Giveaway: The Chance to Win Two of JoJo Moyes’ Novels

With Valentine’s Day quickly approaching, our reading tastes may be more open to checking out books involving love and romance.  And just in time to help spark this fire and desire is an opportunity for you to take home two of JoJo Moyes’ novels! JoJo writes extremely well-crafted tales of love in a fresh and wonderful way. She has easily become one of our favourite authors guaranteed to win the Literary Hoarders Approved stamp every time we finish one and we’re very excited to be able to offer you the chance to win not one, but two of her titles!

This offer is open to all those with a US mailing address and may be gifted to you simply by leaving us a comment below. No crazy questions, no skill-testing questions, no hoops or circles to fight through, no “extra entries” if you do this, this or that, just simply say something below that may tell us why you want to win this fantastic offer. Because we love you and want to share the love and awesome experience of enjoying the stories JoJo Moyes writes.

Book #1 is the newly designed cover for an earlier released title, The Last Letter from Your Lover.

A Brief Encounter for our time, The Last Letter from Your Lover is a sophisticated, spellbinding double love story that spans decades and thrillingly evokes a bygone era. In 1960, Jennifer Stirling wakes in the hospital and remembers nothing—not the car accident that put her there, not her wealthy husband, not even her own name. Searching for clues, she finds an impassioned letter, signed simply “B,” from a man for whom she seemed willing to risk everything. In 2003, journalist Ellie Haworth stumbles upon the letter and becomes obsessed with learning the unknown lovers’ fate—hoping it will inspire her own happy ending. Remarkably moving, this is a novel for romantics of every age.

Book #2 is the wildly wonderful, keep your box of tissues handy, Me Before You. You will easily and very quickly fall head over heels in love with Lou and Will. We’re positive on that note.

Lou Clark knows lots of things. She knows how many footsteps there are between the bus stop and home. She knows she likes working in The Buttered Bun tea shop and she knows she might not love her boyfriend Patrick.
What Lou doesn’t know is she’s about to lose her job or that knowing what’s coming is what keeps her sane.
Will Traynor knows his motorcycle accident took away his desire to live. He knows everything feels very small and rather joyless now and he knows exactly how he’s going to put a stop to that.
What Will doesn’t know is that Lou is about to burst into his world in a riot of colour. And neither of them knows they’re going to change the other for all time.

Hurry and Comment Below! We’ll draw the lucky winner on the big V-Day, Friday, February 14, 2014. We look forward to hearing from you! Good luck!

Giveaway! JoJo Moyes’ The Girl You Left Behind

GIVEAWAY! 

The Literary Hoarders are so pleased (and excited) to be able to offer 1 copy of JoJo Moyes’ latest novel The Girl You Left Behind! (US Addresses only please). Viking/Penguin has graciously said one copy will be sent to one lucky winner (randomly chosen) as well!

Jackie and I read and Looooved Me Before You and we also read it for our Wink 3 Book Club and everyone there raved about it. It was a breakthrough hit for JoJo and everyone we’ve recommended it to has loved, loved, loved it!

The Associated Press said, “There are books that you cannot put down. There are also books where you become so invested in the characters, you force yourself to stop reading to prolong the experience because you don’t want the story to end, and that’s what can happen when you read Me Before You.”

So the hardcover of this new one is sitting here staring me in the face just begging me to dive in to it! Knowing how fantastic Me Before You was, and reading this amazing description about it below, I can’t imagine that The Girl You Left Behind won’t become another major fan favourite!

The Girl You Left Behind isn’t on sale until August 20th, so if you comment below, or better yet, Like Us and comment on our Facebook page, you may just have the lucky, lucky chance of reading before it hits the stores!

(Taken from Viking/Penguin.com):

From the New York Times–bestselling author of Me Before You, a spellbinding love story of two women separated by a century but united in their determination to fight for what they love most

Jojo Moyes’s bestseller, Me Before You, catapulted her to wide critical acclaim and has struck a chord with readers everywhere. “Hopelessly and hopefully romantic” (Chicago Tribune), Moyes returns with another irresistible heartbreaker that asks, “Whatever happened to the girl you left behind?”

France, 1916:  Artist Edouard Lefevre leaves his young wife, Sophie, to fight at the front. When their small town falls to the Germans in the midst of World War I, Edouard’s portrait of Sophie draws the eye of the new Kommandant. As the officer’s dangerous obsession deepens, Sophie will risk everything—her family, her reputation, and her life—to see her husband again.

Almost a century later, Sophie’s portrait is given to Liv Halston by her young husband shortly before his sudden death. A chance encounter reveals the painting’s true worth, and a battle begins for who its legitimate owner is—putting Liv’s belief in what is right to the ultimate test.

We hope you take advantage of the offer and tell us below (and/or on our Facebook page) why you really, really, really need to be the one to get your hands on JoJo Moyes’ latest! This offer is available until Tuesday, July 30th. 

Review: Obedience

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Books, I was able to read this in advance of its January 31 publication date.

Obedience is (taken from Goodreads) set in contemporary and World War II France, this is the story of Sister Bernard: her forbidden love, her uncertain faith, and her guilt- ridden past.

A once -bustling convent in the South of France is closing, leaving behind three elderly nuns. Forced, for the first time, to confront the community that she betrayed decades ago, Sister Bernard relives her life during the war.

At thirty, Sister Bernard can hear the voice of God-strident, furious, and personal. When a young Nazi soldier, a member of the German occupying forces, asks her to meet him in the church in secret one evening, she agrees. And so begins the horrifying and passionate love affair that will deafen the heavens and define her life, tempting her into duplicity. Obedience is a powerful exploration of one woman’s struggle to reconcile her aching need to be loved with her fear of God’s wrath

Unfortunately, and in my opinion (because that’s what these reviews are right? Our own opinion…) this is not a powerful tale at all. It leaves the reader quite confused, and with far too many unanswered questions. There is no historical background or build up to Sister Bernard, her past or why she became a nun, the community that she betrayed. There is no passionate love affair, he made a bet with his fellow soldiers and simply continued to use Sister Bernard. That she felt adoring love for him, does not constitute a passionate love affair to me.

It is an oddly written story that fell short of my expectations. I feel like I have to apologize for that…because I didn’t like it, I’m sorry? It did not hold my interest at all, and it had such great potential based on the description!

The book opens immediately with the story of Sister Bernard at the convent occupied by German soliders. And when I say it opens immediately, I mean it. There is no real date provided, no history or explanation as to why the German soliders are there, no description of Sister Bernard at all. Actually, there is no description given to anything at all in this story.  It seems to start right in the middle it. I kept checking to make sure I was on the right page, that this story did indeed only have 288 pages and yes, I was on Chapter 1. It felt as though I interrupted something in the middle of a private conversation.

Chapter 2 starts in much the same way. (The alternating chapters are supposed to be WWII France and Contemporary France) And Oh! All of a sudden Sister Bernard and the 2 other remaining nuns are now in serious old age and are off to a diocese nursing home. It does not give us any real time frame, no information as to why they are closing the convent, why they are leaving…it just seemed all so bizarre..to not be given any descriptive background info on anyone.

Characters just appear on the page, and some appear and are never mentioned again. Who is Marie? How about Claude? What about Therese? And who is Veronique all of a sudden?? People just popped in out of nowhere and the reader is given no descriptive details at all.

I’m so disappointed and I’m giving it 2 stars. How unfortunate as I was really intrigued by this story. 😦