Review "When You Went Away" by Michael Baron

CMash December 5, 2011 3 Comments

WHEN YOU WENT AWAY by Michael Baron

Published by The Story Plant

ISBN-10: 0981956807

ISBN-13: 978-0981956800

This Kindle Edition is owned by me and was a personal choice of reading, that I downloaded via Amazon, during a special that was being offered.

Synopsis (from Amazon): Baron’s carefully crafted debut tale, the Story Plant’s first mass market original, is too true-to-life to be interesting. Gerry Rubato’s wife has died and his teenage daughter has run away from home, leaving him alone to raise an infant son. Despite the recent tragedies, the focus of the novel is on rather ordinary non-events, such as Gerry’s work at a catalogue company, opinions about the Yankees and tedious descriptions of food. As Gerry struggles to confront his runaway child, he chronicles his emotional reactions in a series of journal entries. A romantic subplot involving a colleague provides predictable conflict. Buried in the minutiae is an earnest tale of a man’s emotional awakening and grief, but a too-easy resolution makes this more of a tour through Gerry’s processing than a story.

My Thoughts and Opinion: Once again Michael Baron pulls on the heart strings from the opening sentence to the very last page. A poignant, tender, emotional, romantic, softhearted and moving love story through the eyes of a male written by a male. A story of love on different levels and in different states of the main character’s life. Gerry has everything, a wife, which is the love of his life, a teenage daughter, a brand new baby boy and then his world collapses. His daughter runs away, his wife dies suddenly, he becomes an instant single parent, and even though there is so much grief, he has to go on.

I have read many books by this author and every time I do, I have to remind myself that it is written by a male author. The soft, compassionate, moving and touching words that the author conveys in his writing, tugs on the heart strings and allows the reader to see and feel from that of a male perspective. Ladies, I wish, all of this could be bottled and made into a vaccine for the male species, if you know what I mean. Another plus with this book was that the main character is a huge Yankees fan. When his son was just an infant, they would spend their evenings together on the couch, watching a game, while he explained the art of baseball, knowing that his son probably had no clue what he was talking about. This brought back memories. I would do the same thing, not about baseball but while I was cooking. And another plus, my oldest son is a HUGE Yankees fan, naming is dog after the team and even has a tattoo. So in my book….that gets extra points. Overall….a phenomenal poignant read!!! A grand slam!!!

2012 Challenges

While I was away……

CMash December 5, 2011 4 Comments

………….I had to pass the time. And with just a few weeks left, I figured I might as well take advantage of all the free time that I had in between reading and writing some reviews. And the best part was it didn’t cost me a penny!!!!!

I found myself 3 more challenges!!!!!! What can I say? Except I realized I have one more addiction!! Not only to reading, reading challenges, reading challenge buttons but also to blogging. I was lost this weekend without my blog so I joined some more challenges. The only problem I see is this, there are a couple of others that I am waiting for lol. But here are the ones I added:

Challenge Details

• Timeline: 01 Jan 2012 – 31 Dec 2012

• Rules: To read TWELVE (12) mystery & suspense novels in 2011 (12 is the minimum but you can read more if you wish!)

• You don’t have to select your books ahead of time, you can just add them as you go. Also if you do list them upfront you can change them, nothing is set in stone! The books you choose can crossover into other challenges you have on the go.

• You can join at anytime. All books read in 2012 count towards the challenge regardless of when you sign up.

• At the beginning of Jan 2012, you will find a link to specific month to add your reviews.

• Audiobooks do not count, but all other formats are accepted.

• At the beginning of Jan 2012, you will find a link to add your reviews.

• You don’t have to have a blog to join in – for those without a blog just FILL IN THIS FORM and I will add you to the list – just join the discussion in the comments section to let us know when you’ve read a book and what you thought of it! 🙂

• You can choose from the numerous sub-genres of mystery and suspense, from cosy mysteries such as Agatha Christie to the more hard-boiled kind like V I Warshawski by Sara Paretsky, or romantic suspense written by the likes of Linda Howard, forensic crime such as those written by Kathy Reichs and even paranormal/supernatural suspense such as Kelley Armstrong. I’m sure this challenge will have something for everyone! 🙂

Free Reads 2012 Reading Challenge

HOSTED BY BOOKISH ARDOUR http://bookishardour.com/free-reads/

January 1, 2012 – December 31, 2012

Free Reads is a new challenge we’re starting this year and we hope it does as well as our other ones.

What It’s All About

Are you one of those book lovers who receive lots of books for presents? Have unread books lying around that you won in giveaways, received as ARCs, were given second hand, or even found lying around in the street! Then you might want to join in this challenge because we’re aiming to read all those unread books received as freebies in some form.

The Deets

The Main Rule: Read books you’ve received without purchasing, gifts, ARCs, prizes (not library books), that you haven’t read yet.
Running Dates: 1st of January – 31st of December 2012
When Can I Sign Up: All the way up to the last two weeks of December!
Crossover Genres: Anything! As long as they were free when you got them, it doesn’t matter..
Mr Linky: To use the Mr Linky you’ll need to click on the graphic then enter your link. These will be updated and posted into this page every couple of weeks or so.
Further Details: Crossover challenges are fine, you can change levels at any time, this is eBook, short story, and graphic novel friendly, and you don’t need a blog to join in (read further for details).

