Introduction Thread

[[deleted user]]

Kinsey wrote: "Nikky wrote: "Kinsey wrote: "Anna wrote: "Pleasure to meet you Kinsey!

I actually just finished the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown and found that really enjoyab..."

Thank you for the recommendation, I will definitely make a note of them books and try and check them out soon, I don't have a massive variety of books at home unfortunately, so it'll be fantastic to expand my genres I read. Currently in reading Go set a watchman by Harper Lee and Battle Royal by Koushun Takami (the novel, not the manga). A few years ago I was reading The Morganville Vampires series, I never finished it, got distracted, I'm not a massive fan of but I did enjoy them, cyberpunk is a type of genre I would love to read about, there's no decent book stores near me and online isn't always so reliable. I haven't decided what my next book or books are, I'll give them you said about a try

[Anna]

Oh man, knowing what happens in the comics would make you think you would be prepared for the show, but that's just not true, they're just different enough to shock you and ruin your life BOTH times hahaha.
I cried full streams of tears at the end of that game, I tell you what.

No I get what you mean! Something so far in the future it really takes a good imagination to build the world up! I think Uglies is a good example of that because he puts a lot of effort into the details of making an environment as well as a story. Fantastical is exactly the word for it!
Inventions that we can't have, only read about!

[Anna]

Nikky wrote: "Kinsey wrote: "Nikky wrote: "Kinsey wrote: "Anna wrote: "Pleasure to meet you Kinsey!

I actually just finished the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown and found that..."

Where do you live Nicky?
I find Perth is quite behind on a lot of things, so most of the books I see on goodreads don't even make it to the book stores here. A lot are even hard to order in through the book stores, which is really frustrating because I really try to avoid buying online.
But sometimes it's the only option you have.
Or an E-reader?
I love to collect the books and display them, so E-readers don't do it for me, but it might be handy for you if you're not interested so much the collection is you are in being able to access more?

[[deleted user]]

Anna wrote: "Nikky wrote: "Kinsey wrote: "Nikky wrote: "Kinsey wrote: "Anna wrote: "Pleasure to meet you Kinsey!

I actually just finished the Red Rising series by Pierce Brown ..."

Heya Anna, I live in Luton England, its not exactly a big town, but I still have too travel to get to a decent bookstore in another town, I'm not a rich person so I'm not able to go anytime, and because of the times I finish at work, everywhere is closed, in the past when I buy online I have had bad condition books when they were meant to be 'new', luckily its very rare but still a gamble to take

[Mel]

Hi everyone! I'm Mel, I'm a 25 year old gender studies/sociology student from Melbourne, Australia. I like to read pretty much everything but I've recently gotten into biographies in a big way, and I'm also finally making my way through Gone Girl. Looking forward to discovering new books and reading them with all of you!

[Anna]

Hey Mel! Nice to meet you!
Gender studies, that's awesome! How far into it are you?
(Your degree that is, not Gone Girl.)

And who's your favorite biography been about so-far?

(Feel free to add me if you'd like :) )

[Mel]

Anna wrote: "Hey Mel! Nice to meet you!
Gender studies, that's awesome! How far into it are you?
(Your degree that is, not Gone Girl.)

And who's your favorite biography been about so-far?

(Feel free to add me..."

Hi Anna, nice to meet you too! I'm doing my degree part time so I'm only about halfway through at the moment. It feels a bit never-ending at this point haha...

I recently read Reckoning: A Memoir which I loved, Magda Szubanski was someone I didn't know a lot about before I started reading but she's led a really interesting life, and she also explores her family history as well. It's her only book and I really wish she'd written more, she's a great writer.

I saw you live in Perth, I have family there! It's a beautiful city.

[Kinsey]

It's nice to meet you, Mel! I've just recently started getting into nonfiction books! What has been the best/strangest/shocking biography/nonfiction book you've read? :)

[Mel]

Kinsey wrote: "It's nice to meet you, Mel! I've just recently started getting into nonfiction books! What has been the best/strangest/shocking biography/nonfiction book you've read? :)"

Well this year I read Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Lessons from the Crematory by Caitlin Doughty. It's about how she became a mortician and is now running her own funeral home. There's a lot about how bodies are actually cared for after death and different burial methods but also about the funeral industry in America as, well, an industry. Definitely pretty weird! But really interesting.

Most shocking would be This Common Secret: My Journey as an Abortion Doctor - some of the protestors she describes and the methods they use are just horrifying.

Have you read any good non-fiction books recently?

[Kinsey]

Mel wrote: "Kinsey wrote: "It's nice to meet you, Mel! I've just recently started getting into nonfiction books! What has been the best/strangest/shocking biography/nonfiction book you've read? :)"

Well this ..."

