MobileRead Book Challenges discussion
2014 Individual Challenges
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Rumpelteazer's 2014 Challenge Thread
Last night I finished The Distant Hours by Kate Morton. I love her writing and I'm sad I only have one of her books to read.Just one more stand alone book before I'm allowed to continue with my ongoing series.
Bianca wrote: "MrsJoseph wrote: "Ha! Want to know how crappy that Shetterly guy is?From Jim C. Hines latest blog:Will Shetterly wrote a blog post asking if I had addressed “RAINN’s refutation of ‘rape culture’..."
You know??
Bianca wrote: "Last night I finished The Distant Hours by Kate Morton. I love her writing and I'm sad I only have one of her books to read.Just one more stand alone book before I'm allowed to con..."
She has other books...or is it something for your challenge?
MrsJoseph wrote: "You know?? "Know what? (slightly confused, but that might be because of the hot chocolate with Baileys).
MrsJoseph wrote: "She has other books...or is it something for your challenge? "No, not for a challenge, but I'm reading her books in order of publication and I've now finished 3 of her 4 book, so only one more to go. I can really lose myself in her books, which doesn't happen often.
Bianca wrote: "MrsJoseph wrote: "You know?? "Know what? (slightly confused, but that might be because of the hot chocolate with Baileys)."
lol!
It's just a...IDK what its called. But its a comment meaning agreement without necessarily requiring an answer.
But now I will spend the rest of the day trying to figure out what that is called...
MrsJoseph wrote: "Bianca wrote: "MrsJoseph wrote: "You know?? "Know what? (slightly confused, but that might be because of the hot chocolate with Baileys)."
lol!
It's just a...IDK what its called. But its a co..."
Ah! Okay, I know what you mean but I haven't got a clue what it's called either.
(BTW. I hate GR's way of quoting previous posts)
Yeah, I hate it, too. I do a lot of copy/pasting with GR... I really prefer the way MR does quotes.
I press quote, then I remove what is in the quote part and then copy in what is relevant. It's time-consuming, but at least it is more understandable.
Homeinmyshoes wrote: "I press quote, then I remove what is in the quote part and then copy in what is relevant. It's time-consuming, but at least it is more understandable."That's what I do. However, as my grandfather always said, I'm rather lazy than tired and sometimes I just can't be bothered, LOL.
I finished another book yesterday, Linda Lafferty's House of Bathory. I had been putting it off because I've recently read a couple of books involving mental health patients that disappointed me. But this was a very good read. It was also a fast read, which was just what I needed to get back into reading a bit.
Bianca wrote: "Homeinmyshoes wrote: "I press quote, then I remove what is in the quote part and then copy in what is relevant. It's time-consuming, but at least it is more understandable."That's what I do. Howe..."
^this
Finished Susan Hill's The Vows of Silence today. Another great mystery, although at one point you start asking yourself how much tragedy the Serrailler family can go through.I've started the next Comissario Guido Brunetti on my list and after that I think it's time for another break from series, not sure what I want to read though.
Last night I finished Fatal Remedies by Donna Leon, not as good as the previous books but still enjoyable.For my GR challenge I set a goal of 52 books, which I will easily do. However, with my recent slump and several long books I thought I wouldn't make a 100 book this year. But I've read 33 books so far, which means I'm 17 books ahead, so if I keep going as I am now, with the occasional long book I should be able to read more than 100 books. Though I have to see how summer goes. Normally I house/dog sit for 2-3 weeks, but my friends haven't booked their vacation yet and might stay at home this year. In those weeks I often read more than normal.
Blacklands by Belinda Bauer. Another book that has been on my TBR list for ages. It was an okay book, it wasn't a page turner and it took me longer than normal to read 244 for an easy read. It somehow didn't feel complete to me, I missed the perspective of the adults who knew and lost their brother and son.
Finished this weekend:Scrapbooking for Dummies by Jeanne Wines-Reed
and
A Room Full of Bones by Elly Griffiths
The Housemates by Iain Rob Wright. An okay story, but one that's been told before (in Dutch we would say "thirteen in a dozen"). The ending is abrupt and there is no real resolution to what the main character has been put through. It is implied he takes revenge but how isn't told. Also there are several threads that aren't resolved, which I hate. Plus, in the final lines it is implied there might be a sequel, or maybe not. I hate it when authors keep threads hanging and imply sequels!
I hate dangling ends, too. :(
The Silence by Sarah RayneThe Sin Eater by Sarah Rayne
Because my Kobo decided to sort this shelf not by title but by upload date I accidentally read these two books out of order (#3 and #2 in the Nell West and Michael Flint series). But it really didn't matter.
Both are nice and easy ghost stories, The Silence even managed to slightly freak me out when reading in the middle of the night, that doesn't happen too often.
Bianca wrote: "The Silence by Sarah RayneThe Sin Eater by Sarah Rayne
Because my Kobo decided to sort this shelf not by title but by upload date I accidentally read these two boo..."
