I'll be honest, I didn't get a lot of reading done in August. This is down to lovely family visitors and other stuff I wanted to do... I love reading of course but I also love to do jigsaw puzzles, watch TV shows, cook, and then there's my current crop of tomatoes and a glut of apples to be dealt with. There's one thing, I'm never bored!
So, I read 4 books in August,
The Cat Who Caught a Killer - L.J. Shearer
The Marlow Murder Club - Robert Thorogood
Star Trek, Strange New Worlds: The High Country - John Jackson Miller
Happy After All - Maisey Yates. I saw this reviewed on Lark's blog - HERE.
Amelia has retreated from a hectic life in LA, connected to the film and TV industry. She's a writer who has bought a rundown motel complex near the Joshua Tree NP in California, to do it up and run while she writes her romances. She knows she has run away from a couple of things that've happened to her and an unhappy childhood. Nathan walks into the motel looking for a place to write. It turns out he's a famous author of war thrillers, writing under a psuedonym, the two writers should get along but Nathan is uncommunicative to the point of being surly. Amelia senses a mutual attraction but also senses a determination in Nathan not to give way to it. So, the events of this book take place over several years and we watch as Amelia slowly breaks down Nathan's defenses. We're also drip-fed information about what happened to Amelia and eventually discover Nathan's tragic past. This is not a light romance, it deals with grief and loss and and how individuals cope with this. There is lightness, the old ladies who live in the hotel are a delight, and the setting, in the California desert, sounds very authentic. It is also quite spicy in places so beware of that if it's not your bag. Overall I enjoyed this one but found there was a bit too much repetitive introspection for my taste. I would certainly read more by this author though as the comedic style of writing suited my sense of humour.
So, I know it's not officially autumn until the 21st. but our weather here in the UK has turned autumnal and as the weather forecast boffins treat the 1st. as autumn, who am to argue?
So these are a few possibles for me for the next two or three months:
As you can see, there are four of the British Library's weird stories books, I may just cherry-pick various stories from each of them. A reread of The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova, which I've been promising myself for several years, and book 2 of the Hyperion series by Dan Simmons.
Add to that I have an autumn folder on my Kindle Fire and a few ebooks I want to get to are:
Nephthys - Rachel Driscoll
The Nameless Ones - John Connolly
The Harbour Lights Mystery - Emylia Hall
The Mountains in the Sea - Ray Naylor
Babel - R.F. Kuang
The Frozen People - Elly Griffiths
A Case of Mice and Murder - Sally Smith
If I read half a dozen from the photo and this list combined then I will be a happy bunny. If not, it matters not.
I hope you have some fun reading plans for autumn too? I also hope you're all keeping well and finding some good books to read.
14 comments:
I just finished Harbour Lights Mystery which I liked as much as the first one and just began The Frozen People! I needed something slightly humorous after two Dorothy Dunnetts (both wonderful but exhausting).
I love The Historian. Lots of people have been mentioning it lately; makes me want to pull it out and reread both it and Dracula this fall. :D And I just spent my Saturday making applesauce...13 pints. It's a bit of a job, but I love having it on my shelves for the rest of the year. Sorry Happy After All wasn't quite your cup of tea. I just really liked how she used all those cliche romance tropes throughout it....I thought that was clever.
Agree, it's good to change one's pace and not just read but do puzzles, garden, meet people. I want to read Happy After All. I would like to compare it to Beach Read because the plots are similar and so I want to see how each author handled the romance plot line. Definitely will be reading The Harbour Lights Mystery before the year is over.
You do have some interesting reads, Cath. Such fine variety in both your August reads and your September plans. And I'm glad that you had time with family, too; that's important. It's good to hear your garden was productive this summer; there's nothing like fresh-from-the-garden food, is there?
I read 5 books in August. I would blame that on the new cat, but I don't think he affected my reading time as much as my blogging time, etc.
I will check out Happy After All (I have been mangling that title). I had wanted to find a romance that would appeal and the inclusion of interesting residents in the hotel make it tempting, but I am not so sure about the spicy parts.
I am glad that you mentioned Strange New Worlds; it reminded me that we have watched the first two episodes in Hell on Wheels, the TV show that you told me about last month. The only negative is that it is somewhat violent and very dark; but the historical setting and the building of the transcontinental railroad should be very interesting. Besides Anton Mount's connection to Strange New Worlds, two of the other actors (Colm Meaney and Christopher Heyerdahl) acted in some episodes of Stargate: Atlantis, which we have watched and revisited several times. Colm Meaney was also in Star Trek: Next Generation and Deep Space Nine.
I will tell Glen about the collections of weird tales that you have and see if he is interested.
Constance: How odd that you've just read and just started two books on my list. Glad to hear you liked book 2 of the Cornish series as much as book 1. I think you're very brave to embark on Dorothy Dunnett!
Lark: I think I read The Historian about ten years ago and I've been wanting to reread it for several, hopefully 'this' year I'll get to it. I feel your pain with the apple sauce, but how wonderful to have that supply for winter! I gave Happy After All four stars on Goodreads so I liked it quite a lot, especially the author's humour, I laughed quite a lot.
Kathy: Yes, Happy After All has a some similar elements to Beach Read but mostly it's really different. It has romance book tropes but also deals with a lot of trauma and grief. It doesn't overwhelm with that element though, I think the author strikes a good balance but I did feel the book wouldn't have harmed for losing a few pages of internalising.
Margot: It is important to prioritise family and luckily mine is fun to be with and 'bookish' so we never run out of things to chatter about. Like the John Denver song says, there's nothing like home-grown tomatoes and I miss them in the winter, supermarket ones are not in the same league.
Tracy: I read 4 books, you read 5... and that's fine... even though we're older we still life things to deal with. The books aren't going anywhere and will be there when we have time.
Easy to skip over the spicy parts in Happy After All... I've been mangling the title too.
Yes, I gather Hell on Wheels is very good, but also really dark, but the subject matter interests me a lot. I saw that Colm Meaney from TNG was also in it, Anson Mount said he couldn't get him to talk about being in Star trek, which I thought was funny. I plan to start watching it soon. I'm also eagerly waiting for season 3 of Strange New Worlds to come out on dvd, I've heard so much about some of the episodes... a documentary style one, one where some of the crew turn Vulcan, it all sounds like a lot of fun.
When I clicked onto your blog, it was showing your August Reads post from last year. I didn't even notice the year and just commented on! LOL. It sounds like this August wasn't too bad reading wise. It's nice to spend time with other hobbies, too, of course :)
I really liked THE FROZEN PEOPLE. It's inventive and fun. I hope you enjoy it when you read it.
I hope you're doing well, Cath, and enjoying your autumnal weather. It's still hot here in Arizona, although a teensy bit cooler than it has been. It won't really cool off until November, sadly, but I can still celebrate Fall in my heart!
Hi Susan! Oh, that's strange, but no matter. :-)
Yes, I plan to read The Frozen people quite soon, Elly Griffiths is such a class act as a writer.
Yes, thanks for asking, I'm doing very well. It takes a while after a serious loss but I'm getting there I feel, and my family have been wonderful. I know how much you miss a proper Fall, wonderful as it must be to live in Arizona.
Thanks for dropping by!
Hey there, Cath! I'm finally getting around to commenting on some blogs today. Have been a bit busy. September has a lot of family stuff for us, birthdays and such. Anyway, I'm planning on getting back to blogging soon. I've got The Frozen People on my fall reading list too. Will watch for what you think. Happy September!
Hi, Kay, nice to see you back. I hope you enjoy all of your September family events. It will be interesting to compare what we both think of The Frozen People, I've heard good things about it.
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