It’s cold, it’s cold, it’s cold where I am. Excellent stay-inside-and-read-a-book weather. What are you reading?
86 thoughts on “This Is a Good Book Thursday, January 31, 2019”
Swordheart by Ursula Vernon / T. Kingfisher. It’s my sort of story. Yet I imagine Vernon reading Bujold’s Chalion/5 gods books and winging this out as a kind of take off. (She did write it quickly according to the endnote.) I love the 5 gods books, so I don’t have a problem with the similarites (no, not plagiarism at all). But I do have these criticisms: the writing is nothing like the beauty of Toad Words or Jackalope Wives; the plot fizzles; and, no! no!, it ends as the first book of a series.
Murderbot. Fun stuff. I really saw Agnes’s Shane in the character Murderbot. Shane was trained as a tool/weapon who begins by despising anyone in Keyes. I won’t be reading any more of the series, but the story was well-written, true to character, well-plotted, and satisfying.
Thanks to all for these suggestions. Now I’m rereading Curse of Chalion and enjoying myself immensely.
Interesting about the Challion/Swordheart comparison. I happened to have listened to the first two Chalion books right around the same time (can’t recall if it was before or after, but I think it was before) and didn’t think of them as similar at all. But I can sort of see it now.
I enjoyed both thoroughly, although I found Swordheart on sort of the wrong line of the romance/fantasy balance (but that’s just me — I prefer more fantasy, less romance, and this was more romance, less fantasy).
I’m on a Crusie binge: Tell Me Lies, Crazy for You, and now Fast Women. Good fun. Thank you, Jenny.
In other news, my surveyor came to look at the floors this morning, and says I can have fitted carpet throughout the knocked through living area, especially if I use a pure felt (therefore breathable) underlay. He’s suggested also running the carpet into the dining room, over the concrete floor, but leaving the area that was originally the passage through to the garden until I’ve got the building work in the garden done, and then flooring it with whatever I choose for the kitchen.
This feels like a really good solution; the spaces will flow into one another and feel more generous.
You’re welcome! Thank you for reading!
While not on a bi ge I have loved each and every Jennifer adventure you have offered. I love the new murder mystery series, should I proceed with baited breath or must I enlist Jobs patience going forward? Stay warm, Daphne
This sounds great Jane. With just a few types of flooring the whole ground floor will feel larger.
Well, I finished The Poppy War by RF Kuang. It was so well written that I didn’t want to finish it. It ended, and not on a cliffhanger, but it’s obvious that there is more for our heroine, Rin, to learn. I’m happily awaiting book 2.
I just got it from the library yesterday, so am looking forward to it.
It was 2 degrees heading to the teens this morning, but compared to the Midwest it could be called a heat wave. If it remains this cold and the bay freezes much like I’ve seen in the news about the waterways of Chicago they’ll have to shut down the ferry into Boston. It doesn’t happen very often and it is the end of January, so we’ll be heading into more balmier weather in February, Hah.
Kristen Ashley’s last book in the Chaos series came out this week. I’ve got it and I’ll sit on it for a while because I still haven’t read the fifth book. She is so good I like to prolong the wait. I hate that it is coming to an end but what can you do when an author wants to move on. An other author I’ve found that is good in this genre is Janine Bosco. Now, she started out with a Mafia based theme that morphed into an MC series. Her latest is Parrish about a president of a club with Bi-polar and is slowly descending into complete mental incapacity. I’m going to wait a while before I read that too. Having said all that I need me some humor (Fast Women is in my bookcase) or a western which I haven’t read in a really long time. Say You’ll Stay by Corrine Michaels I’ve added to my KU list. It’s a second chance romance. So I’m good.
Apparently, I’ve been on a Crusie/Mayer binge. I’ve been re-reading Agnes and the Hitman on my lunch break. I have not wanted to get back to work! But I’m forcing myself to leave it at the office, so there is something to look forward to tomorrow.
And the other day, I pulled a book off my TBR stack and it was Wild Ride. Enjoying it so far – especially since it already defied my initial expectations that Mab and Ethan get together. I’m pulling for some of the other characters. Don’t k now how I missed reading this before!
I just re-read Wild Ride too! Enjoyed it just as much as the first time I read it. I’ll move on to Agnes and the Hitman next
I read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society and really enjoyed it. It has a nice quiet pace which I found relaxing and the historical part of it is wonderful. The characters were vivid and nuanced and I totally want to move there and be their friend.
I am now in the middle of Wheel of the Infinite by Martha Wells. I have had a bit of a hard time getting immersed in it, but I think that is just because it has been a hectic week. I will definitely read more Martha Wells.
I actually read books this week!
Last night I finished Only Human by Sylvain Neuvel which is book 3 of the Themis trilogy,a science fiction series about first contact.
I also read Verses for the Dead by Lincoln Child and Douglas Preston which is the latest Pendergast mystery.
I’m listening to The Golden Tresses of the Dead, the last Flavia de Luce book and really taking my time with it because I love Flavia and don’t want her last adventure to end.
I’m reading The Golden Tresses of the Dead. Is it really her last adventure?? Oh, no!!
I just started the new KJ Charles that came out yesterday, Any Old Diamonds. Jewel thieves! Forbidden love! Revenge heists that are sure to get complicated! It’s great so far.
Oh, good. I’ve downloaded a sample: I love most of hers, but occasionally there’s a dud (for me).
I hadn’t realized there was another JamieH here! When I started commenting in 2007ish I was the only one (though I mostly lurk, tbh). I’ll just start doing what I should have done then and start going by Jamie 🙂
Not at all a romance, but I’ve read The Gray House by Mariam Petrosyan five times and I’m tempted to go for a sixth time. Sure, it’s 800 pages long and it’s all about kids with disabilities living in a boarding school and it’s translated from Russian into English, but it’s just so strangely and beautifully compelling. What’s real and not real? Where do you belong and what if the only place you belong doesn’t exist…or does it? Who is safe and who is dangerous and what does it take to change, if change is even possible? It’s disturbing and intriguing and told from multiple perspectives but it’s not head-hopping. Each chapter is labeled by its narrator and no more than one narrator talks at a time. The translator deserves heaps of praise for so beautifully translating this book into English.
You are the only other person I’ve come across who has read The Grey House and I’m on time eight. Just started again last night. It’s a stunning piece of work.
I have just re read Bet Me, Agnes and the Hitman and Faking It. The new Michelle Sagara Cast in Oblivion arrived yesterday and as we are snowed in in NW England I have just finished. It was another complex well written episode in the Life of Kaylin Neya.
Just finished the Sagara book. Don’t want to reveal any spoilers so I’ll discuss very generally. The first half of the book was heavy on expodition which I was ok with because I love her writing. There was a lot more action in the second half including an ending that I really appreciated (as I assume you did, Hilary!). So, for those of you who might think it starts slowly, it’s well worth pushing on.
