Book Talk with Rebecca Rivera

Hello, everyone. Welcome back to Book Talk. I'm excited to introduce you to the first of the small town business owners in this week's blog post series: Small Town Businesses. Tonya Parrish owns Royal Gifts & Fine China, located on the square in Clinton, North Carolina. She learned her passion for business and creativity from her parents who ran a shop on the far side of town for many years as Tonya was growing up. After a brief time of working various jobs, including filing in an office, Tonya decided that she needed an outlet for her creativity and decided to open her first shop, Shabby Lane, in 2013 where she sold refinished furniture and carried some bridal registry items. In 2015, she moved her shop to a different side of the square and renamed it Royal Gifts and Fine China. Tonya discontinued the furniture but expanded her line of china and began focusing heavily on bridal registry. Today she carries 50+ lines of China, Vietri being her personal favorite. ...

Hello, readers. On Book Talk we talk about books, life and people. I thought it would be fun to talk about some local business people this week who have inspired and encouraged me in my creativity. Over the years these shop owners have become friends, and many times I have seen the correlation between creativity and courage in running a shop and in writing a blog. I will be introducing four local shops owners who I talked with about creativity in business. I'll also be sharing some of their advice for starting a new business in a small town, as well as some of their own ups and downs of business and what got them through. Join me as we meet each of these owners and explore the wonderful items in their shops. Stop back this evening to meet the first of our local shop owners, a woman who knew she had to quit an office job of filing papers and express her creativity by opening her own shop. Welcome to the Small Town Businesses Series Read about Tonya, owner of Royal Gifts ...

Have you ever come home from the library with a stack of books ten high, only to return all of them unread, then repeat the same process on your next visit? I have been doing this for years. Last month I decided I needed to get a handle on this action. So I started asking myself why I took home so many books and why so many of them were returned unread. Taking home so many is simple. They all look so interesting. Ooo, a flashy cover. I'll take that one. Hmm, intriguing title. I'll take that one too. Interesting premise on the back cover copy of this one. I'm sure I'll read this one. I'd better take it too. I'm sure your excuses are as water tight as mine. But why return so many unread? Now that question was a little harder to answer. After some soul searching and much wailing and confessing of sins...wait, that's church, not library books. Ahem...let's start over. After pondering on this question and forcing myself to be as honest as I could, I c...

Have you ever read Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell ? What is that book about?? What is the point? I read umpteen pages just to get to the end and NOTHING HAPPENS! I thought I was just being picky. Or maybe I didn't get it. So I checked reviews on Goodreads and found I was not alone. There are mixed reviews on Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell . Some absolutely love it, the magic, the detail, the characters, the world that Clarke created. Others had the same reaction I did. WHAT IS THE POINT? Nothing really happens in the book. There is no resolution at the end. We are still waiting to see if Strange and Norrell come out of the black cloud (in which they seem none too eager to leave). I don't know if the point is to relate to that type of person or creative who gets so involved in their work they fail to notice whether it's night or day. I enjoy that type of person. I fantasize about being that type of person. I might even dare to say that I've achieved it once or twic...

So I've finished Dream Kiss. It's been a while since I first started this series. I'm glad to reach the end. I'm excited to move on to some other great books I've found on Smashwords since first discovering the Sweet N' Sour Kisses series, including a mystery series by the same author. I'll be reading the first of the mystery series on a casual level. I have some other books I'm reading right now that I'm excited about finishing, so Cindy M. Hogan's Watched will be one that I pick up when I'm waiting at the dentist's office or something like that. (I don't know why people always pick the dentist's office. I know I won't be waiting there because I haven't been to one in over six years! I'm not advocating not going, I'm just saying I know I won't read this book at the dentist's office. Haha. Although I may read it at my husband's office while I'm waiting for him to get off work.) Wow! That was a l...

I've finally reached Dream Kiss . I don't currently remember what it was about. (Lasting impression, huh...) Ok, let me check, and I'll be right back. ... ... ... Ok. Here's what it's about. Our main character, Brooklyn Hamlin, falls for yet another guy, a dreamy, romantic piece of human that she goes physically crazy for. But when she goes on a two-week family vacation with absolutely no contact with her new boyfriend, she comes back feeling quite differently about him. I think I've said this before, but I was excited when I first started this series. The author is a Mormon from what I can tell, so she writes about teens that actually have some rules governing their lives. It's not everyone sleeping with everyone all up in these pages. Brooklyn makes her own personal rule of not kissing a boy until she turns sixteen. All of that is what intrigued me about reading these books, especially since today's YA has limits on barely anything. However, a...

Yesterday I finished reading a book called Summer Breeze by Nancy Thayer. It was one of those sweet "beach" type reads. I actually started it at the beach last Saturday. That is something I've wanted to do: read a book with a setting near water while being at the beach. I don't normally choose "sweet" books like this. I grew up reading adventure or coming-of-age or romance with fantastical life circumstances getting in the way, making you wonder if the couple will ever get together. These stories didn't always have happy endings...unlike Summer Breeze . If that book doesn't have a happy ending, you'd probably want your money back. The title, the front cover picture, all of it, advertises a happy ending. If I was rating the book out of five among others of its kind, I'd give it a three. The writing was competent, but it lacked that certain flair that makes an author really stand out. However, I think lots of people like this kind of writ...