2013 Rainbow Awards Submission: M. Kei - Man in the Crescent Moon

Man in the Crescent Moon: A Pirates of the Narrow Seas Adventure by M. Kei
Paperback: 232 pages
Publisher: Keibooks; First Edition edition (July 23, 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0615829236
ISBN-13: 978-0615829234
Amazon: Man in the Crescent Moon: A Pirates of the Narrow Seas Adventure
Amazon Kindle: Man in the Crescent Moon: A Pirates of the Narrow Seas Adventure

Man in the Crescent Moon is the latest adventure in the swashbuckling Pirates of the Narrow Seas series. Isam Tangueli is a gangly youth of nineteen, longing to leave home and become a famous corsair, and trying to understand his attraction to men. He joins the crew of the Grey Wolf and fights the Spanish on land, at sea, and under water. Under the command of the short but feisty Rajet Rais, young Isam learns the skills of navigation and leadership necessary to become "Captain Tangle," the most notorious corsair of the age. The hallmarks of the Pirates of the Narrow Seas series are all present—diverse and engaging characters, storms at sea, desperate ship fights, hand-to-hand combat, captures, rescues, and escapes, all told with authentic detail. "Isam Agha Hamet saw his father killed and vowed to become a great corsair. But working with his uncle on their galley will not lead to fame and fortune. When Rajet Rais and the Grey Wolf seek refuge and the Spanish attack he must seize the opportunity to fulfil his dream. But will love for a slave stop him."--Astrodene's Historic Naval Fiction

Pierre Menard (1941 - August 3, 1994)

Pierre Menard was a violinist with the Vermeer Quartet based at Northern Illinois University, where he was also a professor of music.

A violinist and founding member of the Vermeer Quartet, he died on August 3, 1994, at his home in Warren, Me. He was 53. The cause was AIDS, said his companion, John Ladley.

Mr. Menard was born in Quebec and began studying the violin there when he was 6. Later, he studied with Ivan Galamian and Dorothy Delay at the Juilliard School. After graduating, he became concertmaster of the Nashville Symphony Orchestra and the Aspen Summer Festival Orchestra in Colorado.

In 1969, Mr. Menard became the second violinist in the newly formed Vermeer Quartet, the resident quartet at Northern Illinois University, where he was also a full professor of music. Over the years, he toured extensively with the group throughout North and South America, Europe and Australia, and made many recordings.

The ensemble also became the resident quartet in the Bay Chamber Concerts summer series in Rockport, Me. Mr. Menard retired from the quartet in 1992.

In addition to Mr. Ladley, he is survived by two sisters, Denise Tailfer and Georgette LeClerc, and three brothers, Gilbert, Yves and Jean-Paul.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/1994/08/09/obituaries/pierre-menard-53-violinist-is-dead.html

( Further Readings )

Richard Olney (April 12, 1927 – August 3, 1999)

Richard Olney (April 12, 1927 – August 3, 1999) was an American painter, cook, food writer, editor, and memoirist, best known for his books of French country cooking.

Olney was born in Marathon, Iowa. He lived in a house above the village of Solliès-Toucas in Provence, France, for most of his adult life, where he wrote many classic and influential cookbooks of French country cooking. He had first moved to France in 1951, to Paris, where he was close friends with (and painted many of) the American and English bohemian expatriate set, including James Baldwin, filmmaker Kenneth Anger, painter John Craxton, poet John Ashbery, and composer Ned Rorem.

His deep knowledge of traditional classic French food and wine got him a job writing a column entitled Un Américain (gourmand) à Paris for the journal Cuisine et Vins de France beginning in 1962. After The French Menu Cookbook was published in English in 1970, his then-revolutionary approach of seasonal menus and close attention to wine pairings began to attract notice in Britain and America. By the time he wrote Simple French Food in 1974, he was one of the most important food writers of the era, with a huge impact on nouvelle cuisine and California cuisine.

Alice Waters, of Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley, California, and Kermit Lynch, the well-known Berkeley wine writer and retailer, were both disciples. He introduced Lynch to the French wine growers who were to lead him to his new career, before he even had his first wine shop, including Lucien and Lulu Peyraud of Domaine Tempier, who were then re-establishing the Bandol AOC as a vineyard area of the first rank. James Beard was an important American mentor, and Olney, in the midst of his career, taught a series of cooking classes in Beard's West Village apartment. Despite this, Olney, in a memoir, presents a mixed picture of Beard's character.

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Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Olney_(food_writer)  

( Further Readings )

Weekend Ebook Giveaway: Grigory Ryzhakov - Mr Right and Mr Wrong

Every weekend I will post one ebook to giveaway, and among those who will leave a comment, I will draw a winner. Very easy and very fast ;-) I will send a PM to the winner, so remember to not leave anonymous comments!

And the ebook giveaway goes to giggling_marlin

This weekend author is Grigory Ryzhakov: Grigory (a.k.a Grisha) Ryzhakov grew up in the Russian Far East, bathing in the icy waters of Seas of Okhotsk and Japan and playing hide-and-seek in the snowdrifts that carpeted his native town of Korsakov.