Uggh, that should be exposition. I have no idea where autocorrect gets some of this stuff!
Jeanine. I thought the ending was very satisfying and complemented the narrative within the book. As you say despite a slow start it’s well worth staying until the end.
I haven’t been reading much this week. I found the Sorted Food YouTube channel and went down the rabbit hole. It is five guys from London who like to cook and eat often while wearing costumes. Their latest video is a review of the cookbook “50 shades of Chicken”.
I find them hysterical, but I have an odd sense of humor.
I just watched the “50 Shades of Chicken” review and thought they were hysterical, too. 🙂
They have no shame.
Halfway through Sagara’s latest. Good so far. Will wait till end before reporting further. BTW, went to a library book sale yesterday and saw one of Melisa Michaels’ books. Haven’t seen this author mentioned here. She writes (or wrote as I haven’t seen any new releases from her in years) SF or Fantasy novels with strong female characters. She had a space opera series I really enjoyed, similar to Ann Aguirre or Kristen Kathryn Rusch. Would be curious if anyone else has read her and what they thought.
I never read Melisa Michaels. Wanted to try her, based on your recommendation, but our city library doesn’t have any of her books, and Amazon prices them ridiculously (like $40 for a mass-market), so no go. 🙁
I am sorry to hear that. I have seen the Michaels books in the used bookstores for only a few dollars and, of course, at this library sale. Had no idea they would be so difficult to find on Amazon. But, I checked Abebooks.com and found a bunch there for a lot less than $40. For example, Pirate Prince (one of the space opera series I mentioned) is available for $3.64 with free shipping. If you haven’t tried Abe, it can be a good place to get out of print or used books. Good luck!
Thanks. I just went there and ordered. No free shipping for Canadians though, but reasonable prices all the same.
Skirmish (Skyrider vol 1) was the only one that made it to the UK, haven’t read it for years, but I loved it. Heroine was awesome, tough, skilled pilot, outwardly cynical the way she leveraged the Company for mission payment, when she would have gone anyway:)
The Michaels Skyrider series (there are 5 books) really reminds me of this space opera series that Ann Aguirre wrote featuring a female spaceship pilot named Sirantha Jax (there are 6). So if you like one you’ll probably like the other. Did that series make it to your neck of the woods?
No, not familiar but it’s definitely going on my TBR pile
I’ve just completed Kate Harris’s great cycling memoir, Lands of Lost Borders, a Journey on the Silk Road. Amazing trips. Amazing writing.
And since she was cycling through Tibet and environs in the 21st century, when I finished, just for fun I went back to an old romantic adventure novel in my library, Merlin’s Keep, by Madeleine Brent (aka Peter O’Donnell), which begins with trekking through Tibet and environs by pony and yak in the 19th century.
I read and enjoyed all the Madeleine Brent novels when they first came out but never knew the author’s name. Thanks for telling me.
And did you know that Peter O’Donnell invented the character “Modesty Blaise”? (The comic strip undercover agent.)
I was first introduced to Madeleine Brent in 6th grade, when our sentimental female teacher would read us chapters of Brent’s romance adventure novel, “Moonraker’s Bride”, while we were drawing (sort of a quiet time/recess equivalent.) Rather an odd (although interesting) choice, I think. (–I should reread that one now, along with “Merlin’s Keep”!)
A later year (and a male teacher) brought a different book to my class, “The Saga Of Andy Burnett”, by Stewart Edward White (which dramatic western epic was definitely more interesting to the guys in my class than the previous book selections had been.) 😉
A bit dryer and more historical (incorporating some real life events and characters into the tale), but a good story, and the teacher told us that parts of it were made into some Wonderful World of Disney episodes in the 50’s, when he was a kid (which was how he had learned of the book and found it himself.)
I would love to find a copy of White’s “Saga Of Andy Burnett” and reread it as an adult, but alas, it is rare, long oop, and expen$ive! !!!
It’s funny when you reread books as an adult which you first heard or read at a formative time in your youth… invariably there are things about them which you had forgotten entirely, and many times you are surprised to realize that they are different than you remembered them as being (i.e., thought they were great and now you find you are disappointed, or weren’t that impressed initially and now you see that they are better than you had recalled.)
I hadn’t thought of either author (or their books) in many years… now I will definitely have to track down some other Brent novels (and maybe some other White novels as well, Wikipedia says he wrote MANY others besides the “Saga”. I had no idea.)
Back to old romantic adventure novels, one of my favorite in that genre that I was quite fond of many years ago (and now must dig up and reread) was “The Mark of Merlin”, by Anne McCaffrey. (Yes, the famous Sci-Fi writer also tried her hand at writing a few romance/mystery/adventure stories.)
It was dated even when I read it (set in WWII, though published in the early 70’s) but still good (in my memory), and I loved the dog (i.e., “Merlin” was her German Shepherd, nothing mystical or fantastic in this book.) In fact, the dog was the most memorable part of the book in a way (hmmmm…. what does that remind me of? Could it be FRED?) 😉
Lois Bujold has a new Sharing Knife title out, Knife Children, which I’m about 1/3 through, whee.
I’m reading the fourth in the Sharing Knife series (somehow, I missed it) so I can then read the new one. 🙂
You’ll love going from Sharing Knife: Horizons to Knife Children. I did.
Finished the last of the Murderbot series, Exit Strategy, yesterday. Like all the other novellas in the series, it has flaws, but it feels so alive, I loved it. The entire series reads like the writer is playing a game, enjoying it, and inviting the readers to join her fun.
I’m reading reviews of my books to see if the comments can tell me what it is about my books that resonate with the readers who like them, so I can figure out how to do more of what works (and less of what doesn’t). It’s an exercise in whiplash as I alternate between 5 stars (love everything about the character/plot) and 1 stars (hate everything about the character/plot).
But I think it will be useful in helping me to understand where I want to go with my next book that I’m starting to plot. Not in a “write to what someone else tells me to” sort of way, but more in trying to go with my strengths, if I can figure out what my strengths are. I think outsiders can sometimes see things about us that we can’t see ourselves, and that’s true of our creative works too, where we can’t see them the way others do.
So true. My Christmas novella from late 2017 seems to please readers, while I thought it was a rambling catastrophe, perhaps because that was how I wrote it — in the midst of chaos and hard times.
I love your books. But that’s not helpful, I enjoy the characters, both the main and supporting ones.
Thank you!
