Release Day Review: Like She Owns The Place

Author: Cara Alwill Leyba

Publication Date: July 10, 2018

Publisher: Portfolio

Can you imagine what life would be like if you could accept failure, cellulite, wrinkles, imperfection, screw-ups, and vulnerability?

I’ll tell you what would happen: you would finally take that weight off your shoulders and build unshakeable, sustainable confidence. The truth is that confidence isn’t about living up to anyone’s expectations—it’s about affirming, every day, that you’re an effing boss. It’s not the result of being skinny, making a six figure salary, finding your dream partner, or drinking a green juice every day. It requires patience, dedication, forgiveness, bravery, and an incredible amount of self-compassion.  

You’ve probably read that “confidence is a choice,” and while that’s true, it’s more accurate to say that confidence is a series of repeated choices to accept yourself. To choose pride over insecurity. And to fearlessly show up in the world as the truest expression of yourself. 

It took me a long time to overcome all the BS. It took me a longer time to develop a rock-solid sense of inner-peace and become intimate with my intuition. To achieve real confidence that lasted longer than a sugar rush. 

My goal with this book is to share with you how I have arrived here, how I’ve helped my clients arrive here, and hopefully save you years of pain, shame, and uncertainty. Because, girl, I know how rocky this road can be. I’m going to show you how to block out all the noise around you, and how to free yourself from the opinions and judgment of others. I’m going to teach you how to trust your gut, reclaim your life, and rock what you’ve got. 

I’m going to show you how to own the place.

WOW! I have been craving memoirs/self-help books lately. Of course, I quickly added this book to my MUST-HAVE list! This book has something for everyone that reads it. You cannot read this book and not feel inspired. Cara’s writing is so impressionable and really speaks to the fierceness inside all of us. Cara is so encouraging and reading her work gives me confidence beyond my wildest dreams. I am going to forever treasure this book. I honestly did not think I would enjoy this book as much as I did, but it will forever sit atop my favorites shelf! I have read two of Cara’s other books and this one is my favorite by far. It takes the cake. This is a perfect summer read – Cara’s writing feels like you are in a conversation with her. Think of her as your personal life coach!

I am a woman who has spent her entire life obsessively trying to become comfortable in her own skin.

I’m going to help you own the place.

How do you find your most authentic self? Listen to your gut.

Are you proud of yourself? Are you doing things that make you happy? Because let me tell you, if you’re hating life and living for everyone but yourself, you will be one unhappy bitch standing in the middle of Drybar in your Chanel loafers. Trust me, I’ve been there.

Happiness is perspective. It’s working toward fabulous things while being grateful for what you already have. Happiness is enjoying the journey and realizing that it’s not a race to the end. 

The real victory will be when the size of a woman’s lips and the height of her cheekbones and the width of her waist don’t determine how worthy of notice she is. Beauty is not found outside. It’s found within.

If you need a pick me up, pick up this book. If you need to remember what you love about yourself, pick up this book. If you need a reminder to put your happiness first, pick up this book. If you want a confidence boost, pick up this book. Do I need to go on? Are you catching my drift? This was a phenomenal read – it is short, fast-paced, and maybe me feel like I was glowing as I read it and radiated with happiness.

***A free copy of this book was provided to me by the publishers at Portfolio in exchange for my honest review***

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Book Review: Number One Chinese Restaurant

Author: Lillian Li

Publication Date: June 19, 2018 

Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.

An exuberant and wise multigenerational debut novel about the complicated lives and loves of people working in everyone’s favorite Chinese restaurant.

The Beijing Duck House in Rockville, Maryland, is not only a beloved go-to setting for hunger pangs and celebrations; it is its own world, inhabited by waiters and kitchen staff who have been fighting, loving, and aging within its walls for decades. When disaster strikes, this working family’s controlled chaos is set loose, forcing each character to confront the conflicts that fast-paced restaurant life has kept at bay.

Owner Jimmy Han hopes to leave his late father’s homespun establishment for a fancier one. Jimmy’s older brother, Johnny, and Johnny’s daughter, Annie, ache to return to a time before a father’s absence and a teenager’s silence pushed them apart. Nan and Ah-Jack, longtime Duck House employees, are tempted to turn their thirty-year friendship into something else, even as Nan’s son, Pat, struggles to stay out of trouble. And when Pat and Annie, caught in a mix of youthful lust and boredom, find themselves in a dangerous game that implicates them in the Duck House tragedy, their families must decide how much they are willing to sacrifice to help their children.

