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2020 Currently Reading

Okay here’s another new thing. Instead of having my TBR page (like I did in 2019) telling you what I’ve read, what I’m reading, and what I plan to read this year, I’m going to have this post “sticky”. Here, always found at the top of my blog, you’ll see what I’m currently reading and/or listening to and what I just read. If I know for sure I’ll tell you what’s next. There might also be some notes about how I’m feeling while reading/listening. Feel free to comment.

Recently Finished:

  • What the Woods Keep by Katya de Becerra – hardcover
    • I’ll have to get back to you on how I heard of this book because I’m certain I heard it from a blogger or podcaster. I went right ahead and bought a copy and I’m really happy I did. My jaunt into long, long books, audio and one paperback, has been great (I am still listening to The Name of the Wind, epic fantasy), has left me satisfied, dissatisfied and longing for a shorter more fast-paced story. And I found it here. I’m about 60 some odd pages in and really really enjoying it.
    • I like the little insert pages that seem to imitate copies of letters, notes, and articles. They add to the story and are unique. There’s a lot of mystery here both to the reader and the main character. I don’t see this being a disappointment. I’ll bet it’s a 4-5 star reader, not ready to commit to 5 yet. 😉
    • And I finished it in just over a week (I think that’s good, at least for me). Yeah! I am going ahead with a 5-star rating. There’s not currently a sequel but from the sounds of it it’s not out of the question.
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  • Lady Midnight (Dark Artifices, #1) by Cassandra Clare – Paperback
    • This has been on my list since March of 2019. Ms. Victorious over at Victorious Pages is how I came across The Dark Artifices but I know I’ve also seen it elsewhere. I happened to see it for sale at Barnes & Noble, knew it was on my list and well I had to take a good deal. 😉
    • I’m about halfway through. It’s interesting. Cassandra Clare is a talented writer however this isn’t really my speed. So much time is spent on the day to day of the characters it just feels too drawn out. In my opinion this book would not have suffered from being shaved down. Of course it doesn’t help that I’m reading this and listening to Strange, the Dreamer, both books that…are…d.r.a.g.g.i.n.g. Maybe I should put ellipses in between each of those letters…
    • Upon finishing: I will not be continuing this series at this time. There are some sample chapters at the end of the book for the next in this series, the first in the ShadowHunters series, and the first book about the characters Tessa & Jem. Of those samples I almost like the first in the whole series but for now I’m moving on.
    • I give this book a 3 because I do not like the pacing. There’s a lot of repetitive thinking going on in terms of character relationships. By this a mean, a lot of talking about how much one character cares for another though we already know this. This is a character driven book, even then I think it would be better served with a little bit more weight put on the overall plot, the thing that keeps it moving. The reason it doesn’t really feel like it moves enough for me.
  • The Ruin of Kings by Jenn Lyons, Audible Audio edition narrated by Feodor Chin, Vikas Adam, Soneela Nankani
    • So I went back through my notes to see how I found this book. It does not appear I learned of it through any book bloggers. Honestly I don’t know how I found this book! I think she was on a podcast but I can’t find the one. It could have also been NPR but I don’t think so. Maybe it was a fellow blogger and I didn’t write it down…? Ugh…notes are great…
    • This is an epic fantasy, which means it’s a really big book. Which is also part of the reason I chose to listen to it: not a heavy book and much cheaper because I used the book “credit” I get from audible for the month. I’m in Chapter 26 and still have 19 hours to go. So if you need a big long story, here you go.
    • It is a long drawn out storytelling that’s for sure. But I don’t say drawn out in a bad way. It’s getting more and more interesting. I won’t be surprised if in the end I say it could have done without being this long but we’ll see. So far I like it, not super in love with it, but it’s cool. 😀
    • Upon finishing: What I said above came to be, I really liked this book. However, I don’t feel that it would necessarily be served by cutting it down. This is a journey and taking the journey makes for a complete story. Could some sections have been shorter and the story still great? Sure thing. But it’s still an excellent book. I’m giving it 4 stars. I do recommend it and I will continue with the series THAT I DIDN’T KNOW WAS A THING! 🙂
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Some of What I’ve Read this Year

  • Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor , narrated by Steve West- Audible audio book
    • [Here’s what I said before:] I’m in about Chapter 10 I think? So far I’m disappointed because this book is taking so long to be interesting. Lazlo, the main character (MC), really feels flat to me at this point. Given the number of roaring reviews I’ve discovered there to be (saw, didn’t read just glazed over a few) I have faith that this book improves but if I was given an ultimatum I’d be tempted to DNF this.
    • You know a book is taking too long to really grab you when you almost forget you’re actually supposed to be paying attention to what you’re listening to and you struggle to want to.
    • This book I found thanks to SilverWolfReads after her trip to NYC and her giant book haul. Please do visit her blog (click the link above) and read my review of this book. I most recently finished this book & after what I’ve said above you’ll be surprised to know I’m rating this 5/5 stars.

Currently Reading/Listening to:

  • The Name of the Wind (The Kingkiller Chronicle #1) by Patrick Rothfuss – Audible audio book, narrated by Nick Podehl
    • I won’t get into how this was an accidental purchase, because I do somewhere else. But here we have another epic fantasy. It reminds me a lot of Lord of the Rings. My patience for long long long stories is just not there. This is a good and interesting story, for sure, well-written and all that. But it’s really super long and probably, again I say this, wouldn’t be hurt if a lot of scenes were cut out or cut down.
    • All in all it’s no where near DNF, but when I think about how everyone complains that the third book in this series (this first book published in 2007!) has not yet even been ANNOUNCED, I get nervous. What if I love these first two and have to just sit empty handed? Okay maybe not empty-handed because I have so many books to read. Stay tuned…
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  • Thick: and Other Essays by Tressie McMillan Cottom – Hardcover
    • This find is thanks to the podcast Reading Women. Do check out my page about the podcasts I listen to, mostly about reading and/or writing. Those lovely women raved about this book. There have been others talking about it as well and then I saw it on display at a local bookstore. I said okay, let’s go, you’re coming with me. It’s been looking at me ever since and well, today I figured what the heck, they’re essays so I can read them as I please. So far, so good. I’m looking forward to seeing the life of a person so different than me through their lens.
  • Everything Here is Beautiful by Mira T. Lee – paperback
    • I don’t typically read contemporary fiction but this sounded interesting to me in part because of the mental health aspect. One of the main characters, one of the sisters, has a mental illness. One hundred pages in I’m intrigued even if it’s not my usual fare. So I’ll be mulling this over with a different set of eyes.
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That’s what I’ve most recently read and am currently reading. I desperately need to finish Voyage of the Basilisk – The Memoirs of Lady Trent #3 by Marie Brennan (started, oh, forever ago last year). So I’m kind of also currently still reading that though admittedly I keep forgetting about it…hm…what does that say about this series that I’ve liked but…ugh…

We’re just getting into February but I don’t have any idea what’s going to come after I finish these. I’m predicting it could be another two weeks before I pick up a new book. I’m thinking I need to pick something awesome and intriguing and not a million pages long.

Thoughts?

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Here’s What’s Up Catch Up!

Hello everyone and welcome to a new week! Now I know I’m supposed to do Here’s What’s Up posts on Saturday (cause I said I would) and today is Monday. But meh, I made the rules here so sometimes I break them. I’ve been missing some posts these last few weeks and not talking to ya all too much but I’m here!

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What’s there to say? First, spoiler alert if you haven’t seen Season 7 (the last one) of Game of Thrones or any for that matter. I saw the Game of Thrones Season 8 premiere Sunday night after watching the last two episodes from last season. Man, that battle scene with the Night King and the dragons? Oh lord, I had goosebumps, still can’t believe that happened. As for last night I think it was a good start to what’s bound to be a great season, I mean it’s got to be if it’s the last right? Although I would have liked to see a little more reaction out of everybody when Bran said they’ve got your dragon and it’s one of them. They looked like oh shit and then we moved on. What! Come on you know that would blow your mind.