Those both sound like amazing reads! I was never really interested in reading non-fiction books until I got, shall we say, kind of old? lol I'm currently reading Spitting Blood: The History of Tuberculosis by Helen Bynum and I am in love! I've always had this weird fascination with TB ever since I read the Time Travelers Quartet by Caroline B. Cooney (in which one of the main characters has the illness) when I was a really impressionable age. The closest city to me is actually Colorado Springs, which is often known as the city that TB sanatoriums built!

[Alex]

Hey!

So I always feel a little weird doing this but anyway here it goes!

My name is Alex, I am a 30 year old Scientific Officer from Sydney, Australia.

I used to read so much when I was younger and although I haven't completely stopped it has been cut back a fair bit because of work.

What attracted me to this group was that there is no pressure on how active members should be because sometimes life gets crazy busy and I feel like I do nothing but work and sleep! Also it hasn't got an insane amount of members which makes it feel more...what's the word....intimate? cosy? haha hopefully that is understandable!

So when I do read it is usually sci-fi, fantasy, horror, crime, ...you know I pretty much will give anything a go the only thing I don't enjoy reading is romance.

So yeah that's me, well part of me anyway :)

Looking forward to chatting with you all!

[Anna]

Hi Alex! Welcome!
That's what I love about this group too, it's nice to actually have a group small enough that you can have a conversations without it getting lost in a flood of other people's comments!

So is that Romance as a genre in itself, or anything with romance in it at all?

[Alex]

haha awesome so I am not the only one! Romance as in the genre, I am completely fine with romantic relationships betelween characters just as long as it isn't dominating the entire story. Hope that makes sense haha

[Alex]

It's the mills and boon sort of stuff I can't get into

[Anna]

Right, I'm the same.
I once was given a romance novel as a joke for my birthday and it was the most plotless, poorly thought out dribble!

I never bothered with the 50 shades craze.

[Alex]

Yeah same here. A friend of mine recommended it...I still couldn't bring myself to read it.

[Kinsey]

Alex wrote: "Hey!

So I always feel a little weird doing this but anyway here it goes!

My name is Alex, I am a 30 year old Scientific Officer from Sydney, Australia.

I used to read so much when I was younger..."

Hi Alex! Welcome to our little group! We pride ourselves on being a small and, as you said, cozy group. My name is Kinsey and I am co-moderator (alongside Betty, the group's creator) so if you have any questions/ideas please feel free to contact one of us!

Scientific Officer sounds like an interesting job to have! It also sounds like you are pretty busy so thank you for choosing this book club to join!

Each month our members recommend books (the Get Recced thread) and then a poll is compiled from those books. We pick a book a month early (for example, we just had a poll for December's book) because some of our members - including myself - need to order the books from the internet. Please feel free to interact with the other members as much as you're comfortable with and welcome!

[Betty]

Hi Alex!

So so happy to have you on board!

I look forward to getting to know you through our little book club!

[Alex]

Thank you all for making me feel so welcome!

Yeah Scientific Officer sounds fancy but really I'm just a glorified butcher... haha I work in a histology lab specialising in skin cancers, so I see a lot of not so great things that have been removed from people.
It's busy, but mainly the reading suffers due to the fact that I start at 5:30 am and by the time I get home I'm mentally drained and my eyes can't take hours of reading anymore, it just makes me sleepy!

I look forward to lots of nice chats with everyone! :)

[Margaret]

Hi everyone. I'm Margie, I'm middle aged and I'm a Teacher-librarian in Brisbane, Australia, so reading goes with the territory for me. I love biography, historical fiction and some thrillers. Sci fi not so much. Looking forward to connecting with some other readers and I really liked the title of this little group (off the books).

I've just started reading the Fortunes of Richard Mahony by Henry Handel Richardson, so I expect this to take me until the end of the year. lol

[Anna]

Margaret wrote: "Hi everyone. I'm Margie, I'm middle aged and I'm a Teacher-librarian in Brisbane, Australia, so reading goes with the territory for me. I love biography, historical fiction and some thrillers. Sci ..."

Heya Margaret! Welcome aboard!

What's your favorite thriller?

[Margaret]

Hi Anna and everyone
The last thriller I read was "I let you go' by Clare McIntosh. I couldn't put it down, read it until 3 in the morning. But I don't read many thrillers as a rule. Just that one was recommended to me and I loved it. At the moment I'm trying to keep up with children's books as I need to for work.

[Anna]

That one has been in my TBR list for a while! I'll have to bump it up if it comes so highly regarded!

I was always impressed by my school librarian's sheer amount of knowledge when it came to all the books on the shelf! She loved pointing me in the right direction for a new series and I always wondered how they knew so much!
I guess you have to do a bit of background reading!

