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Title:Menus in Minutes Author: Better Homes and Gardens Format: Hard Spiral Bound |
This is the best idea for a publisher of recipes I have ever seen. So first it’s spiral bound. Next it has all of the main courses on the top, and then on a different flap it has all of the sides. So you can turn to page 109 on the top half and get Ravioli With Vegetables and then turn to page 133 on the bottom half of the book and get Fruit Kabobs for dessert. Nutritional facts are there for the main course, but not on the desserts. I think that is the one failing point of the book. Other then that, I think it is a really cool addition to any kitchen.
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Title:My Side Of The Mountain Author: Jean Craighead George Format: Mass Market |
Almost everyone has thoughts of running away from home, yet very few think about it after reading a book. Usually, it’s after a fight with one of the “adults.” This book still makes me want to run away, and I am 22. Sam Gribley goes further then most young kids. Most of us make it to the end of the block; the real determined ones go as far as their best friend’s house. Yet our Sam goes up into the mountains of New York and sets up home. He learns to be dependent on only himself and nature. While everything is pushing him to go back home, he will not. In the process of living out a year in the woods by himself, he grows up quite a bit more then that. I love this book and put it up there with Where the Red Fern Grows, although this one is not nearly as sad. If you need a present for a ten year old, this is it.
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Title:Tick Tock Author: Dean Koontz Format: Mass Market |
This is one of the most hilarious horror books I have ever read. Most have a dark sense of humor, but this one has a bright, glass-half-full, happy-go-lucky, side kick character. Our hero, Tommie Pham, has just quit his full time job to write detective novels. The book starts with him buying a brand new blue Corvette, the car he has dreamed of since immigrating to America as a boy. Now he has to face his mother, the thing all children dread. The thing I love about this book, is how many authors have the balls to total a Chevy Corvette by the THIRD chapter? I can understand by the two-thirds mark, but three chapters. As the daughter of a mechanic, my heart just broke when I read that, but at the same time I found it so funny. He hooks up with Deliverance Payne, part-time waitress, full-time millionaire. This book reads like a modern day Dick Tracy with a clown car. I fully enjoyed this book and would suggest it to anyone.
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Title:The Black Swan Author: Mercedes Lackey Format: Mass Market |
So, as I have said before, I like new twists on old tales. This is a new rendition of Swan Lake. Yet we are not following the princess, but the sorcerer’s daughter as she tries to find her own place within this world. She also can wield magic like her father, but he doesn’t seem happy when she follows in his footsteps. He is happy when she can use her magic for more feminine things, like cleaning the tapestry. The sorcerer changes each night into a owl and flies out to find “wicked” women. Any woman that has disobeyed her father or husband is then turned into a swan and taken back to the sorcerer’s castle. So the question is this: does the daughter continue doing what she has always done, and ignore the captives, or does she risk becoming one to save them? I have found that I do like Lackey’s stand alone novels much more then I like her series. I would suggest this title to anyone that has wandered away from Lackey in the past, or would like an intro to her works.
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Title:Treat Your Customers Author: Bob Miglani Format: Hard Bound |
I have nearly burnt myself out on business books. Almost everything I have read up until this point has been over-the-top preachy. The “if I do not do this, my business will fail and I will never be thought of as worthy by anyone ever again” type of preachy. Finally I have found one book that is not like that. Treat Your Customers comes from the heart of Bob Miglani. He has a very “take it or leave it attitude” that I like. The book is his life experience working at his family’s Dairy Queen up to and including his work with a Fortune 500 company. It is very simple but often overlooked advice, like “The boss is never the customer.” I have seen this way too often at the bookstore where I work. The employee will work like they have never worked before in front of the boss, but when the boss isn’t looking, then the employee starts to slack. Each chapter is short, about three to six pages long, so this book can quickly be read by employees to give them a new perspective on customer service. I would highly suggest this as the next book that you buy all of your employees. They will be able to use the advice from the book almost immediately after reading it. Forget Lundin’s Fish!–go treat your employees, your business, and most importantly, go Treat Your Customers.
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