Posted Sunday, 16 February, 2020 by jorielov (Narrator) Benjamin Fife, (Narrator) Brittany Pressley, (Narrator) Eric Jason Martin, (Narrator) Jayme Mattler, (Narrator) Laura Linney, Always the One, An Unconventional Countess, Andrew Krivak, Anita Abriel, Anne Marie Lewis, Annette Hubbell, Bright Dreams: The Brilliant Ideas of Nikola Tesla, Carrie Callaghan, Chantal Gadoury, Christmas Once Again, Collins Hemingway, Daughter of Sun Bride of Ice, Dayla and the Magic Ink Bottle, Edale Lane, Elizabeth Strout, Ellie Midwood, Emma S. Jackson, Essential Ketogenic Mediterranean Diet Cookbook, Eternity Through the Rearview Mirror, Ghost of the Bamboo Road, Good Boy, H.L. Burke, J.M. Evenson, Janice Broyles, Jenni Fletcher, Jennifer Finney Boylan, Jina Bacarr, Julia Kelly, Longbourn Dragon Entail, Margarita Montimore, Maria Grace, Mary Pauline Lowry, Merchants of Milan, Metropolis, Molly Divine RD, My Name Is Lucy Barton, Nancy Montuori, Nicole Derseweh, Oona Out of Order, Pemberley: Mr Darcy's Dragon, Rachel Hauck, Recipe for Persuasion, Regina Scott, Rona Munro, Salt the Snow, Sapphira Olsen, Sense without Sensibility, Signe Pike, Sonali Dev, Soraya M. Lane, Stanley Park, Stef Wade, Susan B Katz, Suzy Spitfire series, Tara Randel, The Bear, The Devil's Bride, The Easy 5 Ingredient Vegan Cookbook: 100 Healthy Plant Based Recipes, The Fifth Avenue Story Society, The Girls of Pearl Harbour, The Highlander's English Bride, The Light After the War, The Light Over London, The Lost Queen, The Marriage of Miss Jane Austen, The Matchmaker's Rogue, The Quill Collective, The Roxy Letters, The Runaway Heir, The Secret Heir, The Story of Frida Kahlo: A Biography Book for New Readers, The Vegan Ketogenic Diet Cookbook, The Very Last Leaf, Tracy Dockray, Vanessa Kelly, Whitney Lauritsen, Winterdream, Yuletide 12 Comments
[Official Blurb] The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Book Reviewer. It’s a chance to share News. A post to recap the past week, showcase books and things we have received and share news about what is coming up for the week on our blog. This is your news post, so personalize it! Include as much as you want or as little. Be creative, it can be a vlog or just a showcase of your goodies. Link up once a week or once a month, you decide. Book haul can include library books, yard sale finds, arcs and bought books..share them!
- Enter your link on the post-
- Sundays beginning at 12:01 am (CST) (link will be open all week)
- Link back to this post or this blog
- Visit others who have linked up
- Read this week’s #TheSundayPost!
A note about the format I am using to journal #TheSundayPost:
I am finding I like being able to give my readers who cannot visit my blog each time a new post, review or guest feature goes live a digest journal of what is happening on #JLASblog each week! If you are familiar with the style in which I journal my readerly adventures via #WWWednesdays (see also Archive) you’ll know why I like this journalled style for #TheSundayPost!
It’s a way of talking about what is bookishly on my mind whilst sharing where my travels in Fiction & Non-Fiction took me through the last seven days! Quite stellar – so very thankful I was encouraged to participate as I love being able to think about which stories settled into my heart and which of the stories I am most eager to see arrive by postal mail and/or via audiobook! It’s a bit of a lovely way to journal your bookish life and have a weekly reminder of the experiences of you’ve gathered and love to remember! In regards to getting back into the groove with #WWWeds – I’m either going to make the meme bi-monthly or monthly which I’ll decide within the next fortnight.