Generous in spirit, unaffected in its intelligence, multi-voiced, poignant, and darkly funny, Number One Chinese Restaurant looks beyond red tablecloths and silkscreen murals to share an unforgettable story about youth and aging, parents and children, and all the ways that our families destroy us while also keeping us grounded and alive.

I have been reading the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy this summer and I was just craving some more literature from the world of a highly chaotic Asian family. This was exactly what I got with Number One Chinese Restaurant. Let me be clear upfront – this is about a comical, dysfunctional, and sometimes unlikeable family. Some of the characters suck – they are not good human beings and you will not like them, but isn’t that any family? We all have family members we could do without. The characters in this family are what pushed me to the end. I am an extremely character driven reader and this family was fleshed out from their vices to their virtues.

I could not put this book down. I was touched by all the characters and their stories. Li writes them so unbelievably realistically. She touches on some dark subjects and topics, but it was a surprisingly realistic glimpse into the lives of Asian Americans. The chapters are so strategically written – they end with devastating material that will force you to keep reading. You won’t be able to get enough!

The waiters were singing “Happy Birthday” in Chinese. All fifteen of them had crowded around the party table, clapping their hands. Not a single one could find the tune.

Together, they hugged the trunk of his body into a tackle that slowly brought him to the ground.

Illuminated by the two faux-Chinese lanterns affixed to the storefront, his face must have looked as shiny as the Peking ducks inside.

***A free copy of this book was provided to me by the publishers at Henry Holt in exchange for my honest review***

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Book Review: Find You In The Dark

Author: Nathan Ripley

Publication Date: June 19, 2018 

Publisher: Atria Books

In this chilling and disquieting debut thriller perfect for fans of Caroline Kepnes’s Hidden Bodies and Jeff Lindsay’s Dexter series, a family man with a habit of digging up the past catches the attention of a serial killer who wants anything but his secrets uncovered.

For years, unbeknownst to his wife and teenage daughter, Martin Reese has been illegally buying police files on serial killers and obsessively studying them, using them as guides to find the missing bodies of victims. He doesn’t take any souvenirs, just photos that he stores in an old laptop, and then he turns in the results anonymously. Martin sees his work as a public service, a righting of wrongs.

Detective Sandra Whittal sees the situation differently. On a meteoric rise in police ranks due to her case‑closing efficiency, Whittal is suspicious of the mysterious source she calls the Finder, especially since he keeps leading the police right to the bodies. Even if he isn’t the one leaving bodies behind, how can she be sure he won’t start soon?

On his latest dig, Martin searches for the first kill of Jason Shurn, the early 1990s murderer who may have been responsible for the disappearance of his wife’s sister. But when he arrives at the site, he finds more than just bones. There’s a freshly killed body—a young and missing Seattle woman—lying among remains that were left there decades ago. Someone else knew where Jason Shurn left the corpses of his victims…and that someone isn’t happy that Martin has been going around digging up his work. And when a crooked cop with a tenuous tie to Martin vanishes, Whittal begins to zero in on the Finder.

Hunted by a real killer and by Whittal, Martin realizes that in order to escape, he may have to go deeper into the killer’s dark world than he ever thought…

Martin Reese, our main character, has an unusual hobby. He finds the bodies of murder victims that have not yet been discovered. Martin is a complex character and his complexity deepens as the story progresses. Martin quickly catches the attention of local detective, Sandra Whittal, and a far more sinister serial killer. Both are on his tail, making his character react in ways that only a skilled writer could portray.

Martin Reese is so smart and highly perceptible. My favorite parts of this book were when he was in a pinch or was on his way to solving something that no other person had been able to solve in the past. He has a daughter, whom he is very overprotective of, which further added to my love of his character. He is realistic but also so intriguing because of just how complex he is. 

This entire novel was uneasy, atmospheric, and everything I needed a thriller/horror novel to be. The setting of dreary, rainy Seattle was a nice touch and helped me to envision Martin’s surroundings. Ripley writes terrifying scenes with an ease that many authors have not yet tackled. I have been in the mood lately for solely thrillers – they are easy to get into and so fast-paced. This one was no different. The story is dark and absolutely riveting.  Ripley’s writing will keep you on the edge of your seat.

I made it through the digging, the carefully arranged dirt, until I finally hit the first bone: an ulna, the thin forearm bone of a woman in her early twenties.

