Last Breath by Rachel Caine

I did it. I made it through a whole series about the same character and I can't wait for book 12 coming out May 1st. I sometimes have trouble with a long series. Don't get me wrong I love series books like J.R. Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood books, love her. Each book focuses on a new character but you still get glimpses of the other characters. With series like The Morganville Vampires about the same character I tend to get bored, but Ms. Caine kept me interested from start to finish. I love Claire, Shane, Michael, Eve, Myrnin, Amelie, and even Oliver.

The Morganville world has sucked me in and I'm glad that there will at least be two more books in the series, hopefully more. I do feel bad for them because it seems like they are always having to rescue and save the town but I guess that comes with the territory when you live with vampires. I wish they could have a vacation but the only time they tried to get out of Morganville they ran into a bunch of trouble so it seems to follow them around. I like that the author keeps it fresh with the enemy problems. She doesn't make it the same over and over again which is nice. That would get old. The cliff hanger endings for the first 5 or 6 books helped with keeping them interesting and spurred me on. Towards the end she stops with the cliff hangers and she adds chapters of Shane, Michael, Eve, and Amelie narrating which is cool. This is a great series. If you enjoy vampire fiction I think you will really like this series.

Coping with Kidney Disease: A 12-Step Treatment Program to Help You Avoid Dialysis by Mackenzie Walser

This is the type of book that no one wants to read, but reads by necessity,
probably because a family member is experiencing kidney failure. That said, of
the books I have looked at that deal with kidney disease, which is 2 so far, this is
the better book. Mackenzie Walser has credentials - he is a professor at Johns
Hopkins University's School of Medicine. And while he has an agenda, namely
that a low-protein diet will help stave off dialysis for those with end-stage renal
disease, that conclusion seems reasonable given all the evidence amassed in the book. '

This book provides a good review of the urinary system, and the causal agents
behind kidney disease. It makes a good case for getting high blood pressure and
blood sugar under control, especially for people in middle-age who haven't gotten
any other life-threatening diseases undermining their health. The book points to
diabetes and hypertension (the diseases that go along with high blood sugar and
high blood pressure) as preventable problems which lead people down the path
to kidney disease. It also makes crystal clear how very dangerous kidney disease
is, and has certainly motivated me to take another look at my eating and exercise
habits!

Walser also explains what kidney patients can do when their condition has gotten
to that point of no return, like dialysis and transplantation. His case studies are
interesting, and my only criticism would be that he doesn't have a chart on every
page (or at least on one page!) of what normal lab levels would be for things like
creatinine and AST. Not being a medical professional, I had to constantly rely on
him to tell me what normal levels were (and what those chemicals indicated
about kidney disease!) However, I don't think other non-medical professionals
thinking about reading this book should be put off by that. The book is still an
invaluable addition to the library of any family with someone in renal failure. It
provides answers to questions they haven't even asked yet, and because of that,
provides ways to keep their loved ones alive longer, which should be the point of
any medical treatment.

Submitted by Gerti

The Top 10 Distinctions between Millionaires and the Middle Class by Keith Cameron Smith

This is a simple book that cannot be put down. Unlike many other books on how
to garner financial success, this is a slim volume, filled with short words, making
it a perfect quick read. Keith Cameron Smith lays the book out in 10 easy
chapters of about 10 pages a piece. This makes the book a quick course on how
to think like a millionaire, readable in an afternoon.

Smith does not have any research at his disposal to back up his claims, but the
points he makes are simple to understand and seemingly simple to implement.
He uses snazzy catch phrases like "Millionaire work for profits. The middle class
works for wages." I suppose he already knows that the book will be read by folks
in the middle classes. Nonetheless, he describes some of his own work history
and job experience, which backs up his theories.

While I am disturbed by the lack of research, his catch phrases are appealing,
and his goals seem easy to implement. One of the things that stands out most to
me is near the end, where Smith talks about how millionaires use their money not
to buy things, but to buy other assets. By this he means that they spend their
wages to buy what makes more money for them, like real estate and stock. This
idea resonates, especially after the enormous lottery jackpot we had recently. It
made me remember all those shows about lottery winners who blow through their
money and are left with nothing. It seems we folks in the middle class have a
tendency to spend our money on hot tubs and big cars, instead of investments
like stock and real estate. We fail to see the big picture or plan for the future,
unlike millionaires, who apparently forgo the hot tub today for the mansion ten
years from now.

