New blog url!!!

If you subscribe to this blog through something other than the followers function, please change the url to this blog's new location:

secretdreamworldofabookaholic.blogspot.com!

I have decided to change the url so that it matches the blog's name. So far it's still made up to fit the waaaay old blog name!

This blog is under allergies *wink*

Sorry, I'm suffering from my allergies and it drains all energy right out of me. I am tired, can't breathe through my nose and wished those stupid pollens would just hurry up doing their job so that I can breathe and live again.
I hope it gets better during the next few days - at least so much better that I can think and read again or at least get used to it...

In My Mailbox Monday (Apr 18)

Please don’t forget my two current giveaways: My 4th Blogiversary Giveaway ending April 24 and my Birthday Giveaway ending April 26!

In My Mailbox is a weekly event exploring the books I found in my mailbox and is hosted by Kristi @ The Story Siren and was inspired by Alea @ Pop Culture Junkie. To join in, please visit Kristi's blog!

Mailbox Mondays is a weekly event hosted by Marcia from The Printed Page. To join, please visit her blog!

Last week I've been really, really bad about visiting all your Mailboxes. Sorry! I hope and plan to be better this week.


Beth Fantaskey's Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side


Gail Carriger's Soulless (The Parasol Protectorate)


Batya Gur's The Saturday Morning Murder: A Psychoanalytic Case (Michael Ohayon Mysteries, No. 1) - I'm reading this series a bit out of order, because I can't always find the right book in the book store.


David Remnick's The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama - my first book about the current president of the USA, and I'm already curious!

And two German books:

Entschuldigung, sind Sie die Wurst? (Excuse me, are you the wurst/cold meats?), a birthday gift from a dear friend. It's a compilation of things overheard in public - similar to Overheard in New York and Overheard Everywhere. (You really need to check these out if you don't know them already!)

Daniel Kehlmann's Ruhm (Fame), which is a novel in nine stories, where one story links to the others in one way or another. This was a birthday gift from a colleague and friend.

blame game time (April 16)

It is time for another blame game! I realized I skipped the last week or so, but with my cat and everything, I was too distraught to remember... The blame game was first done by Chris from Stuff As Dreams Are Made On.

Just Like Me, Just Better by Carol Snow was reviewed by Wendy from Wendy's Minding Spot and it sounds hilarious!

The Girl She Used To Be by David Cristofano was reviewed by Lenore from Presenting Lenore. I read a lot about the book in the past, but her short review just did it for me.

Taken By Storm by Angela Morrison was reviewed by Lorelei from Tattooed Books. I just have to get it, because it sounds like a nice book to read once I have finished some of my other books.

Wish by Alexandra Bullen has been out there for a bit, and I really don't know why I hesitated. Anyway, the review Kim from The Book Butterfly was the last straw...

The Wide-Awake Princess by E.D. Baker was reviewed by Stephanie from Juiciliciousss Reviews - while I don't particularly like the official cover (the ARC cover was much better!), I am still curious about this version of The Sleeping Beauty.

The DUFF (Designated Ugly Fat Friend) by Kody Keplinger was reviewed by Jami from YA Addict and it sure sounds like a fun read of reluctant friends (frenemies???)...

Book Review: Literary Murder by Batya Gur

Author	Batya Gur
Title	Literary Murder
Publisher	Harper
Date of Publication	October 7, 1994
Page Count	368 (my German copy: 480)
ISBN	978-0-060-92548-2
Series	Superintendent Michael Ohajon #2

On a short vacation to the sea with his son, Superintendent Michael Ohajon witnesses the body of a dead scuba diver being pulled out of the sea. The diver turns out to be a lecturer at the Hebrew Literature Institute at Hebrew University in Jerusalem - Ido Duda'i. Back home in Jerusalem, Ohajon helps with the investigation in the lecturer's death, when a second murder victim is found: the head of the institute, Sha'ul Tirosh, a world-reknowned scholar and poet. While investigating the two murders, Ohajon heads back into the world of the university, including its academic talking and the lectures.

To be up front, this book can be boring in some parts for those readers who don't know the basics of studying literature (for example what hermeneutics is). Batya Gur recreated two longer lectures on literature in this mystery and some shorter discussions in conversations between the characters. This, of course, could have been expected in a book set around the world of the lecturers and professors of a literature department at a university. You can of course skip or skim those parts, but I really enjoyed them, as they showed some more distant characters in a new light.

