Cory Day’s
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(group member since Aug 18, 2012)
Cory Day’s
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from the Reading with Style group.
Showing 641-660 of 1,205
10.4 Sovereign StatesRelief Valve by J.L. Merrow (89,374 words)
Review: After reading Pressure Head, I decided to hang out with Tom and Phil for a little longer. I wish these books were titled differently – they sound much dirtier than they are. Really, they’re super fun, pretty silly mystery novels with a bit of sex and romance. In this one, we find out a little more about Tom and his family – in fact, he finds out things that he didn’t know before – but we don’t learn much about Phil. It’s pretty obvious that while they care about each other, they really haven’t talked about most of the major things in their past that may impede a true connection.
The mystery in this one is relatively interesting, but even though it takes up much of the plot it almost feels like background information. The idea of a writers’ group full of suspects is pretty funny – and I expect Merrow has encountered some of the stuffy types that make it up – but I just wanted more about Tom and Phil and their families and lives. It doesn’t hurt to have the mystery plot though.
+10 Task (set entirely in the UK)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 715
I just noticed The Rosie Project is on the list from The Goldfinch - may as well lock that in since I own it, even though I have way too many books to read right now...I think someone claimed it for other tasks earlier, so I assume they can get extra combo points now?
10.4 Sovereign StatesPressure Head by J.L. Merrow (69,823 words)
Review: Pressure Head has elements of romance, urban fantasy, and classic mystery to it. It’s also a very British book – the narrator talks a lot about the different classes and locations in his town, spends a lot of time in pubs, and regularly uses slang. Tom Paretski is a plumber with a ‘gift’ – he can find things that people are hiding. The book opens with the police asking him for help finding a body. Then he meets a private investigator named Phil hired by the murdered girl’s family, and it turns out they were in high school together. They didn’t get along back then, their relationship culminating in a horrible accident that both of them hold Phil partially responsible for. In a lot of ways, that accident seems to have shaped both of their lives, although Tom is the one who has physically lived with its results.
Phil and Tom start spending time together investigating the murder, and begin a tentative romantic relationship. I’m thrilled this is part of a series, because otherwise I’d be frustrated with the character development in this installment. Tom and Phil need to have a couple serious talks in order to be on the same page, but I expect that’ll happen in the books to come.
+10 Task (set entirely in the UK)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 695
10.4 Sovereign StatesSweet Disorder by Rose Lerner
Review: Sweet Disorder uses some of the trappings of traditional historical romance novels, but flips a bunch of them pretty much on their heads. The heroine, Pheobe, is a widow, so she’s not a blushing virgin. She’s not an heiress or the daughter of a titled man or anything like that. She’s plus-sized. She’s independent and does not want to be married again – her first one was no cakewalk. But she finds herself, in order to protect her sister, in a position where getting married seems to be the only solution.
Nick is the middle son of an earl, part of a family heavily involved in politics. He served in the army, but has had to return to England after a bad leg wound. He is dared by his mother to go solve a political problem in Pheobe’s hometown – in order to help Nick’s younger brother to win the election, Pheobe needs to marry one of his supporters. The town gives certain voting rights to the eldest daughter of voters without male heirs, so a marriage will mean another voter to whatever party prevails.
Shenanigans ensue, Nick and Phoebe fall in love, yada yada. It was so fun seeing people of different classes – this isn’t a book that happens in a ballroom, and Nick is not as much of a spoiled rich man as many sons of earls would be. His family doesn’t save the day and money is important but doesn’t solve problems. Phoebe does not always have a perfect accent, which would matter in certain social circles, but she is actually better educated than Nick. I could just keep going on with how interesting the world and characters are.
The only major criticism I had was that there was so much plot that the romance suffered a little bit – the two main characters don’t spend all their time together, so it felt a little rushed at times. But other than that, I loved it, and I want to read the other books set in this town.