The How To

Choose Your Level: These are listed further down and you can change levels at any time.
Grab The Badge: Place it somewhere on your blog, profile, or in a signature where possible and link back (main page or this page, it’s up to you).
Sign Up Post: Create a post on your blog, in a group, or on a forum (only if allowed) to let others see what you’re aiming for (a predefined list of books is optional).
Link Up: Grab the direct URL to your sign up post, not your blog, click the Mr Linky graphic and enter your link!
Blogless? Don’t worry, you can sign up with your social network profile (YouTube, Twitter, GoodReads, Shelfari included), just make sure you link to your review list, shelf, tweet, or category. If you don’t have any of those feel free to comment!

Afterwards

Your Reviews: Reviewing is optional! But if you do review we’d love for you to share them by submitting them on the Review Page (including social networks).
Finished: When you’re done it’s completion post time and you can share these on the Completion Post page!

Challenge Levels

For Me? – Choose 5 books to read
On The Cheap – Choose 15 books to read
Bargain – Choose 30 books to read
Presents – Choose 50 books to read
So Free – Choose 75 books to read
Gift Addict – Choose between 76-135 books to read
Speechless – Choose between 136-200 books to read

Extra Challenges

If you feel like that extra kick to your reading challenges here’s a couple you can choose from.

World: Choose a country as your theme, reading only books from that country or where it’s the setting. For how high you go you can choose more than one country;
- Level For Me? and On The Cheap: Choose one country
- Level Bargain and Presents: Choose two countries
- Level So Free to end of Gift Addict: Choose three countries
- Level Speechless: Choose four countries.
Gender Battle: Read books only by female or male authors. Another alternative is to read equal amounts of both.

I have signed up for this one for the past 2 years and someday, some year my goal is to complete it!!!!

Sign-Up: 100+ Books In A Year Reading Challenge 2012!

from Book Chick City by Book Chick City

http://www.bookchickcity.com/2011/12/sign-up-100-books-in-year-reading.html

Book Chick City’s
100+ Books In A Year Reading Challenge 2012!

Welcome to the 100+ Books In A Year Challenge 2012! I haven’t done too badly with this challenge, but I still failed. At present I’m on book 72 and I imagine I will add another few before the year is out. This is the second year I haven’t reached my personal goal of 100, so I’m hoping 2012 will be my year! I hope you will join in too! For more details see below.

Sign Up

To sign up you MUST make a post on your blog about participating in the challenge – you then use the DIRECT URL of the post to sign up to the challenge by adding it to Mr Linky below. DO NOT just add your blog URL – this will be deleted.

You must add the button to your sidebar – make sure that it links back to this post so others can join the challenge if they wish. Easiest way to do this is to copy and paste the code displayed below!

Challenge Details

• Timeline: 01 Jan 2012 – 31 Dec 2012

• Rules: Read 100+ books in 2012 (any genre)

• You don’t have to select your books ahead of time, you can just add them as you go. Also if you do list them upfront you can change them, nothing is set in stone! The books you choose can crossover into other challenges you have on the go.

• You can join at anytime. All books read in 2012 count towards the challenge regardless of when you sign up.

• At the beginning of Jan 2012, you will find a link to specific month to add your reviews.

• Audiobooks do not count, but all other formats are accepted.

• Only fiction, no non-fiction.

• This challenge can crossover to other challenges.

• You don’t have to have a blog to join in – for those without a blog just FILL IN THIS FORM and I will add you to the list – just join the discussion in the comments section to let us know when you’ve read a book and what you thought of it! 🙂

Please add your DIRECT URL link, not just your blog link. If you have trouble adding your URL link below, just fill out the form above and I will add it for you.

So to date, I have 16 and 2 perpetuals. Have you decided are any more? Have you found any new ones? Now that I lost my google reader, I’m afraid I might miss some, so if you see one in your travels and it has a great button, please let me know lol.

Misc

Howdy

CMash December 5, 2011 7 Comments

Hi everyone!!! Oh it feels good to be home!!! I am not quite sure what happened but I have always proclaimed that I am computer illiterate. Lately I have been getting spammed. It started out slowly when I was away from my computer a lot and by my Mom’s side. Then I noticed it was increasing and I just kept deleting the comments, not knowing about the rules. It then got to the point it was happening daily. So I am thinking that is the reason why.

I have lost some important files, but in time, maybe 10 years lol (I said I’m not computer savvy), I will get it back. My google reader is gone so I will be hopping quite a bit this week to get everyone back so I don’t miss ANYTHING!!!

And I have to give a HUGE THANK YOU to my good friend and computer angel

Gina from Hott Books, who has been helping me all weekend, saving my files, setting up a new site, just in case we need to move. She is a doll. Not only this weekend, but throughout the year, whenever I have a tech question, she is there for me. She has become a special friend that I wouldn’t have met if it weren’t for this wonderful neighborhood of book blogging.

In the meantime, I will be moderating comments so I don’t get in trouble again. I hope this does not cause any inconvenience to all my blogging buddies. I have been searching for the “word verification thingy” but can’t seem to locate it.

And you may be asking what I have been doing these past few days. Well besides …………

I tried attempting to recreate some of my lost spreadsheets, reading 2 books, and writing some reviews. I indulged in my comfort food, ice cream, and instead of shopping, I went on the hunt for one of my other addictions. That post will follow…………..to be continued…………..