Stina’s Comments (group member since Dec 11, 2016)

Stina’s comments from the Challenges from Exploding Steamboats group.

I needed one of these for #Winterween last week, and it was surprisingly difficult to find one on my shelves! But I did locate and get started on Open Season, so that's my pick for this year, even if I didn't finish it in time to count it for Winterween and will have to add it to my personal challenge next year as a fail. Well, at least I can keep my eyes open all year for other books that will count for it next year.

Cheryl wrote: "Ooh, I came on here to ask about the "didn't start any trilogies" issue. Maybe I will work on a trilogy where I have only read the first book."

Yep, that totally works!

Define "on your TBR" however best suits your situation. I've already mentioned some of my 600- and 700-page possibilities, but if I want to avoid doubling up on those prompts, I still have lots of options. I mean, War and Peace has been on my TBR for more than 50 years now, so maybe I should give it a chance.

I don't really consider myself a reader of romances, but I ended up reading quite a few last year, and I mostly enjoyed them. If you really don't want to read a plain romance, there are always cross-genre options. Lots of mystery and SFF books have romantic subplots.

I plan to continue the Brown Sisters trilogy I started reading last summer, so Take a Hint, Dani Brown is coming up soon on my TBR. And if you liked the Eddie Murphy movie Coming to America, check out A Princess in Theory, the first book in the Reluctant Royals series. I will probably continue with those as well this year. I'm also looking at Spoiler Alert, which promises to be fun and nerdy.

My #Summerween video at https://youtu.be/B1dFVqh6R3Y provides links in the description to the announcement videos from both of the hosts, Olivia and Gabby. In case you're not in a video-watching mood, here is a list of the books that sound most interesting to me:
The Turn of the Key
Mexican Gothic
The Silent Patient
The Shadows
Bunny
The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires
The Bright Lands
Pet Sematary
My Best Friend's Exorcism
The Whisper Man

You are also welcome to interpret it more broadly and count any book either Gabby or Olivia has ever recommended, and their BookTube channel info should provide links to other platforms they post on, if that's easier for you to sort through.

And really, if that's just too much work for one prompt, any book in the same vein as those listed above would be perfectly in keeping with the spirit of the prompt.

I'd consider it a haunted house book even if the story ends up debunking the haunting, so no spoilers here. And "house" can be defined pretty broadly. I'm stopping short of counting The Haunting of Tram Car 015 (which is a really fun read and you should read it regardless of whether you can stretch the definition of "house" that far), so maybe I will go with The Sun Down Motel if I don't find something already on my shelves.

In this context, the term can refer to a volume of comic books or short stories, or a memoir or other nonfiction work, just in a graphic format. It doesn't need to be strictly a novel. A few possibilities I am considering are Paper Girls, Vol. 1, Wytches, Volume 1, and Heartwood: Non-binary Tales of Sylvan Fantasy.

I'll be finishing off Where the Crawdads Sing. My copy has a dragonfly embossed on the cover. I don't know if dragonflies are particularly summery, but they make me think of summer, so they count. What animals make you think of summer?

For a different challenge, I have to read a book of nature poems. Any recommendations?

Quite a few options with this prompt! I may give Summer of '42 another go, but some solarpunk sounds more appealing. Maybe Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers or Sunvault: Stories of Solarpunk and Eco-Speculation.

Since you aren't me, you can team this prompt up with the "original Beauty and the Beast" prompt and even decide to go with a completely different original fairy tale or classic.

I'm planning to read The Mere Wife, which is a retelling of Beowulf.

I love maps! I miss the days when it was almost a standard feature in mystery novels. Maybe I will find one in an old Agatha Christie this year. It'll be like a little treasure hunt. What gems have you found?

Maybe I will finally get to read Night Film! I also have Nevernight, The City in the Middle of the Night, and a few other options. Any recommendations?

As much as I like purple, I have surprisingly few purple books. I will have to go hunting on the shelves. What purple book will you be reading?

Well, the obvious one for me is The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our Time. Though I might go with This Is How You Lose the Time War. Remember, you are not limited to birds. Owlbears have beaks, too, and some big-nosed humans could qualify as well.

These were in the Linz challenge last year, so I've set this up so that I can count these only after I've finished the other reading for those levels I failed. You, of course, may ignore my self-imposed restrictions and do this however you like. What are your treat reads?

I have started in on Theft of Magna Carta. Creasey was pretty prolific, so if you're doing GenreLand, this might be a good prompt to knock out that month.

Yeah, this is another multi-part prompt I started but didn't finish. I didn't even manage to half-ass this one. I only third-assed it. I read Get a Life, Chloe Brown last summer, so I have until about mid-June to read the other two Brown Sisters books. Fortunately, the third book is scheduled to be released in March.

If you didn't start any trilogies last year, or you simply don't want to finish the one(s) you did, feel free to re-tool this prompt to fit your situation.

Of course, you can double up and use whatever you read for the 700-page prompt. I'm trying not to do that, so more options for me are Kushiel's Dart and Obsidio. What other big tomes are you hoping to topple this year?

I just happened upon The St. Louis Veiled Prophet Celebration: Power on Parade, 1877-1995 to read for this prompt. What have you found?