Aside from that, though, the murder mysteries and the characters were so well-developped, it was amazing to read Literary Murder. The characters are really three-dimensional, with different reasons that make them tick. It was hard to keep track of every little detail, which made it impossible (at least for me) to guess who did it up until the very last moment.

On top of that, the setting in Jerusalem was one I have yet to encounter in other mysteries. According to SYKM there are a few more series set in Israel, or Jerusalem, more specifically (do authors know there are other interesting cities in Israel? I'd like to read a series set in Tzfat or maybe Haifa *wink* Batya Gur really brought Jerusalem into my living room and my room at my parents'. It was awesome to almost see the streets of Jerusalem with the old buildings and everything!

In my German copy, the publisher even added some explanations about the Jewish terms, as not everyone might know what "shiva" is. I'm really excited about this series, as it is so different from other murder mysteries / police procedurals I've read in the past, yet, it is similar. I can't wait to get my hands on the next book.

This review is part of Jen's Detectives Around the World week. For more posts about detectives from all different countries, please click on the picture:

books, books, and more books - currently reading and not reading

I'm sooo tired! My first week of lectures at unversity is already finished (I only have classes Mon through Wed) and 4 of my classes didn't even take place yet, but I'm so tired, I actually went to bed at 8:30pm yesterday and only read for an hour before I switched off the light and dozed off, happily slept until close to 7am this morning and I am still (or again?) tired!

With all the being tired I haven't read much, but instead I started a few more books. Just what I needed, right? On Monday, I bought and started reading one of Carlo Goldoni's works (the title escapes me, sorry - it's about a notorious liar and his servant, Arlecchino). On Sunday late in the evening I discovered - to my shock and horror - that sometime after my wisdom tooth issue, they changed the class info for my class on Italian lit and I was supposed to read this one *before* the class started. And yes, the class started on Monday! Anyway, I got up early, left for the book shop to get the book and the sat down in the Starbucks right around the corner and started reading. I think I read the first 20 pages before I had to leave for my class, so I really was nowhere near finished (the book has only about 90 pages, but still!). Now, on to said class, with a guilty conscience! And there I found out we won't discuss the book until late May or even early June. Duh! I could have saved myself the trouble (and another currently reading-book. Well, I'm now half-way through, so I will finish it and then skim it once we're closer to the actual discussion date.

Then, I needed something light for the evening, because on Monday already, I was just so tired! So I picked up one of my romance novels which I have here. My small stack of "lifesavers", so to say, because I just can't fall asleep unless I read a few pages. No matter how tired I am, I just won't fall asleep! And then, I'm reading the 4th House of Night book, Untamed. I am on page 45, I think, which really isn't that far into the story yet, and even though I enjoy it, I just haven't managed to pick it back up today (not after the train ride home from the dentist, who took the stitch out this noon, anyway).

Really, right now, I just wished I could sit down with *one* book and finish it. But no, I have a bunch going.

And as if that is not bad enough, I sorted through all the bills from my book-shopping sprees (I collect them :-P ). I filed all those away that have unread books on them, and I have unread books from as far back as 2006 (that's as far back as I could go)! Can you imagine that? 2006!!!

The books are:

1) P.J. Tracy: Dead Run
2) Tamar Myers: The Ming & I
3) Julia Spencer-Fleming: In The Bleak Midwinter
4) Joanne Fluke: Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder (one would think I read that right away - chocolate chip cookies and all!)
5) Rhys Bowen: Death of Riley
6) Nancy Fairbanks: Death A L'Orange
7) Emilie Richards: Let There Be Suspects
8) Rachel Gibson: Simply Irresistible

And maybe Janet Evanovich's Seven Up, but I can't find it on my TBR piles or shelves. Wherever that book is, I hope I already read it!

This run down really scared me, so I didn't even think about going through the bills from 2007. It can only get worse! *sigh*

Do you have many unread books at home from looooong ago?

Book Review: My Invented Life by Lauren Bjorkman

Author	Lauren Bjorkman
Title	My Invented Life
Publisher	Henry Holt
Date of Publication	September 29, 2009
Page Count	229
ISBN	978-0-8050-8950-9

Roz and Eva are sisters who are only one year apart - and up until a few months ago, they were not only sisters, but also best friends. But then they fell out with each other, which ended with Eva deleting a folder from her computer desktop titled "Roz - sister and best friend". Roz calls this the PD - the time Post Deletion. Now the sister are enemies of sorts and very, very tense around each other and argue whenever they're talking. When Eva dares Roz to publicly proclaim she is into girls at the beginning of a new school year, Roz accepts right away, thinking it won't be too difficult and might even help others with their coming out, but is she really ready for what will come her way? And who is actually into girls in this cast? And will this affect this year's play the drama club will perform, Shakespeare's As You Like It?

