Today's Deals

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is Talking with My Mouth Full: My Culinary Career from Line Cook to Food Writer to Professional Eater ($1.99), by Gail Simmons.

Book Description
When Top Chef judge Gail Simmons first graduated from college, she felt hopelessly lost. All her friends were going to graduate school, business school, law school . . . but what was she going to do? Fortunately, a family friend gave her some invaluable advice—make a list of what you love to do, and let that be your guide. Gail wrote down four words:

Eat. Write. Travel. Cook.

Little did she know, those four words would become the basis for a career as a professional eater, cook, food critic, magazine editor, and television star. Today, she's the host of Top Chef: Just Desserts, permanent judge on Top Chef, and Special Projects Director at Food & Wine magazine. She travels all over the world, eats extraordinary food, and meets fascinating people. She's living the dream that so many of us who love to cook and eat can only imagine. But how did she get there?

Talking with My Mouth Full follows her unusual and inspiring path to success, step-by-step and bite-by-bite. It takes the reader from her early years, growing up in a household where her mother ran a small cooking school, her father made his own wine, and family vacation destinations included Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East; through her adventures at culinary school in New York City and training as an apprentice in two of New York's most acclaimed kitchens; and on to her time spent assisting Vogue's legendary food critic Jeffrey Steingarten, working for renowned chef Daniel Boulud, and ultimately landing her current jobs at Food & Wine and on Top Chef. The book is a tribute to the incredible meals and mentors she's had along the way, examining the somewhat unconventional but always satisfying journey she has taken in order to create a career that didn't even exist when she first started working toward it.

With memorable stories about the greatest (and worst) dishes she's eaten, childhood and behind-the-scenes photos, and recipes from Gail's family and her own kitchen, Talking with My Mouth Full is a true treat.

The Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK features two books today:

Maps for Lost Lovers ($1.59 / £0.99 UK), by Nadeem Aslam, is (the US edition is $11.99).

If Gabriel García Márquez had chosen to write about Pakistani immigrants in England, he might have produced a novel as beautiful and devastating as Maps for Lost Lovers. Jugnu and Chanda have disappeared. Like thousands of people all over Enland, they were lovers and living together out of wedlock. To Chanda’s family, however, the disgrace was unforgivable. Perhaps enough so as to warrant murder.As he explores the disappearance and its aftermath through the eyes of Jugnu’s worldly older brother, Shamas, and his devout wife, Kaukab, Nadeem Aslam creates a closely observed and affecting portrait of people whose traditions threaten to bury them alive. The result is a tour de force, intimate, affecting, tragic and suspenseful.

Dogs ($1.59 / £0.99 UK), by Emily Gravett, is (no US edition).

Gorgeous canines of every shape, size and colour are bounding through this irresistible book of opposites. Can you choose one dog to love best of all?

With playful pencil and watercolour illustrations to delight children and adults alike, everyone will long to bark along with the Chihuahua and tickle the Dalmatian's tummy. Emily Gravett has created another wonderfully satisfying book - with a twist in the tail.

Her Highness, the Traitor ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), by Susan Higginbotham, is the Nook Daily Find, price matched on Kindle.

Book Description
A daughter can be a dangerous weapon in the battle for the throne of England

Frances Grey harbored no dream of her children taking the throne. Cousin of the king, she knew the pitfalls of royalty and privilege. Better to marry them off, marry them well, perhaps to a clan like the Dudleys.

Jane Dudley knew her husband was creeping closer to the throne, but someone had to take charge, for the good of the country. She couldn't see the twisted path they all would follow.

The never–before–told story of the women behind the crowning of Jane Grey, this novel is a captivating peek at ambition gone awry, and the damage left in its wake.

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is Hope Solo: My Story ($1.99), by Hope Solo.

Book Description
Meet Hope Solo—Soccer Sensation

In this young readers' edition of Hope Solo's exciting life story, adapted from Solo: A Memoir of Hope, the Olympic gold medalist and starting goalkeeper for the U.S. women's national soccer team gives readers behind-the-scenes details of her life on and off the field. Solo offers a fearless female role model for the next generation, driven to succeed on her own terms. Young fans will truly be inspired by Hope's repeated triumphs over adversity. Her relentless spirit has molded her into the person she is today—one of the most charismatic athletes in America.

A huge player in the Summer 2012 Olympic Games, Hope shares her inside story in her own words, for soccer fans of all ages!

Cookbook Bargain Trio (K)

I was looking thru the cookbooks tonight and ran across a few interesting ones. I also noticed that the Cuisinart GR-4N 5-in-1 Griddler, which I love, has a $10 off coupon (click the button to clip it, to the right of the product picture, before adding to the cart), for those that might be interested. Our first one lasted over 10 years, before the plates wore out; it was cheaper to get a second one than add plates, since I found it on sale at Amazon one day. This has won a coveted spot next to the stove and stays out all the time. It gets used several times a week and it's not unusual to get used twice a day, for steaks, chicken, paninis, etc. The new one has pancake plates on the flip side of the regular griddler plates (also used regularly) and I've been considering getting the Waffle Plates (currently on sale), even though I have a perfectly good waffle iron -- not only is this appliance already out, that would let me run two waffles at once.

If you are a paper cookbook person, be sure to check out the "Black Friday" cookbook sale, which is still going on. Looks to be better than half-price on some interesting titles, including Sweet Vegan: A Collection of All Vegan, some Gluten-Free, and a Few Raw Desserts (under $9).

One Dish at a Time: Delicious Recipes and Stories from My Italian-American Childhood and Beyond ($4.99 Kindle), by Valerie Bertinelli. It's apparently higher for Canadians, but the same $4.99 on Google, for those there or with nooks. For those with iPads, there is an Audio/Video Edition, but it's nearly $15.

Book Description
More than 100 recipes for the Italian dishes of the much-beloved celeb’s childhood, presented with tips and hints for enjoying them without overindulging.

As a member of a large, food-loving Italian family, Valerie Bertinelli has always equated food with good times and togetherness. But at one point her love of food threatened not only her health, but her livelihood as an actress, when personal demons drove her to overeat and make poor food choices that caused her weight to balloon by 50 pounds. Now happily svelte, remarried, and riding a new career high, Valerie has made peace with food, giving it a central—yet considered—place in her home and family celebrations.

One Dish at a Time offers an intimate look into the beloved actress’s kitchen, where she prepares a collection of treasured recipes from her Italian heritage. Along the way, she shares her insights into the portion control and mindful indulgence she has come to practice on her journey to enjoying the pleasures of the table again.

Filled with gorgeous photos including the actress in her kitchen, nutrition information accompanying each recipe, and Valerie’s tips for maintaining a healthy lifestyle, One Dish at a Time is designed to please baby boomer fans and home cooks alike.

The Family Dinner: Great Ways to Connect with Your Kids, One Meal at a Time ($4.99 Kindle), by Laurie David and Kirstin Uhrenholdt

Book Description
The producer of An Inconvenient Truth, Laurie David's new mission is to help America's overwhelmed families sit down to a Family Dinner, and she provides all the reasons, recipes and fun tools to do so.

Laurie David speaks from her own experience confronting the challenges of raising two teenage girls. Today's parents have lots to deal with and technology is making their job harder than ever. Research has proven that everything we worry about as parents--from drugs to alcohol, promiscuity, to obesity, academic achievement and just good old nutrition--can all be improved by the simple act of eating and talking together around the table.

Laurie has written a practical, inspirational, fun (and, of course, green) guide to the most important hour in any parent's day. Chock-full chapters include: Over seventy-five kid approved fantastic recipes; tips on teaching green values; conversation starters; games to play to help even the shyest family member become engaged; ways to express gratitude; the family dinner after divorce (hint: keep eating together) and much more. Filled with moving memories and advice from the country's experts and teachers, this book will get everyone away from electronic screens and back to the dinner table.

The Olive and the Caper: Adventures in Greek Cooking ($2.51 Kindle), by Susanna Hoffman

Book Description
This is the year "It's Greek to me" becomes the happy answer to what's for dinner. My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the upcoming epic Troy, the 2004 Summer Olympics returning to Athens--and now, yet another reason to embrace all things Greek: The Olive and the Caper, Susanna Hoffman's 700-plus-page serendipity of recipes and adventure.

In Corfu, Ms. Hoffman and a taverna owner cook shrimp fresh from the trap--and for us she offers the boldly-flavored Shrimp with Fennel, Green Olives, Red Onion, and White Wine. She gathers wild greens and herbs with neighbors, inspiring Big Beans with Thyme and Parsley, and Field Greens and Ouzo Pie. She learns the secret to chewy country bread from the baker on Santorini and translates it for American kitchens. Including 325 recipes developed in collaboration with Victoria Wise (her co-author on The Well-Filled Tortilla Cookbook, with over 258,000 copies in print), The Olive and the Caper celebrates all things Greek: Chicken Neo-Avgolemeno. Fall-off-the-bone Lamb Shanks seasoned with garlic, thyme, cinnamon and coriander. Siren-like sweets, from world-renowned Baklava to uniquely Greek preserves: Rose Petal, Cherry and Grappa, Apricot and Metaxa.

