The Guardians by Andrew Pyper

In The Guardians, four friends have kept a terrible secret for many years. When one of them dies and the others are drawn back home to attend his funeral, history starts to repeat itself as the secret threatens to become exposed. Through a series of memory journal entries by Trevor, one of the four, the reader learns what happened to all those years ago that shaped the lives of the four friends and irrevocably haunted them.

I loved this book. I don't read that many ghost stories or haunted house stories, but I'm so glad I got to read this one. When Trevor was diagnosed with Parkinson's, his therapist suggested that he keep a diary of his memories to help cope with the disease. It's through those entries that the authors brings in the past events. I just love how this was done; it fit with the story so well and brought out the mystery at a nice pace. I also loved that the story wasn't just about a ghost or haunted house. The story was also about the tests of friendship, the triumph over adversity, secrets and mental illness.

I can't say that the book frightened me to the point where I couldn't keep reading. However, there were definitely some very creepy parts that sent shivers up my spine. I was particularly interested or intrigued by the glimpses of the mysterious boy that the friends saw from time to time.

The title "The Guardians" was very appropriate. That "guardian" theme ran throughout the book. There was the sports team on which the boys played in school, called The Guardians. The coach of that team was supposed to be their guardian, watch over the boys and guide their futures. Ben was also a guardian in that he had to keep watch on the house across the street. He did this to the point of insanity.

Favourite quotes:

Funny what the memory holds and what it decides it can do without. Like a drunk fisherman, it guts some of the least edible fish and tosses its prize catches back into the deep.(page 219)

Highly recommended. I hope to read many more books by this author. In fact, I have at least one of his other books currently on my bookshelf. I hope to get to it sooner rather than later.

For more information about this book, please visit the Random House website.

For more information about the author and his other books, please visit Andrew Pyper's website.

I'd like to thank those nice people at Random House for this review copy.

The Guardians by Andrew Pyper, Doubleday Canada (Random House), ©2011. ISBN 9780385663717(Hardcover), 354p.

Murder is a Family Business by Heather Haven

In Murder is a Family Business, Liana "Lee" Alvarez is a 34-year-old half-Latina and half-WASP private investigator. When the man she was following turns up dead, she sets out to find his killer while trying to convince the police that she had nothing to do with the crime. She's not alone in her tasks. There's also her mother, Lila, who's the CEO of Discretionary Inquiries Inc. and as feisty as they come and her slightly geeky and eccentric brother, Richard, who's employed by the company as the technical guy to help her out. Lee's lovable uncle Tio, an adorable kitten named Tugger and a handful of police officers round out the cast of characters.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a fun read with lots of humorous scenes. The mystery was pretty good and the characters were memorable. Haven does a lot of scene setting in this book as it's the first in a new series. She also spends lots of time introducing the characters and their relationships allowing the reader to get to know the characters really well. As far as the mystery goes, she kept me guessing right until the very end as to who the murder was.

As I said above the characters in the book are memorable. Liana/Lee is such a great character. She's not your typical PI either. She does her job while remaining glamorous in her high-priced wardrobe. For me, Tio and Tugger stole every scene they were in. Tio showed great compassion for both Liana and Tugger. I'd love to have him as my uncle. I also enjoyed reading about Lila, Liana's mother. She was feisty and fun to read about.

The only thing that bothered me about the book was the format in which I read it. The PDF format didn't enlarge well on my Sony Reader. The misaligned format threw off my reading rhythm. The book is quite short (183 pages), however it still took be awhile to read it because of this.

Recommended. I'd love to read the next book in the series.

For more information about this book or to purchase it, please visit the MuseItUp website. The book can also be purchased from Amazon.com.

For more information about the author and her book, please visit Heather's website or her her blog.

For more information about the virtual book tour, please visit the Pump Up Your Book website.

I'd like to thank Cheryl at Pump Up Your Book for this review copy.

Murder is a Family Business by Heather Haven, MuseItUp Publishing, ©2011. ISBN 9780986587597(eBook), 183p.

Hey, isn't this blog supposed to be about books?

Why, yes it is! Thanks for asking. As you can understand, this flood is dominating my conversations, thoughts and dreams. It's really hard getting back into reading, writing reviews and talking books with all of this water and worry surrounding me. Having said that I should have a review or two posted shortly with more to come, I hope.

A note to publishers/publicists/authors: I'm unable to take any more review books until I've cleared the backlog that's accumulated. As for the backlog, I'm am working through those books as quickly as I can. I hope you understand. If you have any concerns, please contact me directly at the email address on the contact tab.