Titles? (Would love to read them!?!) 🙂
I’m still figuring out this blog (and such things in general… I’m not on social media, no Facebook/Instagram/Snapchat/Pinterest/Twitter, etc., my phone is a 2005 flip, and I still write real e-mails and “snail mail” cards/letters,) so I didn’t realize until just now that I could click on anyone here with an underline under their name (and it would hop to their own info!) Sorry, I now know who you are (Gin) and your book titles! (I was just uninformed when I asked you that.) !!! I will now go and track down your books! 🙂
I read (and enjoyed) Maria V. Snyder’s “Navigating the Stars”. Though it can be read as a standalone, it is the first of a new sci-fi YA series and I’m looking forward to the next book.
The narrator, Lyra, is a very bright 17-year-old who has been hauled around the known galaxy by her archeologist parents as they study the Terracotta Warriors that are found on newly discovered planets. Lyra chafes under the strict rules for under-18s and finds ways to alleviate boredom that bring her to the attention of security personnel. Her talents get recognized and even exploited.
There is a mild romance, some suspense, and a mystery around the Terracotta Warriors (that isn’t resolved in this book).
I’d still doing my comfort rereads of my favorite Brit romance authors, Katie Fforde and Trisha Ashley. Their earlier books (like my Crusies) I’ve reread so many times, I’m going to have to wait another couple of years to do again, but I’m rereading things written within the last five years or so.
Not sure what I’m going to read when I run out of those (soon) because I’m still not up to anything too complex or dark.
I’m listening to The Luckiest Lady in London by Sherry Thomas in preparation of her visit to my library next week, and I’m kicking myself for waiting so long. I love her writing style, her characters, the richness of the plot, just all of it.
I’m also reading an ARC of The Bride Test by Helen Hoang, her follow-up to The Kiss Quotient which was my favorite book of 2018. Three chapters in, she seems to have dodged the sophomore slump. I’m having a hard time putting it down.
Curse the bad luck that says I have to earn a living by working 8 hours a day rather than lounge about reading everything I want!
Yay, I am so glad Helen Hoang is writing a second book!
Thanks for this – The Kiss Quotient is on Amazon Aus for $1 today so it’s going on my TBR.
Well, hell, I paid $10 for it yesterday. Sigh.
Thanks to whoever recommended The Magpie Lord by KJ Charles. It was terrific. I’ll have to read more of this series.
I also read Mary Balogh’s Someone to Trust, and agree with whoever it was who said it wasn’t one of her best. Such a sloooow beginning, and an extended family so wholesome that I could hardly bear them. It improved in the middle, with the hero’s vile mother as a great antagonist, but then slumped again at the end. I suspect it should have been a novella rather than a novel.
I love KJ Charles. She has a new one out this week, which means today I am very short on sleep. It was good too.
Just started Murder, Magic And What We Wore by Kelly Jones. Found it here.
Reread / skimmed three Sherry Thomas historicals. Skimmed the good bits of my favourite Barbara O’Neal book The All You Can Eat Buffet.
This week I read How About Never-Is Never Good For You? by Bob Mankoff. He is the cartoon editor of The New Yorker and I really enjoyed hearing how they choose what they print. It also gave some insight into how cartoonists work and how single panel cartoons have evolved over the years. All of which is a great excuse to read a boat load of great cartoons.
I just want to share a huge source of happiness. I just went outside for the first time in a week without freezing my face off. It was so cold yesterday that nobody in their right mind went outside. Although the air temperature is still rather cold, at least the wind chill is no longer a factor. Huzzah!
I just finished How to Walk Away by Katherine Center. Definitely recommend.
This is my third book by her. I like her style of writing that feels like a memoir focused on personal growth with a strong dash of romance. This one is my favorite so far. I have a hold on another which I’m reading because she wrote it and I’ve decided to give it a shot based on that rather than pass based on the plot.
Just finished Leverage in Death which was good solid J D Robb (if you’ve got to book 47 then you pretty much know what you are getting) and mid-way through Neil Shusterman’s Scythe which is suprisingly entertaining given the morbid subject matter.
I also just finished minimum wage magic by Rachel Aaron and I really enjoyed it (I loved her Nice Dragon series and this is set in the same universe ). Rachel Aaron has a gift for engaging main characters who strive to do the right thing.
Television-wise I’m watching a show called the Casketeers (which is a NZ show with season 1 available on Netflix). It’s a reality show about a Māori-owned funeral home and is suprisingly funny and sweet given the subject matter. There are some devastating things happening to people but show has a real warmth and humanity.
I’ve added The Casketeers to my wishlist. I am enjoying Netflix. It’s the first pay TV I’ve had. It’s great having a choice of fun things to watch; I’m easing back on my former relentless diet of education. It’s really got too much; but there’s not much else on Freeview if you’re not into sport or violent melodrama.
I read Knife Children by Lois McMaster Bujold, and I re-read Jennie’s Wild Ride. Also, Are You Ready to Hatch an Unusual Chicken? by Kelly Jones. Plus I finished my book club book Heart of the World (non-fiction by Ian Baker, featuring multiple treks to unknown territory in the Himalayas, history and Buddhism). The first three were fun easy read, very enjoyable. The last one was more challenging, but very rewarding and thought provoking.
I loved Knife Children.
Oh the joy! Another Unusual Chicken book. I just put a hold on it. Thanks.
Read DL Carter’s Ridiculous, in which Our Heroine cross dresses in order to save her family from ruin, encounters a duke, and enjoys her freedom from petticoats. It was funny and underscored the horrible economic realities of women back then, all at the same time. I’m on the second one now, but it doesn’t have the same urgency or humor.
Unlike some, I did not binge on Crusie this week, or even this month. Yes, I re-read Maybe This Time, Charlie All Night, Welcome to Temptation, Bet Me, Manhunting and Sizzle, but it was a long month.
I didn’t binge on Bujold, though I did re-read book 4 of the Sharing Knife and the new release, Knife Children. Yes, that “and” applies; I read Knife Children then I re-read it. That’s not binging, is it?
I may have binged a little on Flint, Goodlett and Huff. The Demons of Paris, The Alexander Inheritance, 1636: The Viennese Waltz, 1637: The Volga Rules, and Flint’s 1636: The Ottoman Onslaught, 1637: The Polish Maelstrom.
And now I’m re-reading Patricia Wrede. The Frontier Magic trilogy is in progress and Cecelia and Kate are queued up.
But mostly I’m completing online prerequisites for In-Service training. Exciting titles like Fentanyl, Prison Rape Elimination Act, Tool and Key Control, Safety, Emergency Procedures, Gangs and Threat Groups, Security Procedures, Bloodborne Pathogens, etc.
That in-service training syllabus demands a lot of bingeing to balance it out, by the sound of it.
Kate and Cecelia in the Queue. Then maybe the Morelon books. Then I’ll be in that In-Service course, Tuesday through Thursday.
