Rutabaga's Free Book Contest: #StayHome Edition

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May I interest anyone in a free book?

   Suffice it to say that 2020 hasn’t been meeting anyone’s expectations. The top of the year looked so promising, but we’ve all long since wished there was a RESET button we could push. During this unprecedented time that’s brought stressors that most (or all) have never experienced before, I want to throw something fun in the ring. Hence, my second Free Book Contest.

1.)    Between now and the end of May, be the person to accumulate the most points by leaving comments on my blog. The comment must relate to the blog post. You can leave more than one comment on the same post as long as it’s related, whether it’s an original comment or a reply/follow-up to a previous question/comment.

2.)   I am trying out a points system for this contest. Participants will receive:

A.)  4 points for any question or comment on THIS post;

B.)  3 points for any question or comment on any 2020 post;

C.)  2 points for any question or comment on any post prior to the year 2020;

D.) 5 points for any question or comment left on my “Origin of The Reading Rutabaga” post. (Hint: The “Rutabagian Search” bar may prove helpful.)

   Friendly reminders:

1.)    Be civil. While I appreciate that we all have varying opinions, there is no need to be crass or vulgar. We are all better than that.

2.)   Use the same name every time you comment. If you post as “Mulan” the first time, post as “Mulan” each subsequent time. If you post next as “Rutabaga,” that will be recorded as comments from two different people.

   For the winner:

1.)    The book you choose can be any book that has been featured in a single book post or a compilation post or seen in a Positive Page-turner’s Challenge picture. Exception: If the book you’re most interested in is not the first in a series, and you’d like to start at the beginning, I would get you the first book instead.

2.)   If the book has both a hardcover and paperback version, I will choose the less costly of the two. This is really only important if the winner is particular about book formats.

3.)   I apologize for any inconvenience, but books will be sent to U.S. addresses only. (As before, I don’t think this will affect any participants, but it’s included anyway.)

HAPPY COMMENTING AND LET’S LOOK TOWARD BRIGHTER DAYS!!

A Poem: "In My Imagination"

Photo by Pixabay via Pexels

In My Imagination

Sometimes I wander through the forest at night

Gliding along in a gown of gossamer twilight.

I wonder deep thoughts while in graceful repose

Looking sweet and as sharp as thorns on a rose.

Sometimes I run off to a land that doesn’t exist

And to a castle that sits high above all the mist.

Bedecked in jewels and a dress made of silk,

My cloak hides the daggers used to dispatch wicked ilk.

Sometimes I stand upon the beach and have a good cry

As waves beat ashore and rain pours in a fierce lullaby.

The wind whips my hair and my dress of diamond tears

To the tune of Grief’s dirge to last many years.

Sometimes I rant and scream and rage.

I want to scream even louder; rage can’t be put in a cage.     

Anger spills forth in a torrent, a rush;

It won’t quiet down with one simple flush.

Sometimes I want to throw breakable things all about

With no regard to the destruction, all rules I will flout.

Toss that there, shatter this into shards.

Bring it all down like a house of cards.

All of this happens in the space of my mind

Where imagination is never confined.

Mental health worries aren’t what I want to impart.

This poem shows that I’m probably dramatic at heart!

--LK 4/15/2020

"Rebel" by Marie Lu

Rebel (Oct. 1, 2019) by Marie Lu.

Ten years have passed since Daniel “Day” Altan Wing incited a revolution to bring down the Republic of America. Eden Bataar Wing continues to live in his shadow, despite being a top student at Ross University of the Sciences, the top university in the world. Eden is brilliant and loves to tinker; he’s going to graduate in seven years when it’d normally take a student ten years. Daniel and Eden live in Ross City, the only city and capital of Antarctica, which is encased in a biodome, because Antarctica is, of course, arctic. They live in the upper echelon of society, residing on the Sky Floors. Daniel is an agent for the Antarctican Intelligence Service (AIS), and along with being a brilliant student, Eden is a rebel drone racer. The races are held in the Undercity, where the poorest barely eek out an existence and cannot afford education, healthcare or housing, nor land decent jobs. Everything is based on the Level system. The higher the level, the  better your life, and the system is expectedly unfair to the poor. Say a man lost his job because he’s sick and can’t work. In this system, his Level decreases because he isn’t working, but the further his Level drops, the further he is from being able to enter a hospital for care or medications. Ross City’s system is like a living game; points are earned for good behavior and taken away for ill behavior, and all of this is noted with one’s Level above one’s head like a glowing plumb bob that’s almost impossible to hide from.