Book Deliveries: For the few books that are already on the way, the couriers are not able to get through to our house as our driveway is still underwater. I have made arrangements with one of them (Purolator) to call me when a package shows up, but to date I haven't been contacted and have no idea if I will be. The other carriers were unable to make such arrangements. Any undeliverable book will most likely be sent back. :(

We have no idea how long our driveway will be impassable. Our mail delivery has been reliable (as far as we know) and as long as Canada Post doesn't strike I should be able to receive books that way.

Thanks for your understanding.

Flood Watch - 2011 - High Water Levels

I haven't posted in awhile, but we are still here....with the water surrounding our house and neighbourhood. The water level has been pretty much constant for a few weeks, only fluctuating a little here and there. It probably will only go down from here, but at a very slow rate.

We've actually been really lucky. We've had relatively few problems compared to others in the province and others in our own neighbourhood. Sure, our septic tank stopped working and had to be replaced and then our power went kaput, but all things considered we made out ok. Our sandbags are still well away from the water, which will make cleanup easier.

Having said all of that, it's still been very stressful. I'm very tired of it all and would like it if someone could just take all of this water away now.  Or better yet, take me away from here.  I'm thinking knight in shining armour on a white horse, but I'm not that picky.  Unfortunately, the water isn't going anywhere anytime soon. We just learned (from Twitter @rmcartier) that the high water level could be around for about 4 more weeks. All I can do is shake my head.

Before all of this started, we had contractors lined up to start some work on our house at the end of May/beginning of June. All of that has been postponed indefinitely. I had lots of plans for yard work/beautification to be completed this summer; again all of those plans have pretty much gone out the window. There are still a few things we can do, but lots of other stuff will have to wait until next year or cancelled all together. The major project this summer will be cleaning up sandbags and debris left behind from the receding river; all of that could take months. Our summer is too short as it is.

We do have one thing to look forward to....mosquitoes. They should be hatching in droves very shortly. With all of this standing water, I'm sure it's going to be mostly unbearable.

One more thing, anyone have a good recipe for carp? Along with the mallards, muskrat, beavers and assorted other creatures, we have a lot of them swimming around in our ditches and yards. That's another thing that'll have to be cleaned up when the time comes.

Here's a look at the backyard now that the leaves are starting to come out.  Isn't that river a lovely colour?  Yuck!  It doesn't smell that great either:

That is it for now.

Wordless Wednesday - Our transportation across flooded driveway

More Wordless Wednesday.

Flood Watch - 2011 - My Backyard - And on it goes

Yesterday, we finally had a day off from sandbagging. After many days, it was great to get some rest, but it was weird to not have to throw on my boots in the morning and slog across the water to get to command central and get the "assignment" for the day.

It was a pretty much quiet day and had it not been for our fluctuating power/telephone, it would have been more restful.

Fluctuating power? Yep, like we needed something else to worry about. The power started acting up Thursday afternoon. Only half the house was effected, so we could still plug a few things in, like the extremely important sump pumps, septic pump and water pump. We still had to do without heat or hot water (the power did come on overnight and briefly the next day) until yesterday when the electrician came back and strung a new main line (through chest high water), which will have to be trenched into the ground once the river recedes. BIG Cha-ching.

The electricians and Hydro figured that the mainline somehow got nicked. It could have been done when the geothermal was installed last year or when the flood proofing was done years ago. It sat like that until the water table came up with the rising flood waters. It wasn't caused by the flood directly, but the flood did make the problem show up.

I swear this is never going to end.

As I write this, the controlled release/breach is underway. For those out of the news area, the province has decided to deliberately cut through a section of the dike to relieve pressure downstream, where we are. The argument is that a controlled breach will flood an area much smaller than an uncontrolled one. Our area is not in the smaller inundation area, but it is in the larger one. For our sakes, I wish them luck.

A big thank you to the neighbours/volunteers who helped raise the dikes around our house and the few who helped move our freezer out of the basement! You guys are wonderful.

Flood Watch - 2011 - My Backyard - Still Here

Yesterday there was some good news and some bad news, but I'm not going to repeat any of it because it's confusing and seems to change by the minute. I can tell you that the military was sent to more at risk areas, so we can't rely on their help. I had mixed feelings about that. So far, though, we are still dry (relatively speaking)...that's the most important thing. The water level hasn't changed in days. We raised the dikes on many houses in the neighbourhood yesterday, including ours. There are more to be done today. It's long hard work and couldn't have been done without some fantastic volunteers. Thanks guys!

Lots of additional water will be coming our way shortly, hence the rise in dikes. How much is going to depend on some decisions made at the provincial government level and luck.

Once again anxiety is high, patience is thin and nerves are frayed. I hope it's not going to have lasting negative effects on our neighbourhood and the friends that we have made. For me, that would be almost as bad as a flooded basement.

I can't tell you how happy I'm going to be when I can start posting book reviews once again.  

Wish us luck.