I finished 14 of 17 online courses AND the AHA First Aid CPR AED course. Just 3 1-hour courses left.
I reread Maybe This Time and the first Amelia Peabody book (Crocodile and the Sandbank?)
MY daughter finished up book 2 of the Kane Chronicles and passed it on to me. I haven’t started it yet. She’s reading for Battle of the Books.
Crocodile on the Sandbank. I’m due for a reread of the series, although I jump half a dozen after the first one; I find them too farcical.
I was just thinking about Crocodile on the Sandbank in relation to Gin’s comment about reading reviews to determine what her readers like and if she could do more of whatever that was. In CotS Peters was amusing and somewhat farcical. Then she did what her readers seemed to want and became much more farcical. And she lost me. Of course, there is a huge contingent who love them so losing me is not a hardship on her sales. But doing what your readers want sometimes seems to mean that the voice changes.
Agreed. But she really changed her voice again later; the series evolved into much more emotionally involving and sophisticated stories. From ‘The Hippopotamus Pool’ (no. 8) on, it’s one of my favourite series. There’s still lots of fun/absurdity, but she pulls off complex characters and relationships, too; and the archaeological background is brilliant.
I agree, I think at a certain point EP looked at the milieu and said ‘you know what, actual real awful things were happening during this timeframe and there is no way these people would not be involved and history, dammit.’
Also at a certain point I think she looked at Ramses and thought ‘hmm this is Sherlock Holmes + Spock + sex appeal, I can do something with this.’
I will have to have another try. I stopped reading at #3 thinking that perhaps #2 was an anomaly so I should at least try one more. I did enjoy the archaeology. My first degree was in physical anthropology with a subspecialty of pre-columbian archaeology and a lot of greek stuff on the side. The second time through I got a degree in art in sculpture. So Peters archaeological background added a lot to the books for me. And for a 10 years I was a human resource manager for the smallest Hanford Project contractor.
I have often wondered what our different backgrounds are here on Argh. We seem to bring a lot of diversity to the discussions that occur here.
I think you’ll really enjoy the later ones. Hope so!
I agree about the diversity here: it’s a really fascinating community.
After several weeks of not reading anything written by anyone other than myself, I forced myself to read a couple things, and wasn’t overly impressed with either one of them. Either I am just not in the mood to get out of my own head, or they weren’t actually that good. Eh.
“The Cinderella Deal” by you for like the millionth time 🙂 I love that book!
Listening to “Necronomicon” by H.P. Lovecraft
And my nonfiction is currently “When God Was a Woman” by Merlin Stone.
Too eclectic, maybe?
Wow, I haven’t thought about the Stone book in decades. Huge impact when that came out.
So I read a weird assortment of stuff – William Dalyrymple’s In Xanadu and From Holy Mountain, which are travel/regional history books set in/across the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. They are lucid and fascinating and informative without being didactic. Also! There was new KB Spangler, The Dinosaur Heist, which is more Joshsmut, very loosely related to the Rachel Peng series (same world building, character but no story overlap) and a lot of fun. There was a new Elizabeth Cadell re-release, A Lion In The Way, which is mostly set in India around the beginning of partition and is one of hers in which the romance is almost incidental to the friendships – not insignificant, but the relationship development is very matter of fact. I liked it but suspect I’ll be in a minority.
I used to read Elizabeth Cadell and reread her but the library has very few of her titles anymore. I am not sure I would find her romances particularly satisfying anymore but if I come across one I will give it a try. Another author I enjoyed was Mary Elgin who only wrote 3 or 4 books and you never see them anymore or they are expensive.
I think her grandchildren and great children stepped in somehow and almost all of her work is available for kindle and there are audibles for some of them also. I originally read them during summers with my grandma, and the comfort factor is very high.
Posted daily art for Feb on IG (#dailyFeb2019). Working on improving digital art skills. Tried to add paranormal fire to B&W image. Mixed results. Think I mostly just look like the disturbed kind you wouldn’t befriend! https://www.instagram.com/p/BtW25shhfmo/
I chose Sarah Wynde’s Cici And The Curator for my recovery book after my dentist visit and it was delightful! So much fun, love the twist at the end, and I really want a puppy now…
I can’t remember if I mentioned it last week, but I recently read Deborah Blake’s Dangerously Driven and found it very satisfying in terms of closing off the Riders’ collective arc and preparing for the next novel. If you’ve read the novels but not the novellas, I definitely recommend getting this one for closure.
I’m late to the party I know, and I’ve mostly been rereading Harry Potter the last weeks because although I’m not sick anymore, I’m still too tired to read anything that requires too much focusing. (These don’t since I’ve read them around 63 gazillion times.)
However I picked up a new one today: “The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue” by Mackenzi Lee. I’ve had it on my TBR for a good while, and chose it now after seeing Rick Riordan giving it a 5-star review. I have only read 4-5 chapters, but I like it so far. 🙂 It’s not every day I read a queer YA novel.
Last weekend I took a pause from Harry and all Hogwarts adventures to reread “The Cinderella Deal”. I’d only read it once before and I upgraded my rating of it because it was even better than I remembered it. <3 It was EXACTLY what I needed right then and there.
And what I forgot to write last time was that I picked up the Thursday Next-novel again by Jasper Fforde that I put on ice late last year: "The Eyre Affair". It did actually grow on me after I'd forced myself through the first third of the book, and I might even read the second book at some point to see if I'll like that one too.
Oh, and on encouragement of a Twitter-friend, I read the 2nd Dresden Files-novel by Jim Butcher: "Fool Moon" some weeks back. I really really liked it, better than the first one actually. Perhaps I didn't pay enough attention to that one or it wasn't the right time, but this one I really enjoyed. So much so I gave it 5 stars and decided to read more about this peculiar wizard when I'm not so exhausted I fall asleep while reading/playing videogames/listening to new music/whatever still-sitting business. Ugh.
PG Wodehouse – one of the Blandings books. Fun stories, but it’s the delicious way that Wodehouse uses words that I enjoy most. His sentences are works of art.
PG Wodehouse is the best. His comic rhythm is so dead on, he has a perfect ear.
I adore PG Wodehouse, but he’s so silly that it’s hard to binge on. Mary Elgin was an enjoyable read, back in the day; I don’t know if I have any paper copies left.
I loved Eizabeth Cadell – clearly one eneeds to be careful shopping for her novels at Amazon, as there appears to be a mixture of paperbacks and Kindle books, as well as at least one by someone completely different.
Maybe after I read (and probably re-read) Knife Children and The Painted Queen (I love getting recommendations here!), I will go back and get some Cadell. But maybe by then my boyfriend will have finishsed the sequel to Crazy Rich Asians and I can move onto that. He is a very methodical reader (a certain amount each day from his Physics periodicals, a novel and a non-fiction book), unlike some of us who fall into books and don’t come out again until we have finished them. Sometimes not even for food.
