Happy Birthday to Me Giveaway!

In case you didn't hear the news, it was my birthday yesterday. The BIG 3-0, ack! Turns out, 30 feels the same as 29. For now anyway. And since we only turn 30 once, I thought I would share the love and have a little birthday giveaway on the blog.  I meant to get this post up yesterday, but with the temperatures in the high 20s and all the birthday festivities that went on, the day got away from me.

So what am I giving away? A copy of Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones, one of my favourite pens ever - the 7 year pen - which I carry in my purse with me at all times, and a little notepad to write down - if you're anything like me - quotes, or to mark pages in your book (say no to dog-ears!).  Really, you can use the notepad for whatever you desire!

I was recently looking through my books and I realized that I have two copies of Mister Pip (both brand new, never read). Oops. I haven't actually read this book yet, but I've heard amazing things about it. In 2007 it won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book Overall and it was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize (if those kinds of things matter to you).

Thirteen-year-old Matilda lives on a copper-rich tropical island that has been shattered by war, from which the teachers have fled along with everyone else. Only one white man chooses to stay behind, the eccentric Mr. Watts, object of much curiosity and scorn. He sweeps out the ruined schoolhouse and steps in to teach the children when there is no one else, and his only lessons consist of reading from his battered copy of Great Expectations, a book by his friend Mr. Dickens. First the children, and the entire village, are riveted by the adventures of a young orphan named Pip, their imaginations aflame with dreams of Dickens's London and the larger world. But in a ravaged place where even children are forced to live by their wits and daily survival is the only objective, imagination-- it turns out-- is a dangerous thing.

The rules are simple. All you have to do is wish me a happy birthday in the comments section. Just kidding. Any comment will do. I will randomly select a winner in two weeks.

If you want to tweet or share this giveaway on Facebook, then leave me another comment telling me you did so and that will count as an extra entry. 

This giveaway is International and will close on May 21, 2013 at  9pm Mountain Time. If you've already read this book or don't want to read this book, then win it for someone else! Books make great gifts after all. 

Good luck and thank you to all my followers, commenters and admirers! I appreciate each and every one of you.

Saigon Sundays: When an Ordinary Stick Just Won't Do

The snow is finally gone and this gorgeous weekend has convinced us that summer really is just
around the corner! So what could possibly be better than fetch in the snow?
Fetch with a big hunk of wood in a field!

{I apologize for the few seconds where the video stalls at the beginning - I shot it on my 

phone and I have no idea how to edit a video}

It's Not Summer Without You (Summer, #2) by Jenny Han

It's a little bit ridiculous that a YA novel can bring out all the FEELS in me, but Jenny Han, you've done it again. My heart was an emotional mess after reading The Summer I Turned Pretty last year. I immediately read It's Not Summer Without You, (the second book in the Summer trilogy), anxious to keep reading about Belly, Conrad and Jeremiah, but then, like usual, I got distracted and neither read the last book in the series or wrote a review of this one. Then, the other day while I was working, I popped into the library and I saw It's Not Summer Without You on audio* and checked it out. What better way to refresh my memory than by driving around in my car while trying to hold back the tears this book demands of me? Seriously - don't read this book while driving.

This book was all kinds of sad - heart-wrenching, blink-back-the-tears-while-driving sad. And it wasn't just about the relationship between Belly and Conrad and Jeremiah. There was so much more to this book. There's young-love, old-love, the love and bond between life-long best friends, the relationships we have with our parent's at an emotionally-charged young age, and the relationships between the parent's themselves. I love how the summer books don't solely focus on the teens in this book. Susannah and Adam - Jeremiah and Conrad's parent's, and Laurel - Belly and Stephen's mom, weren't just side-line characters: they were pivotal to the entire story, providing that parental presence that I often find is lacking (or unbelievable) in teen stories.

This book also had the addition of some of the chapters being from Jeremiah's point of view. Sigh...sweet, loveable, Jeremiah. He and Conrad couldn't be more different if they tried. This is what makes them both so likeable in their own ways. Jeremiah is fun, goofy and wears his heart on his sleeve. Conrad, on the other hand, is his usual quiet, brooding self. He's as closed of a book as they come.

In this book, the summer's of their childhood spent at Cousins beach are no more. Belly, Stephen, Conrad and Jeremiah are growing up and fast becoming adults themselves. But something happens this summer that brings them together at the beach house to fight for something they all need. And along the way, Conrad and Jeremiah become more transparent to Belly than they have ever been, and she has decide once and for all: follow her heart or hold on to the past? How do you choose between two people you love so completely differently? 

“It’s all relative, I suppose. You think you know love, you think you know real pain, but you don’t. You don’t know anything.”

I loved this book just as much as the first and I have promised myself not to waste anytime jumping into the last book in this series, even though I know I'm not ready to say goodbye to Belly, Conrad, Jeremiah OR Cousins beach. 

*This book was fantastic on audio. I really enjoyed the narrator and I found she did an amazing job portraying all the emotions and feelings this book is bursting with.