Life-Changing Magic

Thanks to Blogging For Books who provided me with a free copy of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Konda for this review.

I suspect that Japanese norms for housekeeping and interior design may be regarded as spartan by American standards. Nonetheless, this reader was drawn to Marie Kondo's book because my living space is in need of some serious help as the "stuff" of my 48 years threatens to overwhelm my home.

Kondo's advice for tidying your living space, and subsequently your life is this: forget finding the right storage system. What you really need to do is get rid of most of your stuff.

Perhaps I have oversimplified and slightly exaggerated my summation, however that was my first impression of Kondo's words. (And I will admit I was at once horrified and convinced she had hit the nail on the head.)

The book is uncluttered and neat, streamlined in its advice. As I read Kondo's precise and methodical account of her own discovery of her KonMari method for keeping her living spaces tidy, I frequently looked around at my own living room only to realize I was, in fact, in possession of many items that held little, if any real meaning to me.

According to the book, the standard for deciding what to keep (and thus what you will need to have room for) are those things which bring you joy. Kondo advises actually handling each and every possession, from clothing to books to mementos and asking yourself, "Does this give me joy?" If you hesitate or the answer is "no," get rid of it.

I suspect that many of us are guilty of collecting items for the sake of acquisition only and that many of the items in our homes and lives do not serve to bring us joy. I know that is the case for myself. I suspect that is why so many people have tidied their living spaces only to find themselves surrounded again by clutter within a few weeks or months.

If you find yourself in that position, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up may be the solution you are looking for. You may find it inspiring to hear Kondo say that once you tidy, truly tidy according to her method, you will never have to do it again. (Be warned, it may take up to six months of dedicated effort if your possessions are overwhelming your space!)

I find this succinct little book to offer a promising solution to the clutter accumulating in my home. I am going to re-read Kondo's advice and then I am going to take on the life-changing project of tidying up my home!

From the publisher . . .

This best-selling guide to decluttering your home from Japanese cleaning consultant Marie Kondo takes readers step-by-step through her revolutionary KonMari Method for simplifying, organizing, and storing.

Despite constant efforts to declutter your home, do papers still accumulate like snowdrifts and clothes pile up like a tangled mess of noodles?

Japanese cleaning consultant Marie Kondo takes tidying to a whole new level, promising that if you properly simplify and organize your home once, you’ll never have to do it again. Most methods advocate a room-by-room or little-by-little approach, which doom you to pick away at your piles of stuff forever. The KonMari Method, with its revolutionary category-by-category system, leads to lasting results. In fact, none of Kondo’s clients have lapsed (and she still has a three-month waiting list).

With detailed guidance for determining which items in your house “spark joy” (and which don’t), this international bestseller featuring Tokyo’s newest lifestyle phenomenon will help you clear your clutter and enjoy the unique magic of a tidy home—and the calm, motivated mindset it can inspire.

About the author . . .

Marie “KonMari” Kondo runs an acclaimed consulting business in Tokyo helping clients transform their cluttered homes into spaces of serenity and inspiration. With a three-month waiting list, her KonMari Method of decluttering and organizing has become an international phenomenon. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up is a best seller in Japan, Germany, and the UK, with more than two million copies sold worldwide, and has been turned into a television drama for Japanese TV. She has been featured on more than thirty major Japanese television and radio programs and in the Sunday Times, Red magazine, You magazine, and the Times, who has deemed her “Japan’s preeminent guru of tidiness, a warrior princess in the war on clutter.”

Knockout Knits Packs a Punch!

I was very excited to receive a review copy for Larua Nelkin's Knockout Knits from Blogging For Books. As an avid knitter, I am always on the lookout for new accessory items which knit up quickly, especially as the gift giving season approaches. Knockout Knits not only provides knitters with a wide variety of accessories to knit, it also challenges readers to experiment with new techniques to add an extra element of interest to the experience of knitting and to the final piece.

The book is broken into three main areas of emphasis: wrapped stitches, lace, and knitting with beads. Within each section, Nelkin arranges projects from small and easy at the beginning to larger or more complicated projects at the end. With an introduction to each technique leading off the section, knitters will get a sense of the variety of effects each technique can offer. Even though I had done some basic knit stitches using the wrap/drop technique, Knockout Knits was the first time I saw the variety of ways this technique could be switched up to such different effects for some stunning end results. (Folly Cloche, I'm talking about you!)

Another technique I have always wanted to try but had not had the opportunity is knitting with beads. Nelkin's introduction and step-by-step guidance through the working of patterns with beads has given me the courage to cast on my yarn and go for it!

Patterns in Knockout Knitsare clear and easy to follow. The photographs are eye candy for fiber fanatics and fashionistas. Nelkin provides easy-to-read charts where appropriate. And, as mentioned earlier, the range from easy to progressively more challenging projects provides something that a knitter of any skill level can dive in and accomplish.

