Martha's American Food

I love Martha's cookbooks! Here is the goodreads description:

In this beautiful volume, a love letter to American food, Martha Stewart, who has so significantly influenced the American table, collects her most favorite national dishes, as well as the stories and traditions behind them. These are recipes that will delight you with nostalgia, inspire you, and teach you about our nation by way of its regions and their distinctive flavors. Above all, these are time-honored recipes that you will turn to again and again. Organized geographically, the 200 recipes in Martha’s American Food include main dishes such as comforting Chicken Pot Pies, easy Grilled Fish Tacos, irresistible Barbecued Ribs, and hearty New England Clam Chowder. Here, too, are thoroughly modern starters, sides, and one-dish meals that harness the bounty of each region’s seasons and landscape: Hot Crab Dip, Tequila-Grilled Shrimp, Indiana Succotash, Chicken and Andouille Gumbo, Grilled Bacon-Wrapped Whitefish, and Whole-Wheat Spaghetti with Meyer Lemon, Arugula, and Pistachios. And you will want to leave room for dessert, with dozens of treats such as Chocolate-Bourbon Pecan Pie, New York Cheesecake, and Peach and Berry Cobbler. Through sidebars about the flavors that define each region and stunning photography that brings the foods—and the places with which we identify them—to life, Martha celebrates the unique character of each part of the country. With all the dishes that inspire pride in our national cuisine, Martha’s American Food gathers, in one place, the recipes that will surely please your family and friends for generations to come.

OK I have a confession... I never cook anything from Martha's books. UGHHHH I always want to cook things but they are so complicated. I love to look through the pictures and get ideas though.  And the photography is great.  I usually always check these books out from the library since thwy are so expensive.  Some are $75.00!!!  I own one that my aunt gave to me as a gift, Martha Stewart's Cooking School .  Which is a great book but not a lot of recipes in that one.  The American Food book has deserts, main dishes, drinks, just about everything! Here are some pictures I took from this book...

Also... I found a great picture on the web about Martha...

oh Martha I love you!!

Dragon Age:The Silent Grove- Review

Dragon Age: The Silent Grove

I received this as an ARC through Dark Horse Comics from netgalley.com, Thanks guys!

Here is the goodreads description: 

Dragon Age #1–#6, previously available only on the Dark Horse digital store! It's unusual for a king to embark on a dangerous quest himself rather than send emissaries, but King Alistair Theirin has caught wind of a rumor big enough, and personal enough, that he is compelled to investigate. With the deadly pirate Isabela and underworld merchant Varric Tethras by his side, Alistair travels to Antiva - the nation of assassins - to learn the fate of his long-lost father, King Maric. There, they will engineer a prison break, battle an assassin prince, encounter the mysterious Witch of the Wilds, and uncover the secret history of dragons

I thought this graphic novel was OK.  I have played both Dragon Age 1 and 2.  I didn't care for the map of two.  We were in the same places over and over.  But I did like the characters.  I must say I was surprised that Alister hung out with Varric and Isabela on a journey.  I mean they weren't even in the same games!!  


I was going to read it on my Nook but whenever I read graphic novels on it I have a hard time reading the words because they get real blurry so I just read it through Adobe reader on my computer.  It's nice I can read it either way.  


Also I looked up this Dragon Age graphic novel on goodreads and discovered there are sooo many Dragon Age novels!!  Very surprising to me.  This one is the first one I had heard of for the game.  

Follow Me Friday (#35)

This is the day of the week where we get to know each other better by answering a question devised by our lovely hostesses Parajunkee & Alisoncanread. We also gain new followers by joining each other's sites via GFC, so please let me know if you're a new follower. And now for this week's question....

Q.  You are a matchmaker- your goal, hook up two characters from two of your favorite books.  Who would it be?  How do you think it will go? 

Well I looked through all my books that I've read on my goodreads list and honestly I have always loved Waldo from Where's Waldo!!  So I have decided to hook him up with Carmen Sandiego!  And then when I looked on the internet for pictures there were tons!!  So I am not the only one who has thought of this before!!  I found a lot of great pics... so just bare with me.  I posted them all!!

 What couples do you want to see together??? ?? ?

Garden Party at Book Journey

Today is the Garden Party over at the Book Journey !  I have been waiting a while for this.. we are discussing the Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett and there are even some giveaways!!  Head over and discuss the book with us! 


Here is the Link!

"

And here is my review of The Secret Garden .

Merging Two pics into one JPEG.. HELP me computer geeks!