In addition, it opens with a sixteen-page full-color section and has dozens of lively essays throughout the book--about the origins of Greek food, about village life, history, language, customs--making this a lively adventure in reading as well as cooking.

Today's Deals

Here's an update on the shipping status for the various Kindle models (all for US shipping):

• Kindle (in stock)
• Kindle Paperwhite (week of Dec 21)
• Kindle Paperwhite 3G (week of Dec 21)
• Kindle Keyboard 3G (in stock)
• Kindle Fire (1-2 weeks)
• 7" Kindle Fire HD (in stock)
• 8.9" Kindle Fire HD (week of Dec 3)
• 8.9" Kindle Fire HD with 4G LTE wireless (week of Dec 10)

Maria over at Bear Mountain Books is giving away some Mystery and Urban Fantasy Books and bookbags! She made sure to pick titles that are available on both Nook and Kindle (and in print, in case you don't e-read).

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is Slugs in Love ($1.99), by Susan Pearson and Kevin O'Malley (Illustrator) .

Book Description
Marylou loves everything about Herbie—how his slime trail glistens in the dark, how he can stretch himself thin to squeeze inside the cellar window, and how he always finds the juiciest tomatoes. But Marylou is a shy slug. How can she get Herbie to notice her? Find out how Marylou woos her beloved in this must-have love story that’s perfect for Valentine’s Day.

Grade Level: 1st and up

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is Dead Spots ($1.99), an urban fantasy novel by Melissa F. Olson; the companion audiobook is $5.49. I'll definitely be reading the sample on this one today.

Book Description
Scarlett Bernard knows about personal space: step within ten feet of her, and any supernatural spells or demonic forces are instantly defused—vampires and werewolves become human again, and witches can’t get out so much as a “hocus pocus.” This special skill makes her a null and very valuable to Los Angeles’s three most powerful magical communities, who utilize her ability to scrub crime scenes clean of all traces of the paranormal to keep humanity, and the LAPD, in the dark.

But one night Scarlett’s late arrival to a grisly murder scene reveals her agenda and ends with LAPD’s Jesse Cruz tracking her down to strike a deal: he’ll keep quiet about the undead underworld if she helps solve the case. Their pact doesn’t sit well with Dash, the city’s chief bloodsucker, who fears his whole vampire empire is at stake. And when clues start to point to Scarlett, it’ll take more than her unique powers to catch the real killer and clear her name.

Trojan Horse ($1.59 / £0.99 UK), by Mark Russinovich, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (the US edition is $11.99). I really liked the first in this series, Zero Day, when I read it last year (in paper, since the ebook is staying over $10).

Book Description
It's two years post-Zero Day, and former government analyst Jeff Aiken is reaping the rewards for crippling al-Qaida's attack on the computer infrastructure of the Western world. His cyber-security company is flourishing, and his relationship with Daryl Haugen intensifies when she becomes a part of his team.

But the West is under the East's greatest threat yet. The Stuxnet virus that successfully subverted Iran's nuclear defense program for years is being rapidly identified and defeated, and Stuxnet's creators are stressed to develop a successor.

As Jeff and Daryl struggle to stay together, they're summoned to disarm the attack of a revolutionary, invisible trojan that alters data without leaving a trace. As the trojan penetrates Western intelligence, the terrifying truth about Iran is revealed, and Jeff and Daryl find themselves running a desperate race against time to reverse it - while the fate of both East and West hangs in the balance.

Like Zero Day, Trojan Horse is a thrilling suspense story, a sober warning from one of the world's leading experts on cyber-security, Microsoft Technical Fellow Mark Russinovich. Trojan Horse demystifies the already common use of international cyber-espionage as a powerful and dangerous weapon, and the lengths to which one man will go to stop it.

Young House Love: 243 Ways to Paint, Craft, Update & Show Your Home Some Love ($2.99 B&N), by Sherry & John Petersik, is the Nook Daily Find; no Kindle edition, but you can subscribe to their blog.

Book Description
Design ideas for every style, skill level, and budget, from the beloved couple behind YoungHouseLove.com

This debut book by bloggers Sherry and John Petersik is filled with hundreds of fun, deceptively simple, budget-friendly ideas for sprucing up a home. With two home renovations under their (tool) belts, 5 million blog hits per month, and an ever-growing audience since the launch of Young House Love in 2007, Sherry and John are home-improvement enthusiasts primed to pass on a slew of projects, tricks, and techniques to do-it-yourselfers of all levels. Whether an experienced decorator or a total novice, on a tight budget or with money to spend, any homeowner or apartment dweller will find ideas for his or her own home makeovers here. Learn to trick out a thrift-store mirror, spice up plain old roller shades, "hack" your Ikea table to create three distinct looks, and so much more.

Packed with 243 tips and ideas-both classic and unexpected-every project pictured was exclusively executed for the book (so there are no photos that you've already seen on the blog). With more than 250 photographs and illustrations, this is a book that readers will return to again and again for the creative projects and easy-to-follow instructions in the relatable voice the Petersiks are known for. Adding a little wow factor to your home has never been more fun!

Today's Deals

Today is the last day to take advantage of this KSO deal:

• Get 1 of 10 Kindle Romances for $1

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy ($1.99), a Newberry Honor Book by Gary D. Schmidt.

Book Description
It only takes a few hours for Turner Buckminster to start hating Phippsburg, Maine. No one in town will let him forget that he's a minister's son, even if he doesn't act like one. But then he meets Lizzie Bright Griffin, a smart and sassy girl from a poor nearby island community founded by former slaves. Despite his father's-and the town's-disapproval of their friendship, Turner spends time with Lizzie, and it opens up a whole new world to him, filled with the mystery and wonder of Maine's rocky coast. The two soon discover that the town elders, along with Turner's father, want to force the people to leave Lizzie's island so that Phippsburg can start a lucrative tourist trade there. Turner gets caught up in a spiral of disasters that alter his life-but also lead him to new levels of acceptance and maturity. This sensitively written historical novel, based on the true story of a community's destruction, highlights a unique friendship during a time of change.

Grade Level: 5 and up

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is Devil's Bride ($1.99), the first novel in the Cynster series by Stephanie Laurens. The companion audiobook is $4.99.

Book Description
When Devil, the most infamous member of the Cynster family, is caught in a compromising position with plucky governess Honoria Wetherby, he astonishes the entire town by offering his hand in marriage. No one dreamed this scandalous rake would ever take a bride. And as society mamas swooned at the loss of England′s most eligible bachelor, Devil′s infamous Cynster cousins began to place wagers on the wedding date.

But Honoria wasn′t about to bend society′s demands and marry a man "just" because they′d been found together virtually unchaperoned. No, she craved adventure, and while solving the murder of a young Cynster cousin fit the bill for a while, she decided that once the crime was solved she′d go off to see the world. But the scalding heat of her unsated desire for Devil soon had Honoria craving a very different sort of excitement. Could her passion for Devil cause her to embrace the enchanting peril of a lifelong adventure of the heart?

Daughters for a Time ($1.59 / £0.99 UK), by Jennifer Handford, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (the US edition is $3.00).

Book Description
When Helen Francis was a child, her mother died and her father walked out, leaving her to be raised by her older sister. Now thirty-five, married, and trying to start a family of her own, Helen has moved on but never really healed from her traumatic childhood. She has always believed that a new baby would help fill the loss of what was taken from her at such a young age. After four years of trying to become pregnant, however, she is resigned to the fact that she will never be able to bear children. Halfheartedly accepting adoption as an alternative, Helen gradually embraces and grows excited over the prospect. And when her new baby is finally in her arms, true happiness washes over her. But her unimaginable bliss is dashed when she learns that Claire, the sister who raised and loved her throughout her childhood and adult life, has been diagnosed with cancer.

For Helen, the pain of her childhood returns and the old wounds of abandonment are once again torn open. Balancing the joy of her new daughter with the painful experience of watching her sister, the physical embodiment of unconditional love in her life, slowly die, Helen must reconcile her inner feelings and heal her broken spirit. A heart-wrenching exploration of the ties that bind us and the lasting pain of childhood loss,Daughters for a Time is about longing for a family to heal a broken heart, experiencing unconditional love as a parent, and finding solid ground to stand on when suffering and elation have equally powerful holds on our life.

