WWW Wednesday: 12 July 2023

It’s been a busy day and I have only just sat down to spend some time on the Interwebs. Time for WWW?

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

What am I currently reading?

My main read is The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. I am enjoying it, but I am not sure it will end up quite being for me. It’s not a hard read, but I put it down too easily. I am not quite pulled into the story yet and I am 120 pages in.

I have continued Lyrical Ballads by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge and I am hoping to finish that one this week.

Finally, I have started Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez on audio. I tried the first chapter in physical format, but quickly decided I would probably enjoy listening to it more.

What did I recently finish reading?

I finished three things in the past week. The first one was first collection of The Sandman comics by Neil Gaiman. I enjoyed it, but I was not the biggest fan of the artwork.

I also read We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal, which I was a bit disappointed by. I expected to loved it and it was just ok for me. I have unhauled this one.

Finally, I finished my audio book, which was The Remarkable Life of the Skin by Monty Lyman, which was really interesting

What will I be reading next?

Hopefully I will read Driving Over Lemons by Chris Stewart (paperback) and The Magpie Lord by K J Charles (e-book) over the next week.

I definitely won’t be starting a new audio book this week, as my current one is quite long and will probably last me most of the rest of the month.

WWW Wednesdays: 14 June 2023

On the upside: it feels like summer and I am loving it! On the downside: we’re having some building work done and I am sitting in the garden to the music of drilling and hammering. And my Airbnb guests are smoking a joint in the garden and I can smell it – I don’t actually mind the smell (it’s not as bad as cigarette smoke). Ah well, you win some, you lose some.

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING

I am reading Starsight, the second book in the Skyward series by Brandon Sanderson. It’s taking me a bit of time to get into it. I don’t read a lot of sci-fi generally and this has aliens, spaceships and all sorts. I am almost 100 pages in and I am starting to really enjoy it though!

I am about to pick up a poetry collection, which is Lyrical Ballads by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. I found I really enjoy reading a few poems every day, so I will be taking my time with these ones. I love these clothbound editions by Penguin Classics.

My audio book is still The Earth Transformed by Peter Frankopan. Still loving that one. I am learning so much and it only makes me want to learn more about certain periods and certain parts of the world.

RECENTLY FINISHED?

I read some good ones actually.

The first one I finished since my last WWW was Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rossetti. I enjoyed reading from a female poet from that time period (published 1862). That one was also a from the clothbound Penguin Classics series.

I read the most beautiful book on my shelf, which is Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati. It was a great read, a Greek myth retelling and very well done. I loved it pretty much start to finish.

Then I caught up on past TBRs and read Pedro Paramo by Juan Rulfo. That one was originally on my March TBR, but I never got around to it. It was good, but I think it is one of those novels that takes a little time to sink in and understand. I will definitely re-read it in the future.

Finally, yesterday I finished A Question of Us by Mary Jayne Baker. That one was a romantic comedy type of story. I enjoyed it, even if it was a bit long. It was very English, but that was exactly what I liked about it.

READING NEXT?

I am doing well and I was being nice to myself when I set my June TBR, so after these books I only have three books left. I am going away for a weekend next week with a friend, so I doubt much reading will be done then, but still… in theory I should finish my TBR early.

I think the one I will pick up next will be my one NetGalley eARC for this month, which is Where Ivy Dares to Grow by Marielle Thompson. I think it’s some sort of gothic time travel romance. It sounds like a fun time. I hope it’s nice and eerie too!

WWW Wednesday: 31 May 2023

My reading mojo is doing ok and I am hoping it will stay like that into June!

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING

I am taking my audio book, The Earth Transformed by Peter Frankopan, into June. It’s a chunker, so you will see it in this space for weeks I imagine.

I am reading a poetry collection, which is Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rossetti.

I am about to pick up my new read, which will be Bearers of the Black Staff by Terry Brooks. It’s my next read in my chronological read of the Shannara books and the first book in the Legends of Shannara duology. I have never actually read this one, so I am excited. It’s a mass market paperback as well and I am one of those rare people that loves a good mass market paperback!

RECENTLY FINISHED

I just finished Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree. It was a fun read, even if I did not love it as much as other people seem to.