Hello fellow bloggers. I have been trying to figure out how to get two pictures into one jpeg.  I see it all the time especially on tumblr but just can't seem to do it.  I have a MacBook Pro and I don't have Photoshop (too expensive).  Does anyone have any advice?  I really want to use it so when I post two book covers they line up correctly here on blogger.  Thanks for any help you can give me!

Fever by Lauren DeStephano Review

 

Fever by Lauren DeStefano

I finally got this book from the library.  I wanted to read it because my Young Adult Book Club picked Wither a few months ago and I am tired of not finishing series.  So I am making more of an effort to finish them.  Here is the goodreads description:

Rhine and Gabriel have escaped the mansion, but danger is never far behind. Running away brings Rhine and Gabriel right into a trap, in the form of a twisted carnival whose ringmistress keeps watch over a menagerie of girls. Just as Rhine uncovers what plans await her, her fortune turns again. With Gabriel at her side, Rhine travels through an environment as grim as the one she left a year ago - surroundings that mirror her own feelings of fear and hopelessness. The two are determined to get to Manhattan, to relative safety with Rhine’s twin brother, Rowan. But the road there is long and perilous - and in a world where young women only live to age twenty and young men die at twenty-five, time is precious. Worse still, they can’t seem to elude Rhine’s father-in-law, Vaughn, who is determined to bring Rhine back to the mansion...by any means necessary. In the sequel to Lauren DeStefano’s harrowing Wither, Rhine must decide if freedom is worth the price - now that she has more to lose than ever.

I liked this book. I thought it was a good follow up to Wither. The book kept moving along nicely. New characters, new environments. I love the covers for these two books (Wither and Fever)which is what drew me to these books in the first place.  One thing I like about Fever is that it answers a lot of questions I had from Wither.  My book club discussed all the issues with Wither here if you want to read more about what other people though.  I had such issues with how Rhine talked to Linden and wouldn't tell him what's really going on and she finally does in this book.  THANK YOU!

Spoiler to come:  One thing I didn't like about this book was that we journey all the way to NY and finally get there and then at the end of the book BOOM we are back in the mansion!  WHAT!!! That made it seem like to me that whole journey in this book was a waste of time.  I also feel like I still haven't been able to really get to know Gabriel.  His character really falls flat to me.  I just don't really like him yet.  I love the housemaster though.. Vaughn.  He is a great villain! End spoilers

After reading this book I will for sure move onto book 3. I want to know what happens at the end of Rhine's journey and what happens to the world! Looks like the next book is called Sever and doesn't come out for a whole year!!  Maybe for once in my life I can get my hands on an ARC!!  I can always dream!!

Here is my review of Wither .
Here is my review of Sever.

Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore Review

Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore

I have been waiting sooooo long for this book!!!  I finally got my hands on it.  Here is the goodreads description:

Eight years after Graceling, Bitterblue is now queen of Monsea. But the influence of her father, a violent psychopath with mind-altering abilities, lives on. Her advisors, who have run things since Leck died, believe in a forward-thinking plan: Pardon all who committed terrible acts under Leck’s reign, and forget anything bad ever happened. But when Bitterblue begins sneaking outside the castle—disguised and alone—to walk the streets of her own city, she starts realizing that the kingdom has been under the thirty-five-year spell of a madman, and the only way to move forward is to revisit the past. Two thieves, who only steal what has already been stolen, change her life forever. They hold a key to the truth of Leck’s reign. And one of them, with an extreme skill called a Grace that he hasn’t yet identified, holds a key to her heart.

I love revisiting the world that Cashore has created. And I really loved the little illustrations in this book. The maps... and the section pictures. This story is extremely long though. I was very surprised how long it was. There was way too much going on. Sometimes I was confused.

I know that this book is supposed to be able to be read as a stand alone but I would not recommend that.  You should for sure read the other books first.  I just feel like the reader will lose some of who's who if they skip the other two.  Also... it had been soooo long since I read Graceling and Fire that I had forgotten a lot about what happened in those books and had to wikipedia them.

This book goes in depth about figuring out Leck and what he did to his people.  But I hated how much Bitterblue was pushing everyone.  She would not let up!!  Eventually we are introduced to one of my most favorite characters Death and his cat.  I really loved him.  The covers for this series are beautiful!!  I am having trouble getting the pics next to each other.  I have been trying to find a program out there that can put several pictures into one JPEG.  Can anyone help me??

 

I gave the book 3 cats... would've been more but it was so long and drawn out and there was mystery after mystery.  It just got nuts!!!