03 | June | 2015 | Rebeccabookreview

This past weekend was the yearly Quilting Retreat that my mom and I attend. The above picture is our faithful alarm clock from retreat, we call him Pickles the Peacock. He lives at the camp where we stay for Retreat and he is a very vocal peacock, especially at 5am. For those that don’t know the background, my Mom is part of a Quilt Guild (here is their Facebook page) and every year they go on a retreat the weekend after Memorial Day weekend and spend the whole weekend quilting. For the past few years I come along and spend the whole weekend reading. Here is my post from last year’s retreat. You can also read about retreat on my Mom’s blog, joann94wquilts.

So this year I think I was a little overzealous when packing because I brought 8 books with me, not including the one I had already started. I was bummed though because I didn’t get to start reading until about 5 pm on Friday. By the time we got to the Incarnation Camp in Ivoryton, CT, unpacked the car, and got my Mom’s sewing station set up it was about 11am. At that point I ended up having to do something for work (blah) that took me a little over an hour. Then we had lunch and I started reading after lunch but only got about 4 pages in before I promptly fell asleep. I had been up until 1:30am Thursday night doing laundry and packing for retreat and then I was up at 5:30am to drive over to my Mom’s, so by 1pm Friday I was dead tired. I took a two hour nap, then when I woke up it was time for our daily walk (Mom and I take a walk every day to make sure we are getting some exercise). We saw the adorable baby goat (see pictures below) and then I did some additional exercises and took a shower. Could barely believe it but it was already 5pm and almost time for dinner. Suffice it to say I didn’t get as much reading done on Friday as I would have liked. Luckily, I was able to read all of Saturday as we didn’t go out anywhere this year like we usually do. And then Sunday I read for most of the morning in between getting things packed up into the car when I could.

So that being said, I started reading Pride and Prejudice on Friday afternoon/evening and finished it before dinner on Saturday. After doing my blog post on it, I started reading the first book in the Hunger Games series and finished that book by Sunday before lunch (blog post to follow, I’m just doing one blog post after I finish the whole series). I started reading the second book in the Hunger Games series next but I didn’t get too far since we had lunch at noon and then we did final clean up and packing before we had to be out by 2pm. Overall I still consider the weekend a success but I wish I had planned my reading choices differently. Besides reading, I also spent some time assisting the ladies with IT items and helping my Mom with a few quilt related decisions.

I’ve included a collection of photos from the trip below. Some I took, and some are from other people’s Facebook pages.

I would encourage any reader to try this. Taking a whole weekend away just to read is great fun and I think it is a real treat to be able to devote your time for a whole weekend to reading.

“Waiting On” Wednesday” is a weekly meme hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine that spotlights eagerly anticipated upcoming releases.

This week’s spotlight is on:

Friction by Sandra Brown (unfortunately no cover has been released yet)

Release Date: August 18, 2015

Blurb from the cover (Amazon):

Crawford Hunt wants his daughter back. Following the death of his wife four years ago, Crawford, a Texas Ranger, fell into a downward spiral that left him relegated to deskwork and with his five-year-old daughter Georgia in the custody of her grandparents. But Crawford has cleaned up his act, met all the court imposed requirements, and now the fate of his family lies with Judge Holly Spencer.
Holly, ambitious and confident, temporarily occupies the bench of her recently deceased mentor. With an election upcoming, she must prove herself worthy of making her judgeship permanent. Every decision is high-stakes. Despite Crawford’s obvious love for his child and his commitment to being an ideal parent, Holly is wary of his checkered past. Her opinion of him is radically changed when a masked gunman barges into the courtroom during the custody hearing. Crawford reacts instinctually, saving Holly from a bullet.
But his heroism soon takes on the taint of recklessness. The cloud over him grows even darker after he uncovers a horrifying truth about the courtroom gunman and realizes that the unknown person behind the shooting remains at large . . .and a threat.
Catching the real culprit becomes a personal fight for Crawford. But pursuing the killer in his customary diehard fashion will jeopardize his chances of gaining custody of his daughter, and further compromise Judge Holly Spencer, who needs protection not only from an assassin, but from Crawford himself and the forbidden attraction between them.
FRICTION will keep you on the edge of your seat with breathtaking plot twists and the unforgettable characters that make Sandra Brown one of the world’s best-loved authors. It is an extraordinary novel about the powerful ties that bind us to the ones we love and the secrets we keep to protect them.

Why Am I Waiting?

I am a huge fan of Sandra Brown’s suspense thrillers. They are riveting, exciting, often unpredictable, and just fantastic. I just found out how much I love her books within the past year or so, and I am really exciting for her upcoming release since I’m sure its going to be great.