Royersford resident Lisa Montgomery, author of "Raw Inspiration: Living Dynmically with Raw Food" (2009, Martin Pearl Publishing, $20, 184 pp.) will hold book signings on Nov. 7 and 8 at Boyertown area locations.

*From 3 to 5 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 7, Montgomery will visit the Innerlight Holistic Center, located in the GrosserEase shops, Grosser Road and Route 100, just south of Boyertown.

Montgomery will share personal stories of healing through raw foods, tips for setting up and maintaining a raw foods kitchen and lifestyle, and delicious recipes. She will prepare the Chocolate Mousse Pie recipe from her book to share. Contact Cristina Leeson for more information at 610-413-8191.

*From noon to 3 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 8, she will sign books at Studio "B" for the Art Alliance of Boyertown.

Since the release of her book in August, Montgomery has been conducting book signings at McGuire Air Force Base in Maryland, and recently was the guest speaker at a Raw Foods Gathering in Manhattan.

Montgomery has also been featured locally on the "Boyertown Live" TV program and has sponsored and also been a repeat guest on "What’s The SCORE" radio show on 1370 WPAZ AM.

According to Montgomery's publisher, Martin Pearl Publishing, "Raw Inspiration: Living Dynamically with Raw Food" is an inspiring and informative raw foods lifestyle book featuring personal stories of healing through raw foods, tips for setting up and maintaining a raw foods kitchen and lifestyle, and delicious recipes. The personal stories are intended to be inspirational to those seeking a healthier diet. "Raw Inspiration" also explains the basics of nutrition and meal planning with raw foods, as well as providing a guide to equipping a raw foods kitchen.

“What you put in your mouth and how you live your life are so important,” says Montgomery. “A Raw Food diet cleanses the body and nurtures the soul.”

Montgomery is known for her monthly Living Dynamically Raw Food Potluck gatherings in Royersford as well as workshops, and annual Living Food Expo are attended by celebrities, raw food experts, and enthusiasts.

In 2007, model Carol Alt visited Montgomery's annual Living Food Expo in Royersford and published one of Montgomery's recipes in her book, "The Raw 50."

In her book, Montgomery credits Dick Powell of the Pottstown SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives) chapter for helping her with publicity and marketing for that event.

"SCORE's assitance was instrumental in getting local and national media attaention," she writes in the book.

Montgomery is a Board Certified Holistic Health Practitioner from the Institute of Integrative Nutrition in Manhattan. She is also a Certified Associate Raw Chef and Instructor from the Living Light Institute of Raw Foods in California. According to her publisher, her focus is on living dynamically – teaching people how to heal their entire being (physical, emotional, and psychological) with the raw foods lifestyle. To learn more, visit her website, www.livingdynamically.com.

I'm a fan of Alice Hoffman's books. And while she didn't lose me with "The Probable Future" (Ballantine, 2003, 352 pp. $13.95 paperback), I didn't love it.

True to the author's form, the book draws you in with intricate interweaving plotlines and mystical goings-on.

"The Probable Future" revolves around 13 generations of women in the Sparrow family who have special powers and are native to a small Massachusetts hamlet called Unity. Each of the women bears just one female child who is given her unique gift on her 13th birthday.

The powers range from not being able to feel pain - a "gift" that gets Rebecca Sparrow killed on suspicion of being a witch in the 17th century - to being able to discern a lie, to being able to look at a person and see how they die.

(SPOILER ALERT:) The latter gift is that of one of this novel's main characters, the predictable and annoying teenager Stella Sparrow.

The rebellious Stella's gift gets her in trouble pretty quickly. Or, rather, it gets her philandering father in trouble. During a dinner out to celebrate her 13th birthday, Stella spies the death of a woman seated across the room and begs her father to do something to stop her murder. Relating this tale to the police turns out to be not such a good idea when the women does die in the way his daughter described and now Will is the main suspect.

