Book Review » Four Against Two

Book Review: Matched

Books I Have Read, Moments With Meg, Moments with Mita, Reviews No Responses »

Oct 042012

I just read a new book. Then it turned out not to be so new. It has two other books after it to complete the series(#3 is out in November) and Mita read it over the summer. I had okayed the book for her to read after looking at the reviews, but didn’t see it as a book for me to read. I was very wrong to not look twice at it though. BlogHer Book Clubs recently contacted be to read and review this very same book. This time I listened and read the book myself.

Matched is written by Ally Condie. Condie has brought to life a young heroine named Cassia Reyes . At seventeen Cassia is smart, respectful and loyal to her community and her government that is called The Society. The Society has made perfect life a science. They use genetics, statisics and behavioral observances to create a population of compliant people who are fine with living a good life. Through a series of mistakes and inspirations Cassia learns to question the Society and the life that she has been groomed to live.

While futuristic with hints of a post-apocalyptic America, it differs from The Hunger Games, in that there is very little violence in the open. The threats are more subtle and hard to see unless one is looking for them. The many rules and stipulations as well as the tightly arranged details leave very little room to become anyone but who they want you to become. Free thought, a true education and creativity are all but abolished.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Matched and am currently reading the sequel Crossed. This is a good book to read with your middle school kids who may not be ready for The Hunger Games, but want to delve into some futuristic topics. Tough topics like ethics with genetic testing, privacy issues and the importance of free thought come out of this book that can make dinner time talks more interesting. I’m currently taking a genetics class and this book has helped illustrate some of the ethical questions that come when messing with genes. Here is a link to the book trailer for those of you who like a bit of visual.

Have you read Matched? What did you think? Check out the discussion on BlogHer Book Club throughout this month.

(Disclosure: I was given the book Matched by BlogHer Book Club to review with my honest opinion and also compensated for my time and participation in the discussions.)

Book Review: What Alice Forgot

Books I Have Read, Reading Challenge, Reviews No Responses »

Jul 232012

Once again I accidentally read a book that had an sub-plot of adoption. Loving that I unknowingly have worked on my Adoption Reading Challenge 2012!

What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty is a thought-provoking plot that isn’t too heavy to be considered a light read, which is great for people like me who like to read as a relaxation activity.

The story begins when Alice falls off her bicycle at the gym which causes her to lose the last ten years of her life. She gets to the hospital to discover that her and her beloved husband are in the middle of a messy divorce and the child she thinks is growing in her womb is a crabby pre-teen.

Alice doesn’t like the woman she has become in many ways. She cannot believe how uptight she has become and how did she have three children when the plan was for two? The amazing old house her and her soon to be ex had bought has become the home of their dreams and her mom has become a salsa dancing queen, both positive things, but not expected.

While learning about this new self, she discovers that her and her sister’s relationship has faltered over the missing ten years and there is a void there she wants to fill. Her sister’s story is one of multiple vitro fertilization and subsequent miscarriages, shedding some light on what it is like for infertile couples wanting to have children. The adoption sub-plot is in her story.

Her sister has always stated she would not adopt because of her husband’s experience as an adoptee. Through-out the book the sister and her husband work through their grief. Reading from this perspective was eye-opening. As an adoptive parent who already had two biological children before adopting, I try to be sensitive to people who have adopted through the life experience of infertility. I have no idea how a women who is infertile feels, and do not want to ever try to assume. I do not see adoption as an easy answer to infertility. I do think that What Alice Forgot did a nice job exploring adoption after infertililty.

I don’t want to give any spoilers, but I was very pleased with how the book ended. I was glad it wasn’t a cookie-cutter ending!

Book Review: Pictures Of Hollis Woods

A Mom's Job, Adoption, Moments with Mita, NaBloPoMo, Parenting, Reading Challenge 1 Response »

Jun 222012

Pictures of Hollis Woods is a Newberry Honor Book written by Patricia Reilly Giff. I found out about this book when Mita brought it to me to see how many stamps she would get for reading it. Remember I do summer stamps for the kids to earn media time and gift cards to keep them off the TV and to encourage some mind movements! She had gotten it at school. I hade no idea what it was about and asked her. She said it was good. That was about all the description I got from her, but taking her 12-year-old moodiness in stride I was just happy I didn’t get an eye roll!

