Welcome to Mailbox Monday, the weekly meme created by Marcia, formerly from The Printed Page, where book lovers share the titles they received for review, purchased, or otherwise obtained over the past week. Mailbox Monday currently is on tour, and this month’s host is chaotic compendiums.
Here’s what I received over the past couple of weeks:
Spies and Prejudice by Talia Vance — from Egmont for review (Amazon/IndieBound)
Berry Fields has life under control. She’s top-notch surveillance expert in her dad’s investigation firm. She’s sworn off dating — especially Collin, the annoying football player who won’t leave her alone. She may finally be getting closer to answers about her mother’s death — was it suicide or something more sinister? But when arrogant — and gorgeous — Tanner Halston rolls into town, her world starts to unravel — especially after she overhears him telling his friend she’s “nothing amazing.” She’ll forget him, even hate him — but why does he seem connected to the questions about her mother’s death? And what exactly is Pemberley, the mysterious organization he’s a part of? Most important, can she ignore the crazy way she feels when Tanner looks into her eyes?
Riveting, sexy, and romantic, this is a twisty, edge-of-seat spy thriller written with an enticing nod to Jane Austen. (publisher’s summary)
Lauren Yanofsky Hates the Holocaust by Leanne Lieberman — from Saima Agency for review (Amazon/IndieBound)
Lauren Yanofsky doesn’t want to be Jewish anymore. Her father is a noted Holocaust historian, and her mother doesn’t understand why Lauren hates the idea of Jewish youth camps and family vacations to Holocaust memorials. But when Lauren sees some of her friends — including Jesse, a cute boy she likes — playing Nazi war games, she is faced with a terrible choice: betray her friends or betray her heritage.
Told with engaging humor, Lauren Yanofsky Hates the Holocaust isn’t simply about making tough moral choices. It’s about a girl caught up in the turmoil of bad-hair days, family friction, changing friendships, love — and, yes, the Holocaust. (publisher’s summary)
The Crooked Branch by Jeanine Cummins — from NAL for review (Amazon/IndieBound)
After the birth of her daughter, Emma, the usually resilient Majella finds herself feeling isolated and exhausted. Then, at her childhood home in Queens, Majella discovers the diary of her maternal ancestor Ginny — and is shocked to read a story of murder in her family history.
With the famine upon her, Ginny Doyle fled from Ireland to America, but not all of her family made it. What happened during those harrowing years, and why does Ginny call herself a killer? Is Majella genetically fated to be a bad mother, despite the fierce tenderness she feels for her baby? Determined to uncover the truth of her heritage and her own identity, Majella sets out to explore Ginny’s past — and discovers surprising truths about her family and, ultimately, about herself. (publisher’s summary)
Legacy of Rescue: A Daughter’s Tribute by Marta Fuchs — from Smith Publicity for review (Amazon/IndieBound)
Legacy of Rescue: A Daughter’s Tribute tells the story of the author’s father, Morton (Miksa) Fuchs, and Zoltan Kubinyi, the man who saved him and over 100 other Hungarian Jewish men during the Holocaust. Zoltan Kubinyi was a devout Seventh Day Adventist and a Hungarian army officer who was assigned to be the Commanding Officer of Morton Fuchs’ forced labor battalion in the last year of the war. A year later, as Germany was retreating, Zoltan Kubinyi received orders to march the Jewish men from Russia where they were working toward a concentration camp in Germany since they were no longer needed for the war effort. Instead he defied the Nazi orders and marched the men back into Hungary, arranging to have them hidden in farmhouses along the way. (from the publisher’s summary)
Georgiana Darcy’s Diary by Anna Elliott — a free ebook (Amazon)
Mr. Darcy’s younger sister searches for her own happily-ever-after…
The year is 1814, and it’s springtime at Pemberley. Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy have married. But now a new romance is in the air, along with high fashion, elegant manners, scandal, deception, and the wonderful hope of a true and lasting love.
