Weekly Reading Round-Up
The nice thing about long airport delays is that they do provide plenty of time for reading. Here’s what I’ve been reading this week:
— Beatriz Williams, A Hundred Summers
Beautifully written, thought-provoking, heart-warming… I can keep going. I loved this book. It’s a pitch-perfect glimpse into the world of New York’s elite in the 1930s, with a heroine who manages to be genuinely nice without being a doormat.
— J.R.R. Tolkein, The Hobbit
This was part of my stocking loot, which was a very good thing, since I would never have thought of buying it for myself, since it falls into the category of “things I once read and think I remember”. It was definitely worth the re-read, a good, old-fashioned adventure story with its rather unlikely hero.
— Caroline Stafford, The House By Exmoor
Gothic fun from last week’s care package. This fell into genus narrativus first-personus/ Victorianus/ impoverished-gentlewomanus. Or, in other words, of the lineage of Victoria Holt. A lady of good family forced by her father’s improvidence to hire out as a companion, a cursed house, a brooding master, a slightly demented housekeeper, strange warnings of sinister doom…. Who could ask for anything more?
— Andrea Parnell, Dark Splendor
More gothic fun from the care package. This fell into quite a different gothic genus: think more Woodiwiss than Holt. It was a little bit The Flame and the Flower
Right now I’m dithering between more care package (there is a Victoria Holt, one of the historical Elsie Lees, a Barbara Pym, and a Carla Kelly) and a few advance copies of upcoming books.
What have you been reading this week?
I finally got around to starting Kate Morton’s The Secret Keeper and I’m loving it so far.
Still working on The Essential Ellison. I’ll probably finish it today and start on Isobel Carr’s latest tomorrow.
I definitely must check out those gothics. After finishing Clouds of Witness (Sayers) and Deanna Raybourn’s Lady Julia Christmas novella on the plane back from Italy last week I read Trelawney by Isabelle Holland.
Clouds of Witness I really liked, and look forward to more adventures with Lord Peter Wimsey. Silent Night was pretty good–not great. It felt a bit like an afterthought which, given what I know of how much Deanna Raybourn wrote over the past year, is understandable. Trelawney was great fun if formulaic. Just the kind of easy, “suspenseful” entertainment needed for the holiday madness.
My Christmas loot netted me a huge pile of books and I can’t wait to dig in.
I love the Peter Wimseys! Wait till you get to the Harriet Vane ones– especially “Gaudy Night”. So good.
I read Attachment, by Rainbow Rowell, which I found nice and cute… but not as much as Meg Cabot’s Boys series!
And now, I’m in the middle of the 4th installment in Alex Scarrows’ Time Riders series and loving it very very much!
I finished reading Kate Morton’s The Secret Keeper- it was my first experience with one of her books and I was not disappointed. I didn’t see the ending coming at all! Looking forward to reading more of her books.
I just started Rhys Bowen’s The Twelve Clues of Christmas- love this series!
I finished up all of Elly Griffith’s series about Ruth Galway, forensic archeologist. Set in the marsh country in England. Really good. I’m almost done with a young adult book by Maureen Johnson called The Name of The Star; a modern day Ripper story with ghosts. I will definitely read the next one in the series. And I read The Spanish Bride by Tracy Grant.
I read some more of the Fables comics, then the Doctor Who Christmas tie-in novella, which we all tons of fun. I then finished the second book in Laini Taylor’s Daughter of Smoke and Bones series and it was amazing and made me instantly want to pick up the next… which doesn’t come out for at least a year, sob!
Thinking the next book with be the new Dorothy Parker Mystery book…
Dark Splendor is available on Kindle for $2.99 so I picked it up to try. Thanks.
I just finished Joan Smith’s Delsie. Smith is hit or miss with me, but I think this one might be my favorite. I wanted to smack Delsie at times, but I enjoyed the humor and repartee.
I just finished Death in the Floating City, Tasha Alexander’s latest Lady Emily book, and loved it.
I am now re reading Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton series in anticipation of the publication of the sequels in one package.