Rachel Kovaciny's Blog, page 29

Middle-earth Locations Unscramble

Our first party game this year is an unscramble -- I've mixed up the letters of ten locations in Middle-earth, and you need to unscramble them!  Put your answers in the comments (which I'll put on moderation when I post this so no one can cheat off each other), and I'll announce the answers and people's scores at the end of the week.
1Therolloin
2Beeror
3Boniboth
4Klownate
5Soreda
6Leldervin
7Gloitisha
8Omira
9Deemsdul
10Workdiom
Have fun! :-D

A Tolkien Blog Party 2022 -- Kick-Off Post + Tag

It's party time!

Isn't it awesome that this is our TENTH year celebrating Tolkien together with this blog party?  I look forward to this event all year, so much so that I start collecting up prizes for the giveaway almost as soon as the current party ends!
Speaking of the giveaway, be sure to enter that here :-D
If you've never joined this party before, how this works is, everyone posts things on their own blogs that relate somehow to J. R. R. Tolkien or his creations.  We celebrate the author, the...

Giveaway for the 2022 Tolkien Blog Party

It's giveaway time!!!
Six prizes this year, one each for six winners.  They are as follows:


Prize 1: The Lord of the Rings: Journey to Mordor game.  Brand-new, unopened.  The box says it's for 2 to 4 players, ages 8 to adult, and takes at least 30 minutes to play.  It involves rolling dice to race Nazgul and Orcs while taking the One Ring to Mount Doom.

Prize 2: A sheet of six Tolkien stickers.  I bought this from the Etsy shop Lucy in the Sky.

Prizes 3 and 4: A set of four LOTR book plates featurin...

Author Interview with Allison Tebo

Today, I'm taking part in the blog tour for Allison Tebo's new book, A Flash of Magic, which is a collection of short stories set in her Ambia world.  I got to interview Allison about this new book and her writing, and I'm sharing that with you today!  You don't want to miss the recipe she shares, and there's info about a book givaway toward the end of this post.  Read on!
Rachel Kovaciny: Do you like writing books or short stories better? Which comes more naturally to you? 
Allison Tebo: I actua...

"Flight" by Jan Burke

This book was a great relief.  I disliked the previous Irene Kelly mystery, Bones, so much that I didn't even review it here or on Goodreads.  I just want to forget it.  I put off starting this one for over a month because I was afraid it would be similarly gruesome and creepy.  But I do aim to read the whole series this year, so I finally started reading Flight, and it was great!  Not creepy.  Whew.
This book actually focuses more on Frank Harriman, Irene Kelly's husband who is a homicide detect...

Top Ten Tuesday: On the Map

This week, our Top Ten Tuesday prompt from That Artsy Reader Girl Is "Books with Geographical Terms in the Title."

I decided to go with titles that use words for geographical features you might find on a map.  Here's what I came up with:
(All photos are mine from my Instagram)
Anne of the Island by L. M. Montgomery (G) -- Anne Shirley finally, finally, FINALLY realizes what a gem Gilbert Blythe is.
Gone-Away Lake by Elizabeth Enright (G) -- Two cousins discover an abandoned town with two people stil...

"The Cherokee Trail" by Louis L'Amour

When I was a kid, one of my favorite TV shows was Five Mile Creek (1983-85), which was "inspired by" The Cherokee Trail.  You can read my overview of that series here.
My whole family enjoyed Five Mile Creek -- we rented two episodes on VHS every weekend to watch as a family -- but I absolutely loved it.  (It's still in my top ten for favorite TV shows.)  So, my mom found The Cherokee Trail at the library (presumably at my insistence) and read to see if it would be something she could read aloud ...

"These Happy Golden Years" by Laura Ingalls Wilder

As a kid, this tied with The Long Winter  for my least-favorite Laura Ingalls Wilder book.  It's all about growing up, and I really don't like stories about growing up.  I still don't, and I loathed them as a kid.
I actually quite enjoyed this book this time, though.  Watching Laura slowly come to understand why Almanzo Wilder wanted to court her, and slowly start to value him the way he valued her -- that was delightful.  And seeing Laura mature from a fifteen-year-old who couldn't imagine ever w...

Top Ten Tuesday: Mine, all mine!

Have you ever borrowed a book from the library or a friend, or read an e-copy, and loved the book so much you just had to buy a physical copy for your shelves?
I definitely have done this!  If I love a book, that means I'll want to reread it, and that means I want a copy on my shelves so I can reread it at any moment.  

So, here are ten books and/or series I've done that with, for this week's Top Ten Tuesday from That Artsy Reader Girl.  All titles are linked to my reviews :-)
(All pictures are min...

"Great Expectations" (Manga Classics) by Charles Dickens (original story), Crystal S. Chan (story adaptation), and Nokman Poon (art)

I read the full Great Expectations twenty-some years ago because I was all excited that the BBC made a movie version starring Ioan Gruffudd in 1999.  My family didn't have cable, so I didn't get to watch that version, but I did buy the book and read it.  And didn't like it much, to be honest.  So much so that I STILL haven't seen the version starring Ioan Gruffudd even though he's one of my favorite actors to this day.
I will not deny that I got this Manga Classics version hoping that I would lik...