[Kinsey]

Margaret wrote: "Hi everyone. I'm Margie, I'm middle aged and I'm a Teacher-librarian in Brisbane, Australia, so reading goes with the territory for me. I love biography, historical fiction and some thrillers. Sci ..."

Hi Margie!

My name is Kinsey and I am co-moderator (alongside Betty, our wonderful group creator) of Off The Books. Welcome!

A little background: we tend to pick our books a month beforehand so that everyone has time to get their hands on a copy. If you happen to visit the "Get Recced!" thread, please feel free to throw a recommendation in there for our poll!

I used to work as a librarian which is the best/worst possible job for a bibliophile (best because your entire job is to read/recommend books, the worst because you are constantly surrounded by books you don't have time to read)! ;)

Once again, welcome! I hope you find our little group to your liking!

[Sam]

I'm Maddie and I usually read fantasy books. I also read quite a lot on Wattpad, often stories with LGBT+ characters. My favourite place to read is anywhere and everywhere but especially outside on grass or in woods. Oh and I love pasta!

[Kinsey]

Maddie wrote: "I'm Maddie and I usually read fantasy books. I also read quite a lot on Wattpad, often stories with LGBT+ characters. My favourite place to read is anywhere and everywhere but especially outside on..."

Hello and welcome to our little group!

My name is Kinsey and I'm co-moderator of Off the Books! What are some of your favorite fantasy novels? A particular favorite of mine would be Uprooted by Naomi Novik and the Magicians series by Lev Grossman!

[Naura]

Alex, Mel, Margaret, Maddie- welcome! Welcome! :D

Kinsey- Heyyy! Long time.
Anna- Hey, how are you? :)
Its so hard to make time to be active here. And I'm usually demotivated because I know most of my Goodreads groups are almost dead..

[Kinsey]

Naura wrote: "Alex, Mel, Margaret, Maddie- welcome! Welcome! :D

Kinsey- Heyyy! Long time.
Anna- Hey, how are you? :)
Its so hard to make time to be active here. And I'm usually demotivated because I know most ..."

Let me just say IT'S SO NICE TO HAVE YOU BACK, NAURA!!! ❤️ How has life/school been treating you?

[Anna]

Naura wrote: "Alex, Mel, Margaret, Maddie- welcome! Welcome! :D

Kinsey- Heyyy! Long time.
Anna- Hey, how are you? :)
Its so hard to make time to be active here. And I'm usually demotivated because I know most ..."

Hi Naura! Doing super fine thanks for asking! ^_^

[Naura]

@Kinsey- Aw, thankss you :D College's been crazy, we're having internship this month, so kinda busy with that :) How are things with you?

@Anna-Yay, that's great :)

[Kristina]

Hello everyone! I have been a part of the group for a few months but thought I would take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Kristina, I am from Colorado, a mom to three little ones with another on the way, a nurse, and am sister to Kinsey in this group. I am making it a priority to get back into my love of reading after a long drought over the past few years. I am glad to be a part of a group like this that will push me to read books I never would have picked up on my own (such as "Tattoo Atlas", which I just finished!). Looking forward to many more books and good discussions!

[Naura]

Kristina wrote: "Hello everyone! I have been a part of the group for a few months but thought I would take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Kristina, I am from Colorado, a mom to three little ones with anot..."

Hey Kristina, welcome to the group! It's great to know you. We're always glad to have new members who'll keep the rest of us motivated too :D
Shout out to Kinsey for getting you to join here, woot woot!
Hope you're having a good time here :)

[Miya]

Hey I'm Miya but most people just call me mouse. I'm 15 years old and from the US. I absolutely love reading and bring a book with me pretty much everywhere. I like science fiction, action, dystopian and some romance as long as its not purely about the people's relationship. Im very into sports. I swim competitively, am the goalie for my schools girls lacrosse team, I also run and box outside of school. Sports and reading are just about all I do so i dont really have much else to add :-P

[Kinsey]

Miya wrote: "Hey I'm Miya but most people just call me mouse. I'm 15 years old and from the US. I absolutely love reading and bring a book with me pretty much everywhere. I like science fiction, action, dystopi..."

Hello, Miya and welcome to our little group! My name is Kinsey and I'm co-moderator alongside Betty (who is also the group's creator).

It sounds like you have a very eclectic taste in books! What are some of your favorites? A book I've read recently that hits "science fiction, action, dystopian, and some romance" is Defy the Stars by Claudia Gray and it almost instantly became a favorite of mine!

[Miya]

Sounds like my kinda book, I'll definitely have to find it sometime! I absolutely love the Maximum Ride series and Witch and Wizard series by James Patterson, I must have read them both at least 6 times, The Sense Thief series by Corrine Jackson was insanely good too (I always recommend that one to everyone cause its absolutely amazing).