What Are We Currently Reading?

[Haleth]

3 minutes ago, SierraMist said:

Thanks for the review of To The Bright Edge of the World.  I had to look it up as I didn't realize Eowyn Ivey had written another book.  I absolutely adored The Snow Child, which came out in 2012.  I am a little put off by the length (717 pages).  She is a beautiful writer, though.

I'm heading to the library in a little while to pick that one up.   (Bright Edge is only 400ish pages.)

Edited September 6, 2016 by Haleth

[alias1]

3 hours ago, Haleth said:

I'm heading to the library in a little while to pick that one up.   (Bright Edge is only 400ish pages.)

I'm glad to hear that.  I was pretty sure Amazon said it was over 700 pages.  Hope you enjoy The Snow Child. 

[Cobalt Stargazer]

Just now finished Pit Bull: The Battle Over An American Icon by Bronwen Dickey, and wow, what a read. It's just as much about people as it is the dogs in the title, and I hope it goes a long way in proving that there is no such thing as a "bad dog". Dickey and her husband Sean adopted a pit bull named Nola a few years ago, and she started research for the book shortly thereafter, drawn in by curiosity over the furor over the breed and breeds that are similar. Very informative and worthwhile. I highly recommend looking for it at your local library.

[Bunty]

Since the topic of British procedurals came up, I'm going to throw out one of my favorite authors-- Jo Bannister.  Her Castlemere series is at the top of my list of re-readable books.  All of her titles are great though some of her early works might be hard to find in the U.S.

Castlemere
1. A Bleeding of Innocents (1993)
2. Charisma (1994)
     aka Sins of the Heart
3. A Taste for Burning (1995)
     aka Burning Desires
4. No Birds Sing (1996)
5. Broken Lines (1998)
6. The Hireling's Tale (1999)
7. Changelings (2000)

Blurb for A Bleeding of Innocents

When Detective Chief Inspector Frank Shapiro loses his right-hand man to a hit-and-run driver, he finds himself with little time for regret. Problem number one is Sergeant Donovan, a broody young Irishman convinced that the policeman's death was ordered by a local crime baron. And if that weren't enough trouble for the already understaffed police force in Castlemere, England, someone has chosen this moment to launch a career as a serial killer.

Help comes in the form of Inspector Liz Graham: Intelligent, intuitive, and ambitious, Liz is eager to prove herself worthy of her promotion, and knows she'll have to fight tooth and nail for acceptance in the overwhelmingly male-oriented world of criminal investigation. The resourceful and canny policewoman is determined that no one - especially not an angry young sergeant who resents her very presence - shall stand in her way.

With the body count rising and no end in sight, Liz and Donovan finally realize that their status as outsiders on the police force is perhaps their greatest strength. And when Liz discovers a link between the murder victims - a link so ordinary, so innocent that everyone on the force is baffled - the pair devise an unconventional scheme of grace and cunning that's so crazy it just might work...if it doesn't destroy them first.

[Haleth]

16 hours ago, SierraMist said:

I'm glad to hear that.  I was pretty sure Amazon said it was over 700 pages.  Hope you enjoy The Snow Child. 

Nope.  It's just under 400.

[Jazzy24]

Am reading The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett, it's a classic crime noir novel and I like it so far. 

[Deanie87]

On August 26, 2016 at 4:01 PM, proserpina65 said:

Just finished The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by Kate Summerscale.  Although she does go on a bit too much about how he inspired the Great Victorian Detective character popular at the time in fiction, it's a really good read and I found her conclusions very interesting.  If you're into Victorian true crime, it's worth a read.

I've moved on to The Jungle Books, but have gotten a little bogged down in reading the background of Kipling's life.  I did read the Rikki-Tikki-Tavi chapter, though, because I've always loved the Chuck Jones cartoon.  The story did not disappoint; it was just as charming as the cartoon, which is pretty much word for word from Kipling.  I think I'm going to bag the biography bits and start the actual stories.

I just finished Summerscale's latest "The wicked Boy."  Victorian mystery and crime is totally up my alley and I liked Whicher, but the latest just was not that interesting.  She had to make a lot of inferences and you never quite got the motivations of the boy in the title.  It took me a long while to read.

[Lugal]

Quote

Am reading The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett, it's a classic crime noir novel and I like it so far.

