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Happy Birthday: A Novel Review

It's been awhile since I've read a Danielle Steel book. This book sounded interesting to me because I guess I have birthdays on my mind these days. Amazing how they come around so quickly.
And the truth is Happy Birthday wasn't a horrible book (I have read worse), but it was nowhere near as good as her earlier books. Still, the book has all the elements that Steel lovers enjoy, and for summer reading, you could do a lot worse. The book moves swiftly and Steel dishes out love and pain, as usual, with a happy ending. The book wasn't as well fleshed out as other books by Steel. The characters didn't have a lot of depth and the plot could've been a lot stronger. Steel formula varies little, so there are no huge surprises or differences. If you love Steel, you'll love this book. If you've overdosed on Steel, give it a skip. If you've never read Steel before, read one of her earlier, preferably earliest, books before starting with this one. (You'll be a lot happier with any one of the first five to ten.)
I give it three stars because it wasn't terrible and was pretty much what I expected it to be.
Overall, okay read. I recommend the book to Steel fans and diehard Steel lovers. Other romance fans may prefer to pick a different book and wait for this one to come out in paperback or get it from the library.

Happy Birthday: A Novel Overview

In this beguiling new novel, Danielle Steel tells the story of three very different people, each of whom, on the same day, reaches a crucial turning point in life-a rite both bittersweet and full of hope, a time to blow out the candles, say goodbye to the past, and make a wish for the future.Valerie Wyatt is the queen of gracious living and the arbiter of taste. Since her long-ago divorce, she's worked hard to reach the pinnacle of her profession and to create a camera-ready life in her Fifth Avenue penthouse. So why is she so depressed? All the hours with her personal trainer, the careful work of New York's best hairdressers, cosmetic surgeons, and her own God-given bone structure and great looks can't fudge the truth or her lies about it: Valerie is turning sixty. Valerie's daughter, April, has no love life, no rest, and no prospect of that changing in the foreseeable future. Her popular one-of-a-kind restaurant in downtown New York, where she is chef and owner, consumes every ounce of her attention and energy. Ready or not, though, April's life is about to change, in a tumultuous transformation that begins the morning it hits her: She's thirty. And what does she have to show for it? A restaurant, no man, no kids.Jack Adams once threw a football like a guided missile. Twelve years after retiring from the NFL, he is the most charismatic sports analyst on TV, a man who has his pick of the most desirable twentysomething women. But after a particularly memorable Halloween party, Jack wakes up on his fiftieth birthday, his back thrown out of whack, feeling every year his age. A terrifying act of violence, an out-of-the-blue blessing, and two extremely unlikely love affairs soon turn lives inside out and upside down. In a novel brimming with warmth and insight, beginning on one birthday and ending on another, Valerie, April, and Jack discover that life itself can be a celebration-and that its greatest gifts are always a surprise.From the Hardcover edition.

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Special Prices for The Most Dangerous Thing Review

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The Most Dangerous Thing Review

Lippman explores a mythologized childhood in the woods that skirts Dickeyville, a suburb just inside Baltimore. Five children, Gwen, tomboy Mickey and the wild Halloran brothers, Sean, Tim and Gordon (Go-Go), spend their summers exploring, far exceeding the boundaries of their parents' permission to remain on the outskirts of the wilderness. The unity of five, Go-Go the youngest, following the older kids like a happy puppy, gradually evolves with the onset of adolescence, until a fateful summer where a ramshackle cottage is the scene of tragedy the night of a fearsome hurricane. Thirty-two years later, Go-Go is dead, either by accident or suicide, his descent into bad behavior long a familiar theme in the Halloran family. Go-Go's history is littered with secrets, the long habits of parents keeping silent about bad things infecting five friends who have secrets of their own. None of them have survived that final summer unscathed, brought together finally by the loss of the boy who raptly copied everything they did and hid the ugliest secret of them all.
The narrative voice dissects the lives of each, Gwen, Tim, Sean, Go-Go and Mickey (who has changed her name to McKey). But Lippman fleshes out these pivotal characters with their mothers and fathers, the family patterns, the facades of marriage and secrets passed from one generation to another. Often the pages feel weighted with regrets, of mistakes made and roads not taken: a beautiful, artistic mother who once dreamed of Paris and painting; a woman who trades on the artifice of her body even as her beauty fades to blowsy, changing men like costumes; fathers who act on behalf of their children, adding another layer of deceit to an already senseless tragedy; adolescents eager to explore the adult world and taste forbidden fruit, only later to be burdened with the consequences of their carelessness.
In a provocative and thoughtful novel, Lippman is not content to let events drive her story, delving relentlessly into personalities, motives, the collision of egos and the instinct for self-preservation. Guilt is reduced to nearly equal portions, a collective tragedy, a collective secret that begs for release. As expected, the truth provides a measure of relief, the breaking of silence the only palliative to now-adult lives filled with mistakes and opportunities. Humanity is, after all, a complicated thing. Lippman avoids the easy dismissal or the facile explanation. No, this is murkier territory, where only one body remains buried, secrets intact. Luan Gaines/2011.