Swordheart by Ursula Vernon / T. Kingfisher. It’s my sort of story. Yet I imagine Vernon reading Bujold’s Chalion/5 gods books and winging this out as a kind of take off. (She did write it quickly according to the endnote.) I love the 5 gods books, so I don’t have a problem with the similarites (no, not plagiarism at all). But I do have these criticisms: the writing is nothing like the beauty of Toad Words or Jackalope Wives; the plot fizzles; and, no! no!, it ends as the first book of a series.
Murderbot. Fun stuff. I really saw Agnes’s Shane in the character Murderbot. Shane was trained as a tool/weapon who begins by despising anyone in Keyes. I won’t be reading any more of the series, but the story was well-written, true to character, well-plotted, and satisfying.
Thanks to all for these suggestions. Now I’m rereading Curse of Chalion and enjoying myself immensely.
Interesting about the Challion/Swordheart comparison. I happened to have listened to the first two Chalion books right around the same time (can’t recall if it was before or after, but I think it was before) and didn’t think of them as similar at all. But I can sort of see it now.
I enjoyed both thoroughly, although I found Swordheart on sort of the wrong line of the romance/fantasy balance (but that’s just me — I prefer more fantasy, less romance, and this was more romance, less fantasy).
I’m on a Crusie binge: Tell Me Lies, Crazy for You, and now Fast Women. Good fun. Thank you, Jenny.
In other news, my surveyor came to look at the floors this morning, and says I can have fitted carpet throughout the knocked through living area, especially if I use a pure felt (therefore breathable) underlay. He’s suggested also running the carpet into the dining room, over the concrete floor, but leaving the area that was originally the passage through to the garden until I’ve got the building work in the garden done, and then flooring it with whatever I choose for the kitchen.
This feels like a really good solution; the spaces will flow into one another and feel more generous.
You’re welcome! Thank you for reading!
While not on a bi ge I have loved each and every Jennifer adventure you have offered. I love the new murder mystery series, should I proceed with baited breath or must I enlist Jobs patience going forward? Stay warm, Daphne
This sounds great Jane. With just a few types of flooring the whole ground floor will feel larger.
Well, I finished The Poppy War by RF Kuang. It was so well written that I didn’t want to finish it. It ended, and not on a cliffhanger, but it’s obvious that there is more for our heroine, Rin, to learn. I’m happily awaiting book 2.
I just got it from the library yesterday, so am looking forward to it.
It was 2 degrees heading to the teens this morning, but compared to the Midwest it could be called a heat wave. If it remains this cold and the bay freezes much like I’ve seen in the news about the waterways of Chicago they’ll have to shut down the ferry into Boston. It doesn’t happen very often and it is the end of January, so we’ll be heading into more balmier weather in February, Hah.
Kristen Ashley’s last book in the Chaos series came out this week. I’ve got it and I’ll sit on it for a while because I still haven’t read the fifth book. She is so good I like to prolong the wait. I hate that it is coming to an end but what can you do when an author wants to move on. An other author I’ve found that is good in this genre is Janine Bosco. Now, she started out with a Mafia based theme that morphed into an MC series. Her latest is Parrish about a president of a club with Bi-polar and is slowly descending into complete mental incapacity. I’m going to wait a while before I read that too. Having said all that I need me some humor (Fast Women is in my bookcase) or a western which I haven’t read in a really long time. Say You’ll Stay by Corrine Michaels I’ve added to my KU list. It’s a second chance romance. So I’m good.
Apparently, I’ve been on a Crusie/Mayer binge. I’ve been re-reading Agnes and the Hitman on my lunch break. I have not wanted to get back to work! But I’m forcing myself to leave it at the office, so there is something to look forward to tomorrow.
And the other day, I pulled a book off my TBR stack and it was Wild Ride. Enjoying it so far – especially since it already defied my initial expectations that Mab and Ethan get together. I’m pulling for some of the other characters. Don’t k now how I missed reading this before!
I just re-read Wild Ride too! Enjoyed it just as much as the first time I read it. I’ll move on to Agnes and the Hitman next
I read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society and really enjoyed it. It has a nice quiet pace which I found relaxing and the historical part of it is wonderful. The characters were vivid and nuanced and I totally want to move there and be their friend.
I am now in the middle of Wheel of the Infinite by Martha Wells. I have had a bit of a hard time getting immersed in it, but I think that is just because it has been a hectic week. I will definitely read more Martha Wells.
I actually read books this week!
Last night I finished Only Human by Sylvain Neuvel which is book 3 of the Themis trilogy,a science fiction series about first contact.
I also read Verses for the Dead by Lincoln Child and Douglas Preston which is the latest Pendergast mystery.
I’m listening to The Golden Tresses of the Dead, the last Flavia de Luce book and really taking my time with it because I love Flavia and don’t want her last adventure to end.
I’m reading The Golden Tresses of the Dead. Is it really her last adventure?? Oh, no!!
I just started the new KJ Charles that came out yesterday, Any Old Diamonds. Jewel thieves! Forbidden love! Revenge heists that are sure to get complicated! It’s great so far.
Oh, good. I’ve downloaded a sample: I love most of hers, but occasionally there’s a dud (for me).
I hadn’t realized there was another JamieH here! When I started commenting in 2007ish I was the only one (though I mostly lurk, tbh). I’ll just start doing what I should have done then and start going by Jamie 🙂
Not at all a romance, but I’ve read The Gray House by Mariam Petrosyan five times and I’m tempted to go for a sixth time. Sure, it’s 800 pages long and it’s all about kids with disabilities living in a boarding school and it’s translated from Russian into English, but it’s just so strangely and beautifully compelling. What’s real and not real? Where do you belong and what if the only place you belong doesn’t exist…or does it? Who is safe and who is dangerous and what does it take to change, if change is even possible? It’s disturbing and intriguing and told from multiple perspectives but it’s not head-hopping. Each chapter is labeled by its narrator and no more than one narrator talks at a time. The translator deserves heaps of praise for so beautifully translating this book into English.
You are the only other person I’ve come across who has read The Grey House and I’m on time eight. Just started again last night. It’s a stunning piece of work.
I have just re read Bet Me, Agnes and the Hitman and Faking It. The new Michelle Sagara Cast in Oblivion arrived yesterday and as we are snowed in in NW England I have just finished. It was another complex well written episode in the Life of Kaylin Neya.
Just finished the Sagara book. Don’t want to reveal any spoilers so I’ll discuss very generally. The first half of the book was heavy on expodition which I was ok with because I love her writing. There was a lot more action in the second half including an ending that I really appreciated (as I assume you did, Hilary!). So, for those of you who might think it starts slowly, it’s well worth pushing on.