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Disclaimer by the way, I have not read any of the books. But this epic story is just that, epic. It is a fantastic example of good storytelling. And I love how there is such a diverse cast of characters. We weave in and out of their lives, watching them build, fail and rebuild. All along the way George R.R. Martin and the screenwriters build us up to little pitfalls or triumphs and enormous crescendos and destruction. It’s like you’re watching a real story line in history. My partner said he had to remind himself that this all didn’t really happen, that they never killed that dragon with just one toss of a spear, sending him plummeting onto the ice and into the lake. Gosh…that was too much! There is no one villain or one good guy, and how knows what’s going to happen next because Martin seems to love to “kill his darlings” as they say in writing. Hats off to George R.R. Martin and the production crew behind Game of Thrones! I could do without ALL the nudity but it’s still epic and well deserving of its popularity.

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Okay what else? Here’s What’s Up with Saturday night Boxing. (Another spoiler to follow regarding boxing match Saturday night.) Well I also watched a great fight between two awesome women boxers, Claressa Shields versus Christina Hammer. You might recall that Shields is an Olympic Gold Medalist in boxing and hails from Flint, Michigan. She won gold medals in both the 2012 & 2016 Olympics. She’s the first male or female boxer to win consecutive Olympic medals. She’s also only the 6th boxer, male or female, to hold all four major world titles in boxing. And she just turned 24 this March so she was 17 years old when she won her first Olympic gold in women’s boxing.

Christina Hammer is a very worthy opponent born in Kazakhstan but relocated to Germany soon after her birth. She’s a “multiple-time world champion in two weight classes” and has been named Fighter of the Year and Female Boxer of the Year and won the WBO Diamond Ring for Exceptional Performance.

I wasn’t prepared for Shields to beat Hammer so decisively, I really thought it would be more of a battle between the two. Don’t get me wrong Hammer held up and didn’t exactly do nothing but as the announcers and my partner were saying, she didn’t fight her fight, she fought Shields’ fight. At the end of the night Hammer was looking a little bit stunned by what had just happened herself and Shields was a damn proud woman. Hats off to them both! I hope they have succeeded in catapulting women’s boxing to a new level because they were great to watch. Women’s boxing deserves a lot more attention than it gets. It would be great to see even more qualified fighters in the ring on a regular basis. I would like to see a rematch between these two although I don’t know if it’s in the cards. And come on, Shields vs Hammer, even the title is cool!

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Here’s What’s Up with my Reading

In the world of books, I finished The Deepest Blue by Sarah Beth Durst. I will most certainly have a review for you tomorrow but I can say now that while I was really excited to LOVE this book I mostly just liked it. I’m a fan of Durst’s and I really enjoyed her Queens of Renthia series but this stand alone book set on the Islands of Belene, another part of the world Renthia, missed the mark just left of center for me. It was still a worthy read, and I will continue to follow Durst. In fact I really hope she keeps exploring other parts of Renthia and even Belene. But the story itself kind of fell flat. There’s exciting and interesting parts however there were some crucial details that felt like repeats. I’ll tell you more in my review but let’s just say I think I’m giving this 3.5 stars.

I bumped this and some other books up my Spring TBR because I need an ebook to read while I’m on my spin bike or in other instances where reading from my device is just easier than reading an actual book. Have you seen the hardcover edition of Shadow of Night? Very soon I’ll be starting The Voyage of the Basilisk. But first, I just started reading Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness because that’s the book myself and others voted to read in April for the Goodreads group I’m a member of. This second book in the All Souls Trilogy is almost 600 pages long so I need to get reading it! Know then that The Voyage of the Basilisk by Marie Brennan is up next.

When I look at my TBR on Goodreads I feel so crazy because I want to read so many books like now but I do not have THAT kind of time. Oh well, a girl can dream… In the meantime I’m super stoked because I’ve been doing some impressive brainstorming for my novel. Tonight I plan to start putting these ideas to work on paper. (I brainstorm a lot into a voice recorder. It’s great fun talking to yourself. :D) Writing is an intense act to undertake let me tell you. I have decided to delete a character which means – oh my gosh – I’m going to have to delete a bunch of words I’ve already put together about her. I’ve also found a whole new direction to take things in.