If you are a knitter looking for some great holiday gifting ideas, Knockout Knits is a sure hit!

From the Publisher:

An abundance of knitted luxuries--summery lace shawls, warm and wooly hats, a trio of cool knitted bracelets, and stunning beaded gloves--designed to grow your skills.

Who doesn't love to knit accessories? They're fast, often require only a skein or two of yarn, and make amazingly versatile gifts for friends and family. Small knits are also the perfect way to try something new--an unusual stitch pattern, wild multi-colored yarn, or even a touch of sparkle. Laura Nelkin is well-known for designing these fun-to-knit little projects introducing her students and fans to advanced techniques with her signature "You can do it!" enthusiasm. In her first book, she shares her 3 favorite types of knitting using wrapped stitches, lacework, and beads. Each chapter begins with a quick knitted cuff to lay the foundations, then gradually ramps up to more complicated designs. The result is an all-new collection of wearable, feminine knits with a slightly rustic aesthetic. Give them as gifts, stockpile for a chilly day, or dress up a casual outfit--these are knockout projects to enjoy knitting again and again.

About the Author:

Laura Nelkin, a prolific independent knitwear designer, graduated from Cornell with a degree in Apparel Design. A former design director, Laura sells her knit pattern and kit line to yarn stores worldwide and teaches workshops around the country and online with Craftsy.com. Her patterns have been published through Nelkin Designs, and in The Rhinebeck Sweater, Scarf Style 2, Knitscene, and Knitty. Laura lives near Ithaca, New York. Visit her at www.nelkindesigns.com.

Reading vs. Being Read To

I recently went on a vacation to a destination approximately 1,600 miles from where I live. If you do the math, that's roughly 27 hours of driving, each way. (Somehow it felt twice as long on the way home than it did on the way going!) That's a LOT of time in the car! Between the time I spent as the driver and my inability to read in the car due to motion sickness, audio books have been a godsend to my family for years!

If you find yourself in a position where reading, whether a paper copy of a book or your trusty e-reader, is not an option, why not consider listening to a story or book???

Most book sellers have a variety of books on CD available for purchase. There are also sources for downloading audio books to your i-Pod or smartphone.

One source many people overlook is their public library! Mine (I live in the middle of the country, in a small "city" of 25,000 people) has a superb selection of books on CD! My husband and I went down to peruse the choices together and found several options we thought we would enjoy during our six days of solid driving. We thoroughly enjoyed listening to Neil Gaiman read his novel, Neverwhere, to us!

[If you've never read it, it's a wonderful fantasy story of a man who encounters an injured girl on the streets of London one night and finds his life turned upside-down when he discovers the realm of London Below. If you've never read Neil Gaiman, shame on you! His stories are AMAZING!]

My library stocks not only fiction audiobooks, but a wide selection of non-fiction options as well. Biographies, humor, how-to, spirituality and religion, history.....the choices might surprise you! I always think it's a special treat when you find an audio edition read by the author him or herself. One note: be sure to check whether the audiobook you have in hand is an adaptation or unabridged. This can save disappointment if you're expecting the full story!

The New Art of Capturing Love

Today's post features a guest review by my daughter, Amanda, who is a professional photographer. Thanks for reviewing this book!

This book landed in my lap exactly when I needed it most! Having just booked my first same sex elopement as a photographer, I was hoping to make it the best experience for my couple. The author reassured me of what I was expecting, and brought to light some experiences I hadn't considered. Paired with examples of photographs from same sex weddings by amazing photographers, the posing guidance and considerations were wonderful!

The way this book focused on how lesbian and gay weddings are still just weddings, while also addressing the real differences we will face as photographers (there might not be one dress and one tux!) was super helpful and super considerate of making sure not to focus on same sex weddings as being "Other."

The posing tips were really the big draw to this book for me. Good considerations like the couples' comfort of displaying affection in public really helped me make my couples' experience more enjoyable, and prepared me for steps to take in posing them.

All in all, I am so thankful to have been given the chance to read and review this book! I think it will become a staple for modern photographers as more and more states join in on the push for equality.

From the publisher . . .

The New Art of Capturing Love: The Essential Guide to Lesbian and Gay Wedding Photography by Kathryn Hamm and Thea Dodds Foreword by Martie Maguire of the Dixie Chicks and Court Yard Hounds

The first guide to posing and thoughtfully capturing same-sex engagements and weddings, THE NEW ART OF CAPTURING LOVE equips all photographers to better serve the LGBTQ client while also providing a wedding-planning vision for couples.