So I read it. It only took an afternoon, but the book made an impact on me, like books about foster kids often do. A quick summary: Hollis Woods was abandoned an hour old in NYC and lived her life from foster home to foster home. She often ran away, she felt worthless, but her saving grace was her talent for art.

Seeing inside the mind of a child who has suffered from not having a family is tough. This may be a fictional story, but it could very well be a real one thousands of times over. Children without someone to love them often feel like they are nothing but trouble in the world. My heart breaks.

When we decided to adopt, I first called our local children’s services. I received bad information, and I have sometimes wondered if I had pushed harder or asked on another day how might our adoption journey would have been. Of course the past is the past and I’m in love with my family so it really doesn’t matter. Though I really want people to have good information when seeking adoption. Working through the foster system isn’t easy, but people do it. Kids do find homes, parents do find children.

A bit of a spoiler here in that Hollis does find a home. She learns that families are not perfect, so she doesn’t have to be perfect either. A sweet message.

I recommend this book for fourth grade and up. My goal is to ask Mita a bit more about the book. I’m not even sure if she sees a correlation between her and Hollis as they do have different stories. I do hope she gets the overriding message that the love of a family is deserved by everyone.

BlogHer Book Club Review: Where She Went

Books I Have Read, Reviews 2 Responses »

May 172012

As always, I was delighted to get a new book to review. When I received Where She Went by Gayle Forman from BlogHer Book Clubs, I read the back cover and realized it was a sequel. I was ready to read though and had no time to hit the library. This is when I really love having a Kindle! I bought, read, absorbed and adored If I Stay. I didn’t want it to be over, and was so intensely happy to have the sequel ready to be devoured.

I cannot review Where She Went without reviewing If I Stay. So I will do a double review here and try not to give out any spoilers. I loved this book set so much I want everyone to read them for themselves and not hear it secondhand.

If I Stay Tells the story of seventeen year old Mia. She is a talented, young musician who plays the cello, has a wonderful, yet quirky family and a boyfriend, Adam, who literally rocks. The story has a unique way of backtracking through her memories seamlessly, so that you really get to know the family, their history and how much Mia loves them and loves Adam. After a terrible accident, Mia, has an out-of-body experience that shows her world from a different perspective. As a nurse, I especially loved how Forman portrayed the nurses and hospital staff. She nailed it, from caring to cranky – nurses do make the hospital experience what it is!

Where She Went continues on three years later with Adam being the storyteller. I have to say I missed Mia’s narrative at first, but gradually settled into hearing Adam’s voice. Adam is so vulnerable after his experiences with Mia, but to the world he is a rock star. He is not allowed to show his feelings of loss and therefore his anxiety is sky-high and he is very skittish, and appears arrogant and standofish to those who try to get to know him. Spoiler alert here in that Mia does show up again in the story, though not exactly how I wanted her to. It all makes perfect sense in the end and it doesn’t leave you hanging. Along with the rock and roll theme throughout the book, there are lyrics at the end of the book that are great to read and tell more of the story which is awesome.

I will stop there. It’s hard, but I will stop. Go read this book series! It is rated 14 and up. High schoolers will like it and I think if you read it first and talk about a few things, seventh and eighth graders would like it as well. Check out the BlogHer Book Club discussion page and find out what others are saying about this amazing book!

The book trailers can be found here and I predict a movie to be made. It’s that good of story and what is so great about it, is that it is realistic, it could happen. I’m off to mourn now that I have finished these books.

Any suggestions for a good read?

(Disclosure: This is a paid review for BlogHer Book Club but the opinions expressed are my own.)

Book Review: If Only

A Mom's Job, Books I Have Read, Reviews No Responses »

Apr 012012

I was goofing off on Facebook the other day. Yes, I know I shouldn’t admit that, but I was. I am so very over TV and still kinda building up my stamina so I do have lots of sit down time. Anyway, I was looking at a post from one of my favorite places, Scholastic. They were talking about a book named If Only by Carole Geithner. The cover showed a girl looking out a window. It was simple, pretty and immediately drew my attention. Then I read the plot and was most definitely engaged.

