Month: April 2016

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Checking In…

Tara

I’m still here. I’m still reading – verrrrrrrryyyyyy slooooooowly…. I’m not really in a slump, I just have a lot of other things on my plate. Planning Katelyn’s first birthday (when did that happen?!), Garrett started tball, I’ve been doing the 21 day fix (I’m down 13lb, with 4 more days left in this round), Nathan’s summer hours are kicking in and I’m responsible for the kids by myself more… And at the end of the day, sheer exhaustion takes hold and I’m lucky to read 10 pages. 

I’m really starting to mourn the loss of my “baby”. When Garrett was staring that first birthday in the eyes, I was ecstatic. I didn’t have a very good first year with him. I was inexperienced, unconfident, and he was just a tough baby. The second go around with Katelyn has been a breeze in comparison. She’s a totally different baby and I felt like I had more of a handle on things. So now that we are really facing that one year mark (in 2 weeks…), I’m really struggling with it. But goodness knows I do not have baby fever, I’m pretty sure a third is not in the cards for us, I don’t like pregnancy enough, I would have to give up my office/library for another baby, and honestly the last thing I really want to do is go through another round of newborning. It’s not my favorite stage at all. I like my babies when they sleep and can eat just about anything and potty trained is even better, ha! 

May is an insane month for us with both kids’ birthdays and our anniversary so life isn’t likely to slow down anytime soon, ha! But I am still here and I need to be better about updating a little bit. Today we’re off to my parents house to celebrate my aunts birthday. I’d like to say we’ll have a nice relaxing evening at home, but we have two kids – I’ve forgotten what that feels like…. 

Hopefully soon I’ll get a book finished so I can have a review to post. Until then, happy reading!!

4/5, AUTHOR, Book Review, Fiction, M, RATING, Read in 2016, Review Book

Review: The Girl From Home by Adam Mitzner

Tara

The Girl From Home
by Adam Mitzner

The Girl From Home

Copyright: 2016

Pages: 321

Read: April 1 – 11, 2016

Rating: 4/5

Source: Publicist for review

Blurb: Jonathan Caine is a true master of the universe – a currency wizard with a trophy wife, a penthouse condo with a view of the Statue of Liberty, and the desire for more -when his world comes crashing down. In the midst of this spiral, Jonathan returns to his hometown to care for his ailing father and attend his twenty-fifth high-school reunion, where he becomes reacquainted with former prom queen Jacqueline Williams. Back in the day, Jackie didn’t even know Jonathan existed, but now she is intrigued by the man he has become. Yet their budding relationship has problems, not the least of which is that Jackie doesn’t know the full truth about Jonathan, and she’s married to a jealous and abusive man. Jonathan is determined to learn from his mistakes, but is he capable of complete transformation? Or will a shocking temptation test his desire for redemption beyond anything he could have imagined?

Review: It was the pitch of this book that really brought me back to my blog. Having been given the opportunity to read Mr. Mitzner’s previous two books (A Case of Redemption and Losing Faith) I knew that I would not want to miss this one, so I accepted it for review and decided to come back to my blog 🙂

So what did I think about this book? Honestly, I thoroughly enjoyed it. However, having absolutely no background in the financial world, I did have a little bit of trouble keeping up with what Jonathan was doing in the beginning. I’m sure Mr. Mitzner did  a lot of research to get it all right, but I was just a tad bit confused at times with the different aspects of that whole storyline.

 At first I didn’t like Jonathan’s character. In the beginning he’s just too superficial and completely obsessed with money. It definitely left a bad taste in my mouth. And his wife, Natasha – she was even worse! Yuck! But as the book goes on and Jonathan comes home to take care of his father we definitely see a change in Jonathan’s character. Thankfully it’s a change for the better.

As the story progresses, we see Jonathan and Jackie reacquaint and you have to wonder how this is all going to turn out. The reader is given the sense that it’s definitely not going to work out as well as one would hope. And sure enough, that prediction is true. But it’s what happens in the last 20 or so pages that was really surprising to me. A twist came that I wasn’t expecting and that honestly, kind of upset me until the very last two pages when I realized exactly what was going on.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. It’s just one more reason why I love Mr. Mitzner’s books so much. They are such fun, enjoyable reads! I would definitely recommend this book to anyone.