First Line Friday & The Friday 56: The Duke's Bargain by I. Benott

 
First Line Friday is hosted by Carrie @ Reading Is My Superpower
The Friday 56 is created by Freda's Voice and hosted by Anne @ My Head Is Full of Books
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First Line Friday:

Grab the nearest book and share its first line

"What a wretched excuse of a man."

 The Friday 56:

Grab a book, turn to page 56 (or 56% on your e-reader), and share a spoiler-free snippet.

Arthur had grown accustomed to falling asleep to the sound of her voice, to their endless questions, to the easy companionship that existed only in the darkness of his room.

A marriage of convenience. A scarred duke. And a young woman who was never supposed to capture his heart.

Arthur Wellington, the formidable Duke of Buckingham, has survived war, scandal and a lifetime of expectations. In need of an heir and with little interest in love, he proposes a simple bargain: marriage in exchange for the money that will secure the future of the orphanage Eliza Harper calls home.

For nineteen-year-old Eliza, the choice should be equally simple. Twenty thousand pounds could change countless lives, and all she must do in return is become the wife of one of England’s most feared noblemen.

Neither expects their carefully negotiated arrangement to become something dangerously real.

But as war calls Arthur away and secrets from both their pasts begin to surface, their unlikely marriage is tested by the rigid expectations of Regency society. Eliza must discover where she belongs in a world that was never meant to welcome her, while Arthur must confront a truth far more terrifying than anything he faced on the battlefield: He may have finally found something he cannot bear to lose.

The Duke’s Bargain is a sweeping Regency romance about an arranged marriage that becomes anything but convenient, and two people discovering that sometimes the greatest bargains demand the heart in return.

What do you think of these snippets?

 

First Line Friday & The Friday 56: Mythica by Emily Hauser

First Line Friday is hosted by Carrie @ Reading Is My Superpower
The Friday 56 is created by Freda's Voice and hosted by Anne @ My Head Is Full of Books
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First Line Friday:

Grab the nearest book and share its first line

From the introduction:
August 2017, and it's a hot summer's day in Boston, Massachusetts, but the stacks of Harvard's Widener Library are as cold as catacombs.

From the first chapter:
She has always been treated as an object of beauty, and so she, too, collects beautiful things. 

The Friday 56:

Grab a book, turn to page 56 (or 56% on your e-reader), and share a spoiler-free snippet.

The decipherment of Linear B was an astonishing achievement, and it took the world by storm. On 1 july 1952, a few months after Queen Elizabeth II ascended the throne, Ventris announced his breakthrough on BBC radio. It marked the unlocking of a code that had been bolted shut for millenia, that opened up unhoped-for secrets about the Mycenaean Bronze Age — written in the hands of actual Bronze Age scribes.

Mythica: A New History of Homer’s World, Through the Women Written Out of It by Emily Hauser

 Did you love Madeline Miller’s Circe? Pat Barker’s The Silence of the Girls? Jennifer Saint's Elektra? Natalie Haynes’ A Thousand Ships?

But did you ever wonder who the real women behind the myths of the Trojan War were?

Now award-winning classicist and historian Emily Hauser takes readers on an epic journey to uncover the astonishing true story of the real women behind ancient Greece’s greatest legends – and the real heroes of those ancient epics, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.

Because, contrary to perceptions built up over three millennia, ancient history is not all about men – and it's not only men's stories that deserve to be told . . .

In Mythica Emily Hauser tells, for the first time, the extraordinary stories of the real women behind some of the western world’s greatest legends. Following in their footsteps, digging into the history behind Homer’s epic poems, piecing together evidence from the original texts, recent astonishing archaeological finds and the latest DNA studies, she reveals who these women – queens, mothers, warriors, slaves – were, how they lived, and how history has (or has not – until now) remembered them.

A riveting new history of the Bronze Age Aegean and a journey through Homer’s epics charted entirely by women – from Helen of Troy, Briseis, Cassandra and Aphrodite to Circe, Athena, Hera, Calypso and Penelope – Mythica is a ground-breaking reassessment of the reality behind the often-mythologized women of Greece’s greatest epics, and of the ancient world itself as we learn ever more about it.

