"The Dovekeepers" by Alice Hoffman I never expected to purchase this book, and the cover design caught my eye. I read the back and was immediately intrigued. "Nearly two thousand years ago, nine hundred Jews held out for months against armies of Romans on Masada a mountain in the Judean desert. According to the ancient historian Josephus, two women and five children survived." That tale alone is enough to dive deeper into history, discover lives deeper than fiction and learn about their tales. Who are the dovekeepers? What are their mysteries, secrets, lineage? -brr Book Specs: Title: The Dovekeepers Author: Alice Hoffman Publisher: Scribner, A division of Simon & Schuster, Inc. Fiction. Copyright 2011. Map Included, Copyright 2011 pages: 505 including acknowledgements. Scribner Reading Group Guide/Note from author Included

The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton Frequently known as the coming of age book where required reading and losing your locker combination went hand in hand, almost everyone I knew shed a tear or two from this tale. Enter the "Socs" the rich uppity kids who formed a gang and beat up on "Greasers" whom I always thought were normal and just had a few hard times. Enter dark memes for you whippersnappers, but Ponyboy was the best character ever. He was cool without trying to be, smooth all the time. Then one night...something goes a bit too far. You'll find out. Anyway, you have to have this on your bookshelf. Forever. This softcover copy I purchased second hand. It has bonus material inside, which includes a Q&A with the author. And yes. The book is always better. The movie was pretty good too though. Author: S.E. Hinton (fiction) Publisher: Penguin Group Pages: 180 Copyright: 1995 -brr

Day 4 of #BookSpine365 You probably seen author Brad Meltzer on his popular TV show, Decoded . He surely brings in a conspiracy theory or two with breaks down the truth and history sprinkled in with a bit of intrigue-keeps it quite interesting. When I saw this book, The Book of Lies penned by him, I was instantly curious. I didn't even know he was a former NYT best selling author (although those lists can be quite misleading and biased) with a huge fan base from a previous novel. While I have yet to read this book, as there are many on my shelves which I purchase and have yet to read-I will eventually read it. I have skimmed it, and read the first few chapters. In Chapter Four of the Bible, Cain kills Abel. It is the world’s most famous murder. But the Bible is silent about one key detail: the weapon Cain used to kill his brother. That weapon is still lost to history. In 1932, Mitchell Siegel was killed by three gunshots to his chest. While mourning, his son dreamed o...

Praised by Percy Bysshe Shelley, Hyperion is the unfinished work of John Keats that begun in 1818  pictured as the original manuscript of Keats handwriting below. This poem then began to evolve as a the preface to Endymion but was abandoned in the year of 1820. Its contents are full of allegory between Olympians and Titans, and the fall with the sorrow that accompanies it thereafter when the Olympians were defeated. The epic is a tale of the gods; Hyperion of the sun, Apollo of both the sun and the gift of poetry. The mythological nature gives its verse mysticism and even gods are knocked off their throne and given lesser or human qualities "...gray haired Saturn quiet as a stone" so one can relate to them, and invoke the feeling of powerlessness.  Keats never wanted Hyperion to be published at all; in his 1820 volume of collected works, Keats inserted the following statement:   '[I]t was printed at [the publisher's] request, and contrary to the wish of the ...

Types of Poetry: Palindrome. This specific type of poetry is not for mere amateurs. I say this with the most respect, because the palindrome is perhaps one of the many types of poetry that is challenging to write and to make complete sense while still respecting the subject matter at hand. The palindrome derives from the Greek word palindromos: "palin"meaning again, and "dromos"meaning a running. Combining "palin" and "dromos" we have the collective term of running back again. This gives us a mirrored image which the palindrome is: a poem that is read forward is read the exact same way backwards. With in the palindrome, there is a short break in its center that denotes a specific "turning" as a reversal point which the mirrored image reflects. It's also important to note that the palindrome poem can be achieved by word (letter by letter) or by sentences in the poem. Whatever is read forwards is the exact mirrored image of what...