Day 12 in  #BookSpine365 . R.L. Stine steeps into my memories like a good tea begging to be sipped or devoured, depending on your thirst. My childhood consisted of reading in general-me, hunched over by the nightlight past my bedtime scrolling text. My mother, walking past my room ushering me back to sleep. The Stine series were responsible for many a kid staying up past their bedtime, I'm sure. Quite frankly, I don't even remember how I still held on to this copy. This title I purchased in the early 90's, the era of Borders book stores, way past the nightlight phase-but I always will love Young Adult (YA) fiction. Still purchase to this day, and always will. I lost many childhood books and YA titles that were donated, lost, or given to others. I look at this book and ask myself-who doesn't like a little nostalgia?  The paperback smells lovely. It's "pocketbook" sized, or mass market paper back. Well, I wafted it a few times before my allergies des...

Day 11 of  #BookSpine365 . Don't let the Oprah's Book Club seal of approval be the hipster like dismay which you judge a book a by a cover. Wally Lamb's second novel, I Know This Much Is True is absolutely as riveting and poignant as reviewers described. It's a little dusty and smells beautiful cracked open within those 894 pages. The spine is cracked, pages are thin, and wrinkled from moisture somewhere unexplained. So my copy is a little beat up. This is what happens to mass market paperback books-many just don't stand the test of time. Paperback Books Get Love Too. The words inside don't seem to mind. They lay dormant waiting to tell the tale again. The words tell of twins-one definitely not like the other as told through a series of flashbacks in heartache and pain. One regarded normal, one cutting off his hand claiming it was for God; schizophrenia and paranoia seems only secondary to the abuse and dysfunction within the household they grew up in. ...

Day 10 of  # BookSpine365 So today I want to do something a little different: an ebook. Sitting on my third shelf from the top in a crochet sleeve lays an Amazon Kindle 3G keyboard. Beautiful e-ink . Easy on the eyes. I can do so many neat tricks with it, I even wrote a post a while ago on Google+, although there is probably much more to be added to that list now. If you want to have the battle against e-ink and real, tangible book as your medium-go ahead. I won't waste my time with all that nonsense. I adore all mediums: books, audiobooks, and ebooks. As long as I'm reading (or listening) to a good novel or other genre, I'm in Heaven. The visualization...the smell, the grip of the page. Spine titling poetry. Sneaking in another title on a buckling shelf to tuck somewhere that the book should or shouldn't fit. I love and adore all those things from a book. That's why I will always collect books. The transportation from reality to imagination is what made me a b...

Day 9  # BookSpine365 . There are some books that fall flat for me, and this is one of them. While I initially began reading this and thought, "hey...this seems like a good premise and plot," the story became weaker and weaker. Unbeknownst to me, this was a trilogy series, (but the author's first novel) and continues in this fashion for a while. Simply summarized, you have two twin sisters that have just become orphans. They have never really gotten along, but after their parents uncanny death, they become enemies. They soon discover the reasoning for this: they both play a part in an ancient prophecy of good versus evil and the end of the world. The whole problem I had with the book was the characters were a bit too gullible and sometimes mundane. Insert romance for spitefulness, because all books need a token love story or heartache, correct? You have several scenes where there are characters in the same room with imperative things to do or say but the author doesn...

Day 8 in # BookSpine365 . I own a few series books, and this is one of them. Unfortunately I have never read the previous books before, so will the characters be unfamiliar, disjointed and hard to follow? Hard to tell in many series. This title is relatively new on my shelf, I barely cracked it open. I brought it on a whim at a bargain bin somewhere for $1.00 just in case if I ever needed a mystery novel with quirky characters to delve into. A celebrity chef enters a competition and loses his head-literally. Meanwhile, the chef's sponsors offer a million dollar reward for info on the killers. Enter a bounty hunter and bails bond office worker-the latter who is witness to the crime to collect the cash, and supposedly a little hot romance and traitor is added in the mix. Sounds like a lot going on. Hopefully it will be a fast paced read, not too confusing with the multiple characters and plots.  Book Details: Title: Finger Lickin'Fifteen by Evanovich, J. Forma...

Day 7 of 365 in # BookSpine365 There are some titles you purchase just for the popularity, to see if they're worth the good read or not. This is one of those books . This paperback novel gained its large following after becoming a major motion picture Slumdog Millionaire. An Indian named Ram has been arrested following answering all 12 questions correctly on a TV show to win a billion rupees. So what's so wrong with that picture? Perhaps because he's an orphan who's never read any media such as a newspaper, or even been educated in a school system couldn't possibly do so. In a series of flashbacks, Ram begins to narrate his life and show the world how being street wise and having chance encounters helped him become that billionaire. Read a few pages, put it down. Just like the many others I collect on my shelf-perhaps I will be in the mood for it again one day. Perhaps not. Some books I can "get into" and I used to force myself to finish books, ...

Day 6 of 365 in #BookSpine365 . "Las Vegas magicians are a dime a dozen, but Mel’s new husband, Toby, is different; his magic is real.” That's the one sentence hook, line, and sinker summary given by the first time novelist of this book . I have yet to read this one adorning my shelf as so many countless others, but it seems so very promising despite the median book reviews out there. The inside flap jacket describes a romance between a woman and magician in the gritty and limelight streets of Vegas-where his smooth tricks woo her and their whirlwind romance of two days ends up in a marriage. Apparently, as she falls more for the magician and his tricks, she finds out that his powers are more and more unstable which lead to exile from the stage which leads her to wondering-what is real and what isnt, including their love.  The books is hardcover with illustrated dust jacket, red paper covered cardboard with spine titling. Plain front cover. Plain back cover. Du...