+10 Task (set entirely in the UK)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 675
10.3 1980sRedwall by Brian Jacques (Lexile 800)
Review: Redwall is the story of a mouse named Matthias, who is in training at an Abbey in a peaceful village whose inhabitants have sworn to do no harm. Matthias, however, wants to be a warrior like the great legendary hero from Redwall’s past. It looks like he will be stuck being a non-combatant until a rat comes to take over, threatening the entire way of life. Defending the abbey is allowed under the moral code, and suddenly Matthias is thrust into a quest to find a legendary sword and lead his friends in battle. Unfortunately, the quest takes up a lot of the book, so his friends are fighting without him for the vast majority of the war with the rats, but in the end he fulfills his destiny. It’s a cute book, but for whatever reason it did not consistently hold my attention. I think reading it to a child would be tons of fun though, and I may at some point go back to Redwall and read some of Jacques’ other books.
+10 Task (#97 on list)
+10 Review
+5 Oldies (published 1986)
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 655
20.8 Exiles and EmmigrantsA Bollywood Affair by Sonali Dev
Review: I’d heard pretty much nothing but outrageous praise for this book, so I went into it with some hesitation – I rarely find books live up to the hype. For the first couple chapters, I was afraid that’s what happened – it wasn’t catching my attention. Then the book hit its stride and I was off – ending with a five star rating.
This is a romance novel – the story is about the couple’s getting together. It’s also written accessibly, with a nice quick pace. But it’s also more than that – it’s a story about two people finding themselves as they find each other. The last third of the book had me laughing and tearing up all at once – the blend of humor and emotion was perfect. I loved it, and yes, the hype was pretty much true for me, including the warnings that the book will make you want to consume large quantities of Indian food. I only wish the next book would have the same characters – I wanted more time with all of them.
+20 Task (Dev was born in India but lives in the US)
+10 Review
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 630
10.8 Two for OneMuscling Through by J.L. Merrow (29,934 words)
and
The Gift by Katriena Knights (2,490 words)
Review: Muscling Through is a short book, but probably just about the perfect length for its style. The story is told in the first person from the point of view of a man named Al, a self-proclaimed “poof” who looks like a brute and isn’t the intellectually smartest man. His narration takes some getting used to – he doesn’t use proper grammar, and he doesn’t always understand what’s going on around him. Subtext is particularly challenging for him – he takes things very literally. He meets art professor Larry in an alleyway. The much smaller, much ‘cleverer’ man is believes Al is trying to mug him, when in reality he’s just trying to help him home. They begin dating, and the story follows the progression of their relationship (with, warning, LOTS of sex scenes). We also get to see Larry’s encouragement of Al’s artistic talent. I loved meeting these characters, and while I’m not sure I’d want to read whole novels in Al’s narration, I’m glad I spent just under 100 pages with him.
The Gift is a really short story of a woman in 14th century Scotland whose unrequited love is finally fulfilled – it was cute but very brief.
+10 Task (32,424 words total)
+5 Combo (both are set entirely in the UK, Muscling Through in Cambridge and The Gift in Scotland)
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 600
20.5 Mystery WomenSurvivor In Death by J.D. Robb
Review: This is the 20th Eve Dallas book, and I’m not even really halfway through the series. J.D. Robb, who is Nora Roberts using a pen name, can just churn books out with minimal compromise in quality. That being said, the basic framework is pretty much always the same, so I have to spread these books out. I’ll read one, then wait until I need to visit with old friends, and then go back to them. This one was particularly difficult to read from the crime standpoint – if you don’t like ‘kids in peril’ stories, I’d suggest staying away from this one. It’s gruesome and actually made me cry at one point, which is pretty unusual for me, especially in a crime novel. At this point in the series, there are a TON of side characters, which I kind of love. The only quibble I have, and it happens with every J.D. Robb novel, is that I prefer not to see the little glimpses into the criminals’ viewpoints. She never does it more than a few pages per book, but it pulls me out of the story and makes me feel like I can’t look for the clues along with Dallas since I’ve got a little bit of additional knowledge.