Lethal Vintage ($10.44 $2.99 Kindle, B&N), the fourth title in Nadia Gordon's Sunny McCoskey Napa Valley series, is the Nook Daily Find; it isn't price matched on Kindle (yet), but Amazon has the better price on the third in the series, Murder Alfresco ($1.99). Hopefully it will drop on Amazon later today, so I can add it to the first three in the series in my library. Update: Now price matched on Kindle.

Book Description
In Lethal Vintage, the fourth installment in the Sunny McCoskey Napa Valley mystery series, an old friend calls Sunny for help dealing with her boyfriend, a hedge fund billionaire with a wine country estate fit for a king. Sunny joins her for what she thinks will be a day of girl talk and poolside sunbathing. Instead, a day of gustatory decadence turns into a night of scandal and debauchery culminating in murder. By morning, the police are pounding on doors, and Sunny is more than a witness she s a potential suspect. Sunny and her friends sous chef Rivka Chavez, winemaker Wade Skord, and valley wine merchant and bon vivant Monty Lenstrom offer an insider s take on the foodie culture of Napa as they try to help Sunny stay out of trouble. Steeped in good food, great wine, and plenty of summer heat, Lethal Vintage is a fun read for anyone who s ever wondered what goes on in those mansions above the vines.

Bargain Book Roundup (K)

French Classics Made Easy: More Than 250 Great French Recipes Updated and Simplified for the American Kitchen ($2.51), by Richard Grausman, might be the perfect gift for a Julia Child fan that doesn't have time to spend in the kitchen all day.

Book Description
Classic French food is hotter than ever. But one thing hasn’t changed—few of us have the time, the patience, the technique, or the cream and butter allowance to tackle the classics as presented by Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking. The good news is—we don’t need to. For the past 40 years Richard Grausman, America’s premier culinary teacher, has been training American chefs in a simpler, better way of French cooking, and in French Classics Made Easy—a refreshed and updated edition of his original collection, At Home with the French Classics—he shares all of his extraordinary innovations and techniques. Golden soufflés in ten minutes. A light and luscious chocolate mousse that can be made as a cake, a chocolate roll, soufflé, or pudding. Plus Cassoulet, Boeuf Bourguignon, Coq au Vin, Bouillabaisse, Poached Salmon with Beurre Blanc—in all, 250 impeccably clear, step-by-step recipes in range of anyone who knows how to boil water or dice an onion.

When a step isn’t critical, Grausman eliminates it. If something can be done in advance, he does it. Plus he’s cut the amount of butter, cream, egg yolks, salt, and sugar; the result is health-conscious recipes that don’t compromise the essential nature of the dish. Techniques are illustrated throughout in line drawings. It’s the grandness of French cuisine, made accessible for both entertaining and everyday meals.

Frozen Heat ($5.40), the latest novel by the television character Richard Castle, looks to be a price match to Google, so could go up at any time; I've had this one on my wish list for a while, so jumped at this price.

Book Description
Hot on the heels of Richard Castle's #1 New York Times bestseller Heat Rises comes the fourth novel in the Nikki Heat series, Frozen Heat. Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook are together again, facing an unsolved murder mystery that has haunted Nikki for ten years.

NYPD Homicide Detective Nikki Heat arrives at her latest crime scene to find an unidentified woman stabbed to death and stuffed inside a suitcase left on a Manhattan street. Nikki is in for a big shock when this new homicide connects to the unsolved murder of her own mother. Paired once again with her romantic and investigative partner, top journalist Jameson Rook, Heat works to solve the mystery of the body in the suitcase while she is forced to confront unexplored areas of her mother's background.

Facing relentless danger as someone targets her for the next kill, Nikki's search will unearth painful family truths, expose a startling hidden life, and cause Nikki to reexamine her own past. Heat's passionate quest takes her and Rook from the back alleys of Manhattan to the avenues of Paris, trying to catch a ruthless killer. The question is, now that her mother's cold case has unexpectedly thawed, will Nikki Heat finally be able to solve the dark mystery that has been her demon for ten years?

Wanted: Undead or Alive ($1.99), the twelfth novel in the Love at Stake series by Kerrelyn Sparks; you can also pick up the novella, A Very Vampy Christmas, for 99 cents (originally published in Sugarplums and Scandal), and the fifth in the series, All I Want for Christmas Is a Vampire, for $1.99, in case you missed it last time it was on sale, as well as put in a pre-order for the new anthology Vampires Gone Wild.

Book Description
He's a vampire from the big city . . .

Phineas McKinney thought New York City was tough, until he was attacked by Malcontents—evil vampires who consider mortals to be snacks. Saved by the good vampires, Phin swore to devote his now undead life to stopping the Malcontents. He's got his job cut out for him when word comes that their enemy may be hiding in Wyoming. What does a city boy like him know about horses and campfires? Good thing he's got Brynley Jones with him . . . if only she didn't hate every vampire on earth.

She's a werewolf princess . . .

Bryn believes vampires are seductive and charming, and that makes them dangerous. So she's more than a little annoyed about teaming up with Phin, even if he is the only bloodsucker able to make her inner wolf purr. But as they hunt down the new leader of the Malcontents, danger threatens . . . and Phineas and Brynley discover a passion that will rock the foundation of their supernatural world.

Forced to Kill ($1.99), the second novel in the Nathan McBride series by Andrew Peterson

Book Description
Trained Marine sniper Nathan McBride is the sole survivor of Montez de Oca, the brutal Nicaraguan interrogator who tortured countless souls to death before vanishing fourteen years ago. Though McBride’s body—as well as his soul—still bear the scars from the interrogator’s blade, he dares to hope the worst is behind him.

But when the FBI recovers a mutilated body from a remote Utah lake, McBride needs just one glimpse to know the truth: Montez de Oca has resurfaced, this time on American soil. And McBride will be damned if he lets him escape again. So begins a quest for justice that will push McBride to the edge, pitting his capacity for mercy against his hunger for vengeance in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse that will reach into the highest levels of the US government.

China Moon Cookbook ($2.51), by Barbara Tropp and Sandra Bruce (Illustrator); I sent a sample of this one to my Fire to look thru.

Book Description
The "Julia Child of Chinese cooking" (San Francisco Chronicle), Barbara Tropp was a gifted teacher and the chef/owner of one of San Francisco's most popular restaurants. She was also the inventor of Chinese bistro, a marriage of home-style Chinese tastes and techniques with Western ingredients and inspiration, an innovative cuisine that stuffs a wonton with crab and corn and flavors it with green chili sauce, that stir-fries chicken with black beans and basil, that tosses white rice into a salad with ginger-balsamic dressing.

Casual yet impeccable, and as balanced as yin and yang, these 275 recipes burst with unexpected flavors and combinations: Prawn Sandpot Casserole with Red Curry and Baby Corn; Spicy Tangerine Beef with Glass Noodles; Pizzetta with Chinese Eggplant, Wild Mushrooms, and Coriander Pesto; Chili-Orange Cold Noodles; Sweet Carrot Soup with Toasted Almonds; Wok-Seared New Potatoes; Crystallized Lemon Tart; and Fresh Ginger Ice Cream.

Winner of an IACP/Julia Child Cookbook Award.

Buy One Get One Free Audible Sale

Today (Nov 28) only, Audible is having a member only, Buy One Get One Free sale for those buying audiobooks using credits. There are 100+ books to choose from, sorted into five general categories; just add two at a time to the special cart and checkout, which will use a single credit.

Today's Deals

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is Promise Not to Tell ($1.99), by Jennifer McMahon.

Book Description
Forty-one-year-old school nurse Kate Cypher has returned home to rural Vermont to care for her mother who's afflicted with Alzheimer's. On the night she arrives, a young girl is murdered—a horrific crime that eerily mirrors another from Kate's childhood. Three decades earlier, her dirt-poor friend Del—shunned and derided by classmates as "Potato Girl"—was brutally slain. Del's killer was never found, while the victim has since achieved immortality in local legends and ghost stories. Now, as this new murder investigation draws Kate irresistibly in, her past and present collide in terrifying, unexpected ways. Because nothing is quite what it seems . . . and the grim specters of her youth are far from forgotten.

More than just a murder mystery, Jennifer McMahon's extraordinary debut novel, Promise Not to Tell, is a story of friendship and family, devotion and betrayal—tautly written, deeply insightful, beautifully evocative, and utterly unforgettable.

Whatever You Love ($1.59 / £0.99 UK), by Louise Doughty, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (the US edition is $7.99).

Book Description
Two police officers knock on Laura's door and her life changes forever. They tell her that her nine-year old daughter Betty has been hit by a car and killed. When justice is slow to arrive, Laura decides to take her own revenge and begins to track down the man responsible. Whatever You Love is a heart-wrenching novel of revenge, compulsion and desire from acclaimed novelist Louise Doughty.

Behind Closed Doors ($2.30 Kindle, $2.99 B&N), by Shannon McKenna, is the Nook Daily Find, better than price matched on Kindle (and about half what I paid last Spring).