What do you think of these snippets?

Book Beginnings | The Friday 56: Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox by Eoin Colfer

 Book Beginnings is hosted by Rose City Reader

Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. 

The Friday 56 is hosted by Freda's Voice

Grab a book, any book. Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader. Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) and post it.

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     Book Beginning:

Fowl Manor, Dublin, Ireland
Barely an hour north of Dublin's fair city lies the Fowl estate, where the boundaries have changed little in the past five hundred years.

    Friday 56:

Holly pointed to the sheen covering Angeline's face. "See the gel, Foaly, from the pores. And the smell of lilies too; there can't be any doubt."
"It's impossible," muttered the centaur. "We eradicated this years ago."
Artemis was growing weary of these vague references. "What is impossible? Eradicated what?"

I'm re-reading Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox. I think it's been 7 years or more since I last read it so I'm not remembering a whole lot about this book, although the more I read the more is coming back to me. Of course I'm loving it.

When Artemis Fowl's mother contracts a life-threatening illness, his world is turned upside down. The only hope for a cure lies in the brain fluid of the silky sifaka lemur. Unfortunately, the animal is extinct due to a heartless bargain Artemis himself made as a younger boy.
Though the odds are stacked against him, Artemis is not willing to give up. With the help of his fairy friends, the young genius travels back in time to save the lemur and bring it back to the present. But to do so, Artemis will have to defeat a maniacal poacher, who has set his sights on new prey: Holly Short.
The rules of time travel are far from simple, but to save his mother, Artemis will have to break them all?and outsmart his most cunning adversary yet: Artemis Fowl, age ten.

Book Beginnings | The Friday 56: Lily of the Nile by Stephanie Dray

              Book Beginnings is hosted by Rose City Reader

Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. 

The Friday 56 is hosted by Freda's Voice

Grab a book, any book. Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader. Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) and post it.

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     Book Beginning:

December 40 B.C.
They came from Memphis, Thebes, and Heliopolis to see the Savior born.

    Friday 56:

"Come, Selene, play your kithara for me today," the emperor said. "It will cheer you up, and I know you want to please me. That much was true. The night I'd forsaken Euphronius, I made pleasing the emperor my only choice.

Lily of the Nile is a novel about Cleopatra's daughter Selene and I'm loving it so far. I've read a book about Selene before that I also enjoyed but this one already is different for sure but even better than the one I read before. I personally really like the beginning of the book. It's a strong start. And I'm not actually yet at 56% so that short quote kind of makes me freak out so I'll just have to read on, I guess.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Heiress of one empire and prisoner of another, it is up to the daughter of Cleopatra to save her brothers and reclaim what is rightfully hers...

To Isis worshippers, Princess Selene and her twin brother Helios embody the divine celestial pair who will bring about a Golden Age. But when Selene's parents are vanquished by Rome, her auspicious birth becomes a curse. Trapped in an empire that reviles her heritage and suspects her faith, the young messianic princess struggles for survival in a Roman court of intrigue. She can't hide the hieroglyphics that carve themselves into her hands, nor can she stop the emperor from using her powers for his own ends. But faced with a new and ruthless Caesar who is obsessed with having a Cleopatra of his very own, Selene is determined to resurrect her mother's dreams. Can she succeed where her mother failed? And what will it cost her in a political game where the only rule is win-or die?

And don't forget to enter my giveaway that I'm hosting to win a book of choice from TBD. 2 winners, open INTL — Click here

Book Beginnings | The Friday 56: My Dear Hamilton by Stephanie Dray & Laura Kamoie

Book Beginnings is hosted by Rose City Reader

Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. 

The Friday 56 is hosted by Freda's Voice

Grab a book, any book. Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader. Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) and post it.

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Book Beginning:

The promise of liberty is not written in blood or engraved in stone; it's embroidered into the fabric of our nation.
And so is Alexander Hamilton.
My husband. My hero. My betrayer.