And, before I got up and left, worried for a second that I was going to be on that list of new memories this guy was making. List of new bodies.

I didn’t know yet that I’d made deeper mistakes I wouldn’t ever be able to put all the way right.

***A free copy of this book was provided to me by the publishers at Atria Books in exchange for my honest review***

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Book Review: Sorority

Author: Genevieve Sly Crane

Publication Date: May 1, 2018

Publisher: Gallery/Scout Press

Sisterhood is forever…whether you like it or not.

Prep meets Girls in White Dresses in Genevieve Sly Crane’s deliciously addictive, voyeuristic exploration of female friendship and coming of age that will appeal to anyone who has ever been curious about what happens in a sorority house.

Twinsets and pearls, secrets and kinship, rituals that hold sisters together in a sacred bond of everlasting trust. Certain chaste images spring to mind when one thinks of sororities. But make no mistake: these women are not braiding each other’s hair and having pillow fights—not by a long shot.

What Genevieve Sly Crane has conjured in these pages is a blunt, in your face look behind the closed doors of a house full of contemporary women—and there are no holds barred. These women have issues: self-inflicted, family inflicted, sister-to-sister inflicted—and it is all on the page. At the center of this swirl is Margot: the sister who died in the house, and each chapter is told from the points of view of the women who orbit her death and have their own reactions to it.

With a keen sense of character and elegant, observant prose, Crane details the undercurrents of tension in a world where perfection comes at a cost and the best things in life are painful—if not impossible—to acquire: Beauty. A mother’s love. And friendship… or at least the appearance of it. Woven throughout are glimmers of the classical myths that undercut the lives of women in Greek life. After all, the Greek goddesses did cause their fair share of destruction. 

There a too many characters in this book to name them all, so let me explain how the characters are showcased and how I felt about the characterization. Readers are first introduced to the sisters of this sorority house in the first chapter. A brief description of each room in the house and the sister who lives in it is given that gives readers a teaser of what is to come. We also find out in the first chapter that Margot, one of the sisters, is dead. You get just a brief look into how each girl lives and the small snippet that Crane gives in these meager paragraphs is enough to hook any reader. 

Many of the sorority sisters do not have more than one chapter dedicated to them. Some of them don’t even have one chapter but just show up randomly. The story of each girl’s past and sometimes future is explained in a detailed manner in her respective chapter in the novel. While I loved reading the girl’s sometimes very messed up and disturbed backstories, I found myself wanting more. There were too many characters to follow and keep up with and some of them did not have a very strong connection at all to the deceased sister, Margot. I felt that more of the stories should have surrounded Margot’s death.

This book should come with trigger warnings – BIG TIME! Domestic abuse, self-harm, pregnancy/contemplating abortion, drug abuse, and animal abuse. Crane has a fast-paced writing style; her words are like honey – easy to follow, smooth, and sweet. You will be hooked from the first page, but she covers topics and themes that are sometimes hard to read. Her writing is real and raw – enter at your own risk.

I first believed this book to be a thriller, but it is more about life, mistakes, second chances, family and family issues, and mostly friendship and the idea of sisterhood. Like I said, her writing covers some honest, moving and much need issues in today’s society.

Crane is a debut author and one whose work I will follow. While I did not rate this debut novel a full five stars, I know her work is only going to improve. Her style and flow is so smooth and the words just fly off the page. It took me no time at all to get through this sometimes heart-wrenching story – these are the types of novels that we need more of. Please go and check this book out – it is a perfect summer read.

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Book Review: Something In The Water

Author: Catherine Steadman

Publication Date: June 5, 2018

Publisher: Ballantine Books

“A psychological thriller that captivated me from page one. What unfolds makes for a wild, page-turning ride! It’s the perfect beach read!”—Reese Witherspoon (Reese’s Book Club x Hello Sunshine book pick)

If you could make one simple choice that would change your life forever, would you?

Erin is a documentary filmmaker on the brink of a professional breakthrough, Mark a handsome investment banker with big plans. Passionately in love, they embark on a dream honeymoon to the tropical island of Bora Bora, where they enjoy the sun, the sand, and each other. Then, while scuba diving in the crystal blue sea, they find something in the water. . . .

Could the life of your dreams be the stuff of nightmares?

Suddenly the newlyweds must make a dangerous choice: to speak out or to protect their secret. After all, if no one else knows, who would be hurt? Their decision will trigger a devastating chain of events. . . .