Book Description
Surveillance expert Seth Mackey knows everything about the women his millionaire boss Victor Lazar toys with--and tosses aside. But Lazar's latest plaything, Raine Cameron, is different. Beautiful. Vulnerable. And innocent. Just looking at her triggers a white-hot passion Seth can barely control as night after night, he watches her on a dozen different video screens. Raine is pure temptation, but Seth can't slip up: he's convinced Lazar had his half-brother murdered. His secret investigation--and his life--are on the line. But then he finds out that Raine may be Lazar's next victim...

Raine knows she's being watched--but no one can see the secrets in her heart. She has reasons of her own to seek revenge on Victor Lazar, and she will, despite her fear--and the distracting presence of Seth Mackey. His fiercely masculine good looks and animal sensuality stir her most erotic fantasies when she's alone...and lead her to a bold plan. Offering her body to him, surrendering totally to his ruthless desire, might well push her beyond all emotional limits--and beyond fear itself.

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is A Dragon Moves In ($1.99), by Lisa Falkenstern.

Book Description
Rabbit and Hedgehog are having a picnic when... RUMBLE! CRACK! The egg Rabbit’s sitting on hatches. Out comes a baby dragon! Rabbit and Hedgehog take him home. They have lots of fun... until the baby dragon starts to grow. And Grow. And GROW! The artwork rendered in oil on board gives a classic touch to this appealing story.

Grade Level: 1st and up

Music Deals

Holiday MP3 Album deals (some may be repeats)

• Christmas Piano Masterpieces, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• Christmas Hymns & Carols, by Christian Faith Singers & Orchestra ($0.99)
• Big Christmas Box, by Vanguard Classics ($0.99; 13+ hours classical)
• The 99 Most Essential Christmas Piano, by X5 Music Group($0.99)
• 99 Must-Have Christmas Meditation Classics, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• Christmas Pickins: A Banjo Christmas, by Lifestyles Records ($1.29)
• Celtic Christmas, by Celtic Christmas($1.99)
• The 99 Most Essential Christmas Masterpieces (Amazon Exclusive), by Various artists ($1.99)
• Gregorian Christmas, by CantArte Regensburg & Hubert Velten ($1.99)
• Christmas With The Mormon Tabernacle Choir ($2.99)
• 99 Must-Have Christmas Classics, by Cobra Entertainment ($3.99)
• Christmas In The Sand, by Colbie Caillat ($3.99)
• Christmas with Scotty McCreery ($3.99)
• A Blue Collar Christmas, by Slidawg And The Redneck Ramblers ($5.49; as you can guess from the cover, this one is non-traditional)
• 100% Christmas - The Greatest Artists 100 Hits, by Vista Music ($5.99)
• NOW Today's Christmas, by Various artists ($5.99)
• 75 Christmas Songs Remembering Children's Favourites and Junior Choice for Kids of All Ages (Some Weird and Wacky!), by Various artists ($5.99)

And some not-so-holiday bargain albums

• Healing Piano Music for Massage, Meditation, Reiki, 7 Chakras, Relaxation & Better Sleep, by Steven Cravis ($0.99; listen while practicing with today's free book!)
• The Most Relaxing Classical Music in the Universe, by DENON Classics($0.99)
• 50 Must-Have Beethoven Masterpieces, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• 50 Must-Have Strauss Family Masterpieces, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• 50 Must-Have Handel Masterpieces, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• 50 Must-Have Tchaikovsky Masterpieces, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• 100 Must-Have Waltz & Dance Classics, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• Orchestral Suites, by Cobra Entertainment ($0.99)
• Brandenburg Concertos, by Berlin Chamber Orchestra & Peter Wohlert ($0.99)
• St. John's Passion, by Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra ($0.99)
• St. Matthew's Passion, by Jeunesses Musicales Chorus ($0.99)
• Thanksgiving - Great Chrisitian Hymns Collection, by Christian Gospel Choir ($0.99)
• 40 Must-Have Favorite Hymns: I Stand Amazed, by Christian Gospel Choir ($0.99)
• A Salute to America, by 101 Strings Orchestra ($1.89)
• 50 Must-Have Violin Concertos, by Cobra Entertainment ($1.99)
• Meditation: Classical Relaxation, by Cobra Entertainment ($1.99)
• Big Gustav Leonhardt Box The Bach Guild Recordings 1952-1955, by Gustav Leonhardt ($2.79; 8+ hrs, 144 selections)
• 100 Must-Have Piano Concertos, by Cobra Entertainment ($2.99)

Be sure to check for any credits, now and then - Amazon is giving away Movie Credits for those with prime that let their items ship slower than 2-day and also MP3 credits with various items, including many Kindle accessories.

Now, if only 100 Christmas Blues - Songs to Get You Through the Cold would drop in price...

Today's Deals

It's CyberMonday, but try to remember to do a little work in between the shopping!

Today Only, Amazon has the Kindle Fire (not HD) for $129 ($30 off); enter coupon code FIREDEAL during checkout (no one-clicking). Limit one per customer/account. Be sure to order the charger at the same time (see box at top/right of product page), so you get it for half off.

Amazonlocal has another Kindle deal today: a voucher for 30% off all Kindle accessories. As before, you have to check out at Amazonlocal, but won't be charged. Then wait for your voucher code to be ready and enter it during checkout.

Tantor managed to get their servers rebooted and now has a $4.99 sale on ALL downloaded audiobooks! No codes, nearly 2,000 choices.

Kobo has an 80% off coupon for all Open Road titles and it appears to be good more than once: 80Cyber . If you manage to get thru that list, then you can use 50Cyber for 50% off selected non-agency titles.

O'Reilly has 50% off on All Ebooks & Videos and 60% on orders greater than $100; use discount code CYBERDAY. Print books not included

Mundania Press, originally set up to print some of Piers Anthony's non-traditionally published works, but now with a large author selection, is having a 50% off sale which ends today. Use coupon code BLACKFRIDAY during checkout.

Samhain Publishing has a 40% off Cyber Monday sale using the coupon code CYBERMONDAY.

Today only, get a 50% rebate on ALL eligible titles at Allromance & Omnilit (including HarperCollins titles).

ChiZine Publication is running a 50% off sale for a large portion of their catalog. Sale prices are shown in red, no coupon needed.

B&N is giving away a $20 gift card with purchase of select Nook devices (if you use Mastercard). If you don't mind a refurbished unit, 1SaleaDay has the nook tablet for $99 (their 2nd gen unit).

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is Girl's Best Friend ($1.99), by Leslie Margolis.

Book Description
Dogs are disappearing in her neighborhood, and Maggie Brooklyn Sinclair knows all about it. After all, she has a semi-secret after-school gig as a professional (ok, amateur) dog-walker. Maggie hates to see a pup in trouble, so she's even willing to help her ex-best friend Ivy recover her rescue-dog, Kermit. Kermit's being held for ransom, and Maggie has noticed some suspicious behavior lately. But she never suspected her crush Milo could be involved . . .

Leslie Margolis's pitch-perfect voice and rich characters have endeared her to tweens, and her fans will flock to this hip new series featuring a clever and lovable new heroine, Maggie Brooklyn.

Grade Level: 3 and up

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is Save 80% or More on Kindle Books, with thousands included. It looks like Open Road, at the least, with many prices comparable (but often a bit higher) than the Kobo prices, using the coupon above (and Amazon keeps adding books and has done some price matching). There are way to many to list, so click the link and explore by genre. I know I will be (and I'll need a new gift certificate, I can tell already).


The Pure ($1.19 / £1.91 UK), by Jake Wallis Simons, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (no US edition).

Book Description
Buckle up… there’s a new Bourne in town. The time is now. The place is London. Meet Uzi, a disaffected, deadly ex-Mossad agent with revenge on his mind. When he gives details of a top-secret Israeli assassination operation to WikiLeaks, he makes himself a sworn enemy of the Mossad. But a mysterious, sexy woman known as Liberty is becoming strangely interested in him. Meanwhile, Iran is getting ever closer to building a nuclear weapon . . . What follows threatens to change the power balance of the Middle East and endanger the security of the world. The Pure is a high-octane, action-packed, adrenaline-pumping espionage thriller. Read it. Now.

In the Woods ($2.99 Kindle, B&N), the first title in Tana French's Dublin Murder Squad series, is the Nook Daily Find, price matched on Kindle, where the companion audiobook is $3.95 or $4.95 on Audible's current sale, even without buying the Kindle book first.

Book Description
As dusk approaches a small Dublin suburb in the summer of 1984, mothers begin to call their children home. But on this warm evening, three children do not return from the dark and silent woods. When the police arrive, they find only one of the children gripping a tree trunk in terror, wearing blood-filled sneakers, and unable to recall a single detail of the previous hours.