While Smith may not have set out a foolproof blueprint for success, he does
present some very intriguing ideas in this slim volume. And with a book this easy
to read, I would recommend it to those people who would like 2012 to be the year
they can stop living paycheck to paycheck, and start making and saving more.

submitted by Gerti

Thunderstruck by Erik Larson

Erik Larson is known for his bestselling book "The Devil in the White City"
about the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago and the serial killer who
prowled its streets. Like that book, "Thunderstruck" also mingles a history-
changing event - Marconi's invention of wireless telegraphy, with an infamously
gruesome murder in London. He magically links the forward march of technology
with the nail-biting capture of that criminal at sea because the ship Montrose
used telegraph technology to communicate with the police in England.

While our proximity to Chicago makes the other book more interesting to me
personally, I am constantly spellbound by how this author makes the connections
that he does. The writing is very clear and readable, despite the scientific or
medical matters with which Larson sometimes deals. And the portraits he draws
of the Italian inventor Marconi and the American murderer Hawley Crippen are
complete and brilliant. Dr. Crippen is drawn by Larson as a mild-mannered man
who gave all he could to an abusive wife, before he could finally endure no more
and killed her. Marconi should be a heroic figure, but Larson draws him as a cold,
manipulative aristocrat who loved his invention more than his wives or children,
and certainly devoted more time to it's success.

Larson makes interesting the race for financial success that came with
Marconi's invention, bringing humanity to Marconi's striving fellow scientists, as
well as to charlatans who tried to link the "magic" of wireless communication with
communicating with the dead, which was so popular at the time. Larson makes
us sympathize with everyone - those who tried to help Marconi's invention
succeed, and those who felt his invention had stolen their own thunder. Larson
also has the gift of making us sympathize with the murderer Crippen much more
than his greedy, volatile wife, as well as with the meek little secretary who would
steal the doctor's heart and inevitably become a party to the wife's murder.

I thrilled with the readers of the time as Scotland Yard detectives sped across the
ocean to capture Crippen during his escape attempt, while Crippen himself,
aboard another ship, remained in blissful ignorance that the jig was up. The
situation is nearly impossible to imagine in this day and age where it is hard to
escape even the most mundane news thanks to computers and cell phones. The
capture happens, the villian is condemned to die, and through it all, the world
becomes aware of the power of Marconi's telegraph. Was it my favorite book
ever? No, not in the least. But I do not regret having read it, if only for it's
increasing my understanding of Marconi and the Crippen murder.

Submitted by Gerti

Nobody’s Fool: The Lives of Danny Kaye by Martin Gottfried

Now this is more like it. This is the second biography I have read of the great mid-century comedian Danny Kaye, and this book really gives me a terrific overview of his life and character. I won’t mention the author of the other book I read last month, but will only say that this book delivers on the promise implicit in all these star bios – the promise of giving the reader an inside look at a star’s life, putting some rumors to rest, and sparking others about Kaye’s sexuality, relationships, talents and deep-seated neuroses.

Unlike the other biography, Gottfried’s story doesn’t end when Kaye’s film career does. Gottfried goes from talking about Kaye’s origins and climb to fame, to talking about how Kaye did on his television show, as well as what he did when he was off screen for good. This allowed me as a reader to hear about the man not only at the peak of his fame, but to watch his behavior as his fame ebbed, and that is a truly instructional glimpse, especially as Kaye was troubled by depression which seemed only to deepen with age.

This book looks at the relationship between the great British stage actor Laurence Olivier, and the author makes a call about whether he feels the relationship between Kaye and Olivier was sexual in nature. Gottfried likewise addresses some of the female companionship Kaye enjoyed late in his life, leaving no doubt about the nature of those relationships either. This is quite a relief, as the previous biography promised dirt on the star, but was unable to deliver anything but unsubstantiated rumor. Gottfried appears to have spoken to enough people and analyzed the situations with a clear head, making what seems like the best, most sensible judgment regarding the truth of those rumors.