If only is about the first year a thirteen year old, Corinna Burdette, goes through after her mother dies. It is told from her character, and is aimed at tween/teen girls, but will keep adults interested as well. Corinna has to go to school and be surrounded by her friends who don’t know what they should say or do. Who sometimes say or do the wrong things. The book goes through the seasons and focuses on her feelings and her relationship with her grieving dad as well.

It has all the normal developmental things such as body changes, boy crushes and drama over the little things plus is a great way for young people to learn about grief. Most of us don’t know what to say or do when someone looses someone. It’s tough. I’m not very good at it really, but I am learning. I wish I would have learned earlier in my life and having a book such as this one could have been a big help.

I am encouraging Meg to read it and review it on her blog from her point of view. I hope Mita will read it as it may help her know that the feelings she has about loosing her mother in Ethiopia are normal, that loss is a messy, nasty thing that never goes away. It does change though, into something that softens and doesn’t sear all the time. Someday Enu will be ready to read it as well and I think she will respond to the character well. Though our situation is different, there is still grief to be dealt with.

I must mention that Geithner has worked as a clinical social worker who has worked with children and adults who have lost a parent while they were growing up. She is Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at George Washington University School of Medicine. This is her first book and frankly I think she did a spectacular job. As a mom of two girls who have done counseling, I know when someone gets it. Geithner does.

The book If Only definitely has a niche in the grief community to give girls who have lost a parent a tool to work through thier loss. It also belongs in the mainstream middle school library as a tool to help students learn about grief in an non-stressful way and how to treat those who are grieving.

(Disclosure: Scholastic sent me a copy of the above book at my request to read and review on my blog. No other compensation was given.)

Kids Book Review: The Spooky Scavenger Hunt Giveaway

A Mom's Job, Moments with Elle, Reviews 7 Responses »

Oct 082011

All-aboard the Dinosaur Train! PBS’ hit show has a new Halloween Book out that I get to review. Anyone who reads my blog knows that I like to read, like to get kids to read and love having the opportunity to share my reads with everyone.

For those of you with older kids who may not have heard of Dinosaur Train, well, it’s big. I would call it the Rollie-Poli-Olie of today. Meg was a big Rollie fan (a decade ago EEEK!). In this animated cartoon a family of dinosaurs ride a train each episode to a new place in time. The Jim Henson Company is the creator of the series, so you know that it is full of fun, color and learning.

In The Spooky Scavenger Hunt (Published by Grosset & Dunlap), the conductor takes the kids (all dinosaurs) on a scavenger hunt and they learn to use their senses of sight, hearing, smell as well as touching on nocturnal animals. The pages are colorful, though not to bright – the darkness helps with the spooky theme. Of course the book is not to spooky to read to the little ones and is aimed at ages 4-8.

Elle (my 6.5 year old) enjoyed reading the book along with me. She does watch the show when her older sissies surrender the TV! We will be reading the book the next few weeks before Halloween and then passing it on to the nephews I’m sure. That’s what I love about books: They last for a long time and are never out of date for the most part!

Elle and Friend

Also coming up on PBS: Sid the Science Kid – Spooky Science Special on October 17, 25, 30 and 31st

Dinosaur Train: Haunted roundhouse/Big Pond Pumpkin Patch on October 20, 24, 30 and 31st.

Here are links to patterns for Dinosaur Train or a Sid Halloween costumes!

Okay, giveaway details! A copy of The Spooky Scavenger Hunt will be sent to you if you are the winner (US addresses only please.) .

Mandatory Entry: Leave a comment to the following question: Do you think that dinosaurs trick or treated? Explain your answer….seriously, just leave me a comment!

Extra Entries:

Follow PBS Kids on Twitter and leave me a comment that you did so with your Twitter handle.

Like PBS Kids on Facebook and leave me a comment that you did so.

Like FourAgainstTwo on Facebook and leave a comment that you did so.

The winner will be drawn via Random.org on October 19th at noon. I cannot guarantee that you will get it by Halloween, but there is a good chance!

(Disclosure: I received a free copy of above mentioned book ($3.99 US) from Three Sixty Marketing and Communications and the opportunity to give one copy away. I was given no other compensation and my thoughts are my own.)

