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As expected
I wrote recently about reading The Atlas Six and then having the follow-up book, The Atlas Paradox, available from the library right all ready to start when I was ready. I did like a lot about the first book but I didn’t love it. Mostly I enjoyed the character-driven aspects. It seemed to fall down when it got to some of the science which mostly fell into the area of physic. I never studied physics but even I could tell that some of the plot was a bit of a stretch. Not even the magic part of the book could compensate for this problem. Still, I was able to overlook it to some degree because I enjoyed other parts of the book. I was concerned at the end when new characters and plot devices were revealed. It felt like something that could get really messy unless handled well. I kind of underestimated how badly it ended up being.
Ultimately there wasn’t really a proper plot in the second book. Lots of potential ones and lots of ideas being thrown around. But not a plot. There was limited action in the second book, mostly just conversations that came nowhere near driving a story. It felt like the writer just kept adding more and more to the story, trying to cover too much territory and doing none of it well. The science got even worse and something happens to make a cliffhanger that seems terribly unlikely. Not to mention the character involved acts in ways that seem unlikely for this character. There’s just not enough to convince me the character has changed in ways that would create this “development”. Other characters also had changes that seemed to come out of nowhere. It’s as though the drive of the characters ran out of steam and they just kind of fizzled out.
I finished the book but it was something of a struggle to get there. There is another book but I can’t see how this story could even be saved at this point. Still, I do have some curiosity about where it’s all going. Not that I will be losing sleep until the next book is released. LOL
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Books I’ve been reading
Like many other habits, my reading slowed down quite a bit while I was in the US. I’ve been making goals on Goodreads each year to finish 100 books and I’ve been behind on that for most of the year. But I am just about caught up now.
I recently read My Oxford Year by Julia Whelan and I immensely enjoyed it. At first, it seemed to be a contemporary romantic comedy but about a third of the way through I discovered it was not quite the light read I expected. Also, it wasn’t an original story but one based on a script for a movie, I think. This one is about a young woman who gets a Rhodes Scholarship and goes to Oxford for a year while also working on an election campaign back home in the US.
I read The Venice Train by Georges Simenon very recently for Netgalley. I know of Simenon for his series of Maigret detective stories although I haven’t read any of his work before. This one turned out to be a psychological thriller of sorts. It has such good pacing that it has you on the edge of your seat much of the time. It’s about a man who leaves his family’s holiday in Venice to return to Paris by train. On the way back a stranger requests a favor that upends his life in the most negative of ways.
A non-fiction book that was quite good is Secrets of Women’s Healthy Ageing: Living Better, Living Longer by Cassandra Szoeke. The author is part of a long-term research study on women’s health here in Australia that has been running for thirty years. There are a number of important takeaways but for me, the most important one was to keep moving. It seems keeping active will affect most areas of life positively, from blood sugar to bone health to mental health. There’s a lot of interesting information with regard to research into women’s health too.
Also non-fiction is the memoir by Hannah Gadsby. I first read this as an ebook and then it was available as an audiobook so I checked that out and listened and it was quite good. There’s some pretty tough material in the book and Hannah narrates in a similar way to her comedy and it worked really well for me. I had listened to another memoir from another Australian comedian and it just didn’t sound quite right. I think I would have enjoyed reading more than listening. This one is done beautifully.
Lastly, I am currently rereading Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. My parents had this book on their shelves and I read it probably during my teenage years. It really left a big impression at the time which has remained with me since. I decided enough years have passed that it’s definitely worth a revisit and I started reading it on ebook. I’m only a couple of chapters in, but I will note the beautiful language used to start the book. I don’t suppose I appreciated this so much at the time I first read it but it is really well written.
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Finally
It took a long time but I finally finished reading Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth by Wole Soyinka. It’s an interesting book because it’s all over the place for the better part of the first half, and then there’s a proper plot in the latter part of the book. I can see a bit of what the aim was for the writer but it really was way too long. I found the second half far better than the first half and found myself wanting to read more towards the end. Before that, the flow just wasn’t quite there. Overall I did like it but I don’t consider it a major success. I am glad I kept on with it, though, and now I feel a bit freer to request more books for review. I’m currently listening to an audiobook of A Narrow Door by Joanne Harris. It’s actually the third in a series and I’m fairly sure I read the first book many years ago. So far it’s very intriguing and I look forward to the twists and turns to reach the conclusion.
As a side note, I’ve added a link to the blog I started for book reviews on the sidebar. It’s been in a bit of a lull recently but I’m trying to get back into it again.
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Reading
I’ve mentioned here before that I read lots of books for Netgalley which provides advanced reader copies for new releases. Earlier this year I found I had reached over 20 books and it got to be a bit unwieldy for a while. Also, some requested books didn’t get sent until much later than the request was made and I had to fit those in too. I finally got to under ten books and now I’m down to three books and there are still four that I requested that I haven’t had answers on. One of them I requested in March and still haven’t heard back. Today is the release date. So far the only reviews for it seem to be from librarians so maybe they are the only ones to have access before release.
One of the books I am currently slogging through is a particularly long one from a Nigerian writer who was the first black winner of the Nobel prize in literature many years ago. I say slogging because it’s quite long and perhaps a bit too wordy. I have pondered whether to give it up and not finish but I feel obliged to carry on to some degree. There was a book about genes I read a while back that I had for many months but it was really tough to get through. I didn’t quite finish that one but I felt I had read enough to write a fair review on it.
I haven’t added too many books recently because I need a slow period for a little while. Unless a lot of really good books happen to turn up.
I have also started listening to audiobooks a lot more, mostly from the library. I find it works out well there because I can easily return it if it doesn’t work for me. The first book I listened to early this year was a sequel and that was tough. I don’t think it was the narrator but just the fact I already had preconceived notions from reading the first book and it clashed a bit. I found once I had read it for real, I was able to go back and listen again without too much issue. At the moment I am listening to two audiobooks. One is The Queen’s Gambit, which is a book that was turned into a series on Netflix. The Scientist and I had seen the first episode and it was good. At the same time, I ran across it in the library listing and put it on hold. So far I think the series is a bit better than the book for me. I find the narrator okay when she’s speaking for Beth, the girl in the story. And not too bad for a couple of female characters. But all the male ones sound very similar and often alike and they all sound kind of dumb and slow. I think some of these are supposed to be a southern accent but it doesn’t work for me. I still have half the book to go and only a few days left until it goes back so I don’t know if I will carry on or not. One thing I will note is the tv series doesn’t seem to have anyone with a southern accent despite mostly being set in Kentucky. Strange.
The second book I listened to was The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab and it was just wonderful. Julia Whelan narrated and she really brought it all to life. I didn’t write a review when I finished but I plan to get an ebook and read it and will do a review then. I am curious as to whether I would have liked this as well had I read first it or not. I will never know for sure though since I am sure I will have the memory of the audiobook in mind while reading.
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Audiobooks
For almost my entire reading life, I’ve always read to myself. I have no recollection of ever having books read to me as a child. That’s not to say it didn’t happen but possibly once I learned to read it stopped happening. Or something along those lines.
The one exception on this was when I was in fourth grade and our English teacher read Charlotte’s Web out loud to our class in preparation for us to take a field trip to see the animated film. I don’t remember it that well aside from us sitting on a rug or something while she read. That was the only teacher who I recall doing that.
I didn’t go to kindergarten but once I was in first grade I was super-ready to read. I was in the top reading group from early on and stayed that way throughout my primary years. So again I read to myself and there was never any notion that I would be read to.
I few years ago I read The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic by Emily Croy Barker and I really adored it. I read it a couple of times and still go back and read parts occasionally. Barker just released a sequel this week, but it’s currently only on audiobook. I was quite torn because I want to know what happens next but I really prefer to read for myself.
I read books on Netgalley which provides advanced reader copies in exchange for reviews. Occasionally something good comes along and this time the audiobook for the sequel showed up. I went ahead and requested it and happily, I succeeded.
I’ve been listening for the past three days now. It’s really weird to listen to the book instead of reading it for myself. The worst part is I have my own imagined voices and images of the story and now I’ve got someone else inflicting a different version on me. Of course there’s no way around this but it makes for a totally new “reading” experience. I did find the first couple of chapters to be a bit rough and didn’t find the reader did so good of a job at differentiating characters voices. It’s gotten better as it’s gone on. What’s really funny is that one character has a longish name and it’s pronounced fully each time. But when I read for myself, I tend to create a mental shortcut while reading so as not to take up so much time. It’s really funny to keep hearing this long name spoken.
I’m only up to chapter ten and there’s a lot more to go. I am kind of getting into it a bit more now. Initially I was listening with earphones but last night I connected with a bluetooth speaker and just let it play continuously. I’ve also played it in the car but I find it gets stuck after each chapter ends. I think I listened to three or four last night without pause, so that set up seems to work okay for me. It says I’m about a quarter of the way through the book so progress is happening.
I really look forward to the ebook/print versions being released in June or July so I can read it again with my own personal voices and images. One thing that I do wonder about is whether this would have been an issue had this been the first book or a standalone story. I might have to try it out some time just to see.
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Book Review: The Duke’s Disaster by Grace Burrowes
Note: I discovered this is book 1.5 in a series but it’s not clear why this is so. Usually the .5 books are related to the previous in some way, at least in my experience. That is not the case here.
This was a somewhat better than average historical romance but only enough to push it to 3.5 stars. The Duke of Amselm invested time and energy to court a young lady who ultimately chose another to marry. The Duke, Noah Winters then moves on to the lady’s companion, Lady Thea Collins, who has much to gain at accepting his non-existent courtship and proposal. Thea accepts the proposal, mostly to ensure her younger sister is provided for until marriage. Noah makes things happen to allow them to marry quickly and soon they are married and travelling to one of the Anselm properties.
The wedding night comes and Thea’s big secret is found out and threatens to destroy what was essentially a marriage of convenience for both. Both characters have a stubborn streak and they carry on the best they know how. They come to have a comfortable chemistry and there’s a fair bit of teasing of each other as they go. You always get the sense there is no ill will intended and they come to crave each others’ company. As the story continues there are some trials along the way, mostly related to the duke’s family and Thea. The ending is satisfactory and it seems it will be another happily ever after.
What I liked about the story was the character of the duke, who isn’t all that personable but is fiercely caring and protective of his family and friends. He does have something of a modern mindset which was written well enough that it doesn’t seem too out of place in an historical story. The character of Thea is one that’s commonly seen in these stories. I do like her resolve but she also is able to eventually share with her husband and accept his assistance. It is rather cliched in many ways but I think the best part of the story is the interchanges between the duke and duchess. It’s just so relaxed and comfortable even early on in the relationship.
I wasn’t too keen on the older brother of Thea’s charge early on in the book. It’s clear he’s a villain but I never feel his bad actions have enough motivation to be so vile at times. Also, there is quite a bit of focus on Thea’s brother, the new earl in the family, but rather little of the younger sister she’s meant to be looking after. It just feels the sister is nearly written out of the story from early on and she is mentioned occasionally but almost never seen.
There is the requisite twist in the story which is kind of expected although I didn’t expect the reveal to be quite like it was. My feelings are pretty neutral on this part because it was neither terrible or all that great.
Overall it was an enjoyable read for this rather fluffy genre.
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Book Review: 180 Seconds by Jessica Park
Allison is dropped off at Andrews College in Maine at the start of her junior year by Simon, the man who adopted her when she was sixteen. She’s relieved when she finds out she won’t have the roommate that she expected. See, she doesn’t do relationships with other people thanks to spending most of her childhood being shuffled from one foster family to another. She doesn’t want to get close because she knows she will lose the relationship and starting over just isn’t an option. It’s too much investment for her. Her goal in life at present is to never get too close to anyone and just stay part of the crowd.
It’s early in the school year and Allison spills her iced coffee all over the pavement and feels she has to clean it up. She’s struggling to grab all the ice cube and then this guy appears and is helping her. She thanks him and then she goes about her business. The next day she’s walking in the town when she is accosted by Kerry, who is helping her brother Esben with a social experiment. The experiment consists of sitting across and gazing at each other for 180 seconds. Allison finds herself from the same guy who helped her yesterday. The experience of 180 seconds is profound for both of them and they create something of an Internet sensation. See Esben is big on social media and has multiple thousands of followers. The story is about Allison breaking down the walls she’s constructed around herself and learning to live.
I was really drawn into the story at the beginning and the scene of 180 seconds worked well enough for me when I first read it. I was really interested to find out what happened next and I did enjoy the ride I was on for a while. But then it wasn’t so enjoyable. The first thing I noted is how Allison seems to heal so quickly once she meets Esben. It goes from awkward to a bit less awkward to not a all between them. I’m not saying this doesn’t happen but I know that most with lifelong issues like Allison are not going to go from super damaged to fairly recovered in such short order. Plus the path to recovery is so unlikely to go in that straight line.
Then there are those perfect hero types in her life: Esben who seems to have the mission to use his “star” status to improve the lives of others. Simon, the single, gay adoptive father who seems to have no real flaws. Even her best and only friend, Steffi, is glorified to some degree and seems to be almost self-less in the way she is looking after her friend/almost sister from their foster days. It’s not that these people have no issues or problems but they all seem to be devoted to Allison and not much else by the time we get much further into the story. Yes, there’s some big stuff that comes out but I never feel like we are digging too deeply into any of the characters aside from Allison.
So I can live with a somewhat shallow story to some degree but as we start nearing the end of the story things get a bit over the top dramatic and then it gets over the top silly in the process of dealing with the dramatic. I found myself skimming quite a bit during this part of the story and I certainly didn’t feel as much as I possibly could have for the characters. There is a bit of improvement at the end but it never quite recovers the charm of the beginning. I think I might have been willing to give this 3 or even 3.5 stars until we got to this point but this really dragged the book down a lot for me. And I think I am almost struggling to give it 2.5 at the end because it’s turned into something a bit dream-like by this point.
One other weird point I will make is that even though Allison is a junior, we never get any idea of what she is studying aside from one psychology class. I know we don’t have to know but I think it might have been interesting to help develop the character a bit more. In fact, the only character who seems to have a clear major is Esben’s sister who is an art major.
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Book Review: The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han
Like the previous Jenny Han book I read, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before , this was really quite sweet and lovely. It’s really a bit of a coming of age story. Belly (nickname for Isabel) is on the verge of turning sixteen when she makes the yearly trip to the summer house with her mom and brother. They’ve gone every year and stayed with Susannah Beck and her two boys, Conrad and Jeremiah. Belly is the baby of the group and over the years she has often felt left out from the fun had by the three boys. This year she intends for that all the change. She’s all grown up and she wants to be seen as more than the baby. It’s obvious the boys see that she really has changed when they first see her upon arrival. This is the first year that she feels pretty and feels like she is actually being noticed in a new way by the guys, aside from her brother.
During the summer she has her first summer romance of sorts with a boy she meets at a bonfire. Her brother leaves early in the summer to do college shopping with their dad and so he’s MIA for much of the story. Conrad is different this year and she can’t understand why. Jeremiah is mostly the same but not all. Susannah is napping when they arrive which is totally out of character. For this relatively short YA story, there’s a fair bit of drama here and lots of love in various ways.
I really like this and look forward to reading the next part of the story after what could be a long wait from the library.
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Reading
I’ve been doing lots of reading of late. I started reading amateur writing on Wattpad and that’s been an interesting experience. Most of the writers seem to be young and much of the material I’ve read has been teen fiction. It’s interesting how I see the same sort of stories here as I do elsewhere. And although the writing is often lacking it’s not much worse than some of the published works in some of the free ebooks I’ve read. The one thing that would improve most of these stories would be some proofreading at the very least. Some of the spelling is really atrocious but I am kind if pleased to see the flow of story ideas even though they are keep to some of the same story lines. Something else I noticed in these stories is that they do a lot of building up and then suddenly the story is finished up quickly, skipping over the rest of the story. I can only imagine these are situations where the writer has lost interest or given up but want to do some sort of completion of the story. Some of the stories are reasonably good so it’s a disappointment when this happens because I feel it ruins what was working out to be a good book. I’ve also been reading at Radish and Inkitt which are similar sort of websites. All have apps to use on IOS so I have all three on my phone and try to check out material every so often.
Although Wattpad and similar are kind of fun, I am also back to getting through many of the books I’ve downloaded on my Kindle. Most of the books I have are freebies but some I have bought. The quality is pretty variable and some of them I finish just to get them out of the way. Others are surprisingly good and I read other works by the writers. So the idea of a free book isn’t so terrible if the quality is there. I also get some of the daily and monthly deals. I’m still reading the second book of the Outlander series but managed to buy a couple further titles at greatly reduced prices in the monthly sale a couple months ago. I also managed to get a couple Robin Hobb titles although I don’t think they are in the Farseer trilogy where I am currently reading the second book.
Another series where I got books on sale is the Paper Magician series. I won’t say it’s great literature but I liked the premise of the first book quite a lot. But it got stuck in the problem of the writer setting it in the early 20th century in England but there are teenaged characters behaving like modern day teens instead. This is an issue I felt the editor should have handled but didn’t. I read the second book, The Glass Magician, and it was much better. But I came to wonder why it was set in that time frame in the end. There was so little to tie it to any time period in my view. I still have one book left in the series and plan to read that soon. The books are fairly short and are generally quick reads.
I’m still fascinated with the teen romance genre. One thing I’ve noted lately is a number of stories in published and amateur situations where the female protagonist comes from some dark background (sometimes it’s the male love interest though) and then one bad thing after another happens to this character. I find this to be a bit of overkill and makes the somewhat unbelievable stories even more so in the end. I really do wonder how much tragedy one person could experience.
Which leads me to Twilight which suffers a bit of this sort of treatment too. While I didn’t love the book, it wasn’t so bad as so many have made out. I mean it was like a bandwagon of Twilight haters. Much like the bandwagon of haters on the rock groups Nickelback and Coldplay. I wasn’t too keen on the ending of the book, mostly because it seemed to be like the end of a chapter and not an actual volume of a series. I am in no hurry to carry on to the next book but probably will read it in the future. I will say it’s kind of good to know a bit more about the series than before.
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Reading habits
I seem to be back into a habit of reading books again. Not that I ever stopped but I’d been reading all sorts of mixed media and much of that was manga and webtoon titles. I’m still reading some of those but the manga types I like have been pretty much exhausted as far as what the library has and it felt like time to mix things up a bit anyway.
I’m currently reading lots of straight fiction, mostly romance, mostly light reading. I tend to give a miss to the Harlequin types. Some of what I am reading probably would be similar to chick-lit. But I also started reading more young adult titles too. It’s kind of a weird territory for me. It wasn’t around back when I was in the targeted age range so I mostly read adult novels once I reached my teens…probably before that.
Something I’ve noticed about the YA titles I’ve read are that they are fairly easy reads. Most I’ve finished in a few hours. Maybe it’s just luck of the draw. Of course there are books like the Harry Potter series that are longer reads but I haven’t found any like that lately.
One of the series I’ve read recently is a sort of Twilight wannabe series. It’s not terrible but not great either. I have only finished the first book of what seem to be three or four depending on how a prequel is counted. It deals with paranormal stuff and supposedly dark romance. I don’t know if the darkness is really that dark though and the romance isn’t written that well…but maybe it gets better in the second book. I read another book from a different series which also probably qualifies as a Twilight wannabe. I think I liked that better but I haven’t found the next books in the series to find out what happens next. I haven’t actually read the Twilight books but I am thinking about tackling them some time soon just so I can make comparisons. I know the series isn’t known for any great writing so I won’t be going in expecting much. I suppose it will give more context to all the pop culture references though and I might still enjoy it for what it is.
One of the reasons I’ve delved into YA romances is to compare them to the shoujo manga I’ve read. There are lots of tropes that show up in manga and I am already seeing how there’s some overlap in the YA books although without some of the more culturally Japanese tropes, of course. There’s definitely lots more available these days but I must admit to being disappointed at the way so many books represent romance with such negative behaviors in relationships. Too many girls are just too accepting of the guy doing things they shouldn’t. That’s not stopping me from reading but it does leave me wondering when the culture will change enough that it will be reflected in the literature. So far, I’ve not found much to hold up as particularly good…but it’s still early days in my reading.
I’m also reading books on my Kindle which works better late at night because I can read in bed for a while and just go to sleep. If I’m reading a physical book I need to get up and move to the bed and that often gets me awake again. Anyway, the ebooks are so much easier to carry. I get a lot of the books from the free books on Amazon but I also buy some when they are reduced price too.
Part of my intent in reading is to have a broader understanding of what’s out there in the literature since I do have aspirations of working in a library and probably a public library soon.