Joanna’s
Comments
(group member since Nov 17, 2010)
Joanna’s
comments
from the Reading with Style group.
Showing 781-800 of 2,306
Kathleen (itpdx) wrote: "Will Red Moon by Kim Stanley Robinson work? Although the moon is a real place, the settlement there is imaginary."I think that's in the spirit of the task, but I'll leave it up to the mods to say for sure.
15.3 Alpha OmegaJoe X: Rethinking Physical Fitness for Adults by Avery Hunicutt
+15 Task (A-T)
Task total: 15
Grand total: 225
10.3 PoliceMortal Causes by Ian Rankin
This is the sixth book in the Inspector Rebus series, which I've been reading in order, but separated by quite a bit of time in between. I read the first three in print, and listened to the fourth, fifth and sixth as audiobooks. There's a different narrator for book four than for books five and six, and I think I liked the book 4 narrator (Samuel Gillies) better than Michael Page, who narrated this edition and book 5.
The character development continues to be the highlight of the series for me. Rebus is not a perfect man nor a perfect police officer. But, of course, his heart is in the right place and he wants criminals to be held accountable.
I enjoyed this book, but not quite as much as I've liked some of the others in the series. There was quite a bit of discussion of the Irish "Troubles" between the IRA and the Protestant forces, some of it more detailed than I was interested in. It might have felt more salient when the book was published in the mid-1990s.
+10 Task
+10 Review
+10 Combo (10.4, 20.10)
Task total: 30
Grand total: 210
20.8 ShortTriburbia by Karl Taro Greenfeld
The full cast narration made this audiobook a great listening experience. These interconnected short stories present a fairly grim picture of the residents of Tribeca in the 1990s. These are aging artists and other privileged people who don't feel privileged because they compare themselves only to other rich New Yorkers. These are successful people who still aren't as successful as they dreamed they would be, as they felt entitled to be. These are people approaching middle age and pretty annoyed by it; people trying to recapture some youthful daring they thought they once had.
I didn't like these people. But I really liked reading about them anyway. So, good trick Mr. Greenfeld. It's not easy to write snippets of stories about adultery, middle aged angst, and overprivileged elementary school kids and make it compelling. I can't remember how or why I heard about this book, but I'm glad to have picked it up.
+20 Task
+5 Combo (10.4)
+10 Review
Task total: 35
Grand total: 180
10.4 TwelveTrust by Hernan Diaz
This is probably my favorite read from 2022. Everything about this was great--the structure was very clever (but not in that writing workshop overly clever way), the writing was great and actually different for different sections, the subtle exploration of truth and reality, the characters--all excellent. It's a hard book to describe because you don't want to give away the unfolding structure--part of the joy of this book is unpeeling the layers. But generally, the book tells the story of a successful financier in New York City in the 1920s and 1930s.
Several people recommended this to me all at the same time, and I can see why. I want to press this book into the hands of all my reading friends.
+10 Task
+5 Combo (20.10)
+10 Review
Task total: 25
Grand total: 145
20.7 RatingsBeautiful Bastard by Christina Lauren
I honestly have no idea why I decided to read this book. It's not a good book. The characters are flat and sort of silly. The start of the book and most of the relationship described is either ridiculously unbelievable or kind of gross (especially the first scene in the book that supposedly starts these characters down a romance path).
But all that said, I couldn't look away even though this is one of the most ridiculous books I've read (and I do read some trashy erotica novels on occasion). I wanted to see the end of this book. So I guess the authors captured my attention despite myself.
I can't really recommend this book, but I'd be willing to give this author pair another chance because clearly there was enough here to make me want to finish the book.
+20 Task (190,000+ ratings)
+10 Review
Task total: 30
Grand total: 105
Connie wrote: "Would The Island of Doctor Moreau by H.G. Wells work for this task?"Seems like it's meant to be a fictional country right?
A couple others:
Absurdistan by Gary Shteyngart
Palace Without Chairs by Brigid Brophy
And there's this list of fictional countries from wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...
10.2 PronounsI Remember Nothing: and Other Reflections by Nora Ephron
My bookclub read this about 8 years ago and I missed the meeting and never finished the book even though it's really short. I left it sitting on my unfinished list always thinking perhaps I'd get back to it. And I think now I'm approaching the right age for this book. While I'm not as old as Ephron was when she published this, I've reached an age where I'm out of patience with men's expectations and no longer an object of random male gaze anyway. I've reached an age where my body is failing me in unexpected and unwanted ways. But also an age where maybe I've gained just a touch of wisdom, a bit of earned whimsy perhaps.