Kids Book Review: You Read To Me, I’ll Read To You

A Mom's Job, Adoption, All you need is love!, Books I Have Read, Homeschooling, Moments with Elle, Moments with Enu, Parenting, Reviews 3 Responses »

Sep 142011

Yesterday on our weekly trip to the library I found a fun new book that I thought Elle and I would enjoy. It turns out that Enu is in love with it and *bonus* it is a great bonding tool. The book is called You Read to Me, I’ll Read to You: Very short stories to read together by Mary Ann Hoberman and illistrated by Michael Emberly.

Elle is an emergent reader, reading on her own a bit, but still needing help. Reading with her can be fun or can be tedious depending on her level of stubborness at the time! What is so great about this book is that we are reading short lines together, which keeps her (and me) from getting bored. There are mostly rhymes which is great for new readers and writers and the book gets silly which means fun! Fun while reading is so important when they are young. We can’t make it a chore.

As I mentioned in a previous post, one of the reasons for homeschooling Enu was to give her some one on one time that she missed when she was little. This book offers a fun and easy way to spend that precious time with her. She missed the fairy tales and rhyming books. She missed the silly reading stories. She adores this book. We have reserved the other titles in the series: Very Short Fairy Tales and Very Short Mother Goose Tales and I am hoping to get them in time for vacation.

I get happy when I find something with multi-uses and this book fits the bill. I encourage all parents of emergent readers or parents of older-adopted children to check this book out at your library and give it a try.

Have you read this book with your kids? Is reading time bonding time for you all as well?

(Disclosure: I recieved no compenstation for reviewing this book, nor was I asked to review it. I borrowed my copy from the library. Amazon links are not affiliate links and I will not get any money from them.)

Art Credit

Book Review: Around The World In 80 Days

Books I Have Read, Reading Challenge, Stuff 2 Responses »

Jul 242011

I recently finished my fourth classic of the year. My goal is to read five classics this year. As I have mentioned before I do this every so often and by the time I am one hundred years old I hope to have somewhat of a good handle on classic books (lofty goals maybe but oh well!).

Around The World in 80 Days by Jules Verne annoyed me. I’m hopeless, I know. It was such a great idea for a book and if I would have read it out loud to my kids, I probably would have enjoyed it more. I just couldn’t get into it on my own. I’m not sure why I felt this way. The main characters have so much potential to be loved, it just didn’t happen with me.

The theme of this book is simple. A boring, but very smart and honorable man is challenged to travel around the world in 80 days. He hires a valet (my favorite character) to accompany him and he rescues a lady along the way who stays with him for the journey. Their travels are aided by his wealth of a money bag he brought on the trip and they go from elephants in India to trains in the wild west. A lot of adventure that should have been fun, but I think after reading about Harry and Voltemort I’m spoiled for normal adventure.

I will encourage my kiddos to read this book. Maybe I’ll see the movie and like it better! I have one more classic to read to meet my 2011 goal. Any ideas? I need some!

(Disclosure: I was not asked to review this book, nor is the link worth anything to me!)

Book Review: The Forgotten Garden

Books I Have Read, Reading Challenge, Reviews No Responses »

Apr 182011

I stumbled upon another book to read pertaining to adoption. I didn’t try. I wanted a break, I really did. Yet this book found me. It was recommended by my Hubby’s Aunt through GoodReads.com. If you are not familiar with GoodReads you need to be. It is a great way to find books and keep up with what your friends and family are reading.

My aunt-in-law recommended The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton to me. This is Morton’s second novel and I must go find her first one as this one consumed me. I did not want to finish it I wanted it to go on forever, it was so bewitching. From the first few chapters I considered this a quasi-adoption themed book because it was dealing with abandonment and identity issues. After a while I decided I would not review it as one of my fiction choices for the Adoption Reading Challenge, I didn’t want to look at it through the eyes of an adoptive mom. I just wanted a good read. Well, after time (it is a lengthy book at 549 pages) I realized that though the word adoption does not appear in this book, the themes of it have adoption, (in)fertility, surrogacy and loss are so prominent I couldn’t pretend any longer.

The book spans three generations, actually it goes back a bit farther at times. The bewitching part of the book is that every chapter is at a different time period. It goes from 1907 to 2005 to 1975 and so forth and so on. I must say that the first few chapters this annoyed me. Not because I dislike books written in this way, I was just not in the mood to stay that focused. I soon fell in love with the characters from all generations and fell into hate with a few as well! I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading about generations, the ocean, gardens, family secrets and fairy tales. The fairy tales in this book are wondrous.

