Book Group, Books

Book 282: Tuck Everlasting – Natalie Babbitt

I first read Tuck Everlasting back in high school before the 2002 film came out as I didn’t want the story ruined by a movie (I was just as stubborn back then). Other than a general sense of wonderment and enjoyment I didn’t remember much about the book outside of the basic storyline. I was very glad this was the chosen book this month as it was super short, read it in one day on my T commute, and watched the 2002 film just before book group.

It’s hard to say what part of the story was the best part as there was something so incredibly simple and yet fantastical/magical in both the story and Babbitt’s writing. I definitely didn’t realize when I first read it that the book was almost 30 years old! Originally published in 1975, it clearly stands the test of time and I thoroughly enjoyed this reread. Babbitt did an amazing job of simplifying and writing about a concept as complex and all-encompassing as immortality

Click here to continue reading.

Meme, The Classics Club

The Classics Club – May 2014 Meme

Classics ClubThis month’s question from The Classics Club is finally an easy question! Seriously for once they’ve asked a question I readily have answers for!

Which classic work has caused you to become a master in avoidance? It’s not necessarily because you’re intimidated but maybe there are works out there that just cause you to have the Dracula reaction: cape-covered arm up in front of face with a step back reaction?

Prior to starting the Classics Club I would’ve spouted any number of the Russian novels (Doctor Zhivago, War and Peace and Anna Karenina to name a few), but I’ve read those already. I think for me the final big hurdles will be actually finishing an unabridged Don Quixote (Part 1 & Part 2), making it through a Steinbeck (I put The Grapes of Wrath on my 30 x 30 list so this WILL be done this year) and James Joyce’s Ulysses. We’ll see when these readings occur, I’m not afraid so much as I am wary of them!

ARC, Books

Book 281: Poster Boy (Theta Alpha Gamma #5) – Anne Tenino

I think this is by far my favorite of the Theta Alpha Gamma series by Anne Tenino and it’s definitely one of the best written of the series. I of course requested a copy from the publisher, Riptide Publishing as soon as I found out there was a new release in the series. It didn’t hurt that the cover had the cutest of all the guys in the series so far. Prepare yourself, a Goodreads observation/rant is about to follow, if you want to just read about the book and not my thoughts on female M/M romance writers and readers skip the next two paragraphs.

When I put in my star rating on Goodreads, I noticed that the overwhelming majority of the first page were female readers. I decided to look at the first 100, but there were only 60 written reviews, which I ignored for their general idiocy, and of those 52 of them were female. This really isn’t that shocking, as I’ve mentioned it before and I remember reading about it while studying for my Gender Studies degree, but I’m starting to find it really interesting which ones I like and which ones the female readers like. It’s almost always opposite and I’m not sure what that says about me, the females or about the writer.

Click here to continue reading.

Books

Book 280: An Unquiet Mind – Kay Redfield Jamison

After hours and hours of discussions about a personal relationship with someone who experiences bipolar disorder/manic depression and recommending I read this book on multiple occasions, my therapist finally made me take this book with me after an appointment one week and I’m glad she did. I won’t go into that relationship here, as it wouldn’t be appropriate, one day I might write about it on my other blog at some point, but I doubt it, so on to the book.

I was pleasantly surprised as I read this book with how easily accessible it was. I was concerned it was going to be too scientific and not personal enough for me, but I feel it struck an excellent balance between the two. In the last few chapters she goes in-depth into how and why she decided to write the book and one of the big decisions had to do with her personal experience and how it influenced her entire career and research focus and opportunities.

Click here to continue reading.

ARC, Books

Book 274: Love Comes In Darkness (Senses #2) – Andrew Grey

The second novel in Andrew Grey’s Senses series with Dreamspinner Press didn’t disappoint, but paled in comparison to the first (and third). It wasn’t as great as Love Comes Silently, but is definitely better than 95% of the M/M romance novels out there. I received a copy of this via his publicist and received no compensation for my honest response. Love Comes in Darkness definitely mad me cry, but not in the way that Love Comes Silently did.

Whereas in the first book of the series where Grey bashes your emotions until you’re so low you wonder why you’re still reading the book and then does something so over the top that you wonder how you were ever that sad, in this novel it just felt as if sadness drove the story. I don’t think this is something he actively chose to do, but that came from this story’s set-up.

Click here to continue reading.