And, then,…
Jorie finally returns to journalling her weekly bookish adventures,…
Finding the motivation to write #TheSundayPost has been a bit tricky the past few years, which is why you’ve noticed a staunch reduction in posts alighting in my feeds! I had a lot of good intentions to resume this lovely meme I was enjoying participating in but structuring it the way I wanted to have my weekly journalled notes to appear on my blog was part of the issue and the other half of it really is that I have a lot to shuffle behind-the-blog so to speak (we all do,..) to where I was thankful I had the hours I needed to maintain Jorie Loves A Story but when it came to writing up supplemental posts and keeping in step with the memes I love to blog about – long ago, I realised something had to ‘give’ and these were the posts I had to put on hiatus.
Some months I thought I might be able to return to them sooner, so there are a few notes here or there saying “#TheSundayPost” is returning this week or that week, but no, they haven’t returnt until now! I have a lot of news I never had the chance to share from past reading challenges or past milestones of the blog – I might tuck those into some retrospective posts as the months move forward. For now, I simply wanted to try to recapture a bit of what has been going on since January and then, I’ll tackle what I want to share from [2019-back].
*UPcoming!* blog & Twitter milestones:
(celebrating my 7th Year as a book blogger and joyful tweeter : dates to remember!)
I created my blog on the 31st of March, 2013 – my blogoversary!
I launched it LIVE to the world on 6th August, 2013 – my blog’s birthday!
I waited til the 13th of November, 2013 to join Twitter – my #twitterversary!
I almost cannot believe *seven years!* have elapsed since I first created this idea I had for a book blog and undertook the journey of what has emerged through seeking out the bookish and readerly adventures I’ve curated ever since I first started to blog my bookish and geeky life wayy back in [2013] !! I hadn’t known then how my life would be tenfold #blessed by the authors, their stories and the bookish culture I would endeavour to become a part of until I was into my first few years as a book blogger. There was no guide and blueprint towards sorting out this book blogosphere world nor the twitterverse where I undertook getting socially chatty on a platform I never expected I’d take like a duck to water to explore, engage and carve out my own joyfully tweeting presence seven years in the making!
I’ve worked with publishers in the United States, Canada, the UK and aboard whilst I have had the chance to get to host blog tours with genre focused blog touring companies inasmuch as innovative and insightful touring companies who either focus on select works of Fiction, Non-Fiction and Poetry. Each step of the way, I was not just hosting blog tours or seeking stories for review consideration but I was endeavouring with each opportunity which crossed my path to read deeper and to seek out the stories which :pushed: me into new horizons of literary exploration. For me, that was always the key goal: to find the stories being writ by the authors who are giving me a wicked good read!
I never knew if I could balance my online readerly life the same way I balance my IRL readerly life – but I have found being a hybrid reader has had its best benefits because I can move between mainstream and INSPY offerings by publishers, publicists, authors, agents and touring companies quite easily. Each year, I have decided to seek out new adventures and to re-shift what I wanted to focus on – I started to reduce how many blog tours I would host each month back in [2016] something I happily maintained until this February [2020] where I slide back into a bit of a chaotic blog schedule! (laughs)
Through the years, I’ve disclosed snippets of my walk in faith, my struggles of being a migraineur (someone who has chronic migraines) and have found that I love hosting guest features where I get to interview different guests – authors, editors, narrators (of audiobooks), actors (for Indie Film projects) and other creatives who have crossed my path. I still love blogging the heart out of the stories I am reading – not just to examine the story as a discerning reader myself but to truly give a strong impression about what I found inside the story in order to help someone else choose whether or not the story I’ve read and blogged about is a good ‘fit’ for their own readerly curiosities. As we all gravitate towards different stories at different times – we all dance through genres and literary styles – a book which appeals to us today might not resonate with us when we go to read it, etc. I find I love visiting with the book bloggers who give me something to ‘chew on’ as I’m reading their blogs – from their reviews, to their guest features to their discussion posts. I want to know more than the surface layer of their reactions to stories and that is what I try to bring to my own readers here on Jorie Loves A Story. (and yes, the “a” is purposefully shown in caps!) Read More