            The injustice of the Level system and how it skews toward those with high Levels in the Sky Floors versus those in the Undercity vexes Eden, and it frustrates him that Daniel doesn’t understand him. The fact that Daniel works for the AIS further ignites Eden’s frustration. Eden, the tinkerer, enters an illegal drone race and captures the attention of Dominic Hann. Hann’s been linked to multiple gruesome murders, but no one’s recently laid eyes on him until Eden and his amazing drone. What does Hann want from Eden? This is the best opportunity that’s ever come up to get someone on the inside, but all Daniel wants is to protect his younger brother and love June Iparis again (did he ever stop?), but that is another side story. Eden is going to need any help that he can get: from Daniel, June, Pressa Yu (his janitor friend at the university who lives in the Undercity with her father), the AIS and the Antarctican military. But will that be enough to take Hann down?

            My initial reaction to this book was, “Why?” A fourth book in the Legend trilogy isn’t a trilogy anymore, but a tetralogy, which means I’ll put it with its predecessors. Why couldn’t it at least be a duology? But bookshelf-nitpicking aside, this story should’ve long drawn in Legend fans, and I would hope it kindles interest in new readers to read the first three books if they haven’t already. Although Daniel and Eden live in a gamified world, they still deal with tiers of socioeconomic status and the privilege that’s offered those of the highest Levels, not unlike we might see presently in anything from classroom cliques to the Hollywood elite to the ridiculously wealthy. Lu writes with the expertise of a professional gamer, confident in her storyline and the return of familiar characters. For this story, she’s figured out the algorithm for adventure, fear, want, rebellion, intelligence and romance. She is a powerhouse author.

"Serving Up Love" by Multiple Authors

Serving Up Love (Nov. 5, 2019) by Tracie Peterson, et al.

The book states that this is “A Four-in-One Harvey House Brides Collection.” In short, Harvey Houses were a chain of successful restaurants built along railroads. Harvey Houses were known for their impeccable hospitality, and, perhaps, even more for their Harvey Girls. All Harvey Girls had to be single and white and were subject to a specific dress code and a strict curfew. They were; however, treated well, given room and board as well as a wage considered generous for the time. This collection contains four novellas from leading inspirational, historical romance writers.

   1. A Flood of Love by Tracie Peterson.

            To fill in for the vacationing house mother, veteran Harvey Girl Gretchen Gottsacker returns to her hometown of San Marcial, New Mexico. It is August 1929. It’s been 10 years since she left the railroad town to train to be a Harvey Girl, and she never thought she’d return. Even more surprising is that her love of a decade ago, Dirk Martinez, has also returned to San Marcial. He has a precocious daughter named Katiann, whom Gretchen has the pleasure of meeting the day of her arrival at the Harvey House (and before she realizes she’s Dirk’s). In truth, Gretchen has never stopped loving Dirk, but when he left without explanation, she felt betrayed. When he explains why he left (it is honorable), can Gretchen find it within herself to forgive him? Can they pick up the missing pieces through sun or rain, dust or devastating flood?