Okay, a quick plot review without giving away the particulars! Four year old Nell, is found on a ship alone on the coast of Australia. She is raised by a loving family and told when she is an adult about her true origins, at least the little information they had of her origins. This puts Nell in a tale spin that takes decades for her to recover from. Her granddaughter then picks up the tale and goes deeper into her grandma’s history. Through deaths, books, letters and trips to England the pieces fall together making an incredible truth that is heartbreaking as well as amazing. To give away to much would ruin this book for you so I’m keeping mum about most of the twists and turns.

The adoption themes that I dealt while reading this book are heavy. Since Nell’s story begins in 1913 there is a lot of secrecy going on. Current thinking was to give no details about an adopted child’s life before the adoption. While in Nell’s case this was not an adoption in the traditional sense, I still see it as such. Children need to know age-appropriate truths early on. To find out major life details all at once after you have lived your life thinking one way is very traumatic, makes one question who they really are. Being adopted can be difficult enough to handle sometimes, let alone when it is surrounded by secrecy and lies. There is also has a infertility story line as well as a surrogacy-like theme that makes you think deeper on those losses as well.

The book helps you think about these deep topics and yet you are still entertained by the story. I loved the book. It stayed with me for a while and I couldn’t shake it. I have actually gone back to it and read a few things over again. I could easily read it again and pick up on things I had missed before, and I may someday.

I would love to ask the author how she went about writing this out of order time-lined story. Did she write the story chronologically, then split it up afterwords or did the story come to her in the order that the story was published? How difficult, yet fun, to try and keep all the dates and stories straight!

Have you read this book? What were your thoughts? Do you think I was right in deciding this was an adoption themed book? Check out other adoption book reviews at the Reading Challenge Jenna is hosting.

Book Review: The Great Gatsby

Books I Have Read, Reading Challenge, Reviews 5 Responses »

Feb 152011

IMHO (in my humble opinion) The Great Gatsby is not so great! It was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald and published in 1925. In my challenge to read the classics I chose this book because it is one I have heard referenced many times. The only thing I knew about it was that it was set in the flapper-prohibition time and that Gatsby was a man.

I struggled to finish the book. I read two other books while reading this book, just for entertainment. I thought about tossing it (okay, taking it back to the library) several times, but did finish it just yesterday.

The plot per me: A young man narrates the meeting of his neighbor and the social life of the well-to-do people of his time. Gatsby, the neighbor, is a filthy-rich man who loves to throw parties but has ulterior motives to become reacquainted with an old flame. There is a bit of sex, drinking and violence; but pretty tame compared to today’s standards.

Because Gatsby is not the narrator, you never get to know him. In fact his character is so detached I find myself wanting to hear more about the narrator, Nick. I had a hard time connecting with all of the characters, which is unusual for me, especially with being based in a earlier time. I normally love period books.

Dry and tight are two words I would use to describe the writing, thus making it hard to read. Sorry classic lovers, I just didn’t feel it.

Feel free to argue with my review and tell me how lousy a literary person I am!

Book Review: All The Broken Pieces

Adoption, Books I Have Read, Reading Challenge 4 Responses »

Jan 142011

The superintendent of schools called me at 5am this morning. It was a recorded message saying that (yet again) school is on a two-hour delay. Sometimes I can go back to sleep after this familiar call. Today I could not. So I picked up the book I was going to start reading today anyway and took a bath. I did not know that this would be the best way to read this particular book. Not necessarily the bath, but the quiet house and reading it all in one setting. No interruptions.

All The Broken Pieces by Anne E. Burg is written in verse. A new way of reading for me and I adored it. Short, sweet verses without all the flowery language that can bog a story down sometimes. This adoption themed book is the first of my adoption books I am reading this year in the Adoption Reading Challenge hosted by Jenna at Chronicles of Munckinland. I found this book by looking for adoption books on Amazon and thought I would try it as the adoption theme is about Operation Babylift . Some see as Operation Babylift as the beginning of international adoption in the USA.

The perspective of the book is from a twelve-year-old child, Matt, who was fathered by an American solder who “married” a Vietnamese woman and never returned after his tour of duty. His first mother put him on a Babylift helicopter when he was ten. The raw feelings this child has really helped me with understanding what Mita and Enu have gone through. Different circumstances, sure, but they all have lost a mother, a father, a country, a language.