Uggh, that should be exposition. I have no idea where autocorrect gets some of this stuff!
Jeanine. I thought the ending was very satisfying and complemented the narrative within the book. As you say despite a slow start it’s well worth staying until the end.
I haven’t been reading much this week. I found the Sorted Food YouTube channel and went down the rabbit hole. It is five guys from London who like to cook and eat often while wearing costumes. Their latest video is a review of the cookbook “50 shades of Chicken”.
I find them hysterical, but I have an odd sense of humor.
I just watched the “50 Shades of Chicken” review and thought they were hysterical, too. 🙂
They have no shame.
Halfway through Sagara’s latest. Good so far. Will wait till end before reporting further. BTW, went to a library book sale yesterday and saw one of Melisa Michaels’ books. Haven’t seen this author mentioned here. She writes (or wrote as I haven’t seen any new releases from her in years) SF or Fantasy novels with strong female characters. She had a space opera series I really enjoyed, similar to Ann Aguirre or Kristen Kathryn Rusch. Would be curious if anyone else has read her and what they thought.
I never read Melisa Michaels. Wanted to try her, based on your recommendation, but our city library doesn’t have any of her books, and Amazon prices them ridiculously (like $40 for a mass-market), so no go. 🙁
I am sorry to hear that. I have seen the Michaels books in the used bookstores for only a few dollars and, of course, at this library sale. Had no idea they would be so difficult to find on Amazon. But, I checked Abebooks.com and found a bunch there for a lot less than $40. For example, Pirate Prince (one of the space opera series I mentioned) is available for $3.64 with free shipping. If you haven’t tried Abe, it can be a good place to get out of print or used books. Good luck!
Thanks. I just went there and ordered. No free shipping for Canadians though, but reasonable prices all the same.
Skirmish (Skyrider vol 1) was the only one that made it to the UK, haven’t read it for years, but I loved it. Heroine was awesome, tough, skilled pilot, outwardly cynical the way she leveraged the Company for mission payment, when she would have gone anyway:)
The Michaels Skyrider series (there are 5 books) really reminds me of this space opera series that Ann Aguirre wrote featuring a female spaceship pilot named Sirantha Jax (there are 6). So if you like one you’ll probably like the other. Did that series make it to your neck of the woods?
No, not familiar but it’s definitely going on my TBR pile
I’ve just completed Kate Harris’s great cycling memoir, Lands of Lost Borders, a Journey on the Silk Road. Amazing trips. Amazing writing.
And since she was cycling through Tibet and environs in the 21st century, when I finished, just for fun I went back to an old romantic adventure novel in my library, Merlin’s Keep, by Madeleine Brent (aka Peter O’Donnell), which begins with trekking through Tibet and environs by pony and yak in the 19th century.
I read and enjoyed all the Madeleine Brent novels when they first came out but never knew the author’s name. Thanks for telling me.
And did you know that Peter O’Donnell invented the character “Modesty Blaise”? (The comic strip undercover agent.)
I was first introduced to Madeleine Brent in 6th grade, when our sentimental female teacher would read us chapters of Brent’s romance adventure novel, “Moonraker’s Bride”, while we were drawing (sort of a quiet time/recess equivalent.) Rather an odd (although interesting) choice, I think. (–I should reread that one now, along with “Merlin’s Keep”!)
A later year (and a male teacher) brought a different book to my class, “The Saga Of Andy Burnett”, by Stewart Edward White (which dramatic western epic was definitely more interesting to the guys in my class than the previous book selections had been.) 😉
A bit dryer and more historical (incorporating some real life events and characters into the tale), but a good story, and the teacher told us that parts of it were made into some Wonderful World of Disney episodes in the 50’s, when he was a kid (which was how he had learned of the book and found it himself.)
I would love to find a copy of White’s “Saga Of Andy Burnett” and reread it as an adult, but alas, it is rare, long oop, and expen$ive! !!!
It’s funny when you reread books as an adult which you first heard or read at a formative time in your youth… invariably there are things about them which you had forgotten entirely, and many times you are surprised to realize that they are different than you remembered them as being (i.e., thought they were great and now you find you are disappointed, or weren’t that impressed initially and now you see that they are better than you had recalled.)
I hadn’t thought of either author (or their books) in many years… now I will definitely have to track down some other Brent novels (and maybe some other White novels as well, Wikipedia says he wrote MANY others besides the “Saga”. I had no idea.)
Back to old romantic adventure novels, one of my favorite in that genre that I was quite fond of many years ago (and now must dig up and reread) was “The Mark of Merlin”, by Anne McCaffrey. (Yes, the famous Sci-Fi writer also tried her hand at writing a few romance/mystery/adventure stories.)
It was dated even when I read it (set in WWII, though published in the early 70’s) but still good (in my memory), and I loved the dog (i.e., “Merlin” was her German Shepherd, nothing mystical or fantastic in this book.) In fact, the dog was the most memorable part of the book in a way (hmmmm…. what does that remind me of? Could it be FRED?) 😉
Lois Bujold has a new Sharing Knife title out, Knife Children, which I’m about 1/3 through, whee.
I’m reading the fourth in the Sharing Knife series (somehow, I missed it) so I can then read the new one. 🙂
You’ll love going from Sharing Knife: Horizons to Knife Children. I did.
Finished the last of the Murderbot series, Exit Strategy, yesterday. Like all the other novellas in the series, it has flaws, but it feels so alive, I loved it. The entire series reads like the writer is playing a game, enjoying it, and inviting the readers to join her fun.
I’m reading reviews of my books to see if the comments can tell me what it is about my books that resonate with the readers who like them, so I can figure out how to do more of what works (and less of what doesn’t). It’s an exercise in whiplash as I alternate between 5 stars (love everything about the character/plot) and 1 stars (hate everything about the character/plot).
But I think it will be useful in helping me to understand where I want to go with my next book that I’m starting to plot. Not in a “write to what someone else tells me to” sort of way, but more in trying to go with my strengths, if I can figure out what my strengths are. I think outsiders can sometimes see things about us that we can’t see ourselves, and that’s true of our creative works too, where we can’t see them the way others do.
So true. My Christmas novella from late 2017 seems to please readers, while I thought it was a rambling catastrophe, perhaps because that was how I wrote it — in the midst of chaos and hard times.
I love your books. But that’s not helpful, I enjoy the characters, both the main and supporting ones.
Thank you!
