Last weekend the weather was gorgeous. Early Saturday morning I headed outside with OXYGEN, a novel by Carol Cassella, and plunked myself down in the hammock. When I looked up a few hours later I was on page 200. I love books that tug me into the story like that. OXYGEN is the story of an anesthesiologist who has something go deadly wrong with a patient during what seems like a routine surgery. It then moves on to explore the impact and aftermath that follows.

Cassella herself is an anesthesiologist, so the work is very informed about the person behind the mask. But I am grateful to her that it never was "showy," meaning that there are not five pages of "how smart I am" copy where the author impresses the reader with his or her knowledge. I call those the "flip" pages since rarely am I mesmerized by overtly deep explanations or observations in this vein. OXYGEN instead was infused with refreshingly great informative prose. Cassella wrote a blog piece for us for ReadingGroupGuides.com, and we also have a review of OXYGEN and a discussion guide for it. I look forward to reading more from Cassella.

During my bookish travel trips in July, I had the pleasure of meeting Hank Phillippi Ryan at ThrillerFest and then had the chance to spend some more time with her at the Romance Writers of America Conference. Talking to her made me want to read her latest book, FACE TIME, which is now in stores. Like Hank (who has 26 Emmys), her protagonist, Charlotte McNally, is in the news business in Boston. (Looking back I feel this was something like my "career exploration through novels" weekend.) I floated in the pool reading this one on Sunday (there will be no pictures of that) and thoroughly enjoyed it. FACE TIME is the middle book in a series that Hank's publisher is releasing this summer in a three-month sequence of PRIME TIME, FACE TIME and AIR TIME, which all are coming out between July and September. Lovely to discover Hank, and thus I am glad I "left the house" and traveled in July.

And when talking about authors who also know their way around the newsroom, we love Mary Jane Clark, who, as you know, we have been featuring here on Bookreporter.com with her new book DYING FOR MERCY. She recently spoke with CBS "Early Show" White House producer BJ D'Elia, who also appears as a character in the book. Click here to watch the interview.

Tuesday night I went to see Joseph Finder's bookstore event for the release of VANISHED, his new thriller. This time my sons ---- as well as Erin Quinn and Sunil Kumar from our office ---- joined me for this event. We at Bookreporter.com have been fans of Joe's since PARANOIA back in 2004. We were part of a standing-room only audience where there were some great questions about his new Nick Heller series. We have a terrific interview with Joe this week. By the way, I loved his answer when we ask him to speculate about what he thinks will be the biggest communications advances in the next five years. And we have Joe Hartlaub's review where he says, "Finder has been a marvel from the very start of his writing career, and VANISHED takes him to new heights. It is a sharp, intricate thriller, shot through with memorable characters both good and bad, and wonderfully told from beginning to end. And about that 'end': the last 50 pages or so, in which everything is made clear, contains some of the best writing you will read this year." All I can say is, I agree.

Joe has always been one to come up with innovative ideas to promote his books, so I was intrigued to see his Twitter Book Tour where he was guided by Bethanne Patrick, who is known as the Book Maven. You can see the complete conversation here.

We are launching two new features this week. Our first shines the spotlight on Beverly Barton, an author with whom many of you may be familiar. Her new romantic suspense novel, SILENT KILLER, will be available in stores on August 25th. We have 10 copies to give away to readers who would like to preview the book and comment about it. If you are interested, please fill out this form by Friday, August 28th.

Next up is Alan Jacobson, whose 2008 novel THE 7th VICTIM, was named to Library Journal's "Best Books of the Year" list. In CRUSH, THE 7th VICTIM's heroine and renowned FBI profiler Karen Vail returns in an explosive thriller set against the backdrop of California's wine country. We have 10 copies to give away to readers who would like to preview the book and comment about it. If you are interested, please fill out this form by Friday, August 28th.

Our advance readers of FEAR THE WORST by Linwood Barclay have submitted their responses to the book, which you can read here. And as you may remember, we recently held a special contest for LOVING A LOST LORD, the first title in Mary Jo Putney's new historical romance series. You can see our 10 finished copy winners here.