As a result, this biography does not treat Kaye as an unreachable star, but as a human being with great and amazing talents, who was also given over to very ugly, very human emotions like anger, pride and fear. Gottfried shows the co-dependent relationship Kaye had with his wife Sylvia, but makes no excuses about his treatment of her in later years, or about how he treated other women he loved. Gottfried also takes an unflinching look at how Kaye behaved toward his daughter, and his friends and co-workers, which was not always stellar, but at the same brings out shows his humanitarian leanings and the great personal sacrifices he made for causes like Unicef and the USO.

While it is impossible ever to know another human being completely, in this biography, Gottfried comes very close to examining every aspect of the actor Danny Kaye, and left me feeling that I knew him deeply and well.

Submitted by Gerti

Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James

Let me first say that I wouldn’t normally read a “crime” novel, and that I had never heard about the author P.D. James before this book arrived. I’ll further stipulate that I would never have read a book in this genre had it not been that James based this novel on the characters found in the Jane Austen work “Pride and Prejudice”. With those parameters established, the reader of this review can easily imagine that this book was not my favorite of the novels I have read which are based on the Austen characters Elizabeth Bennet and Fitzwilliam Darcy. But I was impressed that a writer like James, who has obviously spent her whole writing career working on crime and legal stories, was able to fashion a book about Austen’s beloved characters that somehow also involves the Old Bailey.

In “Death Comes to Pemberley,” James draws a portrait of the Darcy family a few years after their marriage, where Elizabeth is planning “Lady Anne’s Ball” based on the example of Mr. Darcy’s mother. As any reader of Austen knows, Elizabeth has a disreputable sister named Lydia who is married to a wastrel named George Wickham, who has his own connections to the Darcy family. In this book, it is in Pemberley wood that Wickham is found hovering over the dead body of his friend, Captain Denny, and as a result, is drawn into a legal fight for his own life for murder. James is skilled at bringing back the Austen characters, but her language does not even try to mimic that of the 18^th century writer, and even worse, some of the characters seem to have changed so greatly that the only resemblance they bear to the Austen characters is that they have the same name. One example is Colonel Fitzwilliam, who is awkwardly drawn into a conspiracy with Wickham to hide the latter’s illegitimate child. The Colonel fans meet in Austen’s novel “Pride and Prejudice” would never have “polluted the shades of Pemberley” in that way.

The illegitimate son of Wickham’s ends up living with the Robert Martin family, from Austen’s novel “Emma”, and several other Austen characters from other novels are drawn in as this book draws to a close, as if to show the reader that James knows her Austen books. However, much of “Death Comes to Pemberley” is concerned with such dry matter as the inquest into the murder and Wickham’s trial, which may be James bailiwick, but which I’d venture to guess does not interest Austen readers quite as much as clever dialogue and romance. There is a brief romance, as Darcy’s sister Georgianna becomes involved with an attorney, but that coupling holds about as much charms as those chalky Valentine’s candies. In short, I believe the book, while well written, will prove unsatisfactory for true Austen fans.

Submitted by Gerti

Forbidden by Syrie and Ryan James

Reading Level: Young Adult
(4 out of 5)

This book was written by a mother, son duo. You don't see that very often. I have to say they did a good job. I enjoyed this book. When I first read what this book was about I thought it sounded eerily like Angel Burn by L.A. Weatherly but after reading the first few pages I was happy to see that it wasn't anything like Angel Burn.

Claire Brennan and her mother Lynn move around a lot. Claire jokes that her mom is a free spirit picking up and moving when the mood strikes but for the past two years they have held steady and Claire wants to stay put. She attends Emerson Academy, which she loves, and she has two best friends. So when she starts having psychic visions there is no way she is going to tell her mother about them. She also falls for the new boy in school, Alec. Alec MacKenzie is hiding from his past. He is fed up with his duties to watch and, when necessary, eliminate the descendants of his angelic forefathers. He chose Emerson as the ideal hiding place so could be normal for once but he didn't factor Claire into his plans.

Their love is forbidden, going against everything Alec has been taught to believe. But when Claire's life is threatened how far will Alec go to protect her? If you like books with Angels then check this one out. I didn't see anything about a second book on either of the authors websites but they leave it wide open for one. Crossing my fingers because I feel like there is more to this story.