stop looking over your shoulder and you forget how precarious your peace is. You take it for granted; you learn to bury your guilt and then you convince yourself that it will never find you.

And then he died.

My cousin Caledon Hathaway Jr. left this earth in late October at the age of forty-five. The cause of death was cirrhosis of the liver. http://www.frugalplus.com/

One of my favorites, Debora Geary, is back with the second book in the Witchlight Trilogy, Witches Under Way. I couldn’t really review the first book in the set, Witches on Parole because I related so much to one of the characters, Elsie.

But I love Debora Geary’s “Witch” books so much that I want to talk about this one. If you’ve read my other Witch reviews, you know that what draws me to these stories so much is the love and community and friendship in them. Our beloved, familiar characters are back, and Geary doesn’t disappoint with the magical adventures.

Lizard and Elsie have formed a tenuous friendship, and as they get closer to facing their own fears, they realize that their biggest ally might just come in the form of their most unlikely friend.  Of course, this is Witch Central, so magical mayhem abounds. So does well-intentioned meddling, a well-aimed water gun, much laughter, and tears borne out of knowing unconditional love and support.

One thing I particularly love about this book is the role of music in it. Elsie starts to find her true self through music, which I can appreciate so very well. And I don’t want to give away too much of the story, but suffice it to say that I found myself singing along to my iPod, loudly and off-key, as I cooked dinner tonight… completely inspired by a part of the storyline.

These characters, this Witching community, and the way Geary tells their stories, always leaves me wanting more.  I’m still very much Elsie, and I can’t wait to find out what awaits Lizard and Elsie in the next chapter of their stories.