I hate reading stuff out of order. That drives my OCD wild.
Since getting an ereader I've also become OCD about series' order. Luckily it didn't matter with these books, but I need to pay more attention. It's weird though, all my other series shelves are in alphabetical order.
Don't you just hate it when you're reading a really good book and you know you can't continue reading until later in the day?I'm currently reading Gone Girl (yes, I'm late to this book) and I'm half way through, just about to start Part 2. But I have to work today, normally I would take my Kobo with me downstairs and read between customers. But Saturday is the busiest day of the week, plus there a big shipment waiting for me to check, tag and put away so there will be no chance for me to read.
I just hate it when this happens, it's so frustrating when life interferes with my reading ;)
I finished Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn this morning. A very good read, although after the Big Reveal a bit predictable. Many people seem to have a problem with the ending, but I think it fits and is in line with the characters' behaviour throughout the book.I'm enjoying reading stand alone books. Since April I've read nine whilst up to then I only read five.
This morning I finished Fallen by Karin Slaughter, from the Will Trent series. Despite it taking me a week to read it was a good book, though a little less than the previous instalment.I'm having both a reading and a tv slump. I've been gaming a lot in the evening, when I'm normally reading or watching tv.
The book I'm reading now is a bit different from the mysteries, thrillers and crime novels I've been into this year. It's One Summer: America, 1927 by Bill Bryson. Another book that's on my TBR list for a while and hopefully something that gets me back into reading again.
I'm going to order Project Life stuff tomorrow or on Tuesday, so I can start with it on Thursday, when the store's closed due to Ascension Day. I'm going to be very nerdy and include a card each week with what I've read (and if I liked it or not) and if I really liked a book I might print out to cover to stick it in.
Woohoo, I finally finished The Mammoth Book of Unsolved Crime: The Biggest and Best Collection of Unsolved Murder and Mystery Cases by Roger Wilkes. It only took me just a couple of day longer than 6 months. I've read several Mammoth Books and liked them but most articles in this one were very dry and boring, I admit that after reading a couple of pages of some I skipped them.Now back to Bill Bryson.
Last night I finished:One Summer: America, 1927 by Bill Bryson. Very interesting, as usual.
Ruth's First Christmas Tree by Elly Griffiths. Okay, I'm not overly fond of short stories in a series. Mostly because they are often used to promote a new book and the sample of the new book is usually longer than the short story.
A Dying Fall by Elly Griffiths. A great story, this series is getting better with each new book. It would have been better if the excitement was more evenly distributed throughout the story instead of all at the end. I'm hoping Cathbad will be back in the next book, it just won't be the same without him.
The Hollow Hills by Mary Stewart.Although I think I like the first book in the Merlin Trilogy/Arthurian Saga better this was a very good book. I could hardly put it down and read it in just 2 days, pretty good since I'm having a reading slump! I admit that I have always like the Merlin/Arthur stories and around 1998 was somewhat obsessed with the Merlin mini-series with Sam Neill as Merlin (I also read the books that were inspired by the series).
I feel like such an anti-reader. I've never read a John Grisham novel. Maybe I should.
It was my third, including one of his non-fiction book. I like his books but I have to be in the mood for them and I doubt I will read all of them.
The Shadows in the Street by Susan Hill.The Simon Serailler series is very dark. Everything that can go wrong for the characters general does go wrong. But I like them, they do feel like real characters in possibly real situations.
Just two more to go and I'm up-to-date with this series. I've got several series now where I only have a couple of books to read to be up-to-date so I'm now looking for new series. One of them will be the Vera Stanhope series (I just love the tv-series).
Friends in High Places by Donna Leon.Okay. I didn't like how one of the storylines wasn't finished. Although it wasn't the main storyline I would have liked to see it resolved.
Looking back at the past two years I'm doing okay. In 2012 I'd read 52 books and 18986 pages around this time, in 2013 61 books and 19880 pages. Now I've read 49 books and 19846 pages. I've read about the same number of pages as last year, and less but longer books. I'm not sure if I'll make it to 100 books this year because I have several long ones high on my TBR list at the moment.
In August I have three weeks where I'm house/dog sitting so I have more time to read (the dog doesn't care if I read all day, as long as she's got food, gets walked and gets the occasional scratch or belly rub).
Bianca wrote: "A Time to Kill by John Grisham.A very good read, though I did find the ending a bit abrupt."
I've read about 3-4 Grisham novels - I went through that phase back in HS. I remember The Firm, A Time to Kill and The Pelican Brief (which was SUPER BETTER as a book than a movie). The 4th or 5th one I read kinda made me done with him. It was just...too much Law stuff.
i kept my Pelican Brief and I still re-read it on occasion.
MrsJoseph wrote: "I've read about 3-4 Grisham novels - I went through that phase back in HS. I remember The Firm, A Time to Kill and The Pelican Brief (which was SUPER BETTER as a book than a movie). The 4th or 5th one I read kinda made me done with him. It was just...too much Law stuff.i kept my Pelican Brief and I still re-read it on occasion."
