{Meme} It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

HHHHHAAAAPPPPPYYYYY MMMMOOONNNDDAAAYYY!!!!

Are you excited about starting another work week?!!

Yeah. Neither are we.

So let's get away from the negative and get to the positive - We're starting new books this week! Below are summaries of the books we're giving a go.

Mandy:

For Review

In the days after the Civil War, a solitary rider travelled the open frontier - but he wasn't alone, for Death seemed to travel with him. Or maybe it was the Devil himself who gave him the lethal pistol shot that earned him the name "Death's Acolyte." And when the stranger with the scarred face, who calls himself Ken Casey, rode into the peaceful Texas town of Wardell, maybe peace - for his own ravaged soul - was all he wanted. But in Wardell, all hell is about to break loose.

Awaiting a train shipment of gold, Angus Pugh and his army of outlaws, including notorious gunslinger Luke Draco, take the town hostage and kill a few innocent citizens as a lesson to any comers. Donning priestly vestments, Ken Casey, ordained man of the cloth, steps from the shadows to conduct the victims' funeral rites - and that's just his first revelation. For Casey can destroy souls as easily as he saves them, and earthly justice is delivered in gun smoke and blood.

For Review

Just because Anny Applebaum qualifies for a senior discount doesn't mean she's ready for retirement. But if she wants to keep her job at the San Francisco Times, she'll have to find a way to spice up her lifestyle column. Even if it means posting her profile as an eligible single on JDate.com. Sure, Anny's a little out of practice. She hasn't been with a man since she found Viagra in her ex-husband's suit pocket, and he wasn't taking it for her. But she's got her friends to help her fumble her way through the strange and intriguing world of online dating.

After hearing cautionary tales from the trenches - about "boomer oldies" who drag around pictures of their dead wives and fixed-income misers who wine and dine their dates at chain restaurants - Anny is relieved to meet Marv Rothstein, a charming ... 75-year-old diamond dealer. Unfortunately, he's also a Digital Age Don Juan who prowls singles sites for younger women. Not to be outdated by this "Serial JDater," Anny realizes Marv is the perfect subject for her flagging column and chronicles his sexcapades for the reading public. But when the new column becomes an overnight hit, Anny can't help but feel conflicted - because now she's having sex with Mr. X ... and it's nothing less than extraordinary.

For Review

In this one-of-a-kind collection of Reader's Digest's best military pieces, you'll meet ordinary people faced with extraordinary circumstances in the name of America and freedom. People such as Staff Sergeant Jeff Sarver, whose mission day after day was to get it right the first time or die as he and his team disarmed hundreds of improvised explosive devices in Iraq; and Colonel Greg Gadson, a double amputee whose inspirational message of courage, perseverance, and teamwork helped lead the then-struggling Giants to a Super Bowl victory in 2007. These articles remind us of all those in uniform who go above and beyond the call of duty, including the 1000-man crew of the USS Point Cruz who cared for an abandoned infant in Korea until his adoption in the United States, and the Green Beret who risked his life to save a dying Afghan girl.

For the 2013 TBR Pile Challenge

As the Inquisition spread its fiery fingers across the land of Spain, holding kingdom and king in its terrible grip, a new horror would rise to challenge even the invincible power of the Grand Inquisitor. A curse on the house of King Alonzo that came from the very Devil.

A curse that would leave his daughter unfit to marry or rule. A curse that would transform his only legitimate son, Rolon, into the very Hound of Hell, whose unspeakable secret bloomed under the full moon of a country where terror came in mother's milk and vengeance roamed abroad. Rolon, the chosen, the damned. Rolon, the kind, blessed with a compassionate soul and a great and tragic love; cursed by a secret plague sent by Lucifer Himself. Rolon, Heir to the Throne of Spain, who dared to defy the Inquisition in the ungodly raiment of The Godforsaken.

Kathy:

For Review

Michel Freij is poised to become the next president of Lebanon. The billionaire businessman's calls for a new, strong regional role for the country take on a sinister note when European intelligence reveals Freij has bought two ageing Soviet nuclear warheads from a German arms dealer.

Maverick British intelligence officer Gerald Lynch has to find the warheads, believed to be on board super-yacht the Arabian Princess, before they can reach Lebanon. Joined by Nathalie Durand, the leader of a French online intelligence team, Lynch is pitched into a deadly clash with Freij and his violent militia as he pursues the Arabian Princess across the Mediterranean.

The partners at Finley & Figg - all two of them - often refer to themselves as "a boutique law firm." Boutique, as in chic, selective, and prosperous. They are, of course, none of these things. What they are is a two-bit operation always in search of their big break, ambulance chasers who've been in the trenches much too long making way too little. Their specialties, so to speak, are quickie divorces and DUIs, with the occasional jackpot of an actual car wreck thrown in. After twenty plus years together, Oscar Finley and Wally Figg bicker like an old married couple but somehow continue to scratch out a half-decent living from their seedy bungalow offices in southwest Chicago.

An then change comes their way. More accurately, it stumbles in. David Zinc, a young but already burned-out attorney, walks away from his fast-track career at a fancy downtown firm, goes on a serious bender, and finds himself literally at the doorstep of our boutique firm. Once David sobers up and comes to grips with the fact that he's suddenly unemployed, any job - even one with Finley & Figg - looks okay to him.

With their new associate on board, F&F is ready to tackle a really big case, a case that could make the partners rich without requiring them to actually practice much law. An extremely popular drug, Krayoxx, the number one cholesterol reducer for the dangerously overweight, produced by Varrick Labs, a giant pharmaceutical company with annual sales of $25 billion, has recently come under fire after several patients taking it have suffered heart attacks. Wally smells money.

A little online research confirms Wally's suspicions - a huge plaintiffs' firm in Florida is putting together a class action suit against Varrick. All Finley & Figg has to do is find a handful of people who have had heart attacks while taking Krayoxx, convince them to become clients, join the class action, and ride along to fame and fortune. With any luck, they won't even have to enter a courtroom!

It almost seems too good to be true.

And it is.

In the aftermath of a colossal battle, new threats are emerging from every direction.

Tyrion Lannister, having killed his father, and wrongfully accused of killing his nephew, King Joffrey, has escaped from King's Landing with a price on his head.

To the north lies the great Wall of ice and stone - a structure only as strong as those guarding it. Eddard Stark's bastard son Jon Snow has been elected the 998th Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, but he has enemies both in the Watch and beyond the Wall. And in the east Daenerys Targaryen struggles to hold a city built on dreams and dust.