Stella's mother, estranged from her father and whom she can't hide her hate for, is drawn back to the childhood home she abhors to try to protect Stella, who is forced to move there after her father leaks the story to the big bad press. Every Sparrow woman seems to hate her mother, and Jenny Sparrow (whose gift is being able to dream other peoples' dreams) now must make peace with her own ailing mother, Elinor (who can see peoples' lies).

And so everybody gets drawn back to Unity to figure it all out, and past and present are interwoven - or unraveled as it may be. Sparrows start nearly liking Sparrows again, or re-discovering a tolerance bordering on love. The story of the present and of the past Sparrow women continues until we get to the climax of the story, where it seems every loose end is tidied up in a bow - a little too neatly.

What drags the novel down is that you can see the ending coming from a mile away. You can see the unrequited loves about to become requited and the killers about to get their due.

It was just kinda boring. I wanted to finish the novel just to get it over with rather than to stay with the characters to see what happened to them.

Was it worth reading? Yes.

Was it a great read? No.

Maybe I simply need to stop reading every single book by a favorite author. Beattie, Hoffman, Atwood, Kingsolver, Tartt, for example. They are bound to disappoint sometime.

They are piled high on my desk at work, on my nightstand and bookshelves at home, and they keep multiplying.

I have too many books, and still I want more. When not satisfying my book addiction at local stores such as Gently Used Books in Douglassville or Wellington Square Bookshop in Exton, I can now get some of the latest novels online for pretty cheap, thanks to some good old fashioned price wars.

Three major retailers are offering new bestsellers at UNDER $10, according to a report today from The Associated Press:

Target joins in price war on expected best sellers

By ANNE D'INNOCENZIO

AP Retail Writer
NEW YORK — Target Corp. has thrown itself into a heated price war on books expected to be top sellers.

The Minneapolis-based discounter said Monday that it will offer some of this season's most anticipated book titles at $8.99, in line with recent moves by Walmart.com and Amazon.com.
Target says the price applies to pre-orders on Target.com of such books as "Breathless" by Dean Koontz, "Ford Country" by James Patterson and "Under the Dome" by Stephen King.

The book battle started Thursday, Oct. 15, when Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said its Web site, walmart.com, would charge just $10, with free shipping, for such upcoming hardcover releases as Sarah Palin's "Going Rogue" and John Grisham's "Ford County,"60 percent or more off the regular cost.

Amazon.com, the largest online book seller, then matched the prices. The fight became even fiercer when the two competitors lowered the prices even further to $9 by Friday, Oct. 16.

A check online Monday afternoon of several of the titles revealed that Target.com, Amazon and Walmart.com have similar prices. Walmart.com and Target.com are selling "Under the Dome" and "Breathless" at $8.99, a penny less than Amazon.com.

The price war, occurring as the critical holiday shopping season gets under way, is bad news for independent bookstores, as well as the large chain bookstores Borders Group Inc. and Barnes & Noble Inc. These chains have seen their sales and profits squeezed by discounting and a decline in their music business.

Wal-Mart has said that the steep book discounts won't be available in stores.

The Boyertown Farmers Market Newsletter informs me that you could win a DVD of a movie based on a bestselling book just by writing down how you feel about plants.

The contest centers around Michael Pollan's bestseller, "The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World," (Random House, $24.95, 271 pp.).

This is a book that Mercury Reporter Evan Brandt has been raving about. But I didn't run to the library to check it out as Evan is into, let's say, whole genres of books that might not ever make the leap onto my bookshelf -- Historical non-fiction and science-y type books, for instance. Our ideas of escapism, which the exception of a tall Bluecoat Gin and Tonic, are quite different.

But, I'll give credit to Evan, this book does sound intriguing and educational.

To borrow from the New York Times Book Review (they can borrow from me anytime),

'' 'The Botany of Desire'' is divided into four parts, each focused on a different facet of human desire and its exploitation of and by domesticated plants: sweetness and apples; beauty and tulips; intoxication and cannabis; control and potatoes."

The Times sums the book up in this sentence: "The author explains how flowering plants have prospered by exploiting human desires."