The other books I finished since the last WWW are The Dragonet Prophecy by Tui T Sutherland (an oddly violent middle grade story about dragons!) and The Makioka Sisters by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki (a Japanese translated novel from 1948). Both were really good reads!

READING NEXT

No idea yet. My audio book is long, so no chance of finishing it by next week and I will mood read from my TBR.

WWW Wednesday: 24 May 2023

I have had a decent reading week. Spring is finally starting to warm up, which makes me happy! Time for a WWW!

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING:

My main read (which I will be finishing today) is The Dragonet Prophecy by Tui T Sutherland. It’s the first book in the Middle Grade series Wings of Fire. It’s about dragons and my daughter’s favourite book series. She’s been asking for me to read it for months, so I finally fit it in my TBR this month. It’s a surprisingly good read. I can understand why she loves it. It’s brutal in places, there’s quite a lot of death in it, but also great friendships as far as I can tell. R will be happy I liked it!

My audio book is one for the long haul. I started The Earth Transformed: an Untold History by Peter Frankopan yesterday. It’s a giant 650+ pages, 29 hour audio book. It’s about the effects climate changes have had on our world over the millennia, natural and not. I am sure it will be super interesting, even if I am usually not one for this type of doom subject, because it will end on what’s happening with climate change currently. I have a gorgeous hardback copy with sprayed edges!

RECENTLY FINISHED:

I finished two audio books since last week. The first was His Bloody Project by Graeme Macrae Burnet, which was a historical novel, followed by Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to a Tribe Called Quest by Hanif Abdurraqib. The latter was fantastic, like pretty much anything the author writes. Even not being a massive hip hop fan, I could appreciate the author’s passion and I was surprised with how much of the music he talks about I was actually familiar. In my top 10 books of the year, along with one of his other books (A Little Devil in America). Definitely my favourite non-fiction author.

Books I read with my eyes in the past week:

• Ship of Destiny by Robin Hobb – the final book in the Liveship Traders trilogy, was a great finale to a fantastically written series.
• Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett – this did not really work for me. I should have known ahead of time as it is a fae story and me and fae don’t really match. I liked the main characters, but it was not for me.
• Black Foam by Haji Jabir – I enjoyed this one. It was the first book I read by an Eritrean author and I found I knew surprisingly little about that part of the world. It is a refugee story and it was a bit different. I liked it.

All in all, this was a very good reading week in which I made superb headway in my TBR – at last!

READING NEXT:

I won’t be thinking about a new audio book yet, but my next physical read will be The Makioka Sisters by Jun’ichirō Tanizaki. I read a short essays works by him (In Praise of Shadows), which was fantastic, so I hesitantly trying this novel, which is almost 600 pages. I’m nervous, but quietly excited.

**

Let me know your WWW!

WWW Wednesdays: 3 May 2023

The days are FINALLY warming up and I am doing a quick WWW this morning as we’re going away for a couple of days. Much needed!

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING

My main read at the moment is Small Worlds by Caleb Azumah Nelson. I kept meaning to pick up Open Water by the same author as I had heard such good things, but I just never got around to it. When I saw this one up for request at NetGalley I jumped at the chance. I am about a third of the way in and so far I absolutely love it. The writing is wonderful and just jumps off the page.

My audio book is The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. I am really enjoying that one, but I have not been listening to my audio book much as my daughter is on her school holidays.

RECENTLY FINISHED

In the past week I did not finish much. I read On A Sunbeam by Tillie Walden, which I loved. I started reading Dragonfall by L R Lam, but I did not get on with it and ended up DNF 25% in. Finally, I read two poetry books; District and Circle by Seamus Heaney, which I was not that fond of, and Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair by Pablo Neruda. I have not written my thoughts up for the latter yet. I will likely do that when I come back from our trip away. However, the gist of my thoughts on that one is that I did really like it, but that I wasn’t blown away by it.

READING NEXT

I will mood-read off my TBR, so I don’t quite know which one I will pick up yet.

***

Have a great week!

WWW Wednesdays: 12 April 2023

It’s been a tough couple of weeks and my reading has suffered as a result. I had to have my beautiful pony Freda put to sleep and it broke my heart. I miss her terribly and I am still healing. I still have her son