I read that a few months ago and I really liked it and now I keep meaning to watch the movie.

Right now, I'm reading The Gaslight Dogs by Karin Lowachee which is a sort-of-steampunk fantasy with Inuit influences.  It was slow to start but I'm liking it so far.

[OakGoblinFly]

Thanks to a BookBub find I picked up The Red Knight (for a whopping 99-cents) a few weeks ago and just now settled in to read it.  I'm only a 100-pages in, but so far I like it; I especially like world building (which is a pseudo medieval society, complete with Crusaders and magic).  

After that I have the first Detective Lavender book, The Heiress of Linn Hagh - it's a regency era mystery - and comes highly recommended by several people based on my enjoyment of the Sebastian St. Cyr books by C.S. Harris (books that I describe as Mr. Bond meets Mr. Darcy).

On 9/12/2016 at 6:20 PM, Lugal said:

I read that a few months ago and I really liked it and now I keep meaning to watch the movie.

Right now, I'm reading The Gaslight Dogs by Karin Lowachee which is a sort-of-steampunk fantasy with Inuit influences.  It was slow to start but I'm liking it so far.

Ooooh, this sounds good - and I am always on the hunt for good steampunky type books.

[Danny Franks]

5 hours ago, OakGoblinFly said:

Thanks to a BookBub find I picked up The Red Knight (for a whopping 99-cents) a few weeks ago and just now settled in to read it.  I'm only a 100-pages in, but so far I like it; I especially like world building (which is a pseudo medieval society, complete with Crusaders and magic).  

 

Ah, that's a really good book. The follow up, The Fell Sword, isn't as tightly plotted, but is still a good read. I've got The Dread Wyrm, the third book, waiting on my bookshelf now it finally came out in paperback.

I'm currently reading Europe in Autumn by Dave Hutchinson, a near-future spy caper, which seems sadly prescient in that it depicts Europe as having descended into a morass of squabbling, ever changing nations and city states.

[Epeolatrix]

Dead Mountain: The Untold True Story of the Dyatlov Pass Incident by Donnie Eichar. Most of the book was the author asking himself why exactly he decided to go to Siberia to investigate a mystery over 50 years old and often regretting the decision. He did learn a lot, though, and things were nicely wrapped up at the end.

[GaT]

I just finished Whispers Under Ground the 3rd book in the Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch, & like the first 2 books, I enjoyed it. The books are described as a cross between CSI & Harry Potter, & that's as good as a description as any. The series features PC Peter Grant, a rookie constable in London & an apprentice wizard so I get my share of my 2 favorite types of novels, British police procedural & urban fantasy combined.

[Joe]

I love the Rivers of London books. I've read all of them twice.

[GaT]

Just now, Joe said:

I love the Rivers of London books. I've read all of them twice.

Do you read any of the graphic novels? I had a really hard time figuring out what was a novel & what was a graphic novel. I don't know why anyone would write both for the same series, Jim Butcher does this too for the Harry Dresden series & it annoys the hell out of me.

[Joe]

3 hours ago, GaT said:

Do you read any of the graphic novels? I had a really hard time figuring out what was a novel & what was a graphic novel. I don't know why anyone would write both for the same series, Jim Butcher does this too for the Harry Dresden series & it annoys the hell out of me.

I have the first one, and I'll get the others when they appear. While I prefer actual books, I'll take more ROL in any format I can. Why does it annoy you?

[GaT]

1 hour ago, Joe said:

I have the first one, and I'll get the others when they appear. While I prefer actual books, I'll take more ROL in any format I can. Why does it annoy you?

It annoys me because I want full stories, not graphic novels. The time the author spends on writing these small stories could be spent towards a full novel, plus, when they write one, then it delays everything else the writer is doing.  The last Harry Dresden book, Skin Games, came out May 2014. Since then Jim Butcher has put out a ton of Dresden graphic novels AND some RPGs, but the next book, which originally was supposed to be out in May, still has no release date.  By time the books finally come out, I can barely remember what happened before & I don't want to have to keep reading the series over & over just to remember what happened before.

[Joe]

Yeah, I see what you mean. But sometimes a story expresses itself in a certain way. For that matter, I have plenty of other things to read in the meantime. And good news! The next ROL is due 3 November! That makes six books in seven years, a good pace for any writer, even without counting side projects.