The Most Dangerous Thing Overview

Some secrets can't be kept. . . .

The Most Dangerous Thing

Years ago, they were all the best of friends. But as time passed and circumstances changed, they grew apart, became adults with families of their own, and began to forget about the past—and the terrible lie they all shared.But now Gordon, the youngest and wildest of the five, has died and the others are thrown together for the first time in years.

And then the revelations start.

Could their long-ago lie be the reason for their troubles today? Is it more dangerous to admit to what they've done or is it the strain of keeping the secret that is beginning to wear on them and everyone close to them?Each one of these old friends has to wonder if their secret has been discovered—and if someone within the circle is out to destroy them.


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Buy Cheap Full Black (Scott Harvath) Review

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Full Black (Scott Harvath) Review

Like the phenominal financial thriller I just finished reading, Chaos and Kingdom, Full Black brings up the same dramatic questions of what it means to be American and conspiracy-esque who can you trust in government or society today? Chaos is 100% local while Thor spans the globe in his intricate plot, but the depth of story and philosophy behind the story are right up there.
What could make 9/11 look like a mosquito bite? What the enemies of America (not just the Jihadist) have been planning since well before that fateful day (since the 1940s), according to the latest thriller by Brad Thor, The Dark Knight of the author's career. Full of fantastic but believable international intrigue from China to Sweden and the crux of it boiling down to a plot to completely bring the United States to its knees. How? By pulling the plug. Thor uses the brownout in the Northeast a few years back to illustrate the importance energy has on American society. We can't live without it. After a few hours, we freak out. After a few days, we run out of water and start dying. After enough time, the entire society would collapse--pretty scary stuff. When it's done from the inside, it's even scarier.
Along the way, Thor drops gems of knowledge on the reader making him or her reflect on politics and economics. There are certainly layers in this book--it's deep. In this way, I think Thor is turning more heady and bold in his writing approach. I for one am glad for that.
If you have read Thor in the past, get ready for a shocking eye-opener of a book. This will be your favorite of his works. It's the same detailed Thor but with much more bite. It's a step up in Harvath as a character and Thor as a writer. I've liked Thor's stuff before, but this one I will tell my friends to read.

Full Black (Scott Harvath) Overview

#1 New York Times bestselling author Brad Thor brings readers his darkest and most intriguing thriller yet-a terrifying story of espionage and betrayal-brilliantly paced with superb nonstop action.Born in the shadows and kept from heads of state, there are some missions so deadly, so sensitive, that they simply don't exist. When one such mission goes horribly wrong, a wave of dramatic terrorist attacks is set in motion. Their goal: the complete and total collapse of the United States.With the CIA's intelligence abilities hobbled, former Navy SEAL Team 6 member turned covert counterterrorism operative Scot Harvath launches an audacious plan to infiltrate the terrorists' network and prevent one of the biggest threats the United States has ever faced. Simultaneously, a foreign wet work team has been sent to California. Their target: one of Hollywood's most famous filmmakers. While working on a secret documentary project, movie producer Larry Salomon has unknowingly exposed one of the world's wealthiest and most politically connected powerbrokers-a man with a radical anti-American agenda poised to plunge the nation into deadly, irreversible chaos.As the plots rocket to their pulse-pounding conclusion and the identities of the perpetrators are laid stunningly bare, Harvath will be left with only one means to save America. Unable to trust anyone, he will be forced to go Full Black.Intense and frighteningly realistic, FULL BLACK is, hands down, Brad Thor's most riveting thriller to date.

