3 Stars. While I did enjoy Ready Player Two, my expectations were so high from Ready Player One that it was almost guaranteed to be a bit of a letdown. I still loved all the '80s Easter eggs that I identified but this older Wade isn't quite as engaging. He's still a major geek but his absolute resistance to listening to others' [...]
Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl invited us to share our most-anticipated releases for the first half of 2021. I'm not very good at tracking new releases so I'm going off on my own tangent. Lexlingua asked me recently which audiobooks are my favorite of all time so this seems like a good week to answer her question! I had such a [...]
Welcome to my weekly update for January 3, 2021! Well, here we are in 2021! The year that felt like it might never end is finally behind us. With the arrival of the vaccine, I'm choosing to view the new year with hope that life will return to a new normal. Posted: Top Ten Books of 2020 2020 Reading by the Numbers--My reading stats for the year and favorites in various genres and categories Around the World: Three Remarkable Journeys by Matt Phelan Read: The Library of Lost and Found by Phaedra Patrick, read by Imogen Church The Blood: Monstress Volume Two by Marjori Liu, illustrated by Sana Takeda Currently Reading: Fathoms: The World in the Whale by Rebecca Giggs Homelands: Fables Volume 6 by Bill Willingham Reading Challenges: I announced 2021 sign ups for several challenges I hosted prior to my long blogging break. I hope you'll join me! Books in Translation Reading Challenge Southern Literature Reading Challenge New (To You) Narrator Reading Challenge I also signed up for several other challenges. I may not complete them all but at least they're nudging me in new directions. The buttons above and the links below take you to the information page for each challenge if you'd like to know more and/or sign up. Uncorked Reading Challenge Nonfiction Reader Challenge Diversity Reading Challenge Audiobook Reading Challenge Book Voyage: Read around the World Challenge Watching: Mulan on Disney Plus was beautifully filmed and an empowering tale. We enjoyed it quite a bit. Up Next: I decided to return the ebook version of The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey since I couldn't download it on my Kindle. I requested the physical book instead and I'll be picking it up from the library on Monday. What did your week look like? Deb Nance at Readerbuzz hosts The…
Hosted by Books Are My Favourite and Best on the first Saturday of every month, the 6 Degrees of Separation meme asks us to start with one title and create a chain of bookish connections to see where it takes us. This month I went from Hamnet to Toil & Trouble. I haven't read Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell but the synopsis indicates that it's about a mother, Agnes, mourning the death of her beloved child, named Hamnet. Four years later, Agnes learns that her husband wrote a play called Hamlet. The author apparently never writes Shakespeare's name in the book; nevertheless, Shakespeare is the easiest way for me to create a bookish connection so he's my theme. Hamnet is historical fiction (sort of) about Shakespeare, as is... Ill Met by Moonlight by Sarah A. Hoyt. I was hoping to continue the trend of Shakespeare as a character but then I realized the book's title is taken from a line from A Midsummer Night's Dream (Act II, Scene i, "Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.") The remaining books in my chain also have Shakespearean titles and they're ones I've personally read. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote (Timon of Athens, Act III, Scene v, "Who cannot condemn rashness in cold blood?") Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer (The Tempest, Act IV, Scene i, "Our revels now are ended. / These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits and / Are melted into air, into thin air.") Something Rotten by Jasper Fforde (Hamlet Act I, Scene iv, "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.") The Dark Tower by Stephen King. (Stephen King based his epic series on a poem by Robert Browning, "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came." But Browning based his poem on King Lear Act III, Scene iv,…
2020 is finally in our rearview mirror! I used to write this post on my first turn at blogging and I enjoyed taking a deep dive into my reading trends. I also like sharing favorite books from various genres that might not make it into my "Top Ten Books of the Year" post. This is always long so bear with me as I review my 2020 reading by the numbers. Links will go to either my review, my GoodReads shelves, or the Malaprop's bookstore website (I'm an affiliate). Edit: I just saw on Helen's Book Blog that there are a couple of other blogs I can link to. Esther at Bite Into Books asks us to share a GoodReads: Your Year in Books meme. Jamie at The Perpetual Page Turner has an End of Year Survey. I didn't answer many of her questions since I found the survey after I'd already written my post, but I touched on enough of them that I feel comfortable linking up. The Stats Number GoodReads challenge goal: 100 booksCompleted: 127! Woohoo! Format 39 audiobooks 65 e-books 23 physical books. Since we're traveling with my husband's job, the Kindle is just easier. Age Group Adult: 92 books Young adult: 19 books Middle grade: 12 books Children: 3 books Shortest and Longest Shortest: Walter the Farting Dog by William Kotzwinkle and Glenn Murray, illustrated by Audrey Colman, coming in at 32 pages. Longest: The Empire of Gold by S. A. Chakraborty at 784 pages. Page Count I read 38,054 pages but considering that there's no real way to track "page numbers" for audio books, that's not a very representative number. The average length of my books was 299 pages. Author Gender Female authors: 73 books Male authors: 52 books Books by genderqueer authors: 1 (as stated…
4 Stars. This book is a taste of three journeys and made me eager to learn more about the featured explorers. The artwork is beautifully done in a style that I (most definitely not an artist) can only describe as a cross between line drawings and watercolors. The predominant colors of each section reflect (or set?) the mood. Warm [...]
This train wreck of a year is finally ending and it's time to post my top ten books of 2020! I revived my book blog in June so I haven't written reviews for all of these. I'm leaving out books that I re-read and these obviously weren't all published this year; I simply read them in 2020. Here we go [...]
Welcome to my weekly update for December 27, 2020! I hope all who celebrate had a merry Christmas and everyone else had a wonderful week! We noticed these beautiful Christmas lights at the San Diego California Temple as we were driving around and had to stop for a few pictures. I received a few bookish/blogging gifts. I got this really cool wooden book thumb page holder, the baby Yoda "Read" shirt I asked for, a Travel Listography journal, a bluetooth keyboard, a case for the keyboard that doubles as a tablet/Kindle stand, and the very first edition of a new magazine called Oh Reader. I'm excited about all of these! I hope Santa was good to you as well! Posted: A Promised Land by Barack Obama--4 Stars Alaskan Holiday by Debbie Macomber, read by Laurel Rankin and Luke Daniels--2.5 Stars Top Ten Books I Hope Santa Brings (or the library delivers) Read: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee, read by Christian Coulson The rest of these books are graphic novels, so my reading speed is not as impressive as it might appear. The Mean Seasons: Fables Volume 5 by Bill Willingham Giant Days Volume Two by John Allison, illustrated by Lissa Treiman and Max Sarin Lumberjanes: Beware the Kitten Holy by Noelle Stevenson and Grace Ellis, illustrated by Brooke Allen Goldie Vance: Volume Two by Hope Larson, illustrated by Brittney Williams Wires and Nerve: Gone Rogue by Marissa Meyer, illustrated by Stephen Gilpin Séance Tea Party by Reimena Yee Currently Reading: The Blood: Monstress Volume Two by Marjori Liu, illustrated by Sana Takeda The Library of Lost and Found by Phaedra Patrick, read by Imogen Church Fathoms: The World in the Whale by Rebecca Giggs Reading Challenges: I announced 2021 sign ups for several challenges I hosted prior…
2.5 Stars. I'm not really the audience for this book but I wanted a Christmas-y audiobook and it was either this standalone romance or other romances or cozy mysteries that were roughly number 52 in a series. (Yes, that's an exaggeration but not as much as it should be.) Standalone romance it was, even though I'm not really a [...]