Titles? (Would love to read them!?!) 🙂
I’m still figuring out this blog (and such things in general… I’m not on social media, no Facebook/Instagram/Snapchat/Pinterest/Twitter, etc., my phone is a 2005 flip, and I still write real e-mails and “snail mail” cards/letters,) so I didn’t realize until just now that I could click on anyone here with an underline under their name (and it would hop to their own info!) Sorry, I now know who you are (Gin) and your book titles! (I was just uninformed when I asked you that.) !!! I will now go and track down your books! 🙂
I read (and enjoyed) Maria V. Snyder’s “Navigating the Stars”. Though it can be read as a standalone, it is the first of a new sci-fi YA series and I’m looking forward to the next book.
The narrator, Lyra, is a very bright 17-year-old who has been hauled around the known galaxy by her archeologist parents as they study the Terracotta Warriors that are found on newly discovered planets. Lyra chafes under the strict rules for under-18s and finds ways to alleviate boredom that bring her to the attention of security personnel. Her talents get recognized and even exploited.
There is a mild romance, some suspense, and a mystery around the Terracotta Warriors (that isn’t resolved in this book).
I’d still doing my comfort rereads of my favorite Brit romance authors, Katie Fforde and Trisha Ashley. Their earlier books (like my Crusies) I’ve reread so many times, I’m going to have to wait another couple of years to do again, but I’m rereading things written within the last five years or so.
Not sure what I’m going to read when I run out of those (soon) because I’m still not up to anything too complex or dark.
I’m listening to The Luckiest Lady in London by Sherry Thomas in preparation of her visit to my library next week, and I’m kicking myself for waiting so long. I love her writing style, her characters, the richness of the plot, just all of it.
I’m also reading an ARC of The Bride Test by Helen Hoang, her follow-up to The Kiss Quotient which was my favorite book of 2018. Three chapters in, she seems to have dodged the sophomore slump. I’m having a hard time putting it down.
Curse the bad luck that says I have to earn a living by working 8 hours a day rather than lounge about reading everything I want!
Yay, I am so glad Helen Hoang is writing a second book!
Thanks for this – The Kiss Quotient is on Amazon Aus for $1 today so it’s going on my TBR.
Well, hell, I paid $10 for it yesterday. Sigh.
Thanks to whoever recommended The Magpie Lord by KJ Charles. It was terrific. I’ll have to read more of this series.
I also read Mary Balogh’s Someone to Trust, and agree with whoever it was who said it wasn’t one of her best. Such a sloooow beginning, and an extended family so wholesome that I could hardly bear them. It improved in the middle, with the hero’s vile mother as a great antagonist, but then slumped again at the end. I suspect it should have been a novella rather than a novel.
I love KJ Charles. She has a new one out this week, which means today I am very short on sleep. It was good too.
Just started Murder, Magic And What We Wore by Kelly Jones. Found it here.
Reread / skimmed three Sherry Thomas historicals. Skimmed the good bits of my favourite Barbara O’Neal book The All You Can Eat Buffet.
This week I read How About Never-Is Never Good For You? by Bob Mankoff. He is the cartoon editor of The New Yorker and I really enjoyed hearing how they choose what they print. It also gave some insight into how cartoonists work and how single panel cartoons have evolved over the years. All of which is a great excuse to read a boat load of great cartoons.
I just want to share a huge source of happiness. I just went outside for the first time in a week without freezing my face off. It was so cold yesterday that nobody in their right mind went outside. Although the air temperature is still rather cold, at least the wind chill is no longer a factor. Huzzah!
I just finished How to Walk Away by Katherine Center. Definitely recommend.
This is my third book by her. I like her style of writing that feels like a memoir focused on personal growth with a strong dash of romance. This one is my favorite so far. I have a hold on another which I’m reading because she wrote it and I’ve decided to give it a shot based on that rather than pass based on the plot.
Just finished Leverage in Death which was good solid J D Robb (if you’ve got to book 47 then you pretty much know what you are getting) and mid-way through Neil Shusterman’s Scythe which is suprisingly entertaining given the morbid subject matter.
I also just finished minimum wage magic by Rachel Aaron and I really enjoyed it (I loved her Nice Dragon series and this is set in the same universe ). Rachel Aaron has a gift for engaging main characters who strive to do the right thing.
Television-wise I’m watching a show called the Casketeers (which is a NZ show with season 1 available on Netflix). It’s a reality show about a Māori-owned funeral home and is suprisingly funny and sweet given the subject matter. There are some devastating things happening to people but show has a real warmth and humanity.
I’ve added The Casketeers to my wishlist. I am enjoying Netflix. It’s the first pay TV I’ve had. It’s great having a choice of fun things to watch; I’m easing back on my former relentless diet of education. It’s really got too much; but there’s not much else on Freeview if you’re not into sport or violent melodrama.
I read Knife Children by Lois McMaster Bujold, and I re-read Jennie’s Wild Ride. Also, Are You Ready to Hatch an Unusual Chicken? by Kelly Jones. Plus I finished my book club book Heart of the World (non-fiction by Ian Baker, featuring multiple treks to unknown territory in the Himalayas, history and Buddhism). The first three were fun easy read, very enjoyable. The last one was more challenging, but very rewarding and thought provoking.
I loved Knife Children.
Oh the joy! Another Unusual Chicken book. I just put a hold on it. Thanks.
Read DL Carter’s Ridiculous, in which Our Heroine cross dresses in order to save her family from ruin, encounters a duke, and enjoys her freedom from petticoats. It was funny and underscored the horrible economic realities of women back then, all at the same time. I’m on the second one now, but it doesn’t have the same urgency or humor.
Unlike some, I did not binge on Crusie this week, or even this month. Yes, I re-read Maybe This Time, Charlie All Night, Welcome to Temptation, Bet Me, Manhunting and Sizzle, but it was a long month.
I didn’t binge on Bujold, though I did re-read book 4 of the Sharing Knife and the new release, Knife Children. Yes, that “and” applies; I read Knife Children then I re-read it. That’s not binging, is it?
I may have binged a little on Flint, Goodlett and Huff. The Demons of Paris, The Alexander Inheritance, 1636: The Viennese Waltz, 1637: The Volga Rules, and Flint’s 1636: The Ottoman Onslaught, 1637: The Polish Maelstrom.
And now I’m re-reading Patricia Wrede. The Frontier Magic trilogy is in progress and Cecelia and Kate are queued up.
But mostly I’m completing online prerequisites for In-Service training. Exciting titles like Fentanyl, Prison Rape Elimination Act, Tool and Key Control, Safety, Emergency Procedures, Gangs and Threat Groups, Security Procedures, Bloodborne Pathogens, etc.
That in-service training syllabus demands a lot of bingeing to balance it out, by the sound of it.
Kate and Cecelia in the Queue. Then maybe the Morelon books. Then I’ll be in that In-Service course, Tuesday through Thursday.
I finished 14 of 17 online courses AND the AHA First Aid CPR AED course. Just 3 1-hour courses left.
