Found Not Lost

OK, so Sexy Sex and Seasoned Vinegar don’t really have anything to do with each other, but I just entered a giveaway contest for the book and also posted my own giveaway on the food blog. If you’d like to enter either giveaway, here are the links:

The book is called The Sexy Book of Sexy Sex - by Kristin Schall and Rich Bloomquist. This is a humorous manual complete with graphs and illustrations, so the descriptions say. Not that I’m needing a manual in this department, mind you, but I thought it would be a fun enough read. It has gotten some mixed reviews too so I am really curious if it really does live up to the hype.

Now if you’d rather have something that you can actually see, touch and taste, then you’ve got to enter my Nakano Vinegar and $25 Gift Certificate Giveaway. You get a full sized bottle of delicious Nakano Vinegar, a $25 gift certificate that you can spend anywhere on anything you like and a booklet with recipes and a $1 off coupon.

Here’s another giveaway that I just entered because I just had to. Just look at the name of the bag!
The Brielle Braided Bag is being given away at Leslie Loves Veggies. Go check out how cute it is!

I discovered the works of Pushkin quite late. I had never heard of him until a Russian co-worker some years back gave me a small booklet of his poem when she heard me say off handedly that I like reading poetry. She didn’t realize that when I said that, the extent of my knowledge of poetry only extended to Emily Dickinson and Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s love poems. So when she gave me the book, I was awed and had to sheepishly admit my limited knowledge. She just laughed and she said, then Pushkin is perfect for you. You don’t have to be a scholar to understand him, everyday people in Russia, regular people, read him”.

So when I had an opportunity to receive a copy of My Talisman to review, I jumped at the chance! I wouldn’t say that this book is an easy read like the other books I normally read. This book is the kind to be savored and absorbed slowly. I loved reading and learning more about Pushkin and the poems, which are published both in Russian and English translation, are a joy read. I also liked the added information from the author, Lowenfeld, about the process of translating poetry and how, if the translator is not vigilant of the original author’s intent, that the essence is lost.
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THIS IS A GUEST BLOG POST FROM JULIA LONDON, AUTHOR OF ONE SEASON OF SUNSHINE

“…our past is our present and our future, that we are all pieces of our past and our loves.”

This book is about Jane, who goes in search of her birth mother. She takes a job as a nanny for the widower Asher and his two children. She begins to fall for Asher and the kids, but as things heat up, devastating secrets begin to emerge that not only threaten the happiness Jane has found, but her search for herself as well.

I began with the idea of having a woman search for her birthmother, but Jane evolved into a more complex woman than I think I had originally intended. I didn’t want her to be a clichéd orphan looking for happiness. I wanted her to come from a big, loving, family to make her internal conflict that much more compelling. Her mother is a woman who has a lot of love to give, and she, along with the rest of Jane’s family, loves her every bit as much as if she’d given birth to her. She reminds me of a friend of mine who is in the process of adopting a child from China. She already loves that little girl and she’s never even touched her. I think some people are just wired to give love to children.

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Who are the idiots that banned these books? I don’t even want to know. On the Huffington Post, here is a list of the 11 Most Surprising Banned Books. These are some of the most loved and popular books ever, and they are classics! Here are the titles:

The Dictionary
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig
Beloved & The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr.
James and the Giant Peach & The Witches by Roald Dahl
The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
A Farewell to Arms & For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
A Light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle

Click on the link if you want to see the reason why they were banned. You will be screaming “idiots!” too. Where have these people been? Even those who’ve been under rocks surely, must have read and enjoyed some of these books. People who ban books should be checked with pulse oximeter to see if they are still alive. Seriously!

Title: Deep Kiss of Winter
Authors: Kresley Cole and Gena Showalter

Publish Date: October 2009
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 432
ISBN-10: 1439159661
ISBN-13: 9781439159668

THE STORIES:
UNTOUCHABLE By Kresley Cole
A breathtaking tale of a brutal vampire soldier about to know love for the first time…and a Valkyrie aching to be touched.

Murdoch Wroth will stop at nothing to claim Daniela the Ice Maiden — the delicate Valkyrie who makes his heart beat for the first time in three hundred years. Yet the exquisite Danii is part ice fey, and her freezing skin can’t be touched by anyone but her own kind without inflicting pain beyond measure. Soon desperate for closeness, in an agony of frustration, Murdoch and Danii will do anything to have each other. Together, can they find the key that will finally allow them to slake the overwhelming desire burning between them?

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BOOK TITLE: Zumba
AUTHORS: Beto Perez, Maggie Greenwood-Robinson

Category: HEALTH & FITNESS
Format: HARDCOVER BOOK
Publish Date: 9/10/2009
ISBN: 9780446546126
Pages: 304

ABOUT THE BOOK
Created by celebrity fitness trainer Beto Perez, Zumba® combines fun, easy-to-follow dance steps with hot Latin beats to help you shed pounds and inches fast. Now the DVD and classes that have hooked millions are available in book format, with a complete workout program, fat-burning diet, and an exclusive instructional DVD with 60 minutes worth of music to help you Zumba your way to the perfect body.

Using the principles of interval and resistance training, the simple dance and sculpting moves (inspired by the traditional cumbia, salsa, samba, and merengue) tone and shape your body. And because it burns 600 to 1,000 calories per hour, you don’t have to restrict your meals to boring or bland-tasting diet foods. The Zumba diet begins with a 5-Day Express Diet to jump start weight loss (lose up to 9 lbs in 5 days) and then offers 14-day meal plans and recipes that target weight loss in the stomach and thighs. You’ll find:

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