I can understand getting fed up with his books. My neighbour can't get enough of them and read them all back to back. I can see myself reading more of his books but only one or two a year. These types of books I have to be in the mood for.
I don't have many authors I've been reading that have copious amounts of the same to read. Terry Pratchett is about the only one that fits with a lot of books to read and I space my Discworld out. One every half a year is about right for me.
Homeinmyshoes wrote: "I don't have many authors I've been reading that have copious amounts of the same to read. Terry Pratchett is about the only one that fits with a lot of books to read and I space my Discworld out. ..."It really depends on the writer/series how often I read a new book. I'm now working my way through the Commissario Brunetti series by Donna Leon, which has 20+ books currently. I've just finished book 9 and read about one book a months. On the other hand, it's been years since I've read the first Jackson Brodie book by Kate Atkinson, but I just put book 2 on my Kobo because I think I'll be in the mood for one soon.
The Secret Keeper by Kate Morton.It was a lot harder to get into the story of her latest book, mainly because one of the main characters (from the storyline set in the 1940s) wasn't very likeable. About halfway through I already guessed what the twist in the story was. Still very enjoyable and I'm sad that I've now finished all her books.
I just love these mysteries where someone in the present has to solve a mystery in the past and the story is divided between the two time settings. Unfortunately, most of the books I find in the category have the emphasis on romance and not on the mystery, I don't mind some romance but I prefer the mystery part better.
The Outcast Dead by Elly Griffiths.The latest book in the Ruth Galloway series. In the previous book one of the main character, one of my favourites, moved away from King's Lynn. This made my sad because he was one of my favourite and I was afraid his role would be reduced. Luckily at the end of this book he's back again. I liked this story better than the previous one, probably because I'm a fan of crime and archaeological tv programs.
The Strain by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan.#1 in The Strain Trilogy.
I bought the hardcover in the summer of 2009 and almost finished it. But with less than 40 pages to go I put the book aside and never picked it up again. Last week I saw that the trilogy has been made in a tv-series, soon to be aired and remembered I hadn't finished the first book but couldn't remember why.
I now remember. I really liked the first half of the book but the second half and the characters are almost a cliché of the vampire hunting genre. The hunt for the head vampire in the sewers (or caves or another dark location) and the group of people coming from all different walks of life and led by an older person who knows everything about their enemy but is too old to take care of it himself.
It's an okay book, but it could have been much more. I will try to finish this trilogy this summer, since I'm interested in the tv-series (when it comes to tv-series I'm less bothered by clichés for some reason).
My first Did-Not-Finish of the year: The Lavender Garden by Lucinda Riley.I just couldn't get into the story, I read almost 200 pages (of the almost 600) and it still felt as if it hadn't moved from the intro. I also was constantly annoyed with the characters.
^Ouch. I read one of those last year, but I'm stubborn. I finished it. I did read a few things in between though.
Homeinmyshoes wrote: "^Ouch. I read one of those last year, but I'm stubborn. I finished it. I did read a few things in between though."There was more that annoyed me. The two main characters were just so stereotypical, helpless damsels. Not being able to stand up for themselves or take care of themselves. Then, early on in the book a hidden room is found in the ancestral home and after that it isn't mentioned again. The hidden room was the reason I kept going, but enough is enough.
A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness.In the description it is compared to the Twilight series. The only similarities are that the male main character is a vampire, he and the female character (a witch) fall in love and another group doesn't like to creatures mixing.
I really liked it, it's the first of a trilogy, the last book will be released on Tuesday.
NOS4A2 by Joe Hill. It's hard not to compare it to the book by Stephen King, his father. Especially when he keep referring to them by mentioning Derry, Shawshank and the True Knot. There's even a character nicknamed Gasmask Man, which could be family of King's Trashcan Man.
One of my favourite reads this year!
It's hot so the best thing to do is sit as quietly as possible and either read, watch tv or nap. Yesterday I manage to read over 100 pages during work (35 degrees Celcius meant not a lot of customer).That means this morning I finished The Fall by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan. An okay read, more consistent in quality than the first in The Strain trilogy. The last part gets mixed reviews, but because I want to know how it ends and because I'm watching the tv series I want to read that one too in the coming weeks. Luckily they're not long reads.
You've been reading a lot of things I've been meaning to get around to. Maybe that will motivate me to finally get to them. :)
I've only been reading romances lately.
MrsJoseph wrote: "I've only been reading romances lately."Nothin' wrong with that. Heaven knows, I've had my share of romance binges.
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Abominable (other topics)The Line (other topics)
In Cold Blood (other topics)
The After House (other topics)
The House of Susan Lulham (other topics)
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From Jim C. Hines latest blog:Will Shetterly wrote a blog post asking if I had addressed “RAINN’s refutation of ‘rape culture’” yet. I’m writing..."
Wow, your reputation must really be bad when you get warned to behave even before commenting!