With nearly half of the states in the US (and 13 countries) currently recognizing same-sex marriage or civil unions, the market for LGBTQ weddings is one of the fastest growing segments in the wedding industry, offering great opportunity for today's wedding photographers. These are exciting times for marriage equality—but capturing portraits in this new market requires a new approach to posing, which until now has been almost exclusively oriented toward pairing a larger man in black with a smaller woman in white. What works for Jack and Jill won't necessarily work for Jack and Michael, let alone Jill and Louise.

THE NEW ART OF CAPTURING LOVE shatters the “old standards” of wedding and engagement photography by showing how inappropriate old standards can be for today’s diverse couples, then shares easy-to-implement poses and techniques that can be applied to any couple (and wedding party), no matter their orientation, to create lasting memories.

Featuring a collection of more than 180 same-sex portraits of 72 couples from 48 photographers, this guide is proudly the first—and most comprehensive—of its kind. Whether you are a wedding photographer looking to enter this burgeoning market, or a same-sex couple looking for visual inspiration, these gorgeous images will both instruct and inspire.

This groundbreaking visual guide book is perfect for:
~ Couples planning their weddings and engagement sessions
~ Photographers interested in branching out to a rapidly-growing new market
~ LGBTQ-supportive friends and family, especially those looking for a meaningful shower or wedding gift

AUTHORS ARE GO-TO EXPERTS: Same-sex wedding pioneer Kathryn Hamm and veteran wedding photographer Thea Dodds are the leading experts for same-sex weddings and wedding photography, respectively. Their expertise has been featured in The New York Times, ABC News, CNN, Rangefinder and on NPR.

GROUNDBREAKING IMAGES: This groundbreaking guide features a collection of same-sex portraits that was called "the best I've ever seen" by Professional Photographer senior editor Joan Sherwood.

About the Authors KATHRYN HAMM is president of GayWeddings.com, the pioneering online wedding boutique and resource for same-sex couples, offering a community forum, planning articles, and a directory of more than 90,000 LGBTQ-friendly wedding pros. She is also an education expert for WeddingWire, the nation’s leading marketplace serving the $70 billion wedding industry, as well as a nationally recognized speaker, workshop leader, and consultant for couples and wedding vendors across the country. She lives with her wife and son in Arlington, Virginia.

THEA DODDS is an award-winning wedding photographer and founder of Authentic Eye Photography. Her work has been featured in Newsweek and New Hampshire Bride, and on ABC News, CNN, and The Huffington Post. Dodds lives with her husbandand two daughters in Rumney, New Hampshire, and can be found online at AuthenticEye.com.

how to be a good wife

From the publisher:

In the tradition of Emma Donoghue's Room and S.J. Watson’s Before I Go to Sleep, How To Be a Good Wife by Emma Chapman is a haunting literary debut about a woman who begins having visions that make her question everything she knows.

Marta and Hector have been married for a long time. Through the good and bad; through raising a son and sending him off to life after university. So long, in fact, that Marta finds it difficult to remember her life before Hector. He has always taken care of her, and she has always done everything she can to be a good wife—as advised by a dog-eared manual given to her by Hector’s aloof mother on their wedding day.

But now, something is changing. Small things seem off. A flash of movement in the corner of her eye, elapsed moments that she can’t recall. Visions of a blonde girl in the darkness that only Marta can see. Perhaps she is starting to remember—or perhaps her mind is playing tricks on her. As Marta’s visions persist and her reality grows more disjointed, it’s unclear if the danger lies in the world around her, or in Marta herself. The girl is growing more real every day, and she wants something.

I really loved this book!

I received an ARC from the publisher and I am so thankful for the opportunity to read Chapman's debut offering.

"How To Be A Good Wife" is a gripping, suspenseful read that will leave you clinging to the edge of each page as you find yourself unable to let Marta Bjornstad remain alone with the ghostly images that haunt the periphery of her mind. As her visions come more and more into focus, readers begin to question their own perceptions and reality. There are two possible explanations for what Marta is experiencing--and both options lead readers to chilling places that no one wants to acknowledge.

Chapman has written a brilliant novel!

Emma Chapman was born in 1985 and grew up in Manchester. She studied English Literature at Edinburgh University, followed by a Masters in Creative Writing at Royal Holloway, University of London. After university, she travelled in Scandinavia, and she currently lives in Perth, Western Australia. How To Be A Good Wife is Emma's first novel.

Tantric Coconuts

From the New York Times bestselling author of A Dog Named Christmas!
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance meets Life of Pi in this quirky spiritual journey across the wild highways and byways of America.

Free spirit Angel Two Sparrow—artist and musician extraordinaire—is having trouble making ends meet. On the verge of desperation, she inherits her crazy Aunt Lilly’s bookmobile and half-wolf named No Barks, and dreams up yet another life plan. Painting her business card on the side of the van, Angel and her trusty companion set off on a pilgrimage across America hoping to jump-start her new profession: Native American Spiritual Consultant.