[GaT]

I already have the next book on my "waiting for release" list. I'm pacing myself with the next 2 books to lead up to it.

[AuntiePam]

I'd love it if series books -- the kind where one story is told over several books, as opposed to series books with the same characters but a new story in each book -- would come with a synopsis.  "Here's what happened in books 1, 2, and 3", etc.  Tad Williams did that for Memory, Sorrow and Thorn and it was much appreciated.  Especially since there was so much padding (a lot of traveling where nothing happened) in those books. 

Not practical for some series, like Game of Thrones, but it'd work well for others. 

What's even better is when you don't discover a series until it's finished. 

[Deanie87]

I am currently reading the latest Elizabeth George Inspector Lynley novel, A Banquet of Consequence.  It has been out for awhile, and though I am usually chomping at the bit to get to the next one, the last few novels have turned me off her a little bit, as they aren't really mysteries, but more like social lectures.  I"m happy to say that this one is back to form and I read nearly half of it in one sitting!

I do have to laugh at her language sometimes, though.  She is an American, but her stories take place in England and sometimes her vocabulary is like something out of an SNL skit.  Its all biscuits this and cuppa that, and she actually refers to the police as rozzers.  I mean, it is very possible that people really do talk this way, but I read a LOT of British mysteries, most written by British authors, and no one talks like that in those books.  Blimey, Guv'na!

[GaT]

31 minutes ago, Deanie87 said:

I am currently reading the latest Elizabeth George Inspector Lynley novel, A Banquet of Consequence.  It has been out for awhile, and though I am usually chomping at the bit to get to the next one, the last few novels have turned me off her a little bit, as they aren't really mysteries, but more like social lectures.  I"m happy to say that this one is back to form and I read nearly half of it in one sitting!

 

Believing The Lie was the straw the broke the camel's back for me. I was so pissed off at Deborah, that I just stopped reading the series. 

[cherrypj]

Jesus. Neon Green by Margaret Wappler. It's been a while since a book made me cry. Just wonderful.

[cherrypj]

On September 17, 2016 at 9:02 PM, AuntiePam said:

What's even better is when you don't discover a series until it's finished. 

I've been taking all summer to get through the The Wheel of Time series (by Jordan and Sanderson). I started it in grad school, got to book 7; restarted it a decade ago, got to book 10; the series is now complete, so I re-restarted it, and I'm now on book 11 with 12-14 ready on the Kindle. That's well over a million words three times. I'm glad all of the books are available--it gets tiresome having to reread so much!

I should get a prize.

[Danny Franks]

9 minutes ago, cherrypj said:

I've been taking all summer to get through the The Wheel of Time series (by Jordan and Sanderson). I started it in grad school, got to book 7; restarted it a decade ago, got to book 10; the series is now complete, so I re-restarted it, and I'm now on book 11 with 12-14 ready on the Kindle. That's well over a million words three times. I'm glad all of the books are available--it gets tiresome having to reread so much!

I should get a prize.

 

Hah. I bought the first seven books in a box set, back in 1998. I thought that it was a complete series, but I ended up spending the next fifteen years of my life waiting for the series to conclude. I stuck with it, book to book, in all that time, even when books 10 and 11 were really, really disappointing. And to be honest, I've probably reread them a dozen times, all told. I reread certain books and passages frequently. It's a series that has meant a lot to me, over the years.

As for the Rivers of London books, I read the first two but just never found anything in them that captured my attention. They're okay, but nothing more than that, and I haven't felt compelled to start reading the third book.

[Danny Franks]

So now I've started The Dread Wyrm and crikey, can Miles Cameron write action scenes! Just sixty five pages in, and twenty of them have been an exhilarating, unbelievably tense scene in which the heroes are ambushed. I need a break after reading it.

Somehow, this seems so much better than most of what he's written as Christian Cameron (except for The Ill-Made Knight, which is tremendous) I guess that the fantasy genre suits him a bit better than the historical fiction genre.

[AuntiePam]

A Journey for Our Times, Harrison Salisbury's autobiography.  Salisbury was a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, born in 1908 in Minnesota, and reported from Russia, Vietnam, China.  What strikes me the most, so far, is how he puts humanity into history, even as he's living it.  He's very perceptive.  He has a lot to say about power, and how the people who have it will do anything -- anything -- to keep from losing that power.  And not just "world power" but power on a smaller scale, like with university administrations, small town newspapers, and even his own family. 

