Katie′s #CBR5 Review #26: The Time of My Life by Cecelia Ahern

Title: The Time of My Life
Author: Cecelia Ahern
Source: from publisher for a TLC Book Tour
Rating: 
Review Summary: Clever, unique, inspirational, with a main character I could definitely relate to – I loved this book!

When Lucy receives the following letter “Dear Lucy Silchester, You have an appointment for Monday 27th July 2011. Yours sincerely Life.” it is neither a metaphor nor a joke. In this wonderful alternate reality, every person has another person who is their life. Their life reflects how things are going for their paired person in their health, appearance, and happiness levels. Needless to say, Lucy’s life is not happy. Having let her relationships and herself go while focusing on a dead-end job she doesn’t like, it’s time for Lucy to make time for her life.

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Katie′s #CBR5 Review #24: Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter

Title: Beautiful Ruins
Author: Jess Walters
Source: from publisher for review
Rating: 
Review Summary: I was completely blown away by the reality of this novel, with its intense emotion; believable characters; and insights into human nature.

To explain all the things this book is about would require a long summary, such as that on goodreads, but here is my best attempt at a shorter description. Beautiful Ruins  involves two main stories. One, set in 1962, describes a meeting between a young, Italian innkeeper named Pasquale and a beautiful American actress named Dee. The other story follows Pasquale as, fifty years later, he tries to find the actress he felt such a connection with. In between, we get to know the many people who become part of their story, including a young assistant producer becoming disenchanted with Hollywood and a young man struggling to find his place in life.

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Katie′s #CBR5 Review #19: And Then She Fell by Stephanie Laurens

Title: And Then She Fell
Author: Stephanie Laurens
Source: from publisher for review
Rating: 
Review Summary: The unique premise and appealing heroine made this both a great romance and an exciting mystery.

Henrietta Cynster doesn’t believe she’s meant to fall in love. Instead she’s devoted her time to helping other young women determine if their suitors are truly motivated by love. However, when she breaks up a match that was motivated by good intentions (but not love) she feels honor-bound to help James find another bride. This being a romance, Henrietta and James are immediately attracted to one another, but their own stubbornness and some societal constraints have to be overcome before they realize it. Once they do, the book becomes largely a mystery, although one intended mainly to highlight the depths of their feeling for each other.

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Katie′s #CBR5 Review #17: 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami

Title: 1Q84
Author: Haruki Murakami
Source: library
Rating: 
Review Summary: Although the book was long and the ending was abrupt, I loved the writing and can’t wait to read more books by Murakami.

This book was so long and so strange that I’m not even sure where to start telling you what it was about, but I’ll do my best. The story involves two main characters and we alternate between their view points. Aomame is an assassin and Tengo is a writer. As the story progresses, they get pulled closer and closer together by events that initially seemed unrelated but which turn out to have a deep connection. The book involves questions of destiny and pre-determination, parallel worlds and some surprising magical elements.

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