Twenty years later, the found boy, Rob Ryan, is a detective on the Dublin Murder Squad and keeps his past a secret. But when a twelve-year-old girl is found murdered in the same woods, he and Detective Cassie Maddox—his partner and closest friend—find themselves investigating a case chillingly similar to the previous unsolved mystery. Now, with only snippets of long-buried memories to guide him, Ryan has the chance to uncover both the mystery of the case before him and that of his own shadowy past.

Richly atmospheric, stunning in its complexity, and utterly convincing and surprising to the end, In the Woods is sure to enthrall fans of Mystic River and The Lovely Bones. And look for French's new mystery, Broken Harbor, for more of the Dublin Murder Squad.

Audiobooks Sales

Audible has 100 Audiobooks on sale for $4.95 apiece (it's likely limited just to those with subscriptions). So long as the "regular" price shown on them is over $14.95, these will count towards your Buy 4, get $10 Listening Rewards for the month, too.

Blackstone Audio is moving their retail site to a new domain, Downpour.com; they have several sales going on, with some classics up to 90% off and over 200 more audiobooks at 40% off.

Tantor Media is also having a 50% off sale this weekend, but currently their server is down. Hopefully they'll get it back up by later this evening.

Get a Holiday MP3 Album for $1.99

Thru Tuesday, or until they sell out, you can get a Free Voucher to Purchase One Top Holiday Title for $1.99 on Amazon MP3 at AmazonLocal. You do have to go thru a "purchase", which means having a credit card on file, but you aren't charged for the voucher itself. Once your voucher is ready, you open it (at AmazonLocal), apply it to your account, then go shopping for one of the eligible titles in the Amazon MP3 store. Click to buy the MP3 album and you'll only be charged $1.99.

Various rules apply, including that your must be a US customer at Amazon and the voucher expires if not used by Dec 2.

If you wish to give an album as a gift, the credit will be applied; you can see it on the very last page before you finalize the order (unlike with book gifts, any gift balance is used first). I also suggest you first check your credit balance in the MP3 store (you can do this on any song or album, there is a link just under the buy button) and use up any existing credits first, so that they don't try to mix with the voucher. I've had trouble with this in the past and had to get Amazon involved in order to get my credits back.

Today's Deals

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is My Mother Was Nuts ($1.99), by Penny Marshall; the companion audiobook is $4.99.

Book Description
Most people know Penny Marshall as the director of Big and A League of Their Own. What they don’t know is her trailblazing career was a happy accident. In this funny and intimate memoir, Penny takes us from the stage of The Jackie Gleason Show in 1955 to Hollywood’s star-studded sets, offering up some hilarious detours along the way.My Mother Was Nuts is an intimate backstage pass to Penny’s personal life, her breakout role on The Odd Couple, her exploits with Cindy Williams and John Belushi, and her travels across Europe with Art Garfunkel on the back of a motorcycle. We see Penny get married. And divorced. And married again (the second time to Rob Reiner). We meet a young Carrie Fisher, whose close friendship with Penny has spanned decades. And we see Penny at work with Tom Hanks, Mark Wahlberg, Whoopi Goldberg, Robert De Niro, and Whitney Houston.Throughout it all, from her childhood spent tap dancing in the Bronx, to her rise as the star of Laverne & Shirley, Penny lived by simple rules: “try hard, help your friends, don’t get too crazy, and have fun.” With humor and heart, My Mother Was Nuts reveals there’s no one else quite like Penny Marshall.

Taliban ($1.91 / £1.19 UK), by Ahmed Rashid, is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK (the US edition is $9.99).

Book Description
The American bombing of terrorist bases in Afghanistan under the protection of the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban movement has brought the Taliban into sharp focus as the most radical and extreme Islamic movement in the world today. Little is known about the Taliban because of the deep secrecy that surrounds their political movement, their leaders and their aims.

The geo-strategic implications of the Taliban are already creating severe instability in Russia, Iran and the five Central Asian republics where the Taliban have become a major player in the new Great Game, as Western countries and companies compete to build oil and gas pipelines from Central Asia to Western and Asian markets.

The Taliban's implementation of their extreme interpretation of Islam poses new challenges to the Muslim world and the West’s understanding of radical Islam in the post-Cold War era.

Cake Pops: Tips, Tricks, and Recipes for Irresistible Mini Treats ($9.99 $2.99 Kindle, B&N), by Bakerella, is the Nook Daily Find. Update: Now price matched on Kindle.

Book Description
What's cuter than a cupcake? A cake pop, of course! Wildly popular blogger Bakerella (aka Angie Dudley) has turned cake pops into an international sensation! Cute little cakes on a stick from decorated balls to more ambitious shapes such as baby chicks, ice cream cones, and even cupcakes these adorable creations are the perfect alternative to cake at any party or get-together. Martha Stewart loved the cupcake pops so much she had Bakerella appear on her show to demonstrate making them. Now Angie makes it easy and fun to recreate these amazing treats right at home with clear step-by-step instructions and photos of more than 40 featured projects, as well as clever tips for presentation, decorating, dipping, coloring and melting chocolate, and much more.

Today's Kindle Kids Daily Deal is Three "Horrid Henry" Books by Francesca Simon for $0.99 apiece.

Francesca Simon is one of the world's best-loved children's authors and winner of the Galaxy Book Award in the United Kingdom. Each book in her best-selling Horrid Henry chapter book series contains four easy-to-read stories with hilarious illustrations by Tony Ross, and today only they're just $0.99 each (80% off).

Grade Level: 2 and up

Horrid Henry

Horrid Henry and his neighbor Moody Margaret decide to make the most sloppy, slimy, sludgy, sticky, smelly, gooey, gluey, gummy, greasy, gloppy glop possible. Is it the best glop in the world or the worst thing that's ever happened to them? Plus three other stories so funny we can't even mention them here.

Horrid Henry's Underpants

Horrid Henry makes a deal with his parents in return for eating his veggies; accidentally wears girls' underwear to school; tries to prove he is sicker than his brother; and writes the meanest thank-you cards ever (and makes money on it too)

Horrid Henry Rocks

Henry is up to his usual mischief: annoying his younger brother, ruining Moody Margaret's sleepover, and irritating his teacher, Mrs. Battleaxe-not to mention trying to manipulate his family into seeing his favorite band-the Killer Boy Rats.

Good Deals via Google (and Amazon)

There are several good Black Friday deals in the Google Play store, from music to apps/games to books. Music will work on any device (although it's a bit tricky to download them from Google; they would much rather have you upload your music to them than download and play your tunes somewhere else), but games are limited to devices with access to the Google store, which leaves out (unrooted) Kindle Fires and Nook tablets. Their books are in EPUB format, so can be read on the Fire using an app like Aldiko or side-loaded onto your nook devices. Kindle users, though, will find price matches on many of the items on sale -- I just troll thru the Google sale, then bounce back to Amazon's Appstore, MP3 Store or Kindle store and check for a price match on the ones that are interesting. Below, I've highlighted some of the deals I've found.

In the Google Music store, there are three playlists of free MP3's from Antenna, Stone Records and FILTER Magazine. There is no real equivalent at Amazon, which is a shame, since Google forces you to buy one song at a time (about 4-5 clicks and you must have a credit card on file, even for free songs).

On the Android side, you can go thru the complete list of the apps on sale on Google, but you'll definitely want to check out Quickoffice Pro ($0.99 Amazon, Google) and OfficeSuite Professional 6 ($4.99 Amazon, $6.99 Google), to see if they are compatible with your devices. The Full Version Key for DocumentsToGo is also on sale in both stores ($8.99), if you missed getting this free from Amazon last year (which I don't expect to ever repeat, now that so many more Fire devices have been sold). Be sure that the DocumentsToGo Main App is running on your device first, before buying the key. I definitely give the edge to Amazon on this one, as the app runs on all my devices, including my phone, while Google's is limited to my phone and one tablet.

One of the sale items that Amazon didn't price match is My Diet Coach - Pro ($2.99 Amazon, $0.99 Google), which you might want on your phone, anyway, rather than a Kindle device (although if you get in from Amazon, it will work on both). If free is more your style, be sure to check out Nun Attack (Google only), which looks like it might be fun. There are several Gameloft games discounted to 99 cents (usually $6.99), mostly matched at Amazon (who actually has some on sale that aren't on sale at Google), but be sure to check out which ones work on which devices (some at Google are restricted to my phone, while the Kindle version might only work on the 8.9" Fire HD), although at these prices, you can afford to grab both editions:

• BackStab HD
• The Amazing Spider-Man
• N.O.V.A. 3 - Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance
• Gangstar Rio: City of Saints
• Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Shadow Vanguard
• The Adventures of Tintin ($4.99 Kindle, 99 cents Google

I'm also grabbing the Roku Remote app ($0.99 on sale from Google; $2.99 Amazon), to run on a Galaxy Tab that I'm setting up as a universal remote (I hope, anyway -- my existing remote won't do bluetooth and my TV doesn't do IR). Since Amazon's isn't on sale, I'll hold off buying it (although it works with all my devices), unless it drops to 99 cents there, too.

