Today is Sally’s birthday! I hope you will all wish her a Happy Birthday! Thanks Mom for all the great reviews and teaching tips!

If you stopped by The Friendly Book Nook last night and it was down, it’s because I was upgrading! And yes that turned into a deeply painful process because I am still learning everyday about technology. I am simply over the moon that I didn’t lose the site…it truly felt like I would at times! I even called my mom (Sally) in near tears.

Anyway, all of that to say that Erin of Journey Through Reading nominated us for a Brilliante blogging award! I am patting myself on the back about that because I don’t feel especially brilliant at the moment. (truth be told….it is VERY easy to upgrade, I just didn’t have everything clicking)

Many thanks Erin, we love you too! We are supposed to nominate seven blogs but I read a whole bunch of book blogs and I think just about everyone I know has already been nominated. I got nominated for this one on my personal blog as well and no one that I nominated passed it on! (ungrateful….)

So I’m nominating Erin right back. And also I just want to say thank you so much to everyone who reads our bookish reflections. I have loved being a part of the book blogging community, because I think that book bloggers are kind and supportive of one another. Reading naturally forces you to open your mind to different ways of thinking and living and I really think that is reflected in the friendship we share in the book blogging community. So many thanks to all!

I was going to have a review of a book that I think is powerful in subtle ways, but it’s almost 3 a.m. and I can’t do it justice to write it now. So look for that on Sunday or Monday or maybe even later today if I get the chance. And tomorrow is the first Saturday in the Nook! I’m really excited about that!

Be sure to leave comments this month for a chance at the Amazon giftcard! Also, enter our bloggy giveaway if you are so inclined.

One more thing…ALL prizes have finally been mailed. I am just the most scatterbrained person I know, so I make it to the post office and realize I forgot one prize, and then don’t get a chance to go again for awhile. I will definitely work on that so that we can be super brilliant next time! Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

The winner of Live a Little by Kim Green is Cindi (no blog)!

The winner of Questory of Root Karbunkulus is Shannon!

Please send me your addresses and I’ll be sure these get to you!

Thanks for your participation everyone!

Next week we are starting a brand new feature on Saturdays called Saturdays in the Nook. We have a really impressive line-up of authors and book bloggers who will be sharing some of the early reading memories with you. It’s Saturday morning books instead of cartoons!

We love reading and want The Friendly Book Nook to be a big celebration of books! There are just a few spots open for the rest of this year so if you are an author who would enjoy sharing an early memory of reading with us, please email Amy at thefriendlybooknook AT gmail DOT com

Tomorrow we’ll announce the winners of Live a Little and the Questory of Root Karbunkulus!

At long last! The winners of the Summer Reading Extravaganza! First, let me thank you all for joining in…I think it was a lot of fun. I got a lot of ideas from everyone!

It took me some to go through and count all the legitimate entries, but we do have some winners! And they are:

Tracy is the winner of the Inspirational Fiction Lot
Nise is the winner of the signed copy of Stealing Athena
Emma is the winner of the ten dollar Amazon gift certificate.

Just get your addresses to me everyone, so I can get those things in the mail to you. There will be more giveaways coming up, so stay tuned.

One more thing…has everyone been able to read The Girl Who Stopped Swimming yet?

We’ll be having another group read discussion in August of Kim Green’s Live a Little! Once again, the publisher (Hachette Book Group USA) has offered to give a copy to one lucky reader. Here are the rules:

1) Leave a comment agreeing to participate in the group discussion August 27-29.
2) For two extra entries, post about this giveaway on your blog and leave a comment here with your link.
3) This will be open until July 23rd. At that point, we will choose a winner. That is the same day the book will be available in stores.

Here’s a little about the book from the publisher’s site:
-What do you do if you have two bratty teenage kids who don’t give you the time of day?
-What do you do if your husband is more interested in his remote than you?
-What do you do if you’re forever being compared to your perfect sister–who just happened to marry your perfect boyfriend?
-And what do you do if you’re told you have stage 4 breast cancer?
Well, if you’re Raquel Rose, you tell your family your diagnosis, and then you watch them go from treating you like dirt to treating you like a queen. Then you go on to raise unprecedented amounts of money for breast cancer research. You fulfill your early artistic promise. And you find you love this new life of yours, no matter how fleeting it may be.

