50 Dates in 50 States
One Woman’s Journey to Positive Change
By M.L. Brocklehurst
Morgan James. $19.95 (Rating: Good)
Describing herself as “a goal-driven, career-focused, workaholic who loved to travel,” the author explains that her life hit rock bottom when her soul mate unexpectedly died. Two years after Adam’s death she still hadn’t gotten her life back together, but she realized that she had to do something to make a positive change in what had become a destructive, downward spiraling existence.
This narrative charts Melanie Brocklehurst’s journey back to “wholeness.” As she explains, “Along the way I quit my job, sold my house, travelled around the U.S. having fifty dates in fifty states, and eventually met the man who loves me and accepts me as I am.”
Part travelogue, part romp and part how-to-guide, Melanie instructs as well as inspires her reader as she lay outs how her positive change formula and works to achieve her dreams.
From shark diving in Hawaii to Fright Night in Philly, the author has some interesting experiences. Making out at a California drive-in movie may have been a lapse back to adolescence but the encounter with a stalker in New Mexico was certainly no fun and an encounter Melanie would rather have avoided.
All in all, though, her account of this struggle to bring about positive change in her life is uplifting and quite entertaining. And, for those who are looking for some way of jumpstarting their own lives, the formula Brocklehurst shares may point to the way of bringing about some positive changes.
The Widows of Braxton County
By Jess McConkey
William Morrow. $14.99 (Rating-Very Good)
A suspenseful and chilling story set in the a small farming community, this is the haunting tale of a woman who is trying to come to terms with her past while discovering her true identity.
When she marries Joe Krause, Kate, the heroine of this novel, agrees to set her city-dwelling past behind her and settle on the Iowa farm that has been in Joe’s family for 140 years.
Although she is more than willing to accept a life defined by daily chores and getting back to the basics, Kate isn’t quite ready for judgmental neighbors and her mother-in-law who moves in shortly after the wedding. Surprise, surprise!
As she struggles to adjust to rural life, Kate also comes to realize that her new family has plenty of secrets. Local gossip suggests that the Kraus clan harbors a secret about a mysterious death. Before she’s done, this beguiling woman is going to have to deal with some dangerous and unexplainable events that will give her a new understanding of the old phrase, “The sins of the father.”
More than just an intriguing mystery, this is a riveting character study of actually two women, Kate and Hannah, a woman from an earlier time, who both had to deal with some unattainable expectations placed on them by family and society.
Love, Laugh and Eat
And Other Secrets Of Longevity From the Healthiest People on Earth
By John Tickell, M.D.
Harper One. $26.99 (Rating-Good)
Ever wonder why Okinawans have the greatest number of centenarians per capita in the world and very low incidences of heart disease, strokes, breast and prostate cancer?
Are there things those who live past 100 know that the rest of us don’t?
The author spent 25 years traveling the world to uncover the secrets of longevity and after researching the cultures, habits, foods and traditions of 100 countries. Dr. Tickell provides some of the answers to these and similar questions about what it takes to live longer.
Boiling down his findings into a practical, doable everyday program, Dr. Tickell has created an easy-to-follow guide that will change for the better and extend one’s life. The Activity, Coping and Eating (ACE) program outlined in this little book points to the way to successfully use your brain, body, and mouth to lose weight and live a healthier existence.
Combining stress reduction, diet alterations and exercise with a seven day detoxification plan, the author also serves up a meal and snack plan that will fight hunger and help shed and keep off those unwanted pounds.
Dr. Tickell will be featured on a PBS special this month and no doubt there will rebroadcasts of the health program throughout the rest of the year and perhaps in 2014 as well.
The Tower
By Simon Toyne
William Morrow. $25.99 (Rating-Very Good)
If you read “Sanctus” and “The Key”, the first two novels of the Ruin trilogy, you’ll certainly want to read this final installment of the series. A cyber attack at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center has not only disabled the Hubble telescope but the director has also gone missing.
FBI agent Joe Shepherd is handling the investigation and among the puzzling clues he finds left behind by the scientist are the words “end of days.”
Meanwhile, American journalist Lib Adamsen has also disappeared. Trapped in the Syrian Desert, Lib is prisoner of the prophecy that drove her there and she is now haunted by the terrible things about to come.
With a countdown clock left at Goddard ticking away, Shepherd realizes time is running out and something truly catastrophic is waiting in the wings to destroy mankind. Extraordinary events from extreme weather to odd animal behavior are harbingers of the coming transformation.
The question is are we rushing towards a revelation or total devastation? Never have the stakes been so high or the outcome so much in doubt as with this situation and only Lib holds the key to what the ultimate outcome will be.
If you thought the first two stories of this trilogy were exciting, you haven’t read anything yet. Simon Toyne pulls out all the stops with this concluding novel. This wrap-up will leave you breathless!
The Paris Deadline
By Max Byrd
Turner. $27.95 (Rating-Very Good)
It is the Jazz Age of the 1920s and Toby Keats may well be the only American working in Paris who doesn’t know Hemingway. No matter, though. Toby relishes his quiet life after serving in the Great War. But unfortunately, this calm existence is about to change radically when he discovers an automaton dubbed Vaucanson’s Duck.
Containing a small gyroscope that a number of people are interested in because it could be the key element in creating unmanned rockets, Toby’s new plaything becomes the center of a nasty struggle to see which group of “baddies” can capture it.
From the Left Bank to the prehistoric caves of southern France, the chase is on and the winners will possess technology that will tilt the next European conflict in their favor.
Rich in historical detail, “The Paris Deadline” is a fun read and a nice diversion from more traditional suspense novels.