Unabridged Chick

I hope those of you on the East Coast are surviving snor'eastercane Sandy. It's just gray and rainy here so far. Perfect day, however, to snuggle up with my new reads! This week's Mailbox Monday below -- what did you get?

For Review









Purchased

I'm wicked late on announcing giveaway winners -- we had a big tamale-making party yesterday and spent the day cooking. My house still smells divine!

The winner of The Headmaster's Wager is ... Laurie C @ Bay State Reader's Advisory!

The winner of Jane is ... Kayla B.!

Congrats to the winners! I've emailed the winners who have a few days to respond before I redraw. If you didn't win, be sure to check out my other giveaways.

I was kind of hoping I could include yet another cute cat-and-book picture but my cats are being totally skittish and petrified of me, my cell phone, and books. Divas.

I had planned a 1940s themed dinner with friends whom I strong-armed into reading Mr. Churchill's Secretary with me, but then one thing after another derailed our plans. I'm still hopeful -- and my wife is now chomping at the bit to make a vintage, ration-quantity meat pie in which the meat is extended, so to speak, with oats. Yum! (?) It's on my mind again since I'm reading Susan Elia MacNeal's Princess Elizabeth's Spy this weekend. I'm totally girl-crushing on that Maggie Hope.  In typical fashion, I can't limit myself to one book, so I'm also working on Water Scott's The Bride of Lammermoor (NaNoWriMo research!) and The Prescribed Burn, a collection of short stories that immediately won me when the author described them as "stories for anyone who couldn’t relate to Hold…

Title:How the French Invented Love: Nine Hundred Years of Passion and Romance
Author: Marilyn Yalom

Genre: Non-Fiction (Literary Criticism / Sociology / Romance / Sex / Love / France / French Cultural)
Publisher/Publication Date: Harper Perennial (10/23/2012)
Source:TLC Book Tours

Rating: Liked.
Did I finish?: I did.
One-sentence summary: A breezy, accessible look at French attitudes toward love through 900 years of French literature.
Reading Challenges:Dewey Decimal Challenge

Do I like the cover?: I do -- it is quite French, and quite passionate. Appropriately enough, it has French flaps.

I'm reminded of...: Diane Ackerman, Molly Peacock

First line: How the French love love!

Buy, Borrow, or Avoid?: Borrow or buy -- gift for the bookish Francophile in your life!

Why did I get this book?: I saw the word 'French' and said, 'oui!'.

Review: I'm a Francophile and I love reading; I love romance and I love -- for the most part -- the dramatic tensions that come with romantic st…

Title:The Art Forger
Author: B.A. Shapiro

Genre: Fiction (Contemporary / Boston / Art World / Art Forger / Art Dealer / Literary Thriller / Historical Figure Fictionalized / Degas)
Publisher/Publication Date: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill (10/23/2012)
Source: The publisher.

Rating: Liked.
Did I finish?: I did -- I stayed up all night to finish because I had to know.
One-sentence summary: Boston artist Claire Roth, shadowed by scandal, makes her living selling reproductions of famous paintings when she's asked to forge a famous stolen painting and discovers it might actually be a forgery.

Do I like the cover?: By itself, I do -- before finishing the book, I liked it -- but upon finishing, I feel like it doesn't capture the heroine's flat at all (which I presume it is meant to evoke).

First line: I step back and scrutinize the paintings.

Buy, Borrow, or Avoid?: Borrow or buy -- this is a zippy fast, fascinating kind of thriller of art, deceit, and forgeries!

Why did I get this bo…