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Portrait of a Spy Review

Okay, here's the thing from a reviewer's viewpoint. You would probably not be reading the reviews of Daniel Silva's newest book in his Gabriel Allon spy series if you weren't already familiar with his writing. Silva's written 10 or so novels in the series and I think I've read most of them. And this one, "Portrait of a Spy" is a very good Daniel Silva/Gabriel Allon book. But it is similar to all the others I've read. And for me, a reviewer, it's a difficult book to review for that reason.
Daniel Silva is deeply concerned with the Middle East and the problems with radical Islamism that have risen from there in the last 60 years or so. Silva uses his books - characters and plots - to speak intelligently about those problems and the repercussions - terrorist bombings in both the Middle East countries and in Europe. Silva seems to publish a new book in the series every July. Now, this year and this book, 2011 and "Portrait of a Spy", pose a fairly tricky problem for Daniel Silva. How much of the "Arab Spring" - which actually began in mid-December, 2010 - does he include in his story? And does he include the assassination of Bin Ladin, which occurred fairly close to the time of publication? I could tell that he makes reference to Bin Ladin's death in a line towards the end where the text could still be changed in final proofs. The "Arab Spring" is mentioned towards the end. That's the problem he may have faced with the plot. But it's with the characters he's really facing problems.
Gabriel Allon has not changed much in the 15 or so years he's been the subject of Daniel Silva's pen. And Chiara, his younger Italian wife is still gorgeous. They are still trying to retire to the English countryside and really go back to art restoration. But the Mossad is still trying to drag Gabriel back in to work on missions for them. Shomrom is still the aging lion of King Saul Boulevard, still hunting down the same Islamic terrorists. Other peripheral characters like English art dealers are still doing their selling and Israeli, British, and American agents are still doing their spycraft. In effect, not much has changed in the lives of Gabriel Allon and his cast of characters. I would love to see some further character development by Silva in next year's Allon book. Give him a kid - who is not killed in a terrorist attack. Let Chiara age a little and maybe become less gorgeous. Give her a haircut. Finally kill off Shomron, who seems to be a pain in everyone's side in Israeli intelligence.
So, why am I giving "Portrait" five stars, even with my silly complaints and comments? Because, it is a very good Daniel Silva/Gabriel Allon book. It gives the reader - who is usually well-acquainted with the characters and on-going plot line - another good read. And that's really the reason for a reviewer to write a review and for a reader to read one.

Portrait of a Spy Overview

Art restorer. Assassin. Spy.

Gabriel Allon has been hailed as the most compelling creation since "Ian Fleming put down his martini and invented James Bond" (Rocky Mountain News). A man with a deep appreciation for all that is beautiful, Gabriel is also an angel of vengeance, an international operative who will stop at nothing to see justice done. Sometimes he must journey far in search of evil. And sometimes evil comes to him.

In a dangerous world, one extraordinary woman can mean the difference between life and death. . . .

For Gabriel and his wife, Chiara, it was supposed to be the start of a pleasant weekend in London—a visit to a gallery in St. James's to authenticate a newly discovered painting by Titian, followed by a quiet lunch. But a pair of deadly bombings in Paris and Copenhagen has already marred this autumn day. And while walking toward Covent Garden, Gabriel notices a man he believes is about to carry out a third attack. Before Gabriel can draw his weapon, he is knocked to the pavement and can only watch as the nightmare unfolds.

Haunted by his failure to stop the massacre of innocents, Gabriel returns to his isolated cottage on the cliffs of Cornwall, until a summons brings him to Washington and he is drawn into a confrontation with the new face of global terror. At the center of the threat is an American-born cleric in Yemen to whom Allah has granted "a beautiful and seductive tongue." A gifted deceiver, who was once a paid CIA asset, the mastermind is plotting a new wave of attacks.

Gabriel and his team devise a daring plan to destroy the network of death from the inside, a gambit fraught with risk, both personal and professional. To succeed, Gabriel must reach into his violent past. A woman waits there—a reclusive heiress and art collector who can traverse the murky divide between Islam and the West. She is the daughter of an old enemy, a woman joined to Gabriel by a trail of blood. . . .

Set against the disparate worlds of art and intelligence, Portrait of a Spy moves swiftly from the corridors of power in Washington to the glamorous auction houses of New York and London to the unforgiving landscape of the Saudi desert. Featuring a climax that will leave readers haunted long after they turn the final page, this deeply entertaining story is also a breathtaking portrait of courage in the face of unspeakable evil—and Daniel Silva's most extraordinary novel to date.