You don't want to miss The Icerigger Trilogy: Icerigger, Mission to Moulokin, and The Deluge Drivers ($2.00 Kindle, Google), by Alan Dean Foster (Open Road) while it's marked down this low.

Book Description
Stranded on a frozen and remote planet, Ethan Frome Fortune searches for a way back to civilization

Icy, desolate, and sharply carved by hurricane-force winds, Tran-ky-ky is a terrible place to crash-land. But a botched kidnapping aboard the interstellar transport Antares sends Ethan Frome Fortune and a handful of his fellow travelers tumbling toward the stormy planet. Stranded and cut off from civilization, the castaways struggle to survive.

In this page-turning trilogy, Fortune confronts vicious predators (even the plants want to make a meal of him) and forges an alliance with a native Tran. As he searches for a way off Tran-ky-ky, he helps the Tran gain admission to the Humanx Commonwealth and learns about their troubled history. Just as Fortune accepts that he’ll never escape the harsh planet and acclimates to its relentless winter, he learns that scientists have detected rising temperatures in the atmosphere. This sinister change leads Fortune to a thrilling and unexpected final adventure.

All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Bright and Beautiful, and All Things Wise and Wonderful: Three James Herriot Classics ($6.00 Kindle, Google), by James Herriot, is only a penny more than the lowest price I've seen for it, when I grabbed it at the end of November, last year.

Book Description
Timeless stories from a country veterinarian about the animals and people that shape life in a sleepy English town

Perhaps better than any other writer, James Herriot reveals the ties that bind us to the natural world. Collected here are three of his masterpieces—All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Bright and Beautiful, and All Things Wise and Wonderful—which have been winning over animal lovers everywhere for almost fifty years. From his night visits to drafty barns during freezing northern England winters, to the beautiful vitality of rural life in the summertime, to the colorful menagerie of animals—and their owners—that pass through his office, Herriot vividly evokes the daily challenges and joys that come with being a veterinarian.

Witty and heartwarming, these classic books also feature an original introduction from the author’s son, Jim Wight, and bonus archival photos courtesy of the Herriot estate.

The Mysteries of Pittsburgh ($3.00 Kindle, Google), by Michael Chabon

Book Description
Chabon’s sensational debut novel: the coming-of-age story of Art Bechstein, a recent graduate whose life is forever changed by one sultry summer

Art Bechstein may be too young to know what he wants to do with his life, but he knows what he doesn’t want: the life of his father, a man who laundered money for the mob. Bechstein spends the summer after his graduation from a Pittsburgh university searching for his future and finding his own sort of trouble with brilliant and seductive new friends—erudite, unscrupulous Arthur Lecomte, mercurial Phlox, and Cleveland, a poetry-reciting biker.

Insightful and energetic, The Mysteries of Pittsburg beautifully renders the hard edges of a blue-collar city and the charm of its local characters.

This ebook features a biography of the author.

Wyoming Fierce ($1.60 Kindle, Google), by Diana Palmer

Book Description
Ranch owner Cane Kirk lost more than his arm in the war. He lost his way, battling his inner demons by challenging any cowboy unfortunate enough to get in his way. No one seems to be able to cool him down, except beautiful Bodie Mays. Bodie doesn't mind saving Cane from himself, even if he is a little too tempting for her own peace of mind.

But soon Bodie's the one who finds herself in need of rescuing—only, she's afraid to tell Cane what's really going on. How can she trust someone as unpredictable as this fierce cowboy? When her silence only ends up getting her into even deeper hot water, it's up to Cane to save the day. And if he does it right, he won't be riding off into the sunset alone.

How to Tell If Your Cat Is Plotting to Kill You ($2.00 Kindle, Google), by The Oatmeal

Book Description
Jesus Rollerblading Christ--another helping of TheOatmeal! Mrow, MOAR kitty comics. Mr. Oats delivers a sidesplitting serving of cat comics in his new book, How to Tell If Your Cat Is Plotting to Kill You.

If your cat is kneading you, that's not a sign of affection. Your cat is actually checking your internal organs for weakness. If your cat brings you a dead animal, this isn't a gift. It's a warning. How to Tell If Your Cat Is Plotting to Kill You is a hilarious, brilliant offering of cat comics, facts, and instructional guides from the creative wonderland at TheOatmeal.com.

How to Tell If Your Cat Is Plotting to Kill You presents fan favorites, such as "Cat vs. Internet," "How to Pet a Kitty," and "The Bobcats," plus 17 brand-new, never-before-seen cat jokes. This Oatmeal collection is a must-have from Mr. Oats!

See Google's full list of book deals up to 80% off.

No guarantee on how long the sale will last, but I don't expect it to survive past Monday (if then; Google might bring out a new sale for CyberMonday).

Today's Deals

Get 35% off eligible titles at Sony this weekend with coupon code NOVEMBER35 (apply to account before buying book).

She Wore Only White ($1.57 / £0.99 UK), by Dörthe Binkert and Lesley Schuldt (Translator), is the Kindle Deal of the day for those in the UK and an Amazon exclusive translation from their AmazonCrossing publishing imprint. The US edition is $1.99, so be sure to check this one out!

Book Description
At the turn of the twentieth century, five thousand people a day arrived at New York’s Ellis Island, their journeys to America signifying a new beginning. But the ocean crossing also has a deeper symbolic meaning: there comes a time for us all when we find ourselves afloat, between phases of our lives, where we say goodbye to our past and move on to new horizons.

For Valentina Meyer, harboring a deep secret of tremendous guilt and pain drives her to board a trans-Atlantic voyage as a stowaway, searching desperately for a new life on a distant shore. Accompanying her is a varied cast of eccentric and unique individuals, each in search of a new and better life. Finding solace—even love—in the companionship of their fellow guests, their arrival in America puts an abrupt end to their camaraderie as Valentina’s future is immediately put in jeopardy. A probing, affecting exploration of the hidden corners of the human heart, She Wore Only White is literature at its finest.

Heart of Ice ($3.99 Kindle, B&N), the third novel in the Triple Threat series by Lis Wiehl, is the Nook Daily Find, price matched on Kindle, where you can also pick up the companion audiobook for $4.99.

Book Description
Elizabeth Avery could easily be the girl next door. But what she has planned will make your blood run cold.

At first glance, the crimes appear random. Arson. Theft. Fraud. Murder. But these are more than random crimes. They’re moves in an increasingly deadly game. And the one element they have in common: a woman who is gorgeous, clever . . . and lethal.

Elizabeth Avery has a winsome smile and flawless figure, but underneath is a heart of ice. She’s a master manipulator, convincing strangers to do the unthinkable. And she orchestrates it all without getting too close. Until now.

When Elizabeth ruthlessly disposes of an inquisitive young reporter, her crime catches the attention of Federal Prosecutor Allison Pierce, FBI Special Agent Nicole Hedges, and crime reporter Cassidy Shaw. They know they’re dealing with a cold-blooded murderer who could strike at any time. What they don’t know is that they’re already on a first-name basis with the killer.

And one of them may be next on her list.

Today's Kindle Teen Daily Deal is Stolen ($1.99), by Vivian Vande Velde.

Book Description
The same day that the villagers of Thornstowe finally hunt down a witch with a reputation for stealing children, a 12-year-old appears in the woods with no memory of her past. Is there a connection between Isabelle, the girl who doesn’t know who she is, and the girl the witch stole six years earlier? One of the few things Isabelle remembers is a chant that keeps running through her head:

Old as dirt,
dirty as dirt.
Ugly as sin,
mean as sin.

Don’t let the old witch catch you!

Could Isabelle have been stolen by the old witch of the woods, or has she lost her memory as the result of an accident? And what about the baby the witch stole right before the villagers attacked? Did either the witch or the baby survive the fire the villagers set?

"Isabelle heard no sound beyond the faintest shivering of leaves in a gentle breeze. No sound of pursuit. But surely something was wrong, or she would know who and where she was. So she resumed running. But it wasn’t as effortless as before. Her worry weighed her down as she tried to list the things she knew—and found the list of things she didn't know longer by far."

Grade Level: 5th and up

Today's Kindle Daily Deal is 14 Kurt Vonnegut Books for $1.99 apiece, all RosettaBooks editions. I planned to fill in my library with this sale, but found I had all but one of them, already. I also picked up Sucker's Portfolio last night (good timing, right?), a collection of his previously unpublished writing that is being released in serial form ($2.99).