Posted Sunday, 16 February, 2020 by jorielov in Bits & Bobbles of Jorie, Blog Birthdays & Blogoversaries, Blogosphere Events & Happenings, Bookish Memes, JLAS Update Post, Jorie Loves A Story, Photography of Jorie, Spontaneous Musings, Stories of Jorie, The Sunday Post
Posted Monday, 10 February, 2020 by jorielov HarperCollins Publishers, Rachel Hauck, The Fifth Avenue Story Society, Thomas Nelson 0 Comments
Acquired Book By: I started hosting with Prism Book Tours at the end of [2017], having noticed the badge on Tressa’s blog (Wishful Endings) whilst I was visiting as we would partake in the same blog tours and/or book blogosphere memes. I had to put the memes on hold for several months (until I started to resume them (with Top Ten Tuesday) in January 2018). When I enquiried about hosting for Prism, I found I liked the niche of authors and stories they were featuring regularly. This is how I came to love discovering the Harlequin Heartwarming authors & series as much as it has been an honour to regularly request INSPY stories and authors. Whenever I host for Prism, I know I am in for an uplifting read and a journey into the stories which give me a lot of joy to find in my readerly queue of #nextreads. It is an honour to be a part of their team of book bloggers.
I received a complimentary ARC copy of “The Fifth Avenue Story Society” direct from the publisher Thomas Nelson in exchange for an honest review. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.
Why this blog tour reminds me of being engaged
with the Southern Belle View Daily community of INSPY authors:
It wasn’t too long ago I was an active commenter on author’s blogs (ie. 2012) wherein I had my first taste of what the book blogosphere involved and how readers were finding ways to interact directly with authors they had either read or were dearly hoping to read ‘next’. This predates when my vocabulary involved the term “TBR” and long before my own blog was as whispered dream which readily became a reality on the 31st of March (in 2013).
Just ahead of developing Jorie Loves A Story, I discovered Southern Belle View Daily (earlier in 2013) and it was happily bookmarked through my browser’s RSS feeds reader (remember that option?). I loved visiting with the authors who were at the helm of the blog: Lisa Wingate, Rachel Hauck, Julie Cantrell, Shellie Rushing Tomlinson and Beth Webb Hart were the original ladies I interacted with whilst Eva Marie Everson, Kellie Coates Gilbert, Amy Hill Hearth, Denise Hildreth Jones, Jolina Petersheim and Nicole Seitz joined them off/on over the years.
They would host interactive forum discussions on their blog and even the occasional bookaway – I won Beth Webb Hart’s Moon Over Edisto whilst during my first month of being a book blogger in 2013 I had the opportunity to review Lisa Wingate’s The Prayer Box which also became my first blog tour! Whilst getting Jorie Loves A Story off the ground and dealing with life as it was being lived whilst juggling my chronic migraines – I found I wasn’t able to maintain the connections I had established prior to being a book blogger on the author blogs I had frequented before launching my own blog. Therefore by the time I had the chance to return to Southern Belle View I learnt it was switching over to Facebook and that in effect knocked me out of joining them as I elected to become active on Twitter instead.
Through the years, I’ve grown attached to the series The Prayer Box began whilst I’ve had my eye on reading through all their stories and finding my favourites. Towards that end, I started by reading Kellie Coates Gilbert’s Texas Star series with A Reason to Stay. I still remember being involved with the now defunct Blogging for Books programme and finding one of Ms Tomlinson’s releases was available to request – however, I waited to long to decide to request it and it went to other readers! I learnt not to contemplate those choices too long afterwards, laughs.