In this young adult novel spiked with Shakespearean curses and even more references Shakespearean language most of the time, we not only meet two sisters and their friends in times of troubles and secrets. We also are thrown into the world of teenagers today who have to deal with their identity and their sexuality.

Roz is a funny, rather clueless girl who stumbles into difficult situations simply because she wants to help. This makes her a likeable character, even if you sometimes feel like telling her to open her eyes. Her sister Eva is someone Roz misses in her life and she does not know what caused the fraction between them, so she tries to figure it out, to go back to normal. To top it of (like the whipped cream on the ice cream, if you'd like), we get Roz's internal view, her daydreams. And then there are of course the other members of the drama club. These characters are something and they throw you right back to high school - there's drama, lies, betrayals and some good acting going on throughout the book.

I really enjoyed that Lauren Bjorkman used this setting everyone involved in high school art clubs knows, to talk about sexual identity, sibling rivalry and friendship. We all need friends, after all! I found Roz' voice to be clear, even if she was not exactly the most straightforward, that's how it is girl and her daydreams spiked things up.

All in all, I was sad to see this story end, but while I would love to visit Roz, Eva and the entire drama club again, I just don't see a good plot. Unless you take Jonathan as the narrator! Actually, I can't wait for 2011 to come, because then I will at least get back with Lauren Bjorkman's beautiful writing, in her second young adult novel Miss Fortune Cookie.

I got this book through International Book Tours, and I'm really glad the girls are doing this for us international book bloggers!

In My Mailbox Monday (Apr 11) and what else I got this week

In My Mailbox is a weekly event exploring the books I found in my mailbox and is hosted by Kristi @ The Story Siren and was inspired by Alea @ Pop Culture Junkie. To join in, please visit Kristi's blog!

Mailbox Mondays is a weekly event hosted by Marcia from The Printed Page. To join, please visit her blog!

This week was filled with good things for me. After all, it was my birthday and I needed some comfort after having my wisdom tooth extracted.

So, for books I got :



My Invented Life by Lauren Bjorkman via the International Book Tours. I already finished the book and it is ready to be sent on to the next person.

Then I got a German book written by former Israeli ambassador in Germany (I hope I got his title right!) Avi Primor, in which he talks about his work as ambassador and his life. I'm really curious about that one - and I was really lucky, because I bought a used copy with his signature!


I also got Exclusively Chloe by J.A. Yang. I think I'll break my rule of reading the older books first with this one. I'm cuuuuuurious! :D


William Sleator's Fingers just had to come to me, now that I finally remembered the title of a childhood favorite, which I read only once when I got it from the library. For years I've been trying to remember the title, because the story of a young boy, a wonder child pianist, haunted me! I hope it can live up to my memories.


Do I have to say anything about this? I had to get Hex Hall (Book 1) by Rachel Hawkins!

Also, I got a bunch of DVDs:



Persuasion with Amanda Root and Ciarán Hinds - it's the first BBC classic I ever watched and I just had to get my own copy.



Don't worry! I got the collectors box with all three movies for a small price. Persuasion with Sally Hawkins and Rupert Penry Jones, Mansfield Park with Billie Piper and Blake Ritson, and Northanger Abbey with Felicity Jones and William Beck.
I just love the Jane Austen movies from BBC!

And my brother and his girlfriend got me the 2nd and 3rd season of King of Queens for my birthday. How awesome is that?

Read-A-Thon woes

Please don’t forget my two current giveaways: My 4th Blogiversary Giveaway ending April 24 and my Birthday Giveaway ending April 26!

I'm really sad I missed out on this read-a-thon! But it was my birthday and I knew right from the start that I couldn't possibly be around for the entire 24 hours. Plus, tomorrow is the first day of the new semester and I'd very much appreciate being wide awake! Also, I thought I would be busy with something, which fell through - and I only found out far, far too late *sigh*

But aw, what have I missed. After reading a few blog posts, I felt so sad I marked every RAT-post as read in my reader. I am so annoyed that I couldn't join in in any way (not long after my family left, our sweet neighbors came over and stayed - for for a quick visit for more than 2 hours!). All in all, it was a fun day with wonderful people, but I missed the whole atmosphere of the read-a-thon!