I reread Maybe This Time and the first Amelia Peabody book (Crocodile and the Sandbank?)
MY daughter finished up book 2 of the Kane Chronicles and passed it on to me. I haven’t started it yet. She’s reading for Battle of the Books.
Crocodile on the Sandbank. I’m due for a reread of the series, although I jump half a dozen after the first one; I find them too farcical.
I was just thinking about Crocodile on the Sandbank in relation to Gin’s comment about reading reviews to determine what her readers like and if she could do more of whatever that was. In CotS Peters was amusing and somewhat farcical. Then she did what her readers seemed to want and became much more farcical. And she lost me. Of course, there is a huge contingent who love them so losing me is not a hardship on her sales. But doing what your readers want sometimes seems to mean that the voice changes.
Agreed. But she really changed her voice again later; the series evolved into much more emotionally involving and sophisticated stories. From ‘The Hippopotamus Pool’ (no. 8) on, it’s one of my favourite series. There’s still lots of fun/absurdity, but she pulls off complex characters and relationships, too; and the archaeological background is brilliant.
I agree, I think at a certain point EP looked at the milieu and said ‘you know what, actual real awful things were happening during this timeframe and there is no way these people would not be involved and history, dammit.’
Also at a certain point I think she looked at Ramses and thought ‘hmm this is Sherlock Holmes + Spock + sex appeal, I can do something with this.’
I will have to have another try. I stopped reading at #3 thinking that perhaps #2 was an anomaly so I should at least try one more. I did enjoy the archaeology. My first degree was in physical anthropology with a subspecialty of pre-columbian archaeology and a lot of greek stuff on the side. The second time through I got a degree in art in sculpture. So Peters archaeological background added a lot to the books for me. And for a 10 years I was a human resource manager for the smallest Hanford Project contractor.
I have often wondered what our different backgrounds are here on Argh. We seem to bring a lot of diversity to the discussions that occur here.
I think you’ll really enjoy the later ones. Hope so!
I agree about the diversity here: it’s a really fascinating community.
After several weeks of not reading anything written by anyone other than myself, I forced myself to read a couple things, and wasn’t overly impressed with either one of them. Either I am just not in the mood to get out of my own head, or they weren’t actually that good. Eh.
“The Cinderella Deal” by you for like the millionth time 🙂 I love that book!
Listening to “Necronomicon” by H.P. Lovecraft
And my nonfiction is currently “When God Was a Woman” by Merlin Stone.
Too eclectic, maybe?
Wow, I haven’t thought about the Stone book in decades. Huge impact when that came out.
So I read a weird assortment of stuff – William Dalyrymple’s In Xanadu and From Holy Mountain, which are travel/regional history books set in/across the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. They are lucid and fascinating and informative without being didactic. Also! There was new KB Spangler, The Dinosaur Heist, which is more Joshsmut, very loosely related to the Rachel Peng series (same world building, character but no story overlap) and a lot of fun. There was a new Elizabeth Cadell re-release, A Lion In The Way, which is mostly set in India around the beginning of partition and is one of hers in which the romance is almost incidental to the friendships – not insignificant, but the relationship development is very matter of fact. I liked it but suspect I’ll be in a minority.
I used to read Elizabeth Cadell and reread her but the library has very few of her titles anymore. I am not sure I would find her romances particularly satisfying anymore but if I come across one I will give it a try. Another author I enjoyed was Mary Elgin who only wrote 3 or 4 books and you never see them anymore or they are expensive.
I think her grandchildren and great children stepped in somehow and almost all of her work is available for kindle and there are audibles for some of them also. I originally read them during summers with my grandma, and the comfort factor is very high.
Posted daily art for Feb on IG (#dailyFeb2019). Working on improving digital art skills. Tried to add paranormal fire to B&W image. Mixed results. Think I mostly just look like the disturbed kind you wouldn’t befriend!
https://www.instagram.com/p/BtW25shhfmo/
I chose Sarah Wynde’s Cici And The Curator for my recovery book after my dentist visit and it was delightful! So much fun, love the twist at the end, and I really want a puppy now…
I can’t remember if I mentioned it last week, but I recently read Deborah Blake’s Dangerously Driven and found it very satisfying in terms of closing off the Riders’ collective arc and preparing for the next novel. If you’ve read the novels but not the novellas, I definitely recommend getting this one for closure.
I’m late to the party I know, and I’ve mostly been rereading Harry Potter the last weeks because although I’m not sick anymore, I’m still too tired to read anything that requires too much focusing. (These don’t since I’ve read them around 63 gazillion times.)
However I picked up a new one today: “The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue” by Mackenzi Lee. I’ve had it on my TBR for a good while, and chose it now after seeing Rick Riordan giving it a 5-star review. I have only read 4-5 chapters, but I like it so far. 🙂 It’s not every day I read a queer YA novel.
Last weekend I took a pause from Harry and all Hogwarts adventures to reread “The Cinderella Deal”. I’d only read it once before and I upgraded my rating of it because it was even better than I remembered it. <3 It was EXACTLY what I needed right then and there.
And what I forgot to write last time was that I picked up the Thursday Next-novel again by Jasper Fforde that I put on ice late last year: "The Eyre Affair". It did actually grow on me after I'd forced myself through the first third of the book, and I might even read the second book at some point to see if I'll like that one too.
Oh, and on encouragement of a Twitter-friend, I read the 2nd Dresden Files-novel by Jim Butcher: "Fool Moon" some weeks back. I really really liked it, better than the first one actually. Perhaps I didn't pay enough attention to that one or it wasn't the right time, but this one I really enjoyed. So much so I gave it 5 stars and decided to read more about this peculiar wizard when I'm not so exhausted I fall asleep while reading/playing videogames/listening to new music/whatever still-sitting business. Ugh.
PG Wodehouse – one of the Blandings books. Fun stories, but it’s the delicious way that Wodehouse uses words that I enjoy most. His sentences are works of art.
PG Wodehouse is the best. His comic rhythm is so dead on, he has a perfect ear.
I adore PG Wodehouse, but he’s so silly that it’s hard to binge on. Mary Elgin was an enjoyable read, back in the day; I don’t know if I have any paper copies left.
I loved Eizabeth Cadell – clearly one eneeds to be careful shopping for her novels at Amazon, as there appears to be a mixture of paperbacks and Kindle books, as well as at least one by someone completely different.
Maybe after I read (and probably re-read) Knife Children and The Painted Queen (I love getting recommendations here!), I will go back and get some Cadell. But maybe by then my boyfriend will have finishsed the sequel to Crazy Rich Asians and I can move onto that. He is a very methodical reader (a certain amount each day from his Physics periodicals, a novel and a non-fiction book), unlike some of us who fall into books and don’t come out again until we have finished them. Sometimes not even for food.