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Best Price Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy Review

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Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy Review

John Julius Cooper, 2nd Viscount Norwich CVO is a well known British historian, author of The Normans in Sicily, A History of Venice, A Short History of Byzantium, etc.
Again, the author takes us to the Italian peninsula (well, mostly) for his new book "Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy".
Although Lord Norwich is an expert on this period and area, he makes it known to us that this is no hagiography, as a "agnostic Protestant" he "has no ax to grind". He'd have to have a lot of them (axes, I mean) as this book covers over 250 Popes, Antipopes and various non-popes (such as the "hoary canard" of "Pope Joan"). Over a period of about 2000 years.
Some of the author's favorite Papal figures include Innocent I, Leo(s) I & XIII, and Benedict XIV. But the author seems to have the most fun with the "bad boys" of Papal history, of whom there are a rather large number. Norwich also doesn't mind telling us about a good number of (rather scurrilous) rumors, but to give him his due, he also often debunks them. I love one chapter title "Nicholas I and the Pornocracy"! (New word!)
Some portions may be somewhat controversial- for example Norwich speaks out strongly about Pious XII (WWII period).
But other than that- it's fun, fast paced, and very readable (well, mostly, it is over 500 pages)

Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy Overview

Critical praise for ABSOLUTE MONARCHS “Absolute Monarchs sprawls across Europe and the Levant, over two millenniums, and with an impossibly immense cast: 265 popes, feral hordes of Vandals, Huns and Visigoths, expansionist emperors, Byzantine intriguers, Borgias and Medicis, heretic zealots, conspiring clerics, bestial inquisitors and more. Norwich manages to organize this crowded stage and produce a rollicking narrative. He keeps things moving at nearly beach-read pace." -Bill Keller, New York Times Book Review, Cover review “Renowned historian Norwich offers a rollicking account of the men who held the papal office, their shortcomings and their virtues, and the impact of the papacy on world history. He conducts us masterfully on a tour of the lives of the popes from Peter to Benedict XVI. . . . Entertaining and deeply researched, Norwich's history offers a wonderful introduction to papal lives." -Publishers Weekly A SWEEPING CHRONICLE OF ONE OF THE MOST SIGNIFICANT-AND CONTROVERSIAL-INSTITUTIONS IN HISTORYWith the papacy embattled in recent years, it is essential to have the perspective of one of the world's most accomplished historians. In Absolute Monarchs, John Julius Norwich captures nearly two thousand years of inspiration and devotion, intrigue and scandal. The men (and maybe one woman) who have held this position of infallible power over millions have ranged from heroes to rogues, admirably wise to utterly decadent. Norwich, who knew two popes and had private audiences with two others, recounts in riveting detail the histories of the most significant popes and what they meant politically, culturally, and socially to Rome and to the world.Norwich presents such brave popes as Innocent I, who in the fifth century successfully negotiated with Alaric the Goth, an invader civil authorities could not defeat, and Leo I, who two decades later tamed (and perhaps paid off) Attila the Hun. Here, too, are the scandalous figures: Pope Joan, the mythic woman said (without any substantiation) to have been elected in 855, and the infamous “pornocracy," the five libertines who were descendants or lovers of Marozia, debauched daughter of one of Rome's most powerful families.Absolute Monarchs brilliantly portrays reformers such as Pope Paul III, “the greatest pontiff of the sixteenth century," who reinterpreted the Church's teaching and discipline, and John XXIII, who in five short years starting in 1958 “opened up the church to the twentieth century," instituting reforms that led to Vatican II. Norwich brings the story to the present day with Benedict XVI, who is coping with a global priest sex scandal.Epic and compelling, Absolute Monarchs is the astonishing story of some of history's most revered and reviled figures, men who still cast light and shadows on the Vatican and the world today.

