Hot Water by Erin Brockovich and CJ Lyons
I received a copy of Hot Water by Erin Brockovich and CJ Lyons in exchange for an honest review. This book is a follow up…
Rock Bottom by Erin Brockovich & CJ Lyons
One of my favorite thriller writers, CJ Lyons, teamed up with environmental and consumer activist Erin Brockovich to create the dramatic thriller Rock Bottom. The story follows heroine AJ Palladino, an environmental activist and single mom to a son with a disability, David. When AJ returns to her hometown of Scotia, West Virginia, she is thrown into the middle of a mystery. The well known lawyer who had hired her as clerk to assist in his new case has died- and it looks like he could have been a homicide. When the lawyer’s daughter, Elizabeth, determinedly takes on the challenge of finding his murderer, AJ becomes involved. The story plays out in twisty sub-plots: David’s father and his past with AJ, the mining company that could be poisoning the town, the mystery behind AJ’s parents and their refusal to speak to her, and more.
Write what you know is a big piece of advice that authors often give, and it is clear that is what Brockovich and Lyons did. While I did enjoy all the mystery/thriller aspects, some of the environmental talks left me a bit confused. I don’t know much about saving the environment and the toxins and mining machines, etc, so I felt a little drowned when the book became heavy on those subjects, simply because I couldn’t grasp what was being talked about. But I did enjoy the suspense, and trying to figure out who killed the lawyer along with AJ and Elizabeth. I loved David’s character and the positive outlook the little boy had. The ending was shocking and unexpected to me, yet I thought it summed up the message the story wants you to get from reading. This is the first in a series from Brockovich and Lyons, and I do think I would give the second novel a try.
[Rating: 3.5]
In My Mailbox: Week of February 27
In My Mailbox: Week of February 27
Title: Tales From the Yoga Studio
Author: Rain Mitchell
Received: From Rubyna Mansuri @ FSB Associates
Synopsis: The yoga studio is where daily cares are set aside, mats are unfurled, and physical exertion leads to well-being, renewal, and friendship. An aggressively expanding chain of Los Angeles yoga “experience centers,” has Lee and her extraordinary teaching abilities in its sights. They woo her with a lucrative contract, a trademarked name for her classes, and a place for her handsome musician husband. But accepting the contract means abandoning the students at the homey studio Lee runs in L.A.’s Silver Lake district- and leaving behind four women whose friendships are suddenly more important to her than retirement benefits and a salary increase.
Tales from the Yoga Studio is an insider’s look at the current obsession with yoga, told with enough humor, wit, and warmth to charm and delight readers, whether or not they’ve ever done a Downward Dog.
Title: Everleigh in NYC
Author: Cathleen Holst
Received: From Cathleen Holst
Synopsis: Cheating boyfriend aside, Everleigh Carlisle picks up the shattered pieces of her life, determined to put them back together. On a whim, Everleigh and her BFF Christina visit a voodoo priestess while celebrating Mardi Gras in the Big Easy, where an unspoken wish is granted, unknowingly altering the course of Everleigh’s life. Two years later, her dreams are set to come true when she lands her dream job as a columnist for New York’s premiere fashion magazine, Trés Magnifique. Everleigh’s life quickly becomes complicated when her ex re-declares his love for her, and she meets Robert Cates, only to discover three things: 1)She is extremely attracted to him. 2) She has the bizarre ability to hear his thoughts. 3) He is her new boss. Everleigh takes a long awaited bite from the Big Apple, but are her eyes bigger than her appetite?
Title: Rock Bottom
Author: Erin Brockovich & CJ Lyons
Received: From CJ Lyons
Synopsis: Ten years ago, Angela Joy Palladino left home as a pregnant seventeen-year-old in trouble. Now, after winning and losing a career as an environmental activist, dubbed by the media as “The People’s Champion,” she hopes to start over by taking a new job with a lawyer who is fighting to stop mountain top removal mining.
As a single mom of a special needs nine-year-old boy, Angela is happy for any work she can get, even if it means returning to the West Virginia hometown she left in disgrace. But when her new boss turns up dead and his daughter’s life is threatened, Angela discovers that her own secrets aren’t the only ones her mountain hometown has kept buried.
Hitting rock bottom, Angela must face the betrayal of those once closest to her and confront the harrowing past she thought she had left behind.
Title: Little Miss Teacher
Author: Cassandra O’Sullivan Sachar
Received: From Cassandra O’Sullivan Sachar
Synopsis: Told through the eyes of Candace Turner, a high school English teacher straight out of college, Little Miss Teacher details one woman’s struggles through the important initial stages of her career and her life as a grown-up. While teaching her students about writing and literature, Candace learns her own lessons about life. As she worries about fitting in with the faculty and conquering piles of essays to grade, Candace also pursues an old crush. Through her endless attempts to succeed in both her job and life, she has many adventures within and outside of her classroom walls. Ultimately, Candace hopes to finish the school year with a feeling of triumph at having touched the lives of her students… and having survived.
In the vein of both Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus’s The Nanny Diaries and Lauren Weisberger’s The Devil Wears Prada, Little Miss Teacher is a story about a young woman dealing with the ups and downs of work and life. In experiences that are sometimes amusing and sometimes sad, Candace endures everything from chaperoning the prom to helping a friend deal with a problem. In her earnest, self-conscious, conversational manner, Candace gives a voice and an all-access pass to the often embarrassing life of a young educator.