Shy Georgiana Darcy has been content to remain unmarried, living with her brother and his new bride. But Elizabeth and Darcy’s fairy-tale love reminds Georgiana daily that she has found no true love of her own. And perhaps never will, for she is convinced the one man she secretly cares for will never love her in return. Georgiana’s domineering aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, has determined that Georgiana shall marry, and has a list of eligible bachelors in mind. But which of the suitors are sincere, and which are merely interested in Georgiana’s fortune? Georgiana must learn to trust her heart–and rely on her courage, for she also faces the return of the man who could ruin her reputation and spoil a happy ending, just when it finally lies within her grasp. (publisher’s summary)
Story of a Secret State by Jan Karski — from Georgetown University Press for review (Amazon/IndieBound)
Jan Karski’s Story of a Secret State stands as one of the most poignant and inspiring memoirs of World War II and the Holocaust. With elements of a spy thriller, documenting his experiences in the Polish Underground, and as one of the first accounts of the systematic slaughter of the Jews by the German Nazis, this volume is a remarkable testimony of one man’s courage and a nation’s struggle for resistance against overwhelming oppression.
Karski was a brilliant young diplomat when war broke out in 1939 with Hitler’s invasion of Poland. Taken prisoner by the Soviet Red Army, which had simultaneously invaded from the East, Karski narrowly escaped the subsequent Katyn Forest Massacre. He became a member of the Polish Underground, the most significant resistance movement in occupied Europe, acting as a liaison and courier between the Underground and the Polish government-in-exile. He was twice smuggled into the Warsaw Ghetto, and entered the Nazi’s Izbica transit camp disguised as a guard, witnessing first-hand the horrors of the Holocaust.
Karski’s courage and testimony, conveyed in a breathtaking manner in Story of a Secret State, offer the narrative of one of the world’s greatest eyewitnesses and an inspiration for all of humanity, emboldening each of us to rise to the challenge of standing up against evil and for human rights. This definitive edition — which includes a foreword by Madeleine Albright, a biographical essay by Yale historian Timothy Snyder, an afterword by Zbigniew Brzezinski, previously unpublished photos, notes, further reading, and a glossary — is an apt legacy for this hero of conscience during the most fraught and fragile moment in modern history. (publisher’s summary)
What books did you add to your shelves recently?
Disclosure: I am an IndieBound affiliate and an Amazon associate.
© 2013 Anna Horner of Diary of an Eccentric. All Rights Reserved. Please do not reproduce or republish content without permission.
The Crooked Branch looks really good; actually, all of them look good! Enjoy your reading week!
LikeLike
I love the mix of genres here. enjoy them all.
LikeLike
What a great mailbox! I love the cover of The Crooked Branch!
LikeLike
ALL your books look good. I hope the Yanofsky book is really funny. We need hilarious books once in a while to give some relief from all the serious ones we read.
LikeLike
I’m really curious to see how the author handles it.
LikeLike
The Crooked Branch really jumps out at me!
LikeLike
Ooh, lovely looking books! Especially The Crooked Branch. Enjoy….and thanks for sharing. Here’s MY MONDAY MEMES POST
LikeLike
The Story of a Secret State sounds absolutely riveting–I’ve been wanting to read a book like that for awhile, on WWII, first-hand account. I really liked Erik Larson’s In the Garden of Beasts, which I read a couple of years ago, and this sounds like it’s in the same vein.
Hope you enjoy it and your other books!
LikeLike
All of these books sound good and cover all ranges of emotion, sadness, hope, and excitement. Enjoy them Anna 🙂
LikeLike
Oh, The Crooked Branch looks interesting. Enjoy all your new reads!
LikeLike
What a wonderfully diverse haul of new books. I looking forward to hearing your thoughts on them. I had a bit of download binge from Amazon at the end of February! Here’s what’s new for me: http://thebookwormchronicles.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/whats-new-to-my-kindle/
LikeLike
Enjoy your new books 🙂
LikeLike
Can’t wait to see what you think of these, especially the darcy ones and the crooked branch
LikeLike
Great selection. I tweeted.
LikeLike
I think you can skip a trip to the library this week, Anna. Enjoy your new goodies!
LikeLike
Nice assortment. The Crooked Branch sounds like one I’d like. Have a great week.
LikeLike
The cover of Crooked Branch makes me want to read it!
LikeLike
Thank you all for stopping by to see my mailbox. Happy reading!
LikeLike