It's Monday! What Are You Hoarding? Oh Wait... Reading.

"It's Monday! What Are You Reading?" is a weekly link up hosted by the wonderful Sheila at Book Journey.  Each week, we share what we read and what we are reading! I totally think you should join in on the fun!

So.  I feel like I should title this "It's Monday! What Are You Hoarding?" because I am going to make a confession and I know that other serious book lovers like myself will feel my pain.  The other day, I was editing a post I was working on and out of NOWHERE an overwhelming compulsion to read the Earth's Children (Jean Auel's Clan of the Cave Bear) series again.  Like OVERWHELMING.  

Well- I went on Amazon and ordered the first five books in Auel's series.  Then found a series called the First Americans by William Sarabande and ordered the first two books.  Then I found the First North Americans by Kathleen O'Neal Gear and Michael Gear.  I ordered the first six.  I am SICK.  

The picture? Oh still waiting for the fifth book by Jean Auel and am awaiting the first, 4th, 5th and sixth books from the First North Americans. 

Hahaha.  I guess there ARE worse obsessions and addictions.  So... which series shall I start?

The First Americans by William Sarabande begins with the book "Beyond the Sea of Ice" and is set in the Ice Age.  A tribe is decimated by an angry woolly mammoth and the books follows the survival of the few survivors. 

Synopsis from Amazon:

Stunningly visual, extraordinarily detailed, powerfully dramatic, here is the first volume of a remarkable new series . . .The First Americans.  When humans first walked the world, when nature ruled the earth and sky, a proud tribe is threatened by a series of natural disasters.  A bold young hunter named Torka, who lost his wife and child to a killer mammoth, leads the survivors over the glacial tundra on a desperate eastward odyssey to the save their clan.  Through attacks of savage animals and encounters with strangers not unlike themselves, they must brave the hardships of a foreign landscape and learn to live in an exotic new world of mystery and danger.  Toward the land where the sun rises they must travel.Beyond The Sea Of Ice,  toward a new day for their clan--and an awesome future for the American.

The First North Americans by the Gears begins with the book, "The People of the Wolf".  The series is enormous.  I believe they are at 12 books now.  Every book has overall positive ratings and the books cover a large expanse of time.

Synopsis from Amazon:

Thousands of years ago, small hunting bands crossed the fragile land bridge linking the Eurasian continent to the Americas and discovered a land untouched by humankind. Over the centuries that followed, their descendents spread throughout this land. Bestselling authors and award-winning archaeologists W. Michael Gear and Kathleen O’Neal Gear bring the stories of these first North Americans to life in this magnificent, multi-volume saga. In the dawn of history, a valiant people forged a path from an old world into a new one through what is now Alaska and the Canadian Northwest Territories. Led by a dreamer who followed the spirit of the wolf, a handful of courageous men and women dared to cross the frozen wastes to find an untouched, unspoiled continent.

And of course, the "Clan of the Cave Bear" is the first book in the Earth's Children series.  I read the first four books MANY years ago.  I am pretty sure through the end of grade school, junior high and high school.  

Synopsis via Amazon:

When her parents are killed by an earthquake, 5-year-old Ayla wanders through the forest completely alone. Cold, hungry, and badly injured by a cave lion, the little girl is as good as gone until she is discovered by a group who call themselves the Clan of the Cave Bear. This clan, left homeless by the same disaster, have little interest in the helpless girl who comes from the tribe they refer to as the "Others." Only their medicine woman sees in Ayla a fellow human, worthy of care. She painstakingly nurses her back to health--a decision that will forever alter the physical and emotional structure of the clan. Although this story takes place roughly 35,000 years ago, its cast of characters could easily slide into any modern tale. The members of the Neanderthal clan, ruled by traditions and taboos, find themselves challenged by this outsider, who represents the physically modern Cro-Magnons. And as Ayla begins to grow and mature, her natural tendencies emerge, putting her in the middle of a brutal and dangerous power struggle.

On another note.  I am on a huge Michael McDonald, Boz Scaggs and Phil Spector kick (i.e., the Ronettes, the Crystals, Ben E. King, etc.) and have been just jamming out.

Oh and my daughter makes special orders for love and hugs.