Also still reading Black Night White Snow, Salisbury's book about the Russian Revolutions. 

[Qoass]

I just finished Here I Am by Jonathan Safran Foer.  At first I had trouble getting into the rhythm of the writing but there were so many sentences and sentiments I just wanted to rip out and stick to to a wall somewhere that I found it worth the investment.

Now, I'm on to Before the Fall by Noah Hawley and it's a much easier but very entertaining read so far.

[Bunty]

I love finding new authors and want to share the discovery.  If you like historical mysteries, may I recommend The Strangler Vine by M. J. Carter.  It is set in 1837 India when the East India Company had its tentacles woven throughout the fabric of Indian life and held the power of life and death.
 

Quote

 

Library Journal

★ 11/15/2014
From the thrilling prolog to the satisfying conclusion, former journalist and nonfiction author Carter's (Anthony Blunt: His Lives) first foray into fiction hooks the reader into a ripping adventure ride, full of danger, conspiracy, and trickery. Young William Avery, a soldier in the service of the British East India Company in 1837 India, receives an unexpected assignment. He is to accompany Jeremiah Blake, a secret political agent with an astonishing talent for languages and Sherlock Holmesian disguises, on a mission to find the scandalous British writer Xavier Mountstuart, who is missing. Each twist and turn of the duo's journey draws them deeper into the mystery of the sinister Thuggee cult and closer to uncovering the shocking truth at the heart of the puzzle of Mountstuart's disappearance. VERDICT Carter's clever historical thriller is a winner. The details of life in 1830s India are enthralling, as is the history of the Thugs. Historical fiction fans who love action, adventure, and intrigue supported by incredible research will devour this novel, which was longlisted for the 2014 Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction. [See Prepub Alert, 9/15/14.]—Barbara Clark-Greene, Groton P.L., CT

 

I actually listened to this and the audiobook was superbly done.  

Another of my favorite titles featuring the British/India milieu is The Last Kashmiri Rose by Barbara Cleverly.

[Irlandesa]

On 8/26/2016 at 8:33 AM, doram said:

There is a core element of the structure of this book - won't elaborate because of spoilers - that borrows heavily from "The Man in the Brown Suit". By the way, I just watched the TV movie of that. LOL. 

Confession Time: I have probably seen the 1989 TV version of The Man In The Brown Suit more times than I've seen any other movie.  Ever.  I wore out the VHS tape. I even have it on DVD. It's on YouTube if anyone else wants to watch it but be warned, its delicious cheesiness came at just the right age for my pre-pubescent self and now it's comfort viewing. It may not delight other adults the way it does me. I also read the book. It was the first Christie I read on my own volition and it was because of that movie.  I had read And There Were None and a few Sherlock Holmes books for school.

I just finished up this book called The English Boys by a new author, Julia Thomas.  The official reviews I stumbled across were good as were a majority of reader reviews.  It's the story of a man who investigates the murder of his best friend's fiancee (who he also was in love with) along with the deceased's sister.  It was a fast read which I am grateful for after something that's harder to get through.  It wasn't grand art but I was enjoying it until they revealed the "secret" from the dead woman's past that may have led up to her murder.  It wasn't so much the secrets but how the other characters talked about those secrets.  It turned me off.  For those who don't care about being spoiled:

Spoiler

It turns out the dead woman had been raped and got pregnant when she was a teenager. She wanted an abortion but her parents pushed her to have the baby.  After the baby was born, the poor girl had some issues and eventually abandoned the baby with her parents and ran off to London. 

What irritated me is the tone the family took about this like the raped teenager was in the wrong.  The sister, who I think we're supposed to like, admitted to being mad at her sister for this.  But my goodness, the girl had been raped and forced to have a child while she was a teenager.  I'm supposed to think less of her because she couldn't deal?  Or sympathize with those who do think less of her?

Edited September 25, 2016 by Irlandesa

[Epeolatrix]

This is season when I can start picking up all the books that were saved as being too Halloween-y for the rest of the year (no such thing). Today's used-book-store find is "Bad Clowns" by Benjamin Radford.