Have you ever wondered how long it takes to dig a grave?

Wonder no longer. Catherine Steadman’s enthralling voice shines throughout this spellbinding debut novel. With piercing insight and fascinating twists, Something in the Water challenges the reader to confront the hopes we desperately cling to, the ideals we’re tempted to abandon, and the perfect lies we tell ourselves.

Steadman’s writing in her new psychological suspense packs quite the punch! Can you say fast-paced? Steadman drops readers right into a sticky situation, to say the least, and she reveals one twist after another as the chapters unfold. The best thing about the story, and Steadman’s writing, is that she really makes you think with this story. This story makes you realize just how badly one bad decision can take you further than you thought you would ever go and change your life forever. Mystery is a perfect genre to dig deeper into ideas just like this one. The characters were written to be fully fleshed out; readers will know and learn their innermost secrets and will question their reliability the entire time. 

Have you ever wondered how long it takes to dig a grave? Wonder no longer. It takes an age. However long you think it takes, double that. 

I feel the trapdoors in my mind creaking under the strain of what lies underneath.

We can go back to our normal lives. Well, normal-ish.

Hands down, fans of Paula Hawkins, Ruth Ware, and even Gillian Flynn will relish in this new thriller out just in time to be everyone’s beach read. As if I haven’t already endorsed it enough, this novel was Reese Witherspoon’s pick for her book club this month! I loved this book; it will most likely be one of my favorites of the year. The climax and the ending came out of NOWHERE – I DID NOT SEE IT COMING! I live for books like this one!

***A free copy of this book was provided to me by the publishers at Ballantine Books in exchange for my honest review***

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Book Review: Sex and the City and Us

Author: Jennifer Keishin Armstrong

Publication Date: June 5, 2018

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

By the bestselling author of Seinfeldia, a fascinating retrospective of the iconic and award-winning television series, Sex and the City, to coincide with the show’s twentieth anniversary.

This is the story of how a columnist, two gay men, and a writers’ room full of women used their own poignant, hilarious, and humiliating stories to launch a cultural phenomenon. They endured shock, slut-shaming, and a slew of nasty reviews on their way to eventual—if often begrudging—respect. The show wasn’t perfect, but it revolutionized television for women.

When Candace Bushnell began writing for the New York Observer, she didn’t think anyone beyond the Upper East Side would care about her adventures among the Hamptons-hopping media elite. But her struggles with singlehood struck a chord. Beverly Hills, 90210 creator Darren Star brought her vision to an even wider audience when he adapted the column for HBO. Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha launched a barrage of trends, forever branded the actresses that took on the roles, redefined women’s relationship to sex and elevated the perception of singlehood.

Featuring exclusive new interviews with the cast and writers, including star Sarah Jessica Parker, creator Darren Star, executive producer Michael Patrick King, and author Candace Bushnell, Sex and the City and Us brings us a both a critical and nostalgic, behind-the-scenes look at a television series that changed the way women see themselves.

I was such a huge fan of the Sex and the City series. I have watched them all and even the movies; Carrie Bradshaw is my ultimate favorite and I always admired all that she stood for. When I saw this book being published, I just knew I had to review it on my blog. I am so glad I read it and here are a few thoughts I had while doing so…

There are so many details in this book for people who are pursuing a career in writing, directing, or producing TV shows. Armstrong provides so many wonderful anecdotes behind the making of the show and this book is truly for hardcore fans – you will learn some of the ins and outs and reasons behind certain things that took place throughout the shows running six seasons. But more than unveiling the secrets behind the show and the characters, you will learn how a hit show is made. This is my first read by Armstrong but it is my understanding that she has written other books that look at hit TV series and she is one of the best for doing so. Her writing shows just how much she researched the topic and reading the interviews was my favorite part!

Everyone involved with Sex and the Cityhedged their bets. But when the show premiered on HBO in June 1998, it would do more than become a hit television show. No one, least of all its own cast and crew, saw it coming.

By the third season, Sex and the City’s writers and directors knew what viewers wanted, and they knew how to give it to them. Sometimes it was the impossibly luxe lifestyle. Sometimes it was the characters’ intimately embarrassing moments. Sometimes it was romance. In a few magical moments, it was all three.

The fashion helped define the characters, from the tulle skirt in the opening sequence to Carrie’s crop tops, Samantha’s siren dresses, Charlotte’s classy chic, and Miranda’s power-bitch suits. The time spent on the stars’ looks was not to be questioned. 

