Mother’s Day Giveaway

If you’ve been with me for long, then you know I’m a mother of a very active 2 year old boy.  So when the Hachette Book Group contacted me about doing one of their massive giveaways for Mother’s Day, I was all over it.  Check out the books they are giving away:

Miracles of Motherhood by June Cotner

A heartwarming and inspirational collection of poems, prayers, and blessings for new mothers from bestselling author June Cotner.

Popular author and speaker June Cotner serves up another generous helping of the uplifting inspiration that readers have come to love and cherish in her previous anthologies. She offers sustenance for a young mother’s soul with carefully arranged prayers, spiritual poetry, and reflections to bring them comfort, inspiration, and joy. It is the perfect gift book for mothers as they contemplate the meaning of motherhood and celebrate one of the most important rites of passage for women–a life-altering, incomparable experience that presents both tremendous challenges and rewards. MIRACLES OF MOTHERHOOD offers encouragement and support for mothers where they need it most–the heart.

Odd Mom Out by Jane Porter

DOES SHE REALLY WANT TO BE A MEMBER OF THIS MOMMY CLUB? Advertising executive Marta Zinsser is no poster child for her wealthy Seattle suburb-and nothing could please her more. This former New Yorker wears combat boots, not Manolos, and drives a righteous Harley hog instead of a Mercedes SUV. Now she’s launching her own agency in this land of the Microsoft elite, even though her ten-year-old daughter wishes she’d put on a sweater set and just be normal.

Can this ex-urbanite remain uniquely herself without alienating the inner circle of smug, cookie-cutter executive wives? And when push comes to shove, can she stop being the proud odd mom out and take a chance at something frighteningly-and tantalizingly-new?

Mommy Grace by Sheila Schuller Coleman

Universally, mothers tend to feel they are not good enough at parenting and fear they are harming their children by not being perfect. In Mommy Grace: Erasing Mommy Guilt, Sheila Schuller Coleman offers overwhelmed moms short but emotive stories of authentic motherhood from her own and others’ experiences-foibles and all-and offers comfort by showing how God makes up for human weakness with His own strength.

Because Sheila shares lessons learned the hard way by real moms rather than giving difficult instructions for better mothering, readers will leave the book feeling encouraged rather than lectured.

For every mom who feels she’s not quite up to the colossal job of parenting, Mommy Grace is full of hope and compassion.

Beginner’s Greek by James Collins

When Peter Russell finally meets the woman of his dreams he falls as madly in love as you can on a flight from New York to LA. Her name is Holly. She’s achingly pretty with strawberry-blonde hair, and reads Thomas Mann for pleasure. She gives Peter her phone number on a page of The Magic Mountain, but in his room that night Peter finds the page is inexplicably, impossibly, enragingly…gone.

So begins the immensely entertaining story of Peter and his unrequited love for his best friend’s girl; of Charlotte and her less-than-perfect marriage to a man in love with someone else; of Jonathan and his wicked and fateful debauchery; and of Holly, the impetus for it all. Along the way, there’s the evil boss, the desirable temptress, miscommunications, misrepresentations, fiendish behavior, letters gone astray, and ultimately, an ending in which every character gets his due. Both incisive and wonderfully funny, this is a brilliantly understated comedy of manners in which love lost is found again.

The Road Home by Rose Tremain

In the wake of factory closings and his beloved wife’s death, Lev makes his way from Eastern Europe to London, seeking work to support his mother and his little daughter. After a spell of homelessness, he finds a job in the kitchen of a posh restaurant and a room in the house of an appealing Irishman who has already lost his family. Never mind that Lev must sleep in a bunk bed surrounded by plastic toys–he has found a friend and shelter. However constricted his life in England remains, he compensates by daydreaming of home, by having an affair with a younger restaurant worker, and by trading gossip and ambitions via cell phone with his hilarious friend Rudi, who, dreaming of the wealthy West, lives largely for his battered Chevrolet.

Homesickness dogs Lev, not only for nostalgic reasons, but because he doesn’t belong, body or soul, to his new country–but can he really go home again? Rose Tremain’s prodigious talents as a prose writer are on full display in THE ROAD HOME, and her novel never loses sight of what is truly important in the lives we lead.

So here’s the details for the contest:

As with all of my contests, there’s a question for you to answer.  If you want a chance for the books, you should have to work a little for it, right?  Either way, it’s an easy question.  All I’m asking is for you to answer one of these questions: What has been a memorable mother’s day for you?  Have you ever given or received a unique gift that went over well?

I have 5 sets of these books to give away.  So there’ll be 5 lucky commentators at the end of the month.  The contest will run from May 1st to midnight on May 31st.  I’ll contact the winners on June 1st and they’ll have one week to get back to me.  I do apologize to my international readers, the contest is only open to US and Canadian residents.

As always, if you want more chances to win, you can post about today’s contest on your blog, social network, or anywhere you can. Digg it, stumble it, twit it, share it with the world. Wherever you share it, make sure you add a link to it along with your answer (yes LE is now on Twitter as well!). The more places you share it, the more entries you get.

Join the Literary Escapism Facebook page and you’ll get an additional entry (for each page).  Make sure you leave a comment so I know that’s why you’re joining.  Only new readers to the group will be considered.

For 2 additional entries, subscribe to Literary Escapism’s newsletter in the sidebar. This is for new subscribers only.

For 2 more entries, purchase anything through LE’s Amazon store sometime during May and send a copy of the receipt VIA email for your purchase to: myjaxon AT gmail DOT com.  I’ll give 2 entries for every book purchased.

I’ll determine the winner with help from the Research Randomizer. All entries must be in by midnight on May 31st.