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Lowest Price The 17 Day Diet Review

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The 17 Day Diet Review

After seeing 2 of my co-workers have great success with this diet, I finally decided to do it myself since I never lost the baby weight from having my 2nd child. So I played it safe and bought this book with a few other weight loss books so I could mix and match the information to suit me just in case 1 of the diets was too hard for me to stick to.
Right now I'm midway through the 2nd cycle, but at the end of the 1st 17 day cycle, I lost a total of 13 pounds. I did some tinkering around with some of the other diet information I learned however, so I didn't do this strictly by the book.
The 17 day diet is a branch off of low carb diets. The first of 4 different 17 day cycles is the hardest and requires you to eat a lot of chicken, turkey, fish, and vegetables. So if you're a picky eater and like to eat a lot of different things, this may not be the diet for you.
Because of the lack of carbs, I had a headache, a bit of brain fog, and was more tired than normal for the first 2 days on the diet. But after tinkering a bit, my body adjusted and I was fine after that. You'll also add back the carbs in the other 3 cycles so don't worry if you're a big carb addict with a sweet tooth or in need of starchy foods.
Learn to like green tea. I wasn't into it before this diet, but I've gotten used to it. No big deal. You have to get away from sodas and diet sodas. Sodas are loaded with useless, empty calories and diet sodas have aspartame in them.
Also on carbs, you'll end up eating most of your carbs in the morning, which is great advice.
For exercise, the 17 minutes of walking each day is sound advice for people who never exercise, but for me it wasn't enough. I did it (actually I did 30+ minute walks) after dinner, but I also followed the home exercises from The 5-Second Flat Belly Secret - Lose 2-3 Inches from Your Belly in Less Than 1 Month I could speed up my weight loss.
Supplements and buying expensive special foods... none of that type of stuff in this book as opposed to most other diet books. So that's a big plus and saves money.
If you're someone who needs a simple plan to follow and you have some discipline, then this book will work well for you. I give it 4 stars and not 5 because it's still a diet and there are restrictions and because I think the Kindle version could be cheaper. It's not a perfect diet and it's definitely not a fit for everyone. But for most people, it should be fine.

The 17 Day Diet Overview

The instant bestseller The 17 Day Diet offers an easy-to-follow dieting plan that can help change your eating habits, your health, and your life. Now The 17 Day Diet Workbook offers an even more guided dieting experience for readers who want a little extra structure. Complete with a brief overview of the 17 Day Diet plan and philosophy, this interactive guide provides a day-by-day breakdown of how to get through 17 days in each of the four central cycles. Each section supplies food charts, shopping lists, 17-minute workouts, tips from Dr. Mike, and a notes section to keep track of personal progress. There are also new details about hurdles you might experience in the different cycles and suggestions for how to stay on track no matter what. The 17 Day Diet has already helped thousands of people lose weight and make lasting life changes. Now, with this workbook, it is easier than ever to start making changes and getting results fast!

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Special Prices for Stories I Only Tell My Friends: An Autobiography Review

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Stories I Only Tell My Friends: An Autobiography Review

To be honest, my main reason for buying this book was that I was a huge "Outsiders" fan back in the early 80's. I always felt Rob was the best looking Greaser in the cast & as the years passed, also felt he was the best looking of the Brat Pack. I certainly didn't expect his book to be more than a compilation of stories about his life in Hollywood but it is more than that. He discusses his parent's divorce, his mother's depression, their financial struggles & his love for his wife & sons. He also gives Outsiders fans a great behind-the-scenes look into the making of that film. He is very candid & exposes himself as a flawed human being like the rest of us. He does discuss other Hollywood pals & tells some great stories but he doesn't make their celebrity the focal point of these tales or his book. A must read for those who loved the movie the Outsiders and anyone who is a fan of Rob's.

Stories I Only Tell My Friends: An Autobiography Overview

A wryly funny and surprisingly moving account of an extraordinary life lived almost entirely in the public eyeA teen idol at fifteen, an international icon and founder of the Brat Pack at twenty, and one of Hollywood's top stars to this day, Rob Lowe chronicles his experiences as a painfully misunderstood child actor in Ohio uprooted to the wild counterculture of mid-seventies Malibu, where he embarked on his unrelenting pursuit of a career in Hollywood. The Outsiders placed Lowe at the birth of the modern youth movement in the entertainment industry. During his time on The West Wing, he witnessed the surreal nexus of show business and politics both on the set and in the actual White House. And in between are deft and humorous stories of the wild excesses that marked the eighties, leading to his quest for family and sobriety. Never mean-spirited or salacious, Lowe delivers unexpected glimpses into his successes, disappointments, relationships, and one-of-a-kind encounters with people who shaped our world over the last twenty-five years. These stories are as entertaining as they are unforgettable.

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