You could win a DVD of the movie based on Pollan's book from LocalHarvest.org, according to our friends at the Boyertown Farmers Market, if you act by Sunday, Oct. 18:

The Botany of Desire will be airing on PBS on Wednesday, Oct. 28, from 8 to 10 p.m. Called an "eye-opening exploration of the human relationship with the plant world - seen from the plant's point of view," and narrated by Frances McDormand, this is sure to be good.

For those who haven't read the book, the idea is that we think that we control the plant world. But what if, in fact, they have been shaping us? Local Harvest has a director-signed copy of the movie, so they are introducing a new contest giveaway playing with the theme of the book.

To enter, send them your story of a time you were obsessed with something in the plant kingdom - such as, going to great lengths to protect your tomatoes from frost, watching and waiting for your seedlings to come up, praying for rain, or spending a summer growing flowers for your wedding, etc.

Submit your story by Oct. 18 (that's this Sunday), and they will announce the winner of
The Botany of Desire DVD (click to view trailer) and publish the stories at www.localharvest.org.
To learn more about the film, visit www.pbs.org.

To learn more about the well-publicized Boyertown Farmers Market, visit their Web site (where you can also sign up for their e-newsletter).

They are bravely starting an outdoor winter farmers market on Nov. 21 at their regular location in the parking lot of the Boyertown Museum of Historic Vehicles at 100 South Walnut Street, two blocks south of the intersection of Routes 562 and 73.

And they're giving away a free cup of coffee to everyone who visits the the rain or shine Winter Market (open from 10 to 11:30 a.m.) during the chilly months on the following dates: Nov. 21, Dec. 19, Jan. 23, Feb. 20, March 20, April 17 and May 22.

Apparently, not me.

Well, I read a few pages of "The Probable Future" by Alice Hoffman, my pleasure reading of the moment. But my to-be-reviewed business books are languishing on my desk under piles of yesterday's and the day before's page proofs, papers, handouts from Wegmans, phone messages and an overripe Bosc pear.

Thankfully, The Associated Press was up to the task. Below is their weekly Bookshelf Roundup of the latest finance-related reading:

Bookshelf: Millionaires and football philosophy

By The Associated Press

You can learn how the rich really live, how one renowned football coach approached leadership and some new strategies to put to use when searching for a job with three new books that explore these diverse themes.
Researcher Thomas Stanley walks readers through his findings uncovering the surprising spending habits of the wealthy. The late coach Bill Walsh dishes on his philosophies about professionalism and other aspects of leadership that helped him transform the San Francisco 49ers into a football dynasty. And career coaches Richard and Terri Deems help job hunters turn their experience into ammunition for finding their dream jobs.
Here's a look at the new titles:
_____________________
TITLE: Stop Acting Rich and Start Living Like a Millionaire
AUTHOR: Thomas J. Stanley
PRICE: $26.95
SUMMARY: Being a millionaire is not about fancy cars, expensive watches, fine dining or top-shelf liquor, Thomas Stanley argues.
Building on the sort of research results he previously reported in the "The Millionaire Next Door" and its follow-up books, Stanley explores the behaviors of millionaires and extrapolates how people who aspire to be wealthy ought to act.
Using findings from surveys of wealthy people, Stanley explains, for instance, that most millionaires don't drive BMWs, wear Rolex watches or live in million-dollar homes. He also explores the cultural impact of what he calls "the glittering rich," the celebrities whose extravagant lifestyles many people try to emulate.
In trying to live like those who have enormous wealth, he argues, ordinary people actually set themselves back and make true financial security more elusive. And since financial security is what his research shows provides for happiness, he concludes that a more frugal lifestyle that enables people to build wealth will make them happier than any Mercedes or bottle of Grey Goose vodka.
The book can be repetitive in spots but it contains some surprising data that makes for a convincing argument supporting a simple lifestyle as a path to security.
QUOTE: "I don't mean to suggest that one live like a miser; the occasional guilty pleasure is perfectly acceptable. If you work hard and save accordingly, you should enjoy a treat from time to time. The problem is that people have come to enjoy the guilty pleasure every day to the exclusion of working for a financially independent future."
PUBLISHER: Wiley
—Eileen AJ Connelly
_____________________
TITLE: The Score Takes Care of Itself
AUTHOR: Bill Walsh, with Steven Jamison and Craig Walsh
PRICE: $25.95
SUMMARY: Before his death, legendary NFL coach Bill Walsh discussed his philosophy on leadership in a series of interviews. Now those interviews have been turned into a book, written from Walsh's perspective, and drawing on his experience as a transformative figure for the San Francisco 49ers and football strategy.
In discussing the importance of professionalism, for instance, Walsh recounts how he didn't allow players to showboat or taunt the other team on the field. At the 49ers headquarters, phones had to be answered promptly and courteously. Walsh says the rules, big and small, eventually helped infuse the entire organization with an atmosphere of professionalism.
Interspersed throughout the book are insights from former colleagues, including assistant coaches Bill McPherson and Mike White.
QUOTE: "There is no guarantee, no ultimate formula for success. However, a resolute and resourceful leader understands that there are a multitude of means to increase the probability of success. And that's what it all comes down to, namely, intelligently and relentlessly seeking solutions that will increase your chance of prevailing in a competitive environment. When you do that, the score will take care of itself."
PUBLISHER: Portfolio
—Candice Choi
_____________________
TITLE: Make Job Loss Work for You
AUTHOR: Richard S. Deems and Terri A. Deems
PRICE: $12.95 (paperback)
SUMMARY: Using their experience working people making career changes, some pop psychology and some traditional advice, the authors put together a helpful book for those who find themselves looking for work.
The book aims to help unemployed readers focus on their accomplishments at work in order to better define what they want to do. Readers are prompted to answer numerous questions and to come up with specific achievements in measurable terms — information that can later be translated into lines on a resume or cover letter.
The couple offers both traditional wisdom about organizing a job search and some unconventional advice, including the suggestion that resume writers add positive quotes from co-workers or clients to their resumes. And there's a section that reviews the sorts of questions a job seeker may have to answer during an interview.
QUOTE: "If you've not been happy or satisfied doing what you've been doing, now's the time to think through your options and design your future."
PUBLISHER: Jist
—Eileen AJ Connelly

This may be too much information, but I was in the shower on Sunday morning listening to the news on KYW (I recently purchased a shower radio just for this purpose, cinching my reputation as a news geek), when I heard a familiar voice: The Mercury's own beloved columnist and OJR-area stringer Laura Catalano.

The extensively talented Catalano, who writes a Sunday column for The Mercury that always has me laughing out loud, has gone and written a book. She somehow found the time outside of her full-time job as a staff writer at the Schuylkill River Heritage Area, her part-time writing gig for our fine paper, raising three children and whatever she does for fun.

Along with SRHA executive director Kurt D. Zwikl, Laura has written "Along the Schuylkill River," (Arcadia Publishing, $21.99, 128 pp.) a pictorial history of the river that borders Pottstown. The book is part of Arcadia Publishing's Images of America series, which, incidentally, also includes a history of The Sunnybrook Ballroom and of The Route 100 corridor.

More than 200 vintage photos are featured in the book. According to a release from the SRHA,

the authors have included multiple pictures of the Schuylkill Canal, such as old canal barges, mules, boatmen and locks.

"The book contains images from virtually every major town and city along the Schuylkill River and gives a glimpse into what life was like across the region from the mid-19th to the early 20th centuries. It includes photos of numerous "firsts" in America: the first wire suspension bridge, opening day of America's first zoo, the first tunnel in North America and the country's first vineyard," states the release.