Sex and the City had formed its own economy, and it did not come cheap.

It was so great to reminisce about this TV show that stole my heart so long ago. I had laughs while reading and ultimately found myself wanting to binge watch the show all over again. I loved the background about the setting, the fashion, the food, and the impact that these four women made on the world. To any fan or to anyone wanting to see what this show is about, this book is a great resource – you are sure to learn a lot and have fun while reading it!

***A free copy of this book was provided to me by the publishers at Simon & Schuster in exchange for my honest review***

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Book Review: The Royal Art of Poison

Author: Eleanor Herman

Publication Date: June 12, 2018

Publisher: St. Martin’s Press

Hugely entertaining, a work of pop history that traces the use of poison as a political―and cosmetic―tool in the royal courts of Western Europe from the Middle Ages to the Kremlin today

The story of poison is the story of power. For centuries, royal families have feared the gut-roiling, vomit-inducing agony of a little something added to their food or wine by an enemy. To avoid poison, they depended on tasters, unicorn horns, and antidotes tested on condemned prisoners. Servants licked the royal family’s spoons, tried on their underpants and tested their chamber pots.

Ironically, royals terrified of poison were unknowingly poisoning themselves daily with their cosmetics, medications, and filthy living conditions. Women wore makeup made with mercury and lead. Men rubbed turds on their bald spots. Physicians prescribed mercury enemas, arsenic skin cream, drinks of lead filings, and potions of human fat and skull, fresh from the executioner. The most gorgeous palaces were little better than filthy latrines. Gazing at gorgeous portraits of centuries past, we don’t see what lies beneath the royal robes and the stench of unwashed bodies; the lice feasting on private parts; and worms nesting in the intestines.

In The Royal Art of Poison, Eleanor Herman combines her unique access to royal archives with cutting-edge forensic discoveries to tell the true story of Europe’s glittering palaces: one of medical bafflement, poisonous cosmetics, ever-present excrement, festering natural illness, and, sometimes, murder.

This book is a fascinating look at poison, as you might have guessed from the title. However, this book looks at more than just death by poison, but also accidental poisoning, poisons in medical treatments, and poisons in skin care, what was used for makeup, and even in clothing. I was so enthralled by the history I learned about here. Herman’s voice and writing is witty and many parts of this book were laugh out loud hysterical. Things that sound common sense and second nature to us today were not so easily understandable years ago. Many famous deaths are categorized throughout the pages – showing how poison was used purposefully and not so purposefully cause death. Herman’s writing was enrapturing, her facts are ones I would have never been able to find out on my own, and her voice caused this book to not feel like a history lesson, but a stirring, rousing thriller with a killer ending.

Imagine a king casting his gaze over a feast of roasted meats, rich sauces, glazed honey cakes, and fine wine. Even though his stomach rumbles with hunger, he might lose his appetite when considering that on the table could, in fact, cause him to die horribly over the next few hours.

Over the centuries, royal courts developed methods for detecting poison or, if poison had been consumed, for reversing its fatal effects. Most such methods were both medically useless and extraordinary silly, yet they were trusted by some of the most powerful and educated people in Europe.

Looking around our Ikea-filled apartments, many of us might utter a soul-deep sigh as we ponder the marble floors, gilt ceilings, and finely carved furniture of European palaces in centuries past. We would be less envious, perhaps, if we remembered that the most magnificent chambers were befouled by parasites, bacteria, viruses, and environmental poisons that carried far more victims to the grave than arsenic ever did.

Palaces were, in fact, a dominion of dung. Inside those lacquered cabinets were chamber pots brimming with a stinking view of human waste. The contents of chamber pots were thrown down latrines, open holes with wooden seats and a straight shot down either into the castle moat, which frequently featured floating turds, or into the palace basement, which was only cleaned – and that must have been quite a job – when full to bursting. The human waste below Henry VIII’s Great House of Easement, a two-story deluxe toilet facility at Hampton Court with twenty-eight holes, rose head-high before it was cleaned out.

This would be the perfect beach read – of course, you might get some weird looks if you chose to read it anywhere in public. I forgot that what I was reading was non-fiction more times than one. Some of my favorite parts of this book were reading about famous deaths like Mozart and Napoleon Bonaparte. I learned more in this book than I ever could have in a history class. Such a entertaining, clever read!

***A free copy of this book was provided to me by the publishers at St. Martin’s Press in exchange for my honest review***

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