   2. More Than a Pretty Face by Karen Witemeyer.

            A Harvey Girl for five years come 1902, Rosalind Kemp’s tenure has been exemplary. She is a godly, chaste woman. Unfortunately, she has been re-assigned to the Santa Fe Depot in Gainesville, Texas, before the end of her current contract. She was hoping to put in for a transfer to California, thus putting more distance between her and a past that seems determined to disrupt her life and prevent a lasting relationship with any man who is upright and just. A man like Gainesville’s handsome young lawyer, Caleb Durrington. Like any lawyer worth his salt, he is prepared to throw out his most convincing arguments to convince Rosalind to marry him (and I tended to find his obsession with her overbearing and a bit creepy, but not in a dangerous way). He not only struggles to woe Rosalind, but is met with adamant disapproval and disdain from his mother, Estella Durrington (who says the word waitress as if it’s a synonym for the word trollop). (No matter that his mother is motivated by her own overbearing love for her son, her behavior is damaging, embarrassing and atrocious, and I wouldn’t forgive her instantaneously.) What could be so bad that Rosalind wants to run and hide instead of accepting the love of an upstanding man? Will Mrs. Durrington’s meddling ways be irreparably disastrous?

   3. Intrigue a la Mode by Regina Jennings.

            There is love behind the work Willow Kentworth does as a Harvey Girl at the Emporia Harvey House in 1898. She is determined to do the best work, so she can continue to wire money to her parents to help pay her mother’s doctor bills. And Willow does her best work, is the finest at her job even by persnickety Mrs. Sykes’ impeccable standards, until new busboy Graham Buchanan arrives. Not wanting to be associated with his railroad-baron father (and grandfather before him), he takes on the name Buck Graham as he tries to investigate smuggling on their railroad. His search is dangerously life-threatening more than once, and it’s Willow who comes to his rescue both times (she is no damsel-in-distress, that’s for certain). But will Graham’s brushes with those who would have no qualms in leaving him for dead put Willow’s life and/or job at risk? What will she think of the 23-year-old man when his aristocratic manners and patrician accent come out? When she learns he’s “one of the railroad family?” And who is the Pinkerton detective that his family has hired?

   4. Grand Encounters by Jen Turano.

            What’s a New York society girl (related to members within the New York Four Hundred) doing working as a Harvey Girl at the El Tovar Hotel, Grand Canyon, in 1908? One Miss Myrtle Schermerhorn is swearing off men forever. Or that’s what she’s told her good friend and fellow Harvey Girl, Miss Ruthanne Hill. All of that seems to be changing with the frequency of Mr. Jack Daggett’s visits to the Harvey House, and his interest in her is all but confirmed by Jack’s meddlesome, though well-meaning, younger brother, Mr. Walter Daggett. Jack wonders if Myrtle would glide into society life – Chicago society, not New York, as the Daggett family with their more recent wealth would be considered “upstart members of the newly rich.” He’s not fond of society, which is why Myrtle avoids the topic of her high society upbringing. She knows she must tell him and is encouraged to do so by Ruthanne, who’s connected very well with Walter, but Mr. Percy Kane beats her to it. He shows up unannounced and with the assumed declaration that they are still engaged despite his previous rejection of her for another young woman. Will this unforeseen ripple in their new relationship wither like an un-watered flower before it’s had a chance to bloom?

   Overall Thoughts: When I began the book, I wasn’t in the mood for historical romance; however, I found the historical aspect of the stories fascinating. Before this, I was unaware of Harvey Houses and the Harvey Girls that kept them up to perfection. Reading these stories has prompted a wish in me to visit any site that was previously a Harvey House, especially those featured within these four stories. Each of the authors is a virtuoso in her writing craft. No two stories are alike, and each features a smart, independent, empowered lead female. The stories are as impeccably written as the immaculate table settings and crisp, starched aprons every Harvey Girl wears. I have read full novels by each of these authors, and while I have a favorite author amongst them, I have at least liked the novels of each of them.

National Poetry Month 2020

Happy National Poetry Month! Things can be overwhelming right now. If you’re floundering, I hope you have a strong support system to help you through. If you’re willing and have the means, I hope you’re helping others, whether it’s taking the time to call someone whom you know is shut in, making face masks, getting a mature relative or neighbor’s groceries, contributing financially to an organization or any other number of ideas. No gesture is too small to be of import, as all small gestures add up as well as the big ones.