As I never quite ‘let go’ of following their literary careers, I found out about The Fifth Avenue Story Society prior to the announcement of the blog tour via Prism Book Tours. I was going to fetch a copy of it from my local library when the invite came into my Inbox. Talk about a serendipitous day!I was overjoyed I could host one of the authors I knew previously but also, this would mark my first story by Ms Hauck I could finally read and I couldn’t wait! I also always see a hawk when I pronounce her name (big smiles) as it was the only way I could remember how to say it aloud! The fact as a wildlife photographer I’ve been blessed to capture hawks IRL through my lens is an added bit of serendipity.
You could say I feel like as I move closer to entering my seventh year as a book blogger this New Year 2020 – I am coming full circle! To my roots as a reader, to the foundation I set down as a blog commenter and as a writer reclaiming her pen and her inspiration to write her own stories. It is an exciting year and one I already feel has become memorable! How lovely I get to kick-off February’s Romance & Women’s Fiction reads with Ms Hauck’s new book!
On my connection to Rachel Hauck:
I discovered Southern Belle View Daily in early 2013 during the times I engaged with the lovely ladies who were ‘behind’ SBV I came to appreciate conversing with all the Belles, including Rachel Hauck. I was a regular visitor and commenter – up til a certain point as once my blog Jorie Loves A Story launched live in August, 2013 I was not able to visit as regularly as I had previously. In the years since 2013 I have been more at a distance from directly engaging with Ms Hauck (though a few times via Twitter as I recall?) and have followed her releases from afar always hoping to start reading them. One thing which prevented me from starting to read the Belles works of Fiction is that they were not always readily available via my local libraries.
I am disclosing this, to assure you that I can formulate an honest opinion, even though I have interacted with her through Southern Belle View Daily and/or Twitter; as I treat each book as a ‘new experience’, whether I personally know the author OR whether I am reading a book by them for the first time.
The Fifth Avenue Story Society
by Rachel Hauck
Source: Publisher via Prism Book Tours
An invitation to join The Fifth Avenue Story Society gives five New York strangers a chance to rewrite their own stories.
Executive assistant Lexa is eager for a much-deserved promotion, but her boss is determined to keep her underemployed.
Literature professor Jett is dealing with a broken heart, as well as a nagging suspicion his literary idol, Gordon Phipps Roth, might be a fraud.
Uber driver Chuck just wants a second chance with his kids.
Aging widower Ed is eager to write the true story of his incredible marriage.
Coral, queen of the cosmetics industry, has broken her engagement and is on the verge of losing her great grandmother’s multimillion-dollar empire.
When all five New Yorkers receive an anonymous, mysterious invitation to the Fifth Avenue Story Society, they suspect they’re victims of a practical joke. No one knows who sent the invitations or why. No one has heard of the literary society. And no one is prepared to reveal their deepest secrets to a roomful of strangers.
Yet curiosity and loneliness bring them back week after week to the old library. And it’s there they discover the stories of their hearts, and the kind of friendship and love that heals their souls.
Genres: Contemporary (Modern) Fiction (post 1945), Inspirational Fiction & Non-Fiction, INSPY Realistic Fiction, Literary Fiction Places to find the book:
Borrow from a Public Library
Add to LibraryThing
ISBN: 9780310350927
Published by Thomas Nelson
on 4th February, 2020
Format: Paperback ARC
Pages: 400
Published by: Thomas Nelson (@ThomasNelson)
an imprint of HarperCollins Christian Publishing (@HCChristianPub)
Converse via: #FifthAvenueStorySociety, #RachelHauck & #TNZFiction
as well as #INSPYFiction and #WomensFiction
Read More
Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
Posted Monday, 10 February, 2020 by jorielov in 21st Century, Bits & Bobbles of Jorie, Blog Tour Host, Flashbacks & Recollective Memories, Inspirational Fiction & Non-Fiction, Introspective Literary Fiction, Literary Fiction, Modern Day, Multiple POV, New York City, Post-911 (11th September 2001), Prism Book Tours, Realistic Fiction, Southern Belle View Daily