Mailbox Monday

It's Mailbox Monday, a fun weekly meme sponsored by Marcia at The Printed Page.  Just as the post office or mailbox is a place to gather to share the news, this gives readers  a chance to share the books that came into their house last week.

This week spring fever took over...there were only two from the postman-and one from the big brown truck:

The first is a delightful children's book The Yellow Hummer by Ivet Graham-Morgan.  Although it focuses on holiday gift giving, the story is appropriate all year long. 
Jordan is looking forward to the big Christmas party where his mother works.  He is thrilled when he receives one of the gifts high on his wish list: A Yellow Hummer with a remote control.  When he gets home he shows it to his grandma who offers to help him free the remote from the heavy plastic wrapping.  Grannie is not wearing her glasses however, and mnages to cut through the cord for the remote, rendering it inoperable.  Jordan is crushed.  How he handles his anger, and how the adults in his life handle this unfortunate episode is beautifully portrayed. In the end, Jordan comes to understand that people and love are much more important than things.

This one is well-written, easy to read to young children, and would be a terrific addition any children's collection.

About the author:

Ivet Graham-Morgan has had fulfilling careers in education, banking and lawinforcement, but she has always been a writer at heart.  Finding herself in the role of single parent, she was unable to follow that career path until she reached her sunset years.  Now,k surrounded by her children and grandchildren, with the luxury of free time, Ivet has returned to her first love--writing....


Many thanks to the author for the opportunity to read and review this well done story.
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My latest Early Review Book from the Library Thing program: The Map of True Places by Brunonia Barry.  Author of  The Lace Reader, this is one I'm definitely eager to read.

Description: Zee Finch has come a long way from a motherless childhood spent stealing boats—a talent that earned her the nickname Trouble. She's now a respected psychotherapist working with the world-famous Dr. Liz Mattei. She's also about to marry one of Boston's most eligible bachelors. But the suicide of Zee's patient Lilly Braedon throws Zee into emotional chaos and takes her back to places she though she'd left behind.

What starts as a brief visit home to Salem after Lilly's funeral becomes the beginning of a larger journey for Zee. Her father, Finch, long ago diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, has been hiding how sick he really is. His longtime companion, Melville, has moved out, and it now falls to Zee to help her father through this difficult time. Their relationship, marked by half-truths and the untimely death of her mother, is strained and awkward.

Overwhelmed by her new role, and uncertain about her future, Zee destroys the existing map of her life and begins a new journey, one that will take her not only into her future but into her past as well. Like the sailors of old Salem who navigated by looking at the stars, Zee has to learn to find her way through uncharted waters to the place she will ultimately call home.

Many thanks to LibraryThing for the opportunity to read and review this one.
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A Captain's Duty by Richard Phillips.  This one I bought from Amazon for hubbie.  But when it arrived, and I thumbed through it, I told him he'd better read it quickly, because I wanted to have a chance to read it also.

Description from Amazon:

It was just another day on the job for fifty-three-year-old Richard Phillips, captain of the Maersk Alabama, the United States-flagged cargo ship which was carrying, among other things, food and agricultural materials for the World Food Program. That all changed when armed Somali pirates boarded the ship. The pirates didn't expect the crew to fight back, nor did they expect Captain Phillips to offer himself as hostage in exchange for the safety of his crew. Thus began the tense five-day stand-off, which ended in a daring high-seas rescue when U.S. Navy SEALs opened fire and picked off three of the captors.
"It never ends like this," Captain Phillips said.
And he's right.
A Captain's Duty tells the life-and-death drama of the Vermont native who was held captive on a tiny lifeboat off Somalia's anarchic, gun-plagued shores. A story of adventure and courage, it provides the intimate details of this high-seas hostage-taking--the unbearable heat, the death threats, the mock executions, and the escape attempt. When the pirates boarded his ship, Captain Phillips put his experience into action, doing everything he could to safeguard his crew. And when he was held captive by the pirates, he marshaled all his resources to ensure his own survival, withstanding intense physical hardship and an escalating battle of wills with the pirates. This was it: the moment where training meets instinct and where character is everything. Richard Phillips was ready.

Off to spend a fun week reading.  What was in your mailbox this week?