In any event, I very much enjoyed these reflections from a great writer. Hearing the author read her own writing was excellent. I highly recommend this in audio form.
+10 Task ("I")
+10 Review
Task total: 20
Grand total: 75
20.3 NYRBSlow Days, Fast Company: The World, the Flesh, and L.A. by Eve Babitz
I loved this book. I loved the narrator for the audiobook. Eve Babitz is just a great writer and I wanted to hear all of her gossipy moments and peer into her glamorous life. So much fun.
The essays range from descriptions of men that she was interested in, or sort of interested in, or were interested in her, to descriptions of friendships with famous and less-famous people. She describes a Los Angeles that dreams are made of--stars and near-stars fretting over scripts, glamorous people doing a lot of drugs and having a lot of sex, everyone living in the moment and randomly taking off for weekends at vineyards or fancy suburbs.
I've never read anything else by this author, but I mean to change that after reading these essays.
+20 Task
+10 Review
+10 Aged (1943-2021)
Task total: 40
Grand total: 40
15.10 EotPSoft Apocalypses by Lucy A. Snyder
Bram Stoker Award for Best Fiction Collection (2014)
+15 Task
+50 Years bonus (2014-2023)
+100 Completion bonus
+200 Megafinish
Post total: 365
Grand total: 1675
15.9 EotPThey May Not Mean To, But They Do by Cathleen Schine
Ferro-Grumley Award for LGBT Fiction (2017)
+15 Task
Task total: 15
Grand total: 1310
15.8 EotPOur Familiar Hunger by Laisha Rosnau
Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize (2019)
+15 Task
Task total: 15
Grand total: 1295
Some preliminary thoughts:10.1 - Series
Picture Perfect Cowboy by Tiffany Reisz
✔10.2 - Pronoun
I Remember Nothing: and Other Reflections by Nora Ephron
10.3 - Police
Mortal Causes by Ian Rankin
10.4 - 12
Trust by Hernan Diaz
10.5 - Journey
Iron Council by China Miéville
10.6 - Map
Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell
Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner
10.7 - Out of this World
A Feast for Crows by George R.R. Martin
10.8 - The Threes
The Children's Blizzard by Melanie Benjamin
10.9 - Covid 19 Hits
The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
10.10 - Group Reads
Swimming in the Dark by Tomasz Jedrowski
20.1 - Birthdays -
The Pure and the Impure by Colette
20.2 - Biography
Typhoid Mary: An Urban Historical by Anthony Bourdain
✔20.3 - NYRB
Slow Days, Fast Company: The World, the Flesh, and L.A. by Eve Babitz
20.4 - Southeast Asia
Man Tiger by Eka Kurniawan
20.5 - Books
The Reading List by Sara Nisha Adams
20.6 - Industry
Last Night at the Viper Room: River Phoenix and the Hollywood He Left Behind by Gavin Edwards
✔20.7 - Ratings
Beautiful Bastard by Christina Lauren
Web of Desire by Sophie Danson
20.8 - Short Stories
Triburbia by Karl Taro Greenfeld
20.9 - Translator
The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories OR The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu
20.10 - Mystery
Girls with Razor Hearts by Suzanne Young low lexile
I really like both Overdrive and hoopla. I have a slight preference for Overdrive because I'm allowed to download the mp3 files and play them in my preferred app. But the hoopla app works pretty well for audiobooks. I find it's really hit or miss for poetry where sometimes the formatting is such a mess that it's unreadable.Also, I'm happy that the lexile score has been moved to 700. I have several books in the 700 range that I kept skipping over because they didn't fit tasks. Plus some of the books I read with my kids.
Tien wrote: "The series is called Remembrance of the Earth's Past, Joanna ;)I get confused too lol"
Duh! Thanks for putting up with me...
15.7 EotPTrust Exercise by Susan Choi
2019 National Book Award
+15 Task
Task total: 15
Grand total: 1280
Tien wrote: "Ken Liu pleaseHe translated books 1 & 3 of Remembrance of Earth's Past (Chinese to English)"
I was just coming here to add this. He also translated The Three-Body Problem and the other two in the trilogy.