He later travelled thousands of miles to vibrant London, on the way collecting his MSc degree in biochemistry at Moscow State and PhD in molecular biology at Cambridge University.
Meanwhile, Grigory has been ceaselessly creating poems, songs and prose until eventually he wrote his debut novel "Mr Right & Mr Wrong".

"Usher Syndrome" was his first published story, also adapted for the stage and performed at London's Barons Court Theatre in 2010.
To connect with Grigory, please visit his blog: http://www.ryzhakov.co.uk

You can also find him on Twitter/Facebook - @GrigoryRyzhakov
His songs are available on SoundCloud - http://soundcloud.com/grishamcarrow

Mr Right and Mr Wrong (a romantic comedy) by Grigory Ryzhakov
Publisher: Flower Book (April 3, 2013)
Amazon Kindle: Mr Right and Mr Wrong (a romantic comedy)

Having two admirers can be a real headache, especially when a tough agronomy course at Imperial College comes on top of that, not forgetting a part-time job at a florist's and a mother desperate to marry you off.
Have I mentioned a stalker who keeps sending roses, and a Professor who thinks it's fine to bury you under an extra pile of academic papers? Arrrgh!

Blake may be cute and charming, but Terrence is no less attractive in his business suits. What is a poor girl to do? Dating both of them is the right thing if you listen to Trish and that's exactly the way Kurt handles his men.
Party after party, you have to deal with these bouts of guilt mixed with hangovers while mulling over the same dilemma over and over again - Blake or Terrence? Terrence or Blake?
Think, Chloe, think!

Mr Right & Mr Wrong is a wonderfully warm and witty yet thoughtful romantic comedy, from which you will not only pick up tips on the intricacies of London dating, but also discover a few moral and ethical aspects of plant neurobiology. Not so much chick lit as chic lit, offering sophistication alongside Chloe's amusing complications.

When One Door Opens by JD Ruskin

When you read a romance you have this expectation the main characters will be perfect; if they are ex-con , they were wrongly accused, framed by some villain. In this novel the author decided to be true to their characters, and Logan, out on parole and recovering alcoholic, is indeed guilty of the crime for which he ended in prison, and still on the path to be completely free of his addiction.

For reasons that have nothing to do with his skills but more with his good looks, he is picked as delivery guy for Caleb, his boss’s housebound agoraphobic nephew. Logan’s boss think that, if the picked guy to care for his nephew is hot enough to be the boy’s type, it will be a stimulus for him to go out. He doesn’t understand that Caleb’s problem is deeper than that, and by the way, he doesn’t know that Logan is gay and that also Caleb is Logan’s type.

As soon as the two meet, they bond over their respective, if different, disability: they both want to try help the other overcome them, and helping each other they will build something together. There is no surprising revelation that will “free” them from their past, there is instead the understanding that, only accepting that past, they can be able to build a future together.

Maybe since Logan is as troubled as him, with him Caleb is able to open himself, and doing so, to have a support to face his fears. On the other hand, Logan doesn’t consider Caleb’s disability so bad to level him to his own situation, Logan sees Caleb as something precious, too good to dirty him with his past; but Logan also realizes that he is doing good to Caleb, that for whatever reason he doesn’t understand, Caleb wants him in his life and not someone else.

With a supporting cast of characters one better than the other, in which I include the huge tabby orange cut Tiny (that of course is not tiny at all), When One Door Opens is a well-done contemporary romance with unlikely romance heroes that in the end are better than the by-the-romance-rules ones.

Amazon: When One Door Opens
Amazon Kindle: When One Door Opens
Paperback: 210 pages
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press (December 28, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1623802520
ISBN-13: 978-1623802523

Reading List: http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bottom.php?tag=reading list&view=elisa.rolle

Doubling Up by Paul Verity

Doubling Up is not my usual choice of reading, meaning that is not a romance, but it’s for sure a novel dealing with being gay in contemporary society. Matt Durant is apparently from the right side of society, an high-executive professional, a lawyer, you would think that being gay should not be a problem for him, but nevertheless, at 28 is still in the closet, right out from a relationship with a woman that was more for convenience than love. Matt is struggling with what is probably the most important decision of his life, and when he finally takes his life in hands and does something, is also the night when his apparently comfortable life takes a turn for wrong. Matt is tried for murder and convicted. Matt has lost everything, but maybe it’s when he finds everything?

Doubling Up is a classical trial/procedural novel, if you have to stay to the author’s bio, he is a practicing lawyer, and indeed, the part related to the preparation and trial itself is probably the best one. The author also knows about the risk that homophobia seeps in the layers of justice; this side of the novel is not overplayed, making it too emotional to be true, it’s instead dealt with an aseptic way, making it realistic, during the evolution but also in the end.

The ending is also something that maybe will let some readers hanging, but it’s indeed very true to all the novel. It’s not a cataclysm, it’s not the novelization of the true, it’s more what probably happens in most cases, waiting for years for the right resolution of a trial.

Amazon: Doubling Up
Amazon Kindle: Doubling Up
Paperback: 218 pages
Publisher: lulu.com (April 14, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0557697522
ISBN-13: 978-0557697526

Reading List: http://www.librarything.com/catalog_bottom.php?tag=reading list&view=elisa.rolle