On the bright side, I'm participating in Jen's Detectives Around the World! I will be posting my review of Batya Gur's Literary Murder and some additional info on Thurday, so watch out for it!

Happy birthday to me!

I'm another year older! Some days I really feel old, but so what! Anyway, I am not on my computer again for 25 hours, but I want to share this with you. So I just scheduled this post!

Today is my 26th birthday and on top of my blogiversary giveaway, I have a smaller birthday giveaway for you!

You might remember that I'm absolutely crazy about bookmarks. I absolutely love bookmarks and it's pretty much the coolest thing ever! I have all kinds of bookmarks and I collect them. So to celebrate my birthday with you, two of you will get a small bookmark selection - the book marks will be new ones and I will buy them as soon as I have picked some winners, so you can tell me if there's something you really don't like in bookmarks.

And now, here's your chance to enter: Just fill out the form by April 26 12AM CEST! For the exact time, please check out this clock.

blame game time (April 9)

It is time for another blame game! I realized I skipped the last week or so, but with my cat and everything, I was too distraught to remember... The blame game was first done by Chris from Stuff As Dreams Are Made On.

Forgive My Fins by Tera Lynn Childs was mentioned by Rebecca from Lost in Books. She has it on her wishlist - and now, so do I!

Have a Littel Faith by Mitch Albom was reviewed by Nelly from All About {n} and as I really, really loved Albom's previous novels, I have to get this one as soon as it is out in paperback!

Exclusively Chloe by J.A. Yang was mentioned by Ari from Reading in Color - and she gets two points because I already ordered the book. (What the heck happened to my book buying rules???) She also added Love, Shelley by Kate Sakensa and Ten Things I Hate About Me by Randa Abdel-Fattah to my wish list.

Never Tell Our Business to Strangers by Jennifer Mascia was reviewed by Naida from The Bookworm.

Prism by Faye and Aliza Kellerman was mentioned by Karin from Karin's Book Nook. I'm really curious about it!

Happy 4th Blogiversary!

Can you believe it? I've been blogging here at Secret Dreamworld of a Bookaholic since four years! (And about two months from now I'll have my 6 year blogiversary - yikes!)

And to celebrate this, I'm hosting a giveaway! One of you will get to pick 2 books from those I reviewed in the past 4 years (the books have to be available at Amazon.de, as I will order them there) and 2 bookmarks. And three of you will get a 2 bookmarks.
To see which books I reviewed in the past 4 years, please check out my reviews.

This giveaway will be open for 4x4 days - so your last chance to enter will be Saturday, April 24, at 1pm CEST! For the exact time, please check out this clock.

And here's your form to enter the giveaway!

out for a day or two

Well,me - the wisdom tooth is out for good ;-) And with this announcement I'm off to bed with a book. See you again once I'm no longer woozy from the drugs... My dentist was nice to me, I think. It's been 6 hours and I still don't feel much... I hope it stays that way!

I'll be back once I feel better! Also: Check back later this week, as I will have a blogiversary & birthday giveaway!

The Book List (Apr 6): Regretable Book Covers

Once again it is time for The Book List, a meme started and hosted by Rebecca from Lost In Books.

This week's theme is regretable book covers.

Now I admit right away, this one won't be easy! Unfortunately, I judge a book by its cover, so I hardly ever buy books with ugly covers - and therefore have a hard time remembering bad covers.

One book I bought despite a not exactly favorable cover was Cassandra Clare's City of Bones. Not the pretty, colorful cover, but the ugly, two-color dark-grey, shiny blueish (?) cover, which didn't tell anything about the book. It didn't have one of the characters or a scene from the book, it was just - blah! Unfortunately - or maybe fortunately - I couldn't find a photo of the cover. They changed it to the regular cover.

Another one is John Sandford's Rules of Prey.

Now, really, what is up with the green and the light colors? This is a dark book - serial killer, murder, blood and gore all over the place! Why did they have to pick these light colors? The book looks friendly, if bland, like something I'd want to read in my spare time, something that's not all exciting, but still a bit of a pleasure to read.

And third, I'd say: every single cover on a Harlequin romance novel I ever laid my eyes on! They're an abomination! I don't even know where to start with this. they're cheap, ridiculous, never tell a thing about the story other than some semi-good looking guy and some beautiful woman apparently have the hots for each other.