Upcoming book signings are scheduled at the followinglocations:

* Sun. Oct. 4, 1:30-3:30 p.m.-Fairmount WaterWorks Interpretive Center, Philadelphia

* Sat. Oct. 10, Noon-3 p.m.-Schuylkill RiverFestival, Riverfront Park, Pottstown

* Sun. Oct. 18, 1-3 p.m.-Schuylkill CanalAssociation Open House, Locktender's House Lock 60, 400Towpath Rd, Mont Clare, PA 19453

All author royalties benefit the nonprofit Schuylkill RiverHeritage Area.

If you want to buy a copy of the book, buying one directly from the nonprofit Schuylkill River Heritage Area ensures that a greater portion of the profits supports their mission of using conservation, education, recreation, tourism, and cultural and historic preservation as tools for community revitalization and economic development.

To order, contact Cindy Kott at the Schuylkill River Heritage Area at 484-945-0200. Or order online HERE at the SRHA website.

Boyertown native K. Scott Schaeffer (unknown to me whether he is related to the Schaeffers of former South Reading Avenue Pa. Dutch restaurant fame) has penned a book, "Biblical Freedom from Religious Oppression" (Albireo Publishing, $14,95, trade paperback, 256 pp.)

Midwest Book Review calls Schaeffer's work “an intriguing and fascinating read that may change some reader's lives for the better."

The following is taken verbatim from the Midwest Book Review:

Schaeffer examines how the teachings of most Bible-believing churches conflict with the Bible’s teachings. Using messages that resonate throughout the Bible to free Christians from strict, man-made religious rules and practices that add to human misery, Schaeffer delivers a complex and controversial book that shows how the Bible is actually more lenient than the Church.

"Schaeffer explains how Christians can achieve religious freedom by using the Every-Verse Method of Bible Study — a means through which the Bible is studied in totality, as opposed to pulling isolated verses out of context — on some of the most complicated — and confusing —issues Christians face.

"Meticulously researched and engaging, Biblical Freedom from Religious Oppression contains over 700 Bible verses and examines Biblical perspective on such issues as: freedom, creationism, alcohol consumption, sexual thought, divorce and re-marriage, oppression of the poor, Christian political power, judgmentalism, and religious arrogance. Rather than focus on isolated verses in the Bible, Schaeffer presents all of the applicable verses that address the various issues and explains the historical background, whereby allowing readers to achieve a greater understanding of the Bible’s message. For example, Schaeffer presents all 35 Bible verses addressing alcohol consumption, and upon examination of each verse, it becomes clear that the Bible’s stance on alcohol consumption is far more lenient than that of many churches.

Biblical Freedom from Religious Oppression explains the Four Fundamental Freedoms of the Christian Faith, as well as the Four Freedom Defeaters. Moreover, Biblical Freedom from Religious Oppression presents, in clear and concise terms, where the Bible and the Church differ in sections entitled “Required by the Church, but Not by the Bible,” ”Forbidden by the Church, but Not by the Bible,” and “Committed by the Church, but Opposed by the Bible.”

Thoughtful and thought-provoking, Biblical Freedom from Religious Oppression explains how Christians can differentiate between which Christian practices are truly Biblical, which are optional, and which are evil, and explains how to achieve freedom from the myths, misconceptions, and man-made rules that prevent us from leading the lives God intended.

According to Schaeffer, “Millions of people have been driven away from both the Bible and God thanks to those who have distorted isolated Bible verses to promote oppressive religious traditions. The good news is that the Bible actually rescues us from this oppression. Biblical Freedom from Religious Oppression is simply a fresh look at the Bible, stripping away tradition and assumption as much as possible, and, from beginning to end, forces us to let the whole Bible dictate the truth to us. It denies us permission to approach the Bible with the intent of finding verses that support our pre-existing beliefs. My hope is that readers are prepared to have their traditional beliefs challenged, but will ultimately develop a greater appreciation for what Christianity is all about.”

Schaeffer now devotes his life to exposing the differences between Biblical teaching and church tradition.

"Biblical Freedom from Religious Oppression" will be nationally released on Oct. 15. To learn more, check out the Biblical Freedom website.