How To Rule The World From Your Couch Giveaway.

It's time for another giveaway, courtesy of Katrina A. from Wiredset.com. Yay! This time it is a non-fiction book, How To Rule The World from Your Couch by Laura Day. And there will be two (2) winners.
Here's the publisher's description:







In her new book, How to Rule the World from Your Couch, Laura Day teaches you or your company how to create success in any area by using your brain in unique and compel-ling ways so that your innate intuition can propel you ahead to successful solutions.

The step-by-step exercises included -- many of which can (and should!) be done from the comfort of your couch -- will show you how you can:

• Find and secure your dream job
• Maintain solid relationships, even at a distance
• Lose weight by reclaiming the body you were meant to have
• Know how to spot your perfect mate
• Make better investments and business decisions
• Negotiate differences in the workplace
• Have an understanding relationship with your child
• Identify which opportunities will pan out
• Project a desirable image for yourself or your product
• Anticipate and resolve difficult conflict before you walk into a situation

Laura's work has helped demystify intuition and demonstrate its practical, verifiable uses in the fields of business, science, medicine, and personal growth. Her list of clients and students includes doctors, financial investors, scientists, engineers, and celebrities. Day has shown that 98 percent of success is planning and that you, therefore, have the power to transform your life

Sounds like a very interesting read especially for all of us who want to finally get on the 'ruling train'. The book goes on sale today, October 6th and if luck is not on your side this time, you can first read an excerpt and then proceed to order it either from Simon & Schuster or amazon.com.

Giveaway details:

1. To be entered in this giveaway, please leave a comment plus your email address.

2. There will be two (2) winners - one copy each.

3. This giveaway is for U.S. and Canada residents only.

4. It ends on Tuesday, October 20th.

Good Luck to you all!!!

September Reads

Even though I yet again haven't read as much as I'd have liked to last month, I am very happy with the quality of what I did manage to read. despite there being a couple of titles I didn't really enjoy, most of the books were really worth my time. I have also managed to review all but two books which wil be talked about on my blog pretty soon as well.

1. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier - it's a classic in Gothic romance and I am extremely glad I read it. Now I can watch the movie.

2. God Is an Englishman by R. F. Delderfield - a superb historical fiction novel written by an author that until now was completely unknown to me. It made me very happy to discover Mr. Delderfield and add him to my list of favorites.

3. Amazing Grace by Kathleen Norris - one of the two titles that I haven't yet reviewed but I will soon. For now, all I'll say is that it's a good read that puts a lot of perspective on my own faith.

4. The Big Rock Candy Mountain by Wallace Stegner - one of the saddest reads this month but very enjoyable nonetheless.

5. I Do Again by Cheryl & Jeff Scruggs - book two of the ones waiting for a review. Unlike Amazing Grace, I did not enjoy it at all and had a feeling that at least for me, it came a little too late.

Audio Books:

1. Dark Desire by Christine Feehan - book two in the series about Carpathians and also the last one I will waste my time on.

2. Nefertiti by Michelle Moran - an entertaining read about ancient Egypt and definitely one that encouraged me to read more of Ms. Moran's.

Traveling With Pomegranates Giveaway results.

The Traveling With Pomegranates Giveaway ended on Thursday. As usual, I have taken my sweet time posting the actual results and I sincerely apologize.
With the help of random.org, the winner of this memoir was chosen and it was the lucky commenter no. 1. This just proves that just because you are the first one to comment, it doesn't mean you will not be picked.

This lucky commenter turned out to be:

Diane from

Bibliophile By The Sea

!!!

Congratulations to Diane! And to all of you who participated I am sending huge thanks and hugs. I will be having another giveaway soon, so make sure you stop by and enter.

To Serve Them All My Days by R.F. Delderfield

My dream profession had always been teaching. I got my degree and then I did work as a teacher in Poland for a period of two years and even now, ten years later, I look back at it as my best times working. Somehow, life didn’t work out the way I wanted and while living here I gave up teaching and became a translator instead. But I still do look back with nostalgia and sentiment at the time when I felt most fulfilled spending time in a classroom with my students. Therefore, reading To Serve Them All My Days by R.F. Delderfield became a very personal and beautiful experience to me.

The novel gives us a story of David Powlett-Jones, a young man traumatized by three years fighting in WWI , who ends up getting a teaching position in Bamfylde, a public school for boys in England. P.J., as he is called by all who know him, applied for this job at the suggestion of his war doctor to heal his mental and emotional wounds acquired while fighting in this war meant to end all wars. David soon finds out that teaching is not merely a job but that it becomes a way of living and true healing. He makes dear friends among teachers and students alike and discovers that he was born to be a teacher, a guide for all the boys who change from children into adolescents right in front of his eyes and under his guidance. And miraculously, his own wounds do heal and the school prepares him for what’s to come in life just as much as it does those boys he teaches. It’s another wonderful saga by Delderfield spanning the years between the end of WWI and the beginning years of WWII in which there is a lot happening in England just as much as in all other parts of the world.

In my review of God Is An Englishman, I already expressed my great affection towards Delderfield’s writing talent. To Serve Them All My Days not only confirmed it but turned out to be actually better even though I didn’t think it possible. It is not an easy book to read in terms of the subject it deals with. There are many heartbreaking moments when I was reminded how much havoc WWI did wreak in lives of all people, especially the ones who survived. David, who as a boy went through the death of his father and his two older brothers who died buried in a collapsed coal mine, emerged from the three years spent on the battlefield shattered and without hopes for ever being able to deal with war experiences. Bamfylde’s headmaster, Algy, deals with the deaths of boys he came to treat as his sons, he raised to adulthood only to send them to their demise. Many times I cried because I was reminded how real all these war experiences were even to us, almost a century later. Not to mention, David’s commitment to his students and his life lived through his teaching, was something I could identify with to the point where I would stop and think that by giving up teaching myself, I defied my destiny somehow.

I truly adored this novel and I was sad to let it go. I wish there had been more of David and all others that came after him. R.F. Delderfield is now officially on the list of my favorite writers. The book is quite big, with 600 pages but once I started reading I didn’t notice the length at all. Reading To Serve Them All My Days is an experience, not merely an activity and it is one of those books that give you a story you will not soon forget, that will give you characters that you will know, inside out, and you will crave to meet one more time.

*******
Special Thanks to Danielle J. from Sourcebooks, Inc for sending me a copy of this book for review.

Book Info:

Author: R.F. Delderfield
Title: To Serve Them All My Days
Published In: 2009
By: Sourcebooks Landmark, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc.
ISBN: 1402218249

If you would like to get other points of view, please visit:

Kristen's review @ We Be Reading

Tricia's review @ Library Queue

Carey's review @ The Tome Traveller's Weblog

BTT: Lies, lies, lies.

Saw this article (from March) and thought it would make a good BTT confessional question:

Two-thirds of Brits have lied about reading books they haven’t. Have you? Why? What book?

Sadly, or maybe not so sadly, there is not much to confess here. I have never made up a lie about reading books. Not that I am a person who abhors this kind of behavior. I don't. It has simply never occurred to me to say that I read a certain book when in reality I haven't and probably never will.

I read books for myself only. There is no other motive than love of reading what I want to read and not what others might think I should read. The days of school assignments are over for me. And even then, I read all the books on the required reading list. Yep, I was that nerdy.