5 in 5: For every season

Michael Symon's 5 in 5 came out with a new book focusing on in season produce and a simple way to prepare it. While the recipes do not actually use only five ingredients, you can be sure that many of these recipes will help you with some ideas of what to do with some of the more under-utilized vegetables of the season. I liked Michael's small intro to each recipe which explained his opinions and tips about each dish. Also, as a regular CSA member, many of the produce items I receive can be confusing and intimidating. Michael breaks the book into four sections (spring, summer, fall, winter) which was very helpful when looking for and identifying dishes that use a specific confusing vegetable I may have received at the Farmer's Market that day.

Many of the dishes are accompanied by photos of the food which are beautiful and very detailed. However, many of the dishes are not accompanied by photos which can leave the reader on their own when figuring out how the final product will look. Also, Michael's ingredient lists are not limited by geographical location, obscurity, or price. So you may not be able to just open the book and grab from your pantry and many of the meals are not going to be appropriate for a tight budget. Overall, I was very satisfied and excited about many of the dishes and have plans to try quite a few of them. Additionally, because seasonality is important to me, I was very happy with this cookbook's break down of the seasons which encourages us to eat food growing during that time of year. Michael Symon's notes are funny and personal and I would recommend this cookbook to adventurous cooks looking to create meals using fresh produce appropriate for each season. I received this book from Blogging for books in exchange for this review.




http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/92231/michael-symon/

J by Howard Jacobson

Great Idea, but can be hard to follow. The overall story follows two people who meet, maybe not by accident in a world that forgets the past of something that maybe happened, that people only half remember. The letter J is also very little used, while not illegal it is rarely used. The story is great in its scale, but it may get lost in its own story sometimes. While this makes it hard to read at times, the story is fantastic.

The characters are well thought out, the plot has surprises, which can make it easy to follow. You come to love the characters and engaged to their outcome. I would recommend this book to everyone, and suggest they go pick it up.

4 out of 5.

More about the author.
http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/14271/howard-jacobson/

I did receive this book from Blogging for Books in return for this review, it did not have any affect on my review.

The Marauders by Tom Cooper

After the BP oil spill life in a small town shrimping town drastically change. We follow the lives of different people affected. Each character is unique and engaging in their own way. The story is very well written, and this novel is one in which it is hard to put down. Once I began to read I just wanted to keep reading. I would strongly recommend this novel to anyone who loves fiction novels, or anyone who is capable of reading.

I received this book from Blogging for Book in exchange for a review.

Near Enemy by Adam Sternbergh

If you loved Shovel Ready, you will love this novel. Spademen is back one year later and things are just as dicey and riveting as before. A caring hit-man, who finds out the truth, come it this is awesome. To put it simply, I loved this novel just as much as the first and could not put it down. If you loved Shovel Ready, read this, if you haven't, read Shovel Ready now and then get to this book as soon as possible.

I received this book from Blogging for Books for this review.

http://www.randomhouse.com/book/225885/near-enemy-by-adam-sternbergh

http://www.randomhouse.com/author/170649/adam-sternbergh?sort=best_13wk_3month

Dark Eden by Chris Beckett

We are taken to a breathtakingly original world in which the "family" rules and the world is dark, sometimes dark dark or even dark dark dark. The only light comes from the local fauna which inhabits the Circle Valley, in which the children are batfaced and clawfooted due to inbreeding, as they are all descendants of Tommy and Angela, the two who decided to stay behind on Eden. But everything is not going well for John Redlatern. After 163 years and now over 500 people the food is running out, space is limited and John decides to press out into the Dark. 

The originality of the world is what first drew me into the fantastic novel which won the Arthur C. Clark Award and has been praised by many. The novel was a little slow to start as we grow accustomed to the world of Eden and our main characters. John Redlatern is brave, his cousin Gerry will follow him off a cliff, Jeff who is Gerry little clawfooted brother and Tina who is smitten for John. But once this was out of the way the story begins to pick up as we relate to John and the questions that he raises about the world in which he grew up and the customs that go along with it.

I like to think of John as a anti-hero, since he has his flaws and he fully admits them, but he still pushes on with his goal because he knows that it is the right thing to do. On top of that there are times when you almost hate John for the way he thinks and acts, but it is all to achieve something greater. John is an everyman who wants to change the world.

I would recommend this novel over and over again. Some people may object to it saying it is dirty and obscene, but through some of these scenes we better understand the culture and the hardships of our characters lives. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this story by Chris Beckett and couldn't put it down once I got into it.

Overall: 4/5

Book Press Release

http://crownpublishing.com/news/arthur-c-clarke-award-winning-author-chris-becketts-brilliant-us-debut-dark-eden/#.U2ghVoFdV8E

I received this book for free from Blogging for Books for this review

The Flight of the Silvers by Daniel Price

I absolutely loved this, while it was an easy read, it still captivated me and I couldn't put down the book, especially the last third. I have to agree with the way the author described himself as being more Joss Whedon than Ray Bradbury. It is an easily accessible sci-fi novel. The size may be intimidating to some, but the easy of reading easily makes up for this. Basically the entire novel takes place in a parallel universe, which split from our own during an event which forever made the two almost unrecognizable from the other. They use something called tempis, more or less a force which they can control, for just about everything, from running faster to creating barriers to flying cars. The group with we follow were all in the same general area when they passed to the other universe and form a group and develop their talents, in order to eventually, hopefully save this universe. Their talents range from running faster, turning their body into tempis, passing notes through time, aging or de-aging objects and things, projecting things from the past, or lastly being able to follow strings and see the future. All of these are very well depicted in the novel and I won't explain them here.

I would suggest this to anyone who is not well versed in science fiction or are new to the genre as a whole. This is also going to become a series of novels, with the second one being written currently, something I can't wait for.

Shovel Ready by Adam Sternbergh

This is Adam Sternbergh and it is a fantastic one. I picked this one up because it was in Barnes and Nobles authors you should check out section and boy were they write. We follow our main character of Spademan, a hit man, or how he describes himself, a garbageman. I don't know if it is right to call it a dystopian future novel, but at the same time I feel that it is fitting. Since most of the world is still the same-ish, but New York is now a wasteland. Spademan is given a job to find a girl, the daughter of a famous "evangelical" and "throw her away", he finds her and sees that she is not one to mess with, she has a little bit of mean streak, and when he finally catches up to her, he finds she has a few secrets to hide. Spademan must then navigate throw the real world and the fantasy world which most now escape all hours of the day and ensure he doesn't end up the one dead.

The grit all throughout is truly stunning. This is a short read, but one that is worth it. It is also regarded as good enough that supposedly they are creating a movie based on it with Denzel Washington attached to it.