Book Review: I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have To Kill You by Ally Carter

Author	Ally Carter
Title	I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have To Kill You
Publisher	Hyperion
Date of Publication	March 20, 2007
Page Count	288
ISBN	978-1-423-10004-1
Series	Gallagher Girls #1

Cammie Morgan is a student at Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women. On the outside, this is a fancy prep school for the daughters of wealthy families - but on the inside, it is a top-secret boarding school for girls training to be spies. Their subjects range from culture & assimiliation and advanced encryption to covert operations. The girls are even learning way more than a handful of languages - with the help of lunch time conversations in Chinese, Japanese and all the other languages the girls are studying. On a covered operations mission, Cammie meets Josh, a local boy, who has no clue she's a Gallagher Girl. This sets off a chain of events - from hands-on investigating to lying to Cammie's mother, the headmistress at Gallagher Academy.

My first YA by Ally Carter blew me off my feet! I expected some sweet "girl-James Bond" novel, but what I got was a group of average girls, different characters. There were some technically versed students as well as girls who loved to go undercover. No girl was like another and especially one "transfer student" was a hoot. I'm not telling you more about her, though. You'll have to read it for yourself!

While ITYILYBTIHTKY (wow, even shortened, it's a loooong title!) starts off without too much action during the first few chapters to properly introduce everyone and everything. After all, we have to take in a lot of information, and with tons of action, it could get lost. But as soon as Ally Carter accomplishs that, she moves to action with covered operations lessons for the girls and she brings the reader right along.

The writing and the story line was never boring and it was such a wonderful experience reading this book, I not only brought it along to a friend for her to read, but also ordered the 2nd in series, Cross My Heart And Hope To Spy, and pre-ordered the 3rd, Don't Judge A Girl By Her Cover - in fact, I already read the 2nd and passed it on to my friend.

Did you read I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have To Kill You? Then please leave a comment soI can link to it!

Busy week ahead

So, the upcoming week will be filled with "events". I will spend some time at my dentist's to see whether or not we'll extract my (last!) wisdom tooth. I'm not sure whether I want it out or not. If it's out, I won't be able to get any decent food for another week (maybe even a few days longer). After 8 days of card board bread and potatoes, I could really use some good food :-P

Then, my blogiversary is coming up. Yay! Also, my birthday is coming up - two days after the blogiversary. So watch out for something nice (I hope)!

And on my birthday? Well, and then there will also be Dewey's 24 Hour Read-A-Thon - finally! You can't wait either, can you? If you haven't heard of this awesome read-a-thon yet (really???), check it out and join in! It's the most fun you can have!

And as soon as next weekend is over, I will be back at university, the new semester begins!

In My Mailbox Monday (Apr 4)

Now, a rainy, sunny, cold, warm - all in all, weird - week is over. Of course, I had some delicious food, and tons of "card board" bread (those of you who have been eating it for the past 6 days know what I'm talking about - and no, I caved and had some real bread when I realized I was about to fall up and down several stairs...)

But I think you want to know more about the book-ish stuff I got last week, right? So there you go.

In My Mailbox is a weekly event exploring the books I found in my mailbox and is hosted by Kristi @ The Story Siren and was inspired by Alea @ Pop Culture Junkie. To join in, please visit Kristi's blog!

Mailbox Mondays is a weekly event hosted by Marcia from The Printed Page. To join, please visit her blog!

I got one book only, and this was one of my pre-ordered books:



Jill Shalvis' Instant Temptation, the last in the Wilder Brothers trilogy - and I'm already sad! I will miss not only the people, but also the surroundings, the places featured and the mountains and everything!

So now you know what I found in my mailbox last week. What did you find?

blame game time (April 1)

It is time for another blame game! I realized I skipped the last week or so, but with my cat and everything, I was too distraught to remember... The blame game was first done by Chris from Stuff As Dreams Are Made On.

Elizabeth Scott's Grace was mentioned by Elie from Ellz Reads. After my first encounter with Elizabeth Scott's work earlier this year I definitely have to read more!

Secrets of Eden by Chris Bohjalian was reviewed by Jill from The Magic Lasso. I've never read any of Chris Bohjalian's books, but I'm really curious.

Ann Malaspina's FInding Lincoln was reviewed by Natasha from the Maw Books Blog. It sounds like a good kiddie lit book!

Queen of Secrets by Jenny Meyerhoff was reviewed by Laura from Tattooed Books. Even if she didn't absolutely love it, the story sounds interesting to me, so I actually already pre-ordered it.