Steve was just in my office complaining that he won't be able to watch the sunrise from the new apt. as we won't be on the East End of the island anymore. Then he perked up when he realized he could watch the cruise ships come in instead. They come in early in the a.m. and leave at dusk. Gives the tourists a day on the island. Many hit jewelry row and shop as we are known for the hundreds of jewelry stores with supposedly good prices. Others get on a safari cab and tour the island, swimming at Magen's Bay, etc.

The cover art for The Sphere of Secrets, the second book in the Oracle Prophecies by Catherine Fisher, is gorgeous, even though quite simple in detail. It is a hand holding a silver sphere with some type of markings on it. I was anxious to read it as I loved the first book, The Oracle Betrayed, in which the reader meets Mirany, the new bearer. As the old Archon dies he presses a slip of paper into her hand that warns her of the treachery around her. She has been chosen as the bearer of the god because the inept and corrupt Speaker thinks she won't notice that the Speaker cannot hear the god and makes up what General Argelin thinks is good for him. Mirany wasn't too sure she even believed in the god until she started to hear him in her head and he was asking her to find the new Archon, a child in a remote village. With the help of a scribe and a drunken musician they do find the young boy, but trouble doesn't end there. In the second book the new Archon must find the Well of the Gods and give back the three stars that a previous Archon had stolen. The silver sphere is a map across the desert to the well. Fisher has a way with language - you can tell she also writes poetry - and draws you into the story immediately. I am already waiting for the third book. Delicious fantasy reading. The Sphere of Secrets is a HarperCollins book and should be in the stores now - came out in March.

Off to work.