Welcome to the Monkey House

This short-story collection Welcome to the Monkey House (1968) incorporates almost completely Vonnegut's 1961 "Canary in a Cathouse," which appeared within a few months of Slaughterhouse-Five and capitalized upon that breakthrough novel and the enormous attention it suddenly brought.

Drawn from both specialized science fiction magazines and the big-circulation general magazines (Saturday Evening Post, Colliers, etc.) which Vonnegut had been one of the few science writers to sell, the collection includes some of his most accomplished work. The title story may be his most famous--a diabolical government asserts control through compulsory technology removing orgasm from sex--but Vonnegut's bitterness and wit, not in his earlier work as poisonous or unshielded as it later became, is well demonstrated.

Two early stories from Galaxy science fiction magazine and one from Fantasy & Science Fiction (the famous "Harrison Bergeron") show Vonnegut's careful command of a genre about which he was always ambivalent, stories like "More Stately Mansions" or "The Foster Portfolio" the confines and formula of a popular fiction of which he was always suspicious. Vonnegut's affection for humanity and bewilderment as its corruption are manifest in these early works.

Several of these stories (those which appeared in Collier's) were commissioned by Vonnegut’s Cornell classmate and great supporter Knox Burger, also born in 1922.

God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater

God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater is a comic masterpice. Eliot Rosewater, drunk, volunteer fireman, and president of the fabulously rich Rosewater foundation, is about to attempt a noble experiment with human nature... with a little help from writer Kilgore Trout. The result is Vonnegut's funniest satire, an etched-in-acid portrayal of the greed, hypocrisy, and follies of the flesh we are all heir to.

Bluebeard

Bluebeard, published in 1987, is Vonnegut's meditation on art, artists, surrealism, and disaster. Meet Rabo Karabekian, a moderately successful surrealist painter, who we meet late in life and see struggling (like all of Vonnegut's key characters), with the dregs of unresolved pain and the consequences of brutality. Loosely based on the legend of Bluebeard (best realized in Bela Bartok's one-act opera), the novel follows Karabekian through the last events in his life that is heavy with women, painting, artistic ambition, artistic fraudulence, and as of yet unknown consequence.

Vonnegut's intention here is not so much satirical (although the contemporary art scene would be easy enough to deconstruct), nor is it documentary (although Karabekian does carry elements of Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko). Instead, Vonnegut is using art for the same purpose he used science fiction cliches in Slaughterhouse-Five; as a filter through which he can illuminate the savagery, cruelty, and the essentially comic misdirection of human existence.

Readers will recognize familiar Vonnegut character types and archetypes as they drift in and out through the background; meanwhile, Karabekian, betrayed and betrayer, sinks through a bottomless haze of recollection. Like most of Vonnegut's late works, this is both science fiction and cruel contemporary realism at once, using science fiction as metaphor for human damage as well as failure to perceive. Readers will find that Vonnegut's protagonists can never really clarify for us whether they are ultimately unwitting victims or simple barbarians, leaving it up to the reader to determine in which genre this book really fits, if any at all.

Galapagos

Vonnegut was in his early sixties and his career, still successful, drawing toward a kind of bitter summation when Galapagos (1985) was published. His early work with its unequivocal statement of absurdity and hopelessness was now almost four decades behind when he completed this meditation on Darwinism, fate and the essential irrelevance of the human condition.

Humanity has in the millions of years after inevitable holocaust and exile transmogrified into a race of not-quite-human seals on Darwin's Galapagos Islands. Leon Trotsky Trout, the son of Vonnegut's wretched familiar character Kilgore Trout, watches and broods over his no-longer-human descendants who have made natural selection a matter of debased survivalism.

Using a device common in his novels after Slaughterhouse-Five, the material is presented in the form of a transcript or memoir; Trout unhappily witnesses a sad outcome which may nonetheless represent the best of all human possibilities. Trout's father Kilgore, in ghostly form, remains in communication, urging his son to cease observing and exit, but Leon will not take the opportunity, feeling linked to the pathetic, morphed shards of humanity who remain on the Islands. Whether the survival of the seals constitutes human survival, whether Kilgore and his son are imaginary fragments of evolutionary decay lurk as questions beneath a sequence of events which show Vonnegut trapped in the Age of Reagan.

Vonnegut is trying to see through (rather than to shape) his material; the theme of the novel represents a kind of apotheosis and never has Vonnegut's ambiguous despair been more clearly revealed or more clearly made the engine of his narrative.

Deadeye Dick

Rudy Waltz (aka “Deadeye Dick”) is the lead in this latter day Vonnegut novel. Waltz, our protagonist, moves through the book trying to make sense of a life that is rife with disaster; there is a double murder, a fatal dose of radioactivity, a decapitation, the total annihilation of a city by nuclear holocaust and, believe it or not, more. Waltz, a diarist, becomes symbolic of a person living a fraught post-technological life in which frailty is as likely to be a person's undoing as any bomb.

Waltz finally reaches the point of resignation; a realization and understanding that there are things that are just beyond our control and understanding that make all human motive, ambition, and circumstance absolutely irrelevant. Waltz's search for meaning leads him ultimately to a kind of resignation which ought not be confused with understanding of any kind, for it is not. It is simple resignation.

It is this theme of Vonnegut's--the impossibility of trying to live meaningfully in a meaningless world--that is ultimately central to this novel. Rudy Waltz (like some of Vonnegut's other protagonists, Billy Pilgrim or Howard Campbell) is ultimately only a stand-in for Vonnegut himself who is really narrating for us as the lead witness and character here--the philosopher who is telling us why and what for.

Jailbird

Walter Starbuck, a career humanist and eventual low-level aide in the Nixon White House, is implicated in Watergate and jailed, after which he (like Howard Campbell in Mother Night) works on his memoirs. Starbuck is innocent (his office was used as a base for the Watergate shenanigans of which he had no knowledge) and yet he is not innocent (he has collaborated with power unquestioningly served societal order all his life). In that sense, Starbuck is a generic Vonnegut protagonist, an individual compromised by the essential lack of interior.

Jailbird (1979) uses the format of the memoir to retrospectively trace Starbuck's uneven, centerless and purposeless odyssey in or out of the offices of power. He represents another Vonnegut Everyman caught amongst forces which he neither understands nor can defend. Written in the aftermath of Watergate, Jailbird is, of course, an attempt to order those catastrophic events and to find some rationale or meaningful outcome, and, as is usually the case with Vonnegut's pyrotechnics, there is no easy answer or perhaps there is no answer at all.

Starbuck (his name an Americanized version of his long, foreign birth name), in his profound ambiguity and ambivalence, may himself constitute an explanation for Watergate, a series of whose consequences have not, almost forty years later, been fully assimilated or understood. The Nixon who passes across the panorama of Jailbird is no more or less ambiguous than Starbuck himself--a man without qualities whose overwhelming quality is one of imposition.

Mother Night

Best known now by the 1996 Nick Nolte film of the same title, Mother Night (1961) is a dazzling narrative of false, shifting identity. The story tells of the odyssey of Howard Campbell, Jr., the book's protagonist, and is a paradigm of shifting loyalties, ambiguous commitment, and tales of personal compromise. Campbell is an American emigre in Germany at the time of Hitler's ascension; he is married to a German, his relations with the Nazi regime are excellent, and he agrees to spy for them and to become a broadcaster for the regime; but then, increasingly disaffected, Campbell becomes a double agent, then perhaps a triple agent, sending coded messages to the Allies.

After the War, he is tried for war crimes but is exonerated. The novel is written in memoir format from the point of view of the exiled Campbell, who, indifferent to outcome, plots suicide.

Here is a moral tale without a moral, or perhaps, according to Vonnegut, a tale with several morals. Vonnegut, a science fiction writer in his early career, knew the science fiction community very well, and it is more or less accepted that the conflicted and indecipherable Howard Campbell is modeled upon John W. Campbell, Jr. (1910-1971), the great editor of Astounding and Analog whose decades long rightward drift led him to endorse George Wallace in 1968.

Bagombo Snuff Box

Here, Kurt Vonnegut's final short story collection--Bagombo Snuff Box (1999)--we have combined early and rather more obscure stories which had not appeared earlier. Drawn largely from the 1950s and the slick magazine markets which Vonnegut had from the beginning of his career in the postwar period demonstrated an uncanny ability to sell, these stories show clearly that Vonnegut found his central themes early on as a writer. More, he had been able to place stories in great consumer magazines like Colliers (that his good friend and college classmate Knox Burger was editing Colliers during this time was perhaps no small factor in Vonnegut's success). There were only a handful of science fiction writers of Vonnegut's generation who were able to sell in such a broad manner outside of the genre during the '50s, but it was this success that allowed Vonnegut the consistent denial that he was not a science fiction writer at all.