"Bad clowns—those malicious misfits of the midway who terrorize, haunt, and threaten us—have long been a cultural icon. This book describes the history of bad clowns, why clowns go bad, and why many people fear them. Going beyond familiar clowns such as the Joker, Krusty, John Wayne Gacy, and Stephen King’s Pennywise, it also features bizarre, lesser-known stories of weird clown antics including Bozo obscenity, Ronald McDonald haters, killer clowns, phantom-clown abductors, evil-clown panics, sex clowns, carnival clowns, troll clowns, and much more. Bad Clowns blends humor, investigation, and scholarship to reveal what is behind the clown’s dark smile."

I don't fear clowns; they annoy me if I'm targeted because I hate being singled out for attention, whether good, bad, or 'prankish'. That said, Tim Curry's rendition of Pennywise still creeps me right the hell out and I was in my early 20s when that first aired lo those many decades ago. People who dress as scary clowns on purpose bug me because they're just being cruel for so-called lulz, and I have a low tolerance for that. Either way, I don't like clowns. It's not fear, it's dislike. Deep-seated, creeped-out dislike. Like I feel about spiders (only I am actually scared of spiders).

So why did I get this book? Damned good question. At least it's interesting so far?

[Black Knight]

On 9/19/2016 at 3:20 PM, cherrypj said:

I've been taking all summer to get through the The Wheel of Time series (by Jordan and Sanderson). I started it in grad school, got to book 7; restarted it a decade ago, got to book 10; the series is now complete, so I re-restarted it, and I'm now on book 11 with 12-14 ready on the Kindle. That's well over a million words three times. I'm glad all of the books are available--it gets tiresome having to reread so much!

Heh. I discovered that series when I was in high school, when there were just six books out. They were all in paperback, and I was nervous that the series wasn't done, so before I bought the books I checked to see if there was a seventh book in the hardcover edition area. There wasn't, so I thought the series was complete. Ha! It just turned out that there was a longer period of time than usual between the sixth and seventh books - though not GRRM-esque long.

For years afterward I bought every book as it came out and read it, and they went from good to total cash-grab filler. After the tenth book, I and a lot of other readers made the same pledge, that we weren't going to buy any more installments until the series was actually finished, and so Tor announced that the eleventh book, that was just about to come out, was the penultimate book and the twelfth book would be the last. Great news and all, but I kept to my pledge and didn't buy the eleventh book.

Then, of course, Jordan died, Brandon Sanderson came in, and Tor announced that "last book 12" was so long that it would need to be divided into three more books. Sure, Tor. *crosses my arms beneath my breasts* I was so angry that I refused to buy any of those books when they came out, even after the last one did, and years later, I'm still refusing. So I only have the first ten books. I don't really regret not knowing how things turned out. With all the prophecies, dreams, visions, etc. I can guess a fair amount of it anyway. Plus the whole thing with the assholish male hero who's soooooooo virile that he gets simultaneous relationships with three adoring women, none of who have any interest in taking on a second or third partner themselves, was a little eye-rolling even when I was in high school and college, so I fear for the state of my eyeballs if I ever went back to the series.

[Danny Franks]

14 hours ago, Black Knight said:

Then, of course, Jordan died, Brandon Sanderson came in, and Tor announced that "last book 12" was so long that it would need to be divided into three more books. Sure, Tor. *crosses my arms beneath my breasts* I was so angry that I refused to buy any of those books when they came out, even after the last one did, and years later, I'm still refusing. So I only have the first ten books. I don't really regret not knowing how things turned out. With all the prophecies, dreams, visions, etc. I can guess a fair amount of it anyway. Plus the whole thing with the assholish male hero who's soooooooo virile that he gets simultaneous relationships with three adoring women, none of who have any interest in taking on a second or third partner themselves, was a little eye-rolling even when I was in high school and college, so I fear for the state of my eyeballs if I ever went back to the series.

The last three books are actually very good, and a satisfying climax to the series. Sanderson really took his duty to get things finished seriously, and brought a focus that Jordan had long since lost. Yes, it did have to be split into three books, because there was just so much stuff that still needed to be done. Jordan had set up so much, and then set up yet more, without paying off the earlier stuff.  It wasn't a cash-grab by Tor or by Brandon Sanderson. Both wanted to give fans who had spent fifteen or more years of their lives on the series the payoff that they had been waiting so long for. As did Jordan himself, which is why he made sure that a suitable author was chosen to finish the series, and given copious notes on how it was all supposed to tie together.

