Saturday, May 31, 2014

Book Review: Death in the Clouds

Death in the Clouds by Agatha Christie

Twenty-one people have boarded the Prometheus at France's Le Bourget airport for a routine, one-day flight to London. But what begins as an ordinary excursion over the English Channel turns into a most extraordinary case of murder when a female passenger is shot with the venom-tipped dart of a South African blowpipe. Even more bizarre is that the killing could go completely unnoticed by any other passengers--including Hercule Poirot, the brilliant Belgian detective, sitting not fifteen feet from the victim.

This was another good read from Agatha Christie. I don't think I've read a single book by her that I didn't like. It wasn't my favorite of her books, but still suspenseful and well-written as always. I thought I had it all figured out, but, as happens most of the time with her books, I ended up being wrong in the end!


Saturday, May 3, 2014

Book Review: A Broken Kind of Beautiful

Broken Kind
              of Beautiful
 by 
Katie Ganshert
  
SOMETIMES EVERYTHING YOU EVER
LEARNED ABOUT YOURSELF IS WRONG.

Fashion is a fickle industry, a frightening fact for twenty-four-year-old model Ivy Clark. Ten years in and she's learned a sacred truth---appearance is everything. Nobody cares about her broken past as long as she looks beautiful for the camera. This is the only life Ivy knows---so when it starts to unravel, she'll do anything to hold on. Even if that means moving to the quaint island town of Greenbrier, South Carolina, to be the new face of her stepmother's bridal wear line---an irony too rich for words, since Ivy is far from the pure bride in white. If only her tenuous future didn't rest in the hands of Davis Knight, her mysterious photographer. Not only did he walk away from the kind of success Ivy longs for to work maintenance at a local church, he treats her differently than any man ever has. Somehow, Davis sees through the facade she works so hard to maintain. In fact, it seems that everyone Ivy comes across in Greenbrier challenges what she has come to believe about beauty and worth. Is it possible that God sees her---a woman stained and broken by the world---yet wants her still?

This book is beautifully written. I must admit I'm a little envious of Katie's writing style. She adds just enough detail to give you a feel for the surroundings without being too wordy. I loved the book at first because of this, but after a while I guess I just grew kind of bored with the story. It's a bit cliche and predictable and a little unrealistic. At one part someone drops a snow globe on CARPETED floor and it shatters... and at another part a guy hit a girl in the cheek with a beer bottle and the bottle shattered and cut her face... uh... I'm pretty sure her cheek bone would break before the bottle would! The glass in glass bottles is pretty thick! Stuff like that REALLY bugs me in books... but anyway, other than those things it was an interesting story and Ivy wasn't your typical heroine for these types of books so I guess that was nice. Although her character kind of annoyed me. I suppose it's sort of cut down the middle. It had good stuff and not so good stuff. But I'll give it 4 out of 5 because of the writing style and the story was interesting at some parts.


I received this book for free from the publisher in exchange for this honest review.