Friday 56:

"Mademoiselle, you are a most excellent patriot," Lafayette said when I returned to the safety of Johnston Hall, where I reported everything.
To my surprise, the Frenchman seemed sanguine. "It is good you learn of all this in secret while all eyes were upon your father and me. You have been an essential asset to the cause."
It was flattery—French flattery at that!—and I wanted to believe it was true.

I've said it a couple of times before on my blog here but My Dear Hamilton is my highest anticipated book of this year so I'm really happy to be finally reading it. And I gotta say so far it's not been a disappointment. I am enjoying it so much! I have a feeling the romance is going to break my heart in a million pieces but I'm sure it's all worth it. 

A novel of Eliza Schuyler Hamilton

A general's daughter...

Coming of age on the perilous frontier of revolutionary New York, Elizabeth Schuyler champions the fight for independence. And when she meets Alexander Hamilton, Washington's penniless but passionate aide-de-camp, she's captivated by the young officer's charisma and brilliance. They fall in love, despite Hamilton's bastard birth and the uncertainties of war.

A founding father's wife...

But the union they create - in their marriage and the new nation - is far from perfect. From glittering inaugural balls to bloody street riots, the Hamiltons are at the center of it all - including the political treachery of America's first sex scandal, which forces Eliza to struggle through heartbreak and betrayal to find forgiveness.

The last surviving light of the Revolution...

When a duel destroys Eliza's hard-won peace, the grieving widow fights her husband's enemies to preserve Alexander's legacy. But long-buried secrets threaten everything Eliza believes about her marriage and her own legacy. Questioning her tireless devotion to the man and country that have broken her heart, she's left with one last battle - to understand the flawed man she married and imperfect union he could never have created without her...

Book Beginnings | The Friday 56: Now I Rise by Kiersten White

Book Beginnings is hosted by Rose City Reader

Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. 

The Friday 56 is hosted by Freda's Voice

Grab a book, any book. Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader. Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) and post it.

~~

I'm doing something new today and participating in Book Beginnings and The Friday 56. I'm not sure if I will participate every single week but I'll definitely try.

Book Beginning:

Hell was a party. At least, Radu was fairly certain that whatever hell there was would certainly resemble this party.

Friday 56:

Lada's knife paused. She looked down at it as it trembled in her hand. This was the first time she would kill a man outside of battle. It was not a reaction to save her own life. It was a choice.

I'm actually not far into this book yet. I had to put it on hold for a few days while I read another book but I'm definitely enjoying it so far. I thought the start was really great and I can't wait to read more about Lada and Radu.

Now I Rise by Kiersten White

The Conqueror's Sage #2

Expected publication: June 27th 2017 by Delacorte Press

Lada Dracul has no allies. No throne. All she has is what she’s always had: herself. After failing to secure the Wallachian throne, Lada is out to punish anyone who dares to cross her blood-strewn path. Filled with a white-hot rage, she storms the countryside with her men, accompanied by her childhood friend Bogdan, terrorizing the land. But brute force isn’t getting Lada what she wants. And thinking of Mehmed brings little comfort to her thorny heart. There’s no time to wonder whether he still thinks about her, even loves her. She left him before he could leave her.

What Lada needs is her younger brother Radu’s subtlety and skill. But Mehmed has sent him to Constantinople—and it’s no diplomatic mission. Mehmed wants control of the city, and Radu has earned an unwanted place as a double-crossing spy behind enemy lines. Radu longs for his sister’s fierce confidence—but for the first time in his life, he rejects her unexpected plea for help. Torn between loyalties to faith, to the Ottomans, and to Mehmed, he knows he owes Lada nothing. If she dies, he could never forgive himself—but if he fails in Constantinople, will Mehmed ever forgive him?

As nations fall around them, the Dracul siblings must decide: what will they sacrifice to fulfill their destinies? Empires will topple, thrones will be won . . . and souls will be lost.