[Black Knight]

It's good that fans who stuck it out the whole way are satisfied, because you certainly deserved a payoff, but I just don't personally care about finishing. I'm still doubtful that it was strictly necessary to turn the final book into three more books, and suspect that it has more to do with Brandon Sanderson, who was and is a credible author in his own right, not wanting to sign on if he was just going to write one mop-up book for somebody else's universe for which Jordan would get all the real credit (and Tor of course being perfectly happy to go along with that), but whatever the truth of that matter is really is neither here nor there. I was angry at the time, but it's not germane to why I continue to refuse to buy the remaining books. That's more about aspects of the series that I suspect would be much harder for me to overlook now that I'm older, the huge investment of time that would be involved in re-reading the first ten books when much of the content is blah and there is so much else out there to read, and with the weak characterizations that make me not particularly interested in finding out what happened to all of them. That final one is probably the biggest factor; I can endure/overlook many things as long as I'm still invested in some characters, but I was never very invested in anyone to begin with and that investment only dwindled as the series went on, to say nothing of all the years that have passed since the tenth book. Not only do I not care enough to read fourteen books, I don't care enough even to read a synopsis for closure's sake. *tugs braid* *realizes I don't have a braid to tug*

[Lovecat]

On 9/24/2016 at 7:26 PM, Violet Impulse said:

"Bad clowns—those malicious misfits of the midway who terrorize, haunt, and threaten us—have long been a cultural icon. This book describes the history of bad clowns, why clowns go bad, and why many people fear them. Going beyond familiar clowns such as the Joker, Krusty, John Wayne Gacy, and Stephen King’s Pennywise, it also features bizarre, lesser-known stories of weird clown antics including Bozo obscenity, Ronald McDonald haters, killer clowns, phantom-clown abductors, evil-clown panics, sex clowns, carnival clowns, troll clowns, and much more. Bad Clowns blends humor, investigation, and scholarship to reveal what is behind the clown’s dark smile."

This book might as well be subtitled "The Only Book on the Shelf in Hell."  God, I effing hate clowns!  ::shudder::

I blame both Pennywise and the clown from Poltergeist.  I encountered both during my impressionable formative years.

[Danny Franks]

I've just started Morning Star the final book of Pierce Brown's Red Rising trilogy. I held off on reading the second, Golden Son, for ages, waiting for this one to come out in paperback. 

Really good series. I was put off for a while because the blurb on the first book compared it to The Hunger Games (not read the books, but the movies are garbage). Not a fair comparison at all. It's a very dark vision of humanity, with a compelling, if not entirely sympathetic, hero and great supporting cast. I highly recommended it.

[AltLivia]

For book club, reading Library of  Souls in the Miss Peregrine's series. I've paged through earlier books in the series long before this was assigned to me. Possibly an unpopular opinion, but I don't much care for this novel. The writing is rich and visual, but for long stretches nothing actually happens. Some twists are really convenient.  Jacob always seems to say "if I had the luxury of thinking about (insert concept here)" after he's meditated at length about the very concept. Aside those moments, at least in this novel, the characters have little depth to me.  

I just don't personally relate to YA in general and am trying to get my thoughts together so that I don't bum folks out.

Edited October 13, 2016 by AltLivia

[GaT]

I'm currently reading Magic Binds by Ilona Andrews, it's the 9th book in the Kate Daniels series. It's a good book, but I'm getting tired of the plot always being about her father. They need to finally get rid of him & move on.

[Epeolatrix]

The Exorcist: Studies in the Horror Film by Danel Olson. It's a 516-page book of essays about the movie and the other films of the franchise. It's absolutely amazing and practically a textbook. I bought and read it ages ago, but now that I'm watching the tv series, I thought it was worth another look.