+20 Task (Robb is on the list, and Eve Dallas is the main character and main narrator)
+10 Review
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 575
10.8 Two for OneWaiting for Winter by L.B. Gregg (15,690 words)
and
Baby, It's Cold by Josh Lanyon (18,810 words)
Review: Both of these stories are based on the same basic premise – couples that used to be together, broke up, and want to be back together (although each man doesn’t know his partner feels the same way), who get stuck in cabins in the snow at Christmastime. Waiting for Winter deals with a long-term relationship gone south, and the power dynamics bothered me some – Winter is the much older, more financially stable partner, and his decision to take a job in Germany without telling Luke was unacceptable to me – but he manages to be vulnerable and even kind of nice in the end, so he won me over. Baby, It’s Cold deals with friends who had a brief love affair that didn’t work out because they were both too scared, but the story itself has an extra person, a lot of cooking, the flu, and not that much romantic interaction until the last couple of paragraphs. In the end, both were cute and promising, but as with most short stories I was left wanting much more.
+10 Task
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 545
10.8 Two for OneRest and Be Thankful by Joanna Chambers (25,570 words)
and
The Battlefield: A Short Story by George Bedell (4,580 words)
Review: Rest and Be Thankful is a surprisingly well developed romance for its length. At only approximately 85 pages, I managed to thoroughly buy into the character growth and relationship development between Cam and Rob, two supposed nemeses in the Scottish Highlands. I kind of want to read stories about all the inhabitants of the small town now, as well as to see the ‘happily ever after’ beyond the tentative ‘happy for now’ the story promised. I’ll read some more by this author.
Honestly, I found The Battlefield: A Short Story on Smashwords in an attempt to grab a story that was set in the UK and was close to 4,500 words so that I could just fit under the two for one minimum. This is obviously self-published, and the story wasn’t all that great, but now I want to know more about the author. The tone of the story read like a grandpa telling a tale to his grandkids, and that part delighted me, even if the story did not.
+10 Task (just over 30,000 words total)
+5 Combo (both are set entirely in the UK)
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 525
15.6 – T-FThreads and Flames by Esther M. Friesner (Lexile 840)
+20 Task
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 500
10.8 Two for OneThis Wicked Gift by Courtney Milan - 28,781 words: http://www.courtneymilan.com/rambling...
and
Out by Harper Fox - 21,620 words: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...
Review: This Wicked Gift serves as a prequel to the first novel Courtney Milan had published, so it’s a little rough around the edges, but it was still satisfying for a less than 100 page novella. The protagonists are not members of the ton – William may once have had a chance at existing on its edges, but Lavinia never even had delusions of wealth or grandeur. I love it when Milan does that – her stories have their fair share of dukes and earls, but she explores the middle and lower classes too. This is short, so the actual romance happens pretty quickly, but the power dynamics aren’t typical and it was relatively refreshing, even though the premise was a little iffy. It was nice seeing William appear in the following novella, too.
Out hit a strange chord for me – for such a short story, it took me a LONG time to get into it. By the end, I actually would have read more from the two characters, but it’s possible Harper Fox just needs to stick to novels. I’ll have to read one of her full-length ones to gauge that.
+10 Task
+5 Combo (both stories are set completely in the UK – This Wicked Gift in England; Out in Scotland
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 480
10.4 Sovereign StatesProof by Seduction by Courtney Milan
Review: If I’m not careful, I’m just going to rip through all of Courtney Milan’s backlist and have nothing left within the month. Regardless, I’m enjoying the ride. This is the first book in her first series, so it’s not as polished as her more recent ones, but many hallmarks are there. The heroine is an intelligent and educated woman, who has managed to be resourceful and provide for herself in spite of her unknown familial origins. The hero is a marquess, actually more concerned with status than most of Milan’s other heroes, but still open to change. I love the glimpse into multiple classes and the characters’ development in the course of the book, and am looking forward to the second one in the series.
+10 Task (set entirely in England)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 455
10.4 Sovereign StatesUnsticky by Sarra Manning
Review: This book pulled me in two directions the entire time. I had a fundamental problem with the premise, but I totally fell into the story and the characters. The premise is that a 23-year-old girl and a 41-year-old man enter into a “contract” in which she is paid for essentially being his mistress. Through the course of the seven months, she learns to be more confident and he learns to feel – but the power dynamics never settled well for me. By the end, I thought Manning did a decent job of giving Grace agency and showing Vaughn’s vulnerability, and I really did love the last chapter. I just wish that in the course of this actually quite long book that I’d felt like more of the loose ends had been tied up. I’m going and finding more of the author’s books though, definitely.