            Circling back to National Poetry Month: If, like me, you enjoy poems that rhyme, go ahead and keep reading this post. If reading a poem (rhyming or not) is the very last thing you want to do today, tomorrow or for the rest of your lifetime, stop reading right now!

A New Normalcy

From home, the world looks the same to me,

But away, there is a new normalcy.

One can only enter the main entrance at work.

I hope this doesn’t last long and is a hiccup, a quirk.

Businesses have closed; no dine-in is allowed.

If there’s more than one, it’s too much of a crowd.

Face masks are everywhere, including one on my face

With gloves at the ready, you know, just in case.

Getting groceries now is an extra big chore.

Please let there be Clorox wipes, oh how I implore!

The paper goods aisle remains void of toilet paper,

And will someone write the canned goods crisis caper?

It’s been so long since one could share an embrace.

Social distancing parts us from here to outer space.

A bright smile, hearty wave or Vulcan salutation will have to do,

While we wait for a mighty medical breakthrough.

Although things seem dire, I hope you can find a light side.

Safeguard yourself and your loved ones and stay fortified.

Thank those that we rely on; they’re on the front lines.

Humble heroes they are and like stars they do shine!

--LK 4/6/2020

"Beauty and the Beast: Lost in a Book" by Jennifer Donnelly

Beauty and the Beast: Lost in a Book (Jan. 31, 2017) by Jennifer Donnelly.

No matter how smart or bookish one is, being a captive in Beast’s castle is taking a toll on Belle. While she has befriended its inhabitants (Lumiere, Cogsworth, Mrs. Potts, Chip, Plumette, Froufrou, Cuisinier, Chapeau and Madame de Garderobe) and has accepted her captivity, she greatly misses her father and the rare villagers that she appreciated in Villeneuve such as Pere Robert, the village’s curé and librarian, and Agathe, a brave beggar woman who knows that “love is not for cowards.” Beast shows the rare unguarded, joyful moment, but ultimately remains wary, reclusive and downright difficult. When Belle discovers an enchanted book called Nevermore, she is enamored by the world’s glamour and the beautiful people who readily befriend her. There’s the lovely and generous Countess (or Comtesse des Terre des Morts, i.e. Countess of the Land of the Dead) and the handsome and charismatic Henri, Duc des Choses-Passées (i.e. Duke of Things Past). The countess appeals to all of Belle’s desires: the opportunity to see the world, attend university, escape the Beast’s castle and perhaps even reunite with her father. Nevermore is the best story come to life, but what is the cost? Is it really too good to be true? Belle doesn’t think so, but doubts sweep in when Nevermore’s inhabitants are quick to discredit friends like Chip and Mrs. Potts as nothing more than dangerous, living objects. It doesn’t help when a fearsome, talking stag beetle (named Lucanos) and a large brown spider (named Aranae; she doesn’t talk, she chitters) give dire warnings about things eaten and things lost. What is the truth? Belle had better find out before she becomes nothing more than words in a book.

            All of the beloved characters from the familiar Disney movies are in this book, as are many of the story’s recognizable bits (Belle taking her dad’s place, fleeing the castle and getting saved from wolves by the Beast, etc.), but then Donnelly sweeps in with this original story that greets us like a companion. I rejoiced in the familiarity, while appreciating this new plot. As a reader who loves the idea of visiting fantasy worlds and fantastical places, Belle’s adventurous spirit and opportunity to walk into a book appealed to me. Like Belle, sometimes we don’t have the best judgment, as she finds in repeatedly visiting Nevermore, creating an imperfect character to reflect our imperfect selves. This story may have readers thinking that real life is preferred, despite the trials and chaos it brings, but with current events being what they are, readers may wish themselves lost in a book. Where do you stand?