What resonated with me is how Matt saw things. When his adoptive mom and dad showered him with love and what they thought was understanding, he saw it as conditional. He strives to be a very good child, so they don’t send him away. This is common with children who have been adopted. They either strive to be the “perfect” child or they rebel and act out. It was as if he kept waiting for them to send him away.

Do my girls still feel that way? What goes through their minds? Like Matt, they don’t talk about Ethiopia much or their feelings about the adoption, but when they do the floodgates open and I get a better perspective of what is in their mind and hearts.

While reading I felt good and refreshed with a new sense of commitment to listen to my girls, to try and understand better, to offer more opportunities for them to open up.

After reading this book I am starting to doubt my parenting. I resent how perfect Matt’s adoptive parents were. They never lost their patience. I must remind myself, yet again, that parenting if never easy and people are never perfect but consistent love and affection does will in the end make a difference.

The characters are a bit stereotypical with the sacrificial first mom, the irresponsible birth father, the saving adoptive parents; but because it is written in simple verse and can be read in one setting, these stereotypes did not annoy me. In the end it is just about the child, his feelings, his journey not the parents’ journey.

The story covers the themes of loss, culture, cancer and death, as well as prejudice and hate. It is worth the read for everyone, not just the adoption world.

Have you read this book? If so what did you think about it?

Also, any recommendations on other books written is verse would be welcomed. I love it!

Book Review: Dracula

Books I Have Read, Reading Challenge, Stuff 2 Responses »

Jan 092011

As I posted last week, I am doing a reading challenge to read more classics. I just finished my first book of 2011, Dracula by Bram Stoker. Yes, you read that right. It took me eight days to read it. I have two reasons for this 1) I’ve been crazy busy and 2) It is hard to read this old time language! I am normally a very fast reader, but found that I had to have a quiet room and had to be fully awake to keep up with my book. Anyway, here is my official review.

I loved it and totally see why it remains the book people refer to when talking vamps. I found it to be entertaining and suspenseful, without being to dark or graphic with horrific details. I told Hubby that I could see why this was once considered the scariest book ever, but with our modern day desensitization (my age showing here) it wasn’t remotely to scary for me. I’m not a horror movie or book kinda person. The reason I like Twilight so much is because it has what I call Moral Vampires. Dracula was not a moral vampire! He was evil with some self-control, and he was smart but limited by his condition.

The story starts in Transylvania and it was great actually reading the beginnings of all the tall tales and legends that are talked about in movies, books and in everyday life. There are five other main characters besides Count Dracula in the book and they are extremely moral characters themselves. They are not chasing vampires for thrills, kisses or blood, but to rid the world of the evil that has effected their loved ones.

I loved how they talked to each-other and at the same time I wonder if people really did talk with such poetry and prose? Is this just the writing style of the day or because they didn’t have to express themselves in 140 characters or less? One passage of speaking lasted several pages long and I had to read it twice because I kept getting lost in the descriptions!

First published in 1897 the sexism was very obvious and not tongue-in-cheek. Mina, the only female main character, was in the end the hero (in my opinion) and beloved by all but this is how she was described at one point of the books:

“Ah that wonderful Madam Mina! She has man’s brain – a brain that a man should have if he much gifted- and a woman’s heart…we man are determined -nay, are I say pledged – to destroy this monster, but it is no part for a woman. Even if she not be harmed her heart my fail her in so much and so many horrors; and here after she may suffer….”

Dr. Van Helsing is who we hear about, but as I mentioned above, she rocked the whole story and Dracula would still be among us if not for her. Okay, joking. Not real I know!

I am very glad I decided to read Dracula. I would highly recommend it to the vampire crowd or to the not-so-much-vampire crowd as well. I think I would let my oldest (age 11) read it with no problems as well. She is an avid Harry Potter, Narnia, Eragon fan and I think she could handle the Count!

The next stop on my book reading adventures is a modern read by Jennifer Weiner, Fly Away Home, and then I will get started on my adoption reading challenge. The next classic book that I am thinking about reading is The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Thanks to The Deranged Book Lovers for hosting the classic Reading Challenge!

What are you reading right now?

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Four Against Two