Tuesday afternoon I took my sons to the Guggenheim Museum to see the Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward exhibit, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the museum. I had been trying to get there since it opened in May, and since it was closing on Sunday, I left a desk full of work behind, flipped on my away message and headed uptown. I had spent time at Taliesin East and Taliesin West the year that LOVING FRANK by Nancy Horan came out, and the boys had been to Oak Park, so this exhibit enhanced all of our Wright experiences.

As we toured the museum I was surprised to see drawings for a large number of buildings that had been designed but never built, as well as a project that had been planned for Baghdad that I was unaware of. Behind me as I started the tour was a man who had worked at Fallingwater. He shared so much detail about the exhibit that I felt like we had a personal tour guide. I remarked how once again, when we got to the Taliesin East portion of the exhibit, there was no reference to the murder of Wright's mistress. Again the sanitized version of Taliesin being destroyed was given. I want to read T.C. Boyle's THE WOMEN, about the women in Wright's life.

My younger son is rather crazy about Legos. There are "structures" all over the house --- and even some floating in the pool --- and I seemingly cannot walk in his room without nailing the instep of my foot with a Lego piece. Thus, when his eyes lit up as he saw a Lego creation of Fallingwater when we made the proverbial bookstore stop, I took a deep breath and plunked down my credit card. Within two hours of getting home that night he had finished pawing through the pieces (a sound all too familiar in our house) and came downstairs to show me the completed structure. I am happy to report that he has remade this twice since then, so I was not looking at a project that had cost me $50 an hour. It has been amortized to something like $17 an hour.

My older son heads back to college on Tuesday as he is on the orientation committee, though he vows he will not be yelling, "We are FORDHAM." This year there is a lot less drama and trauma attached to his leaving, as instead of racing around shopping, we will be packing up the boxes that were hauled into the basement in June. It's much more civilized. Who knew? I still keep asking who among his five other suitemates has a microwave or a TV, and I have gotten no answers.

My plan for the weekend besides reading is to try to pick 10 books to take on vacation when we leave next weekend. I also am determined that the knitting project I have been working on since San Diego (the remake of a ruana that in its first go-round was knit up so big it looked like a coat) will be finished before we leave. Tune in next week to see my list and hopefully a ruana photo. (Before you get your fingers on keys to ask...a ruana is like a poncho.) Oh, one more thing. Television shows I have been addicted to --- "Nurse Jackie" and "Dexter" (which I JUST am getting to now; I know, I am slow.) Anyone else watching those?

Tuesday night I am going to a screening of Taking Woodstock. More on that next week! May the rain stay away this weekend...and read on...

Carol Fitzgerald (Carol@bookreporter.com)

For those of you with teens or kids in your households or who have grandchildren, library patrons or friends, we have surveys running right now on Teenreads.com and Kidsreads.com. The Teenreads.com 2009 Reader Survey is open until August 31st, and 775 teens will have the chance to win one of the 27 titles being given away if they complete the survey. The Kidsreads.com 2009 Reader Survey is open until September 15th, and 1,000 readers will have the chance to read one of 24 titles being given away.

If you know other readers who may be interested in responding to these surveys, may we ask you to forward these links to them? The more voices that are heard for this, the better!

-Click here to participate in the Teenreads.com 2009 Reader Survey.
-Click here to participate in the Kidsreads.com 2009 Reader Survey.

Poll:

Does the length of a book ever intimidate you?

No, I love long books.
Yes, I shy away from long books.
The length of a book has no effect on me.
I am not sure how I feel.

-Click here to answer our poll.


Question:

Which long book would you recommend?

-Click here to answer our question.

This week we have three great prizes: FIVE readers each will win a copy of THIS IS WHERE I LEAVE YOU by Jonathan Tropper, VANISHED by Joseph Finder and THE WHITE QUEEN by Philippa Gregory. Tell us what you are reading and rate the titles 1-5 by noon on August 28th to ensure that you are in the running to win these books.