Small Change - Sheila Roberts

You know it's going to be a fun read when the first chapter starts out with a wife attempting to beat her husband home so she can smuggle in her newly purchased "bargains"! Only she drives too fast and gets a ticket. I've never gotten a ticket during my cloak and dagger missions, but have been known to shove shoe boxes in the bottom of a trash bag, leave bags in the trunk, and claiming that no, these shoes aren't new, I've had them for awhile.

And this is what you will find with Sheila Roberts' newest release...a mixture of some serious and not-so-serious issues experienced by three best friends, all told with a voice of an author who has been there/done that, and has learned to laugh at what life throws her way.

Rachel is recently divorced with two children, cannot find a full-time teaching job, and is struggling to make ends meet (while her wealthy ex flits about with his young underwear model girlfriend). Jessica is stay-at-home wife who lives a life of leisure. Until her son moves back home after losing his job, and her husband loses HIS job at the bank. Tiffany (my shoe-smuggling soul sister) is a nail tech with an addiction to shopping, presumably to drown her sorrows over fertility problems, and thus a huge debt problem. Between the three ladies, they decide to take their economic problems into their own hands, and support each other through the often hilarious process of making their own giftables, shopping on the cheap, and making better decisions for themselves. Through the roller-coaster ride of successes and failures, marriage problems, love interests, and crappy jobs, these women strengthen their bonds and learn first-hand the power of a girlfriend.

If there was ever a book that is a sign of our times, it is this one. There isn't a person in this country that hasn't been affected, somehow, by the economic crisis. What I loved about the story, besides the hilarious dynamics between Rachel, Jessica and Tiffany, was that there are actually some really good ideas here to help women analyze their spending personalities, and find ways to live smarter and within their means. Tips like bartering for services, entertaining your family and friends through game nights and potlucks, when to shop for the best deals, and even recipes for making your own blackberry cordial, which can be given as gifts.

Granted, by the time I got the end of the book, I had heard enough about frugality, but the the points were all well-made. The plot is also very predictable. However, my expectations of this book were not that it would blow my mind and keep me awake at night with soul-searching dilemmas. I wanted to read this book for fun. Which is exactly what I got.

I would like to thank Pump Up Your Book Promotions for the opportunity to read and review this book!

4 out of 5 stars

Murder in Baker Company: How Four American Soldiers Killed One of their Own - Cilla McCain

I have a penchant for true stories...memoirs, biographies, and above all else, true crime. Knowing the documented events actually occurred inspires a need to know more; to understand human frailties. Why did this happen? What sickness or deadly sin drove the crime to occur? What was the outcome? How are the families coping years later? When approached to review McCain's account of an American soldier murdered by four of his own men, I knew there was no way I could walk away from this one. This is a story that needs to be told.

When Richard Davis was reported as AWOL after he returned from Iraq on leave, his father Lanny knew something was wrong. Richard was an upstanding kid...fiercely loyal to his country and his parents. He would never shirk his responsibilities as a son and a soldier. So Lanny began to search for him, and assumed as a retired military officer himself, he would find help from his brotherhood. He was wrong. He was faced with a total lack of cooperation from the highest ranking officers on down. Calls were not returned, stalling and intimidation tactics were used, so it took months before Richard's body was actually found, brutally stabbed and burned in a wooded area outside Fort Benning, GA. A crime of intense hate.

What unfolds from thereon is a twisted, shocking story of a young man, Richard Davis, bullied by a gang of his fellow soldiers with a history of violence, depression and attempted suicide. A story of previously unstable soldiers under additional pressure, with shortages of food and water, exposed to superiors committing unforgivable war crimes. Yet none of these issues were addressed. Even when the murder was being investigated, the members of Baker Company were so terrified to tell the truth, they instead wrote an anonymous letter simply signed "Men of Baker Company". Throughout the story, one starts to get the sick feeling that there is alot of dirty little secrets that the military would like to keep to themselves, and would go to lengths to keep it that way.

The final nail in the hearts of Richard Davis' parents is threefold. First, the ringleader of the four murderers plea-bargained and received a much lesser sentence. Second, after all of the political maneuvering and legal protection of the plea-bargainer, they never really got any answers to WHY their son was brutally murdered. And third, they had to fight to get their son's remains released for burial long after the trial concluded. The injustice never ended for them.

It is interesting to note that this story caught the attention of writer/director Paul Haggis, who used elements of the Davis case to film the Oscar-nominated movie In the Valley of Elah.

My husband likes to hear about stories like this and play devil's advocate. He always asks if we have gotten the entire story. Is it politically slanted? In this instance, I'd say McCain has her facts pretty buttoned up. There were many military officials that refused to be interviewed, but despite this, McCain attempts to question all angles and back up statements with documents and corroborative evidence.

The writing is also very smooth and easy to read. The only thing that would stop you from finishing this book in a few days would just be the topic, which can inspire some pretty terrifying emotions in a reader. In the chapter covering the actual trial, when you hear about the acts committed against Davis, you may need to put the book down for a bit. It is more than even a hardened, true crime junkie like me can take. As the mother of a son, I can barely stomach the idea of someone's child suffering like this.

I would like to thank Jaime from Pump Up Your Book Promotion for the opportunity to review this phenomenal book!

4.5 out of 5 stars

Gauntlet - Richard Aaron

Thanks to Jaime and Dorothy Thompson at "Pump Up Your Book Promotion", I was offered an opportunity to participate in the blog tour of this novel. After a long line of classics, WWII dramas and YA novels, I was ready for a little action, and this one promised it in spades.

An accomplished Afghan businessman and drug smuggler has received orders to facilitate a terrorist attack on the US. While this individual has his reservations in taking his game to a new level, he is primarily motivated by power and the challenge. With the assistance of an international network of associates, he hijacks a large shipment of explosives in Libya, and sets into motion a highly technical plan to bring the US to its knees in a way that has never been seen before. The potential results are terrifying, and could cripple the American economy and claim thousands of lives.

We are introduced to an interesting cast of characters that have the intelligence and skills to stop the attack. There is a drug-addicted Navy pilot. An undercover agent captured and held in an Afghan prison by a sadist with a penchant for amputating body parts. A couple of Canadian drug enforcement agents just doing their job. A newly-established Terrorism Agency run by a pompous yet ignorant rich boy. And at the heart of the story, a young, functional, autistic man that works for the Terrorism Agency. To his boss and co-workers, he is an eccentric flake, but is soon appreciated as a wunderkind. The chase is on to track down the missing explosives and determine the ultimate target. The question is...can they work together to figure it out in time?

This story is intense and gripping from the very start. It's one of those books where you have to remember to breathe, it is so fast-paced and edge-of-your-seat. Uniquely, unlike many other thrillers I've read, this one includes very satisfying character development of the primary personalities. You understand why the pilot is struggling to maintain balance. You flashback into the terrorist's childhood to understand how far he has come, his intelligence, his charisma and surprisingly, his humanity. You walk in the shoes of the autistic prodigy, and your heart breaks for his pain in never fitting in or being understood. The book has a tremendous amount of technical detail that must have required hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of research. The detail makes the story seem very authentic, but is not something that bogged me down. My only struggle was acquainting myself with the players in the first half dozen chapters...there are well over a dozen of them that required a bit of note-taking. When this happens, I just raise my level of reading a notch or two, and ride it out. It all falls into place pretty easily after that.

The ending doesn't tie up all loose ends, but wraps up enough of them to allow me to sleep at night. But best part of all? The sequel is almost completed. Bring it on! (Soon, please.)

4.5 out of 5 stars