A.C. Smyth's Blog

Teaser Tuesdays

Okay, so I’m late to the party, but I just discovered this meme, so I thought I’d play.

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of ADailyRhythm. Anyone can play along. Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so...

I admit it. I’m no blogger.

Wow! How long away?

Well, I haven’t been idle. Around May last year (round about the time this site got abandoned. No significance to that. None at all.) I discovered Storium. It’s a collaborative storytelling site, where people from all over the world, of all ages and abilities, come together to tell stories, play, and have fun.

Okay, so maybe a bit too much fun, in my case.

Storium ate my words for months on end. However, I’ve come out of it a better writer, having probably written a couple...

I’m in an anthology!

I’ve known for a while, actually, and have been sitting on my hands waiting for contracts etc. to be finalised.

I rarely write short stories. I don’t enjoy reading or writing them as much as novels, as I like the complexity and character development that’s possible over 100K words. But at World Fantasy Con last year I came away with a good piece of advice from a more experienced writer. (Which is pretty much everyone, let’s face it!)

She said to me that it didn’t matter whether I pursued tradit...

A Shift in Perspective

So as often happens, I’verecently experienced a random train of thought.

Over the past few months, the BBC have been showing a series called “The Musketeers”. It has got some people very hot under the collar, as they’d been expecting a Pride-and-Prejudice-like faithful adaptation of the Dumas classic. What they got was more of a Merlin-like romp which pays lip service to the original, but otherwise is a shameless excuse for swords, guns, fight scenes, ladies in posh frocks, Peter Capaldi as a...

Readathon Update 3

Midday

Currently reading: Just finished The Clockwork Giant

Pages read: 100%

Snack of choice: None

Other comments: Only an hour to go, so I won’t get anything finished. I may continue with The Thief’s Gamble by Juliet McKenna. I’m only about 40 pages into that.

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11am

Currently reading: The Clockwork Giant by Brooke Johnson

Pages read: 76%

Snack of choice: Toast and the last of last year’s rhubarb jam. Will need to make more.

Other comments: I’m enjoying TCG. Again, it’s a YA, which I hadn’t realised,...

Readathon Update Post 2

11pm

Current book: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Pages read: 43% (Kindle)

Thoughts so far: Not too brain-taxing for this time of night. I’ll go back to The Gospel of Loki in the morning, when I’m more up to remembering who all the characters are!

Snack of choice: Twiglets gone, ale nearly gone.

Other comments: really flagging now. Will see how I am at midnight and decide whether just to turn in for the night.

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10pm

Current book: The Gospel of Loki by Joanne Harris

Pages read: 16/302

Thoughts...

Readathon Best Books

Best Book of Your Reading Year : This is a toughie. I’d have to give it to a reread of my favourite novel ever, The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. It’s a blockbuster story of betrayal and revenge, and Edmond Dantes has been one of my fictional crushes since I was 11 or 12.

Best YA Book of Your Reading Year : No way can I narrow this down to one. My favourites have been Pantomime/Shadowplay by Laura Lam, and Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor. I’m excited to read the rest of...

Readathon Update Post

I’ll add to this as the day goes on, rather than doing lots of separate ones.

6pm

Book reading: Glass Houses, by Rachel Caine

Pages read: 204/348

Thoughts on book: I have to say, I’m liking Michael, although him telling Claire (whom he hardly knows) about his “problem”, rather than Shane or Eve doesn’t 100% work for me, it’s still an interesting character quirk.

Snack of choice: mini pretzels (now finished). Yet more tea.

Other comments: stopping for dinner with family now. Back later.

5pm

Book readi...

Readathon Opening Meme

OK, so I’ve barely hit publish on my introductory post, when an opening meme turns up on Twitter. So here goes.

1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?

Cambridgeshire, UK, where it is a sunny, if cloudy day. Local time for start of the readathon is 1pm.

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2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?

Probably The Gospel of Loki, although I’ve got so many books both in hard copy and on Kindle that I’ve not read, that I could read one of about 300 and not read somet...

Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon!

So today, April 26th, is the day of Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon. I’m not planning on reading the whole 24 hours (I need my sleep, and my attention span isn’t what it used to be), but I’m certainly going to be reading a lot today.

This particular event is set up so that everyone begins and ends at the same time, so the start time for the UK is 1pm. This means that for the last couple of hours I’ve been clock-watching, fretting to get started.

The recommendation seems to be to choose several shorte...