Vonnegut's themes--folly, hypocrisy, misunderstanding--cycle through these stories although with perhaps somewhat less bitterness than what had come before. Even through the screen or scrim of magazine taboos, Vonnegut's voice is singular, infused by disaffection and wit. Most of Vonnegut's characters stagger through the plot full of misapprehension, cowardice, and self-delusion. In ""Thanasphere,"" the achievement of space travel becomes a means of communicating with the dead (and for that reason the project is abandoned). In ""Mnemonics,"" a forgetful protagonist is given a drug that prompts him to remember everything with the exception of an unrequited crush. This late collection of Vonnegut's work clearly shows the unifying themes of his work, which were present from the very outset, among them, his very despair.

Timequake

Timequake (1997) exists in two conjoined versions ("Timequake One"/"Timequake Two") and in meta-fictional mode is a novel about a novel, composed in short, arbitrary chapters and using its large cast of characters and disoriented chronology to mimic the "timequake" which is its subject. Some cosmic upheaval has hurled the entire population a decade back where, in full consciousness (but helplessly entrapped) everyone’s pitiable and embarrassing mistakes are helplessly enacted again.

By this stage of his life--he was 72 the year the novel was published--Vonnegut was still wearing his luminescent bells and Harlequin's cape, but these had become dusty and the cape no longer fitted. Vonnegut’s exasperation and sense of futility could no longer be concealed or shaped, and this novel is a laboratory of technique (deliberately) gone wrong, a study of breakdown.

Vonnegut had never shown much hope in his work for human destiny or occupation; the naive optimism of Eliot Rosewater in God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater had in the damaged veteran Billy Pilgrim of Slaughterhouse-Five become a naive fantasy of escape to a sexual heaven. In the nihilism of Timequake, the only escape is re-enactment, but re-enactment has lost hope and force.

This is no Groundhog Day in which Vonnegut traps his various refugees (many escaped from his earlier works) but a hell of lost possibility. The temporal timequake of the title is the actual spiritual fracture of the 20th century, and in his 73rd year Vonnegut envisions no hope, not even the hollow diversions of Slapstick. Vonnegut’s imaginative journey, closely tracked by his work, is one of the most intriguing for any American writer of the twentieth century.

Slapstick

Perhaps the most autobiographical (and deliberately least disciplined) of Vonnegut's novels, Slapstick (1976) is in the form of a broken family odyssey and is surely a demonstration of its eponymous title. The story centers on brother and sister twins, children of Wilbur Swain, who are in sympathetic and (possibly) telepathic communication and who represent Vonnegut's relationship with his own sister who died young of cancer almost two decades before the book’s publication.

Vonnegut dedicated this to Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. Like their films and routines, this novel is an exercise in non-sequentiality and in the bizarre while using those devices to expose larger and terrible truths. The twins exemplify to Swain a kind of universal love; he campaigns for it while troops of technologically miniaturized Chinese are launched upon America. Love and carnage intersect in a novel contrived to combine credibility and common observation; critics could sense Vonnegut deliberately flouting narrative constraint or imperative in an attempt to destroy the very idea of the novel he was writing.

Slapstick becomes both product and commentary, event and self-criticism; an early and influential example of contemporary "metafiction." Vonnegut's tragic life--like the tragic lives of Laurel, Hardy, Buster Keaten and other exemplars of slapstick comedy--is the true center of a work whose cynicism overlays a trustfulness and sense of loss which are perhaps deeper and truer than expressed in any of Vonnegut's earlier or later works. Slapstick is a clear demonstration of the profound alliance of comedy and tragedy which, when Vonnegut is working close to his true sensibility, become indistinguishable.

Player Piano

Vonnegut's first novel, an unforgiving portrait of an automated and totalitarian future, was published in 1952. A human revolt against the machines which control life was arranged by the machines themselves to prove the futility of such resistance. Visionary and unrelenting, this is felt by some critics to be Vonnegut's best and most original novel.

Palm Sunday

Vonnegut was a memorable novelist, but this work is, though memorable, entirely something else: Vonnegut has assembled some powerful and disturbing confessional essays which take the curtain between writer and novelistic material aside, and in some pieces like the "Self Interview" published in The Paris Review no. 69 or the audacious 1972 short story, "The Big Space F***," Vonnegut has produced material as potent and disturbing as any of his novels.

There are political speeches and endorsements ("Dear Mr. McCarthy"), blistering self-evaluation ("I Am Embarrassed") and the kind of consideration of contemporaries (the review of "Something Happened") which function as direct testimony. Even when writing in occasional mode, Vonnegut was unable to escape a sense of occasion, and perhaps no modern collection has been as painfully self-exposed as this by a writer who of course was always self-exposed, a writer who made Delmore Schwartz's "wound of consciousness" his true text.

Palm Sunday (1981) can best be described as an "occasional book", the kind of potpourri which a successful (or not so successful) novelist would drop in-between books. Usually, though by no means always, a short story collection, the occasional work is meant to keep the writer's name (and work) before the public during a fallow time. The work in it is assembled from magazine publications or journalistic pieces and although regarded as secondary, it has proven in the cases like those of A.J. Liebling or Dorothy Parker to be the exemplary testimony of the writer. This is not the case here.

Hocus Pocus

Eugene Debs Hartke (named after the famous early 20th century Socialist working class leader) describes an odyssey from college professor to prison inmate to prison warden back again to prisoner in another of Vonnegut's bitter satirical explorations of how and where (and why) the American dream begins to die. Employing his characteristic narrative device--a retrospective diary in which the protagonist retraces his life at its end, a desperate and disconnected series of events here in Hocus Pocus show Vonnegut with his mask off and his rhetorical devices unshielded.

Debs (and Vonnegut) see academia just as imprisoning as the corrupt penal system and they regard politics as the furnishing and marketing of lies. Debs, already disillusioned by circumstance, quickly tracks his way toward resignation and then fury. As warden and prisoner, Debs (and the reader) come to understand that the roles are interchangeable; as a professor jailed for "radical" statements in the classroom reported by a reactionary student, he comes to see the folly of all regulation. The "hocus pocus" of the novel's title does not describe only the jolting reversals and seemingly motiveless circumstance which attend Debs' disillusion and suffering, but also describe the political, social, and economic system of a country built upon can't, and upon the franchising of lies.

At 68, Vonnegut had not only abandoned the sentiment and cracked optimism manifest in Slaughterhouse-Five, he had abandoned any belief in the system or faith for its recovery. This novel is another in a long series of farewells to the farmland funeral rites of childhood.

Fates Worse Than Death

Kurt Vonnegut presents in Fates Worse than Death a veritable cornucopia of Vonnegut's thought on what could best be summed up as perhaps "anti-theology", a manifesto for atheism that details Vonnegut's drift from conventional religion, even a tract evidencing belief in the divine held within each individual self; the Deity within each individual person present in a universe that otherwise lacks any real order.

Vonnegut was never a real optimist and with just cause: he had an incredibly difficult life (he had been a prisoner of war from which he drew the title for his book Slaughterhouse-Five) and suffered from failing health, which only showed him his own mortality even more than he already knew it. Still, most readers find that in the body of Vonnegut's work there is still a glimmer of desperate hope. Vonnegut's continued search for meaning surely counts for a great deal as he balances hope and despair.

Scholars and fans can read about Vonnegut’s experiences during World War II and the after-effect he felt it had on him. His religious (or anti-religious) ramblings and notations are interesting and, by turns, funny and perceptive. The humor may be dark, but that does not make it any the less funny.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007) is one of the most beloved American writers of the twentieth century. Vonnegut's audience increased steadily since his first five pieces in the 1950s and grew from there. His 1968 novel Slaughterhouse-Five has become a canonic war novel with Joseph Heller's Catch-22 to form the truest and darkest of what came from World War II.

Vonnegut began his career as a science fiction writer, and his early novels--Player Piano and The Sirens of Titan--were categorized as such even as they appealed to an audience far beyond the reach of the category. In the 1960s, Vonnegut became closely associated with the Baby Boomer generation, a writer on that side, so to speak.

Now that Vonnegut's work has been studied as a large body of work, it has been more deeply understood and unified. There is a consistency to his satirical insight, humor and anger which makes his work so synergistic. It seems clear that the more of Vonnegut's work you read, the more it resonates and the more you wish to read. Scholars believe that Vonnegut's reputation (like Mark Twain's) will grow steadily through the decades as his work continues to increase in relevance and new connections are formed, new insights made.

ABOUT THE SERIES
Author Kurt Vonnegut is considered by most to be one of the most important writers of the twentieth century. His books Slaughterhouse-Five (named after Vonnegut's World War II POW experience) and Cat's Cradle are considered among his top works. RosettaBooks offers here a complete range of Vonnegut's work, including his first novel (Player Piano, 1952) for readers familiar with Vonnegut's work as well as newcomers.