The nature of my story has changed and it feels so right to me! But there’s so much juggling to do. One thing I’m practicing that’s helping me immensely is just getting some thoughts out to see how they look and feel and what branches off of them before I butcher and beat them. I have a heavy handed inner editor and she tries to stop nearly everything before it even comes out of my brain. Well she is getting put in her MF’n place, let me tell you.

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There you have it, Here’s What’s Up With Me! Game of Thrones, Boxing: Shields v. Hammer, The Deepest Blue by Sarah Beth Durst, Voyage of the Basilisk, Shadow of Night, and write write write! Woo! Can you tell I’m excited? Oh my gosh I almost forgot that I also got the ebook for The Caged Queen by Kristen Ciccarelli, Iscari Book 2. I really enjoyed the first one and this book got bumped up my 2019 TBR to Spring TBR because, like I said, I need some ebooks.

How about you? Do you watch GOT? Did you? What about boxing? Will you now? I tell ya you should check these women out, they are bad asses.

And how’s your reading going? Have you read The Deepest Blue? Voyage of the Basilisk? Shadow of Night? The Caged Queen? Let me know what you think because I would love to have a chat.

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March Plans

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First week of March is over already? Oh dear, I guess my hopes that time would slow down now that we’re almost out of winter won’t be realized. Bummer. That said, March as we all know is home to the spring equinox, and spring is the kick off to lots of activities. Yard work, house work (remodels, repairs, flips, rentals), exercise (sure this is a year long thing but ya know, gotta get ready for summer), bonfires, BBQs, outdoor adventures, gardening perhaps. So so much to do with those long days.

All this activity means sitting around reading will be a bit more difficult. However, it’s not impossible especially when reading is kind of a priority, although writing is a greater priority. (Beware writers, reading is an excellent EXCUSE not to write. Lol.) This is one reason it’s a great idea to lay out some March plans. I’ll be creating a lot of plans for a lot of different things but not sharing them all here. What I will share here, right here right now, are my reading and writing plans for March.

While browsing the world of Book Bloggers I found an interesting post, well two, about book blog post ideas. It’s a collaboration between two book bloggers, one posts 10 ideas then links to the other who shares another 15. Interesting post and really cool idea and execution of a collaboration. You can find these lists at Elated Books by El and 10 more from Maggie at Dreaming of Guatemala. I’m mentioning this now because as you might know I already have a 2019 TBR page. However, what I’ve not done is told you guys what I’m about to read and why. I just listed all the books I’m so far planning (read: hoping) to read in 2019.

Their list inspired me be more interactive with my TBR. This means my March plans will include specific books, the order I will read them, why I have them in the first place, why I’m reading them now, and if applicable how I heard of the book. This way you know in advance what I’ll be talking about and maybe you can read along with me. It might be difficult for me to make these March plans, as I like to choose the books I read spontaneously. But I’ve been planning my reads in advance more often. With so many books to read it helps to have some kind of method for choosing.

What am I talking about? Well for example, I finished Phantom Pains by Mishell Baker earlier this year. Last year I started the series with Borderline. Having finished Phantom Pains rather quickly (for me) I thought it best to start Impostor Syndrome sooner than later so my connection to the story would be current. It was nice to have read #2 & 3 closer together than #1 & 2.

Also, I read Marie Brennan’s A Natural History of Dragons quite a while ago. I shelved it on Goodreads back in 2015 and apparently never wrote a review. Eh… of course I enjoyed it, I’m going to read book 3 this month! I read The Tropic of Serpents (Lady Trent #2) last month. Just like with The Arcadia Project, I want to read #3 closer to having read the last one. This is a great segue into my March plans for reading!

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March Plans for Reading

At present I’m reading three books; Gutshot by Amelia Gray (a collection of short stories), Everfair by Nisi Shawl (alternate history/historical fantasy/steampunk novel), and My Age of Anxiety: Fear, Hope, Dread and the Search for Peace of Mind by Scott Stossel (non-fiction). The first two I will finish by the end of this weekend. The non-fiction I will finish in the next two weeks (that’s the deadline I’m going to give myself).