Traveling in the other direction, Ted Day and his trusty Irish Terrier-mix Argo are on a much needed vacation (and in need of spiritual nourishment). When he leaves Kansas, Ted can’t image how far from his sleepy law office that old silver and black Winnebago 32RQ Chieftain will take him.

Two lives (four if you count the canines) collide (literally). Once the dust settles, Ted and Angel find themselves enamored. Sensing that something bigger and more profound has been set in motion, the couple embarks on a wild road trip, detouring into some rarely traveled corridors of the human soul. Very soon, it becomes clear that nothing will ever be the same for these travelers, their dogs, and, heck, the world at large, too.

“Coming from the author of books such as A Dog Named Christmas and Christmas with Tucker,” Kincaid writes, “This new novel might at first blush sound like a de­parture for me. And yet, Angel and Ted’s journey throughout the Southwest reveals the themes at the heart of all my work: the ultimate questions of life and love, of companionship and overcoming the odds.”

GREG KINCAID, when not writing, is a practicing lawyer, specializing in divorce and family law mediation. He lives on a farm in eastern Kansas with his wife, three horses, two dogs, and two cats.

I am thankful to Blogging for Books for providing me with a free copy of Kincaid's novel to review. This is my first experience with any of Greg Kincaid's writing, so I had no preconceived notions of what this book would be like. Being on a spiritual journey or quest myself, the description given above from the publisher was enough to get me interested in reading the book.

Tantric Coconuts reads as a didactic piece on spiritual practice and growth couched in the form of a novel. Some of the passages between Angel and Ted (and the other spiritual gurus Ted is introduced to via Angel) felt a bit like a religious studies lecture in dialogue form. Readers will get a very basic viewpoint of Christianity, Islam and Buddhism from the point of view of someone who is a peace with finding the common themes in each religion. (I happen to fall into this camp myself, and so was not offended by this. Other readers who are fundamentally attached to a specific religion's doctrine may find these discussion hard to swallow.)

Having grown up in the upper Midwest, in Lakota territory, I was trying not to read any racism or stereotyping into the author's decision to make the spiritual guru a young, Lakota woman. I suppose it was simply a choice that set the spiritual guide/teacher outside of the realm of the majority of readers' personal experience/religious system.

I found Tantric Coconuts to be a quick and easy read. I was somewhat jealous of the swiftness of Ted Day's enlightenment journey and found myself wishing it could be that way in the real world. In real life most people spend decades doing the Work and still don't end up where Day and Two Sparrow land at the end. But that is the nature of reading fiction; one must suspend reality and live in the universe as created by the author.

I do highly appreciate Kincaid's inclusion of the background texts and sources used in taking Ted Day on this spiritual quest. There are several books listed in the footnotes that I plan to investigate further on my own.

If you find yourself questioning the meaning of life or whether or not there might be more to things than the conventional teachings from your background have to offer, jump in and enjoy the ride with Angel Two Sparrow and Ted Day aboard Bertha the Bookmobile!

The Banh Mi Handbook

I am very thrilled to have received a free review copy of Andrea Nguyen's beautiful new book, The Banh Mi Handbook! It is a feast for the eyes with some of the most gorgeous food photography I have seen.

Nguyen makes what may be a new food experience to some people accessible and inviting. I enjoyed the opening in which she gives readers a bit of background to her country and this particular culinary delight. (This is a part of cook books that I always appreciate!) She lets readers know from the start the types of ingredients which are typical to these Vietnamese sandwiches, and then breaks the chapters up according to the layers you would normally find included in a banh mi experience.

I love that Nguyen helps readers on each step of the journey toward building a perfect replica of the typical street fair. The photographs, which are all well lit and artistically composed, include pictures of some of the less familiar ingredients readers might be looking for at the store.(For instance the lemon grass used in one of the pickle recipes.)

Another small, but appreciated feature is Nguyen's tips on ways to use parts of the ingredients which might otherwise be overlooked. She suggests using the liquid from your homemade pickled vegetables as part of a dressing for salad--something many of us might not think to do. (What other uses for pickle juice have I been squandering all these years?!)

Because banh mi is an everyday, street vendor type food in Vietnam, the ingredients are fairly easy to come by. I was reassured that it will be possible for me to make the sandwiches in my own kitchen, and without spending a fortune to do so. (I love that she says the bread need only be what is readily available and least expensive at your local store!)

My only criticism of this book is that it left my mouth watering and my tummy grumbling.

If you like trying new cuisine and haven't had the pleasure of experiencing banh mi, you will love this book! If you have had the pleasure of eating the delectable sandwiches, you will love having this recipe collection so you can make your own!