So when the doctor calls to tell her that there was a mistake and she’s actually perfectly healthy, instead of sharing her good news, Raquel can’t relinquish the sudden attention and love from her family. Soon Raquel’s lie by omission snowballs and the wise-cracking 40-something becomes a sought-after figure on her sister’s popular talk show, elevating her “illness” to local rock star status. Her mistaken diagnosis becomes the fated opportunity to fix the glaring problems in her life–her stalled career as an artist, her lackluster marriage, her unappreciative children, and her highly dysfunctional family.
And while she wants to tell the truth, she’s afraid to give it all up–would her family go back to taking her for granted? Would the donors rescind their checks if they think she was a fraud? In the end, it’s up to Raquel to find her real “cure”: an ending that befits the second chance she’s been granted.

Since you guys haven’t had a chance to read the book, yet, we’ll push the rest of the discussion to next weekend…does that sound good?  Be sure to let anyone else interested know!

June 23rd-27th The Friendly Book Nook will be having a Summer Reading Extravaganza! Each day we will have a topic about summer reading that we encourage you to post about on your blog! It should be a great chance to get a lot of ideas for books to read over the summer as well as ways to encourage your children to spend some of their time reading.There are also prizes! Through regular participation you will have the chance to win one of the following:1) Inspirational Fiction Lot: Includes Skizzer by A.J. Kiesling, A Mending at the Edge by Jane Kirkpatrick, In the Dead of Winter by Nancy Mehl, To Trust a Friend by Lynn Bullock, and a special cross bookmark made by Rabuna Fi.2) A brand new signed copy of Stealing Athena by Karen Essex.3) A ten dollar Amazon gift card!

If you would like to donate some prizes to add to these, please contact Amy at thefriendlybooknook AT gmail DOT com.

Here’s how to be eligible to win one of these prizes:

For bloggers:
1) Post a message on your blog inviting your readers to join in the Summer Reading Extravaganza. (required)
2) Participate in the Summer Reading Extravaganza. For each day you participate, you will receive an entry!
3) For a bonus entry, write a wrap-up post at the end of the week linking to your favorite posts from the week.
4) Add the button to your sidebar for another bonus entry!

For non-bloggers:
1) Participate by leaving comments on participants blogs. For each comment you will receive an entry.
2) Send an email at the end of the week to thefriendlybooknook AT gmail DOT com with links to the posts you commented on.

Thanks you all for helping us make it the best it can be!

The group discussion for The Girl Who Stopped Swimming will be moved to June 28-30 to give our winner time to read her book!  Our winner is Cheryl!  Congrats Cheryl!  Even if you didn’t win, I hope you will consider joining in the conversation.  You might check your library to see if they have the book.  Some of you have asked how it will be conducted.  This is a blog, so we’ll hold the discussion blog style in comments.  But on the last day you can write your concluding thoughts on the book and we’ll link up!   I’m also working on a button you can put on your blogs, so stay tuned.

Don’t forget about the Summer Reading Extravaganza Carnival!  It will be June 23-27!  Each day we’ll have a theme that you can write about on your own blogs or respond to in comments (if you are a non-blogger).  We’ll cover everything from your favorite beach reads to summer reading lists for the kiddos.   I’m working on a prize basket (of books, what else?) as well for participation.

(If anyone out there wants to contribute something, do contact Amy at thefriendlybooknookATgmailDOTcom)

Thanks everyone and happy reading!

Courtesy of the publisher, we have a copy of The Girl Who Stopped Swimming by Joshilyn Jackson to give away!

Here’s how to enter!

1) Agree to participate in the Group Discussion if you win the third week of June and leave a comment. (one entry)

2) Blog about the Group Discussion and invite your readers to join in with a link back to this giveaway! (two entries)

By the way, I’m reading it now and it’s unputdownable. Thanks everyone! I’ll leave this open for a week.