[Ruby Gillis]

On 10/13/2016 at 6:36 PM, AltLivia said:

For book club, reading Library of  Souls in the Miss Peregrine's series. I've paged through earlier books in the series long before this was assigned to me. Possibly an unpopular opinion, but I don't much care for this novel. The writing is rich and visual, but for long stretches nothing actually happens. Some twists are really convenient.  Jacob always seems to say "if I had the luxury of thinking about (insert concept here)" after he's meditated at length about the very concept. Aside those moments, at least in this novel, the characters have little depth to me.  

I just don't personally relate to YA in general and am trying to get my thoughts together so that I don't bum folks out.

I only read the first book the Miss Peregrine's series, but I had the same thoughts about the characters' lack of depth and long stretches of nothing happening.  The photographs really made the book more interesting than anything in the writing for me. 

[NewDigs]

Just finished Heroes of the Frontier by Dave Eggers. I really enjoyed it. His writing style is, to me, atmospheric and I feel not only drawn into his stories but almost part of them. The moods are almost tangible. And Heroes is dark and comic and a tangle of the main character's motivations. And a real page-turner.

I've also read and equally enjoyed his Hologram for the King and The Circle and need to get into Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. 

So many books, so little time!

[Hanahope]

I'm reading on my kindle Wild by Cheryl Strayed.  I saw the movie and liked it a lot more than I thought I would, so when the book came up at a discount for kindle, I bought it.

At home, I'm reading the Mistresses of Cliveden by Natalie Livingstone that I got from the library.    Just started it, but seems pretty interesting so far.  Its starting off with the reign of Charles II.  One of the more interesting and perhaps a little gruesome was describing the beauty methods.  They used "fat from puppy dogs" (I shudder to think how they got that) and gloves made out of chicken skin to keep their hands smooth.

[BooksRule]

I just started reading Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children.  It's a very interesting book, but such an odd one (and I'm only up to chapter three).  This is the author's first book, and I'm now wondering what his next one will be like!

[truthaboutluv]

Just completed Neal Shusterman's Challenger Deep. I really enjoyed it and I thought it did a really good job exploring the theme of mental issues. While the story itself didn't break any new ground and it was clear what was happening very early in the book in terms of Caden's experience on the ship, I still really enjoyed it. 

[AuntiePam]

I'm reading The Door, my first from Mary Roberts Rinehart, a prolific mystery writer from the early 1900's.  Reading these older novels is a surefire way to avoid gratuitous sex and explicit violence. 

It's pretty good but I'd enjoy it more if I was one of those mystery readers who likes to try solving the mystery.  I don't, and even if I were, I'd have a hard time with this one.  One murder after another, clues revealed slowly, new relationships introduced willy-nilly.  It's like Rinehart thought "This isn't complicated enough -- I need a new character."

[Hanahope]

On 10/22/2016 at 7:03 PM, BooksRule said:

I just started reading Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children.  It's a very interesting book, but such an odd one (and I'm only up to chapter three).  This is the author's first book, and I'm now wondering what his next one will be like!

After we saw the movie, by oldest daughter wanted to read the books so she put them on her amazon wish list and got them for her birthday.

[Epeolatrix]

Just got Feeding Hannibal : A Connoisseur's Cookbook by Janice Poon (food stylist on the tv series Hannibal). I love the content of the book. There are a few typos and production/printing errors, but I am prepared to forgive them because the book is very pretty and has recipes I might actually make.

[Crs97]

I just finished After I'm Gone by Laura Lippman.  Very enjoyable mystery, and she does a good job of jumping back and forth in time as Sandy tries to solve a cold case.  My first book of hers, but it won't be my last.

[Qoass]

I finally got to the top of the hold list at the library for Amy Schumer's The Girl With the Lower Back Tattoo.  I mostly only see her stuff when it makes headlines but so far, she's really succeeding in showing that her on-stage persona is one thing and her personal life is another.  I'm liking it.

[AuntiePam]

I'm reading A Fine Summer's Day by Charles Todd.  I thought it was the first Inspector Rutledge mystery but apparently it's the last.  I can be forgiven for my confusion because it's a flashback story of the last case he worked before WWI, so it reads like a beginning. 

I really like it -- lots of interesting characters, fine details that make the setting and the people seem real. 

[alias1]

I finally obtained To The Bright Edge of the World (Eowyn Ivey). It's told completely in letters and journal entries, which I thought would bother me, and I found it totally captivating.  The author writes so beautifully.  This book is completely different from her first, The Snow Child, but just as fascinating.