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I have been reading Everfair for quite some time now. To be honest I’ve come really close to DNFing it. Nisi Shawl is clearly a talented writer however I’m not a fan of her style of writing and I’m leaning towards the idea that I’m also not a fan of this genre. I’m more than 3/4 of the way through this book and I still can’t get into it, it’s like there’s no solid story to grab hold of even though this is an alternate telling of history, so there’s a real life story under there!

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Gutshot is my first collection of short stories in a long time. While I would like to read more collections than I do now this one isn’t turning out to be my cup of tea or coffee. In my most humble opinion, there’s not a lot of meat on the bones of these stories. I’m sure they’re the type to read in between the lines with deeper meanings and all but that’s not the type of story I want to read. I’ll go to poetry for that. It’s a short book so DNFing isn’t necessary, I’ll see it all the way through.

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No need to go into my feelings about My Age of Anxiety now, it’s a non-fiction so it’s going to take me a little longer and I’m not even halfway through. Instead let’s go back to March plans for reading!

After I finish the first two, the fiction books, I will start on The Honours by Tim Clare in Kindle format and The Voyage of the Basilisk (The Memoirs of Lady Trent #3) by Marie Brennan in paperback format. So I will start these on the 10th or 11th if not a little sooner.

The Honours by Tim Clare

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The Honours is written by the podcaster Tim Clare. I’ve been listening to him using the app Podcast Addict for a little under a year now. I do enjoy his eccentric nature though some of his rants get a little long. That said he has a new book coming out in May, The Ice House, a sort of sequel to The Honours. He’s hoping to get enough pre-orders to make it on a best seller list. I haven’t read The Honours already because I’m not entirely sure it’s my kind of story but it’s good to support fellow writers you enjoy if you can. So I’m going to give his book a shot and now so if I do enjoy his writing I can pre-order The Ice House.

The Voyage of the Basilisk (The Memoirs of Lady Trent #3) by Marie Brennan

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The Voyage of the Basilisk is the third book in this series and seeing as I liked the first two naturally I’m going to go ahead and continue reading this series. I don’t recall how I found this series and this author in the first place. It was probably a random find for me, meaning no one suggested it to me, just sounded interesting. I also plan to read more books by Marie Brennan.

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If I finish these two fiction books before the end of March then I will start on The Book of Phoenix by Nnedi Okorafor. Here’s some fun irony… I can’t remember exactly how I found this book, either from an Amazon recommendation or just a random. But I have had it for some time. Fast forward to the present. Browsing Book Outlet for something interesting I found Binti by Nnedi Okorafor. Ordered it. Got it. Read it (click the link above to read my review) and loved it. That led me to look for more work by the author. Naturally I added the Binti sequels to my TBR (probably will make my April plans for reading) but I also saw other books that looked interesting. This book stood out, I knew I’d seen it before but where? I then looked around for how best to get the book.

Don’t you know I forgot I already had it? Yup. Yup. Guilty. But it kept nagging at me that I was aware of the book prior to reading Binti. So here I’ve read Binti, became a fan of Nnedi, while sitting in a stack of books in my dining room was The Book of Phoenix waiting for me. My dining room table is tall, think bar stool tall with storage underneath, part of the reason I chose it. Naturally books dominate this storage. So a couple weeks ago I was sweeping and bent down to fill the dust pan. This particular sweeping event had me facing some of the books under the table and BAM! Hey I know that book! The Book of the Phoenix is now out and visible and stands out even more due to this series of events. Strange right?

Okay this post is super long, they won’t all be but since March plans are my first in this “series” it’s naturally a little longer. But there you have it, hit me up if you plan to read any of these or if you have (do not leave me spoilers!). Stay posted for reviews and thoughts on the books I finish and updates for when I start the new ones.

Check out my 2019 TBR to see what else I want to read this year. If there’s something you’re dying to read or hear about let me know because you never know, I might push it up my list just for you. 😉

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