+10 Task (aside from a few pages set in trips out of the country, the entire book is set in England)
+5 Jumbo (562 pages)
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 435
10.8 Two for OneA Kiss For Midwinter by Courtney Milan and Claiming the Duchess by Sherry Thomas
Review: A Kiss for Midwinter gives the story of how the best friend in The Duchess War finds love with one of the doctors present during her most vulnerable moment. Lydia doesn’t understand at first how Jonas communicates – but in a short novella, Milan manages to thoroughly convince her, and the readers, that the serious doctor is her one true love. The Christmas setting was perfect for the season, and I would love to read some more about this couple. I love that neither of them is titled, and they have had real problems in their lives.
Claiming the Duchess sets up Sherry Thomas’s Fitzhugh trilogy. This one is VERY short, and the romance is just okay, but I would like to get to know Christian, who is the hero of the first novel in the series. I’ve only read one of Thomas’s books, but will eventually definitely read more.
+10 Task (A Kiss for Midwinter is 94 pages; Claiming the Duchess is 6,500 words - http://www.sherrythomas.com/claiming-..., which works out to approximately 22 pages based on 30,000 words = 100 pages)
+5 Combo (10.4 – both are set entirely in England)
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 410
10.9 EconomistAmerican Rust by Philipp Meyer
Review: I’ve been trying to read just about anything I find set in the Pittsburgh area, since it’s my hometown and I get a little homesick sometimes. This one gets filed under “the setting distracts me” – the author isn’t originally from the Monongahela Valley, but still put in the occasional Pittsburgh reference that just threw me off most of the time. The rest of the book was my least favorite kind – disaffected young men (really, everyone is disaffected) making stupid decisions to try to “escape.” At least most of these people actually had reason to feel disaffected – the loss of jobs after all the mills closed in the area was, and to some extent still is, a real problem. That was one of the problems though – it was hard to tell when in time the story was set, although there were enough clues to place it fairly contemporarily with when it was written. I ended up rating this two stars, but wish I could have given it more.
+10 Task (2009 list)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 385
20.8 Exiles and EmmigrantsLegend by Marie Lu
+20 Task (born in China, lives in USA)
Lexile 710 – no styles
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 365
10.6 Foreign LanguageThe Fat Years by Chan Koonchung
Review: The Fat Years is not a hard book to read. When I was reading it, I flipped through the pages like I would a good thriller. The problem is that it felt like a dream that makes no sense, and not in a good way for me. For some reason, I had a similar feeling reading this as when I read Cloud Atlas, but I’m not sure there are many similarities between the books.
It’s set in near-future China, which really ends up being more like contemporary China. A few years before, the majority of the Chinese people have mysteriously forgotten an entire month, and the story is (kind of) about figuring out where that month went and what happened during it. Really, though, the book was about the dangers of what government could do (is doing?) to its people, and the last section, when the main characters finally find out what happen, reads more like a treatise than the end of a good mystery. That part reminded me a lot of War and Peace, when Tolstoy waxes on and on about historians.
All in all, this book was more interesting to me because it’s been banned in China than for its actual content, but it was still worthwhile to read.
+10 Task (written in Chinese)
+10 Non-Western (born in China, lives in China)
+10 Review
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 345
10.4 Sovereign StatesThe Duchess War by Courtney Milan
Review: This is the first book in Milan’s Brothers Sinister series. I’d read the prequel novella and loved it, so I was greatly looking forward to this book. Milan has quickly become one of my favorite romance authors, and this series has so far not disappointed me. She does such a good job of mixing perspectives – someone in her novels is usually someone with mixed parentage or of a lower class or something else special that moves her books beyond the typical upper class drawing room type stuff usually found in historical romances. Her view of what people could have been is one I’d like to see – I’d like to believe there were dukes in the 1800s who befriended their bastard brothers and wanted to abolish the peerage system. This book has one such duke, matched with a woman whose past would be seen as a scandal to most of society, but not to him. It’s a fun book, although I’m even more looking forward to the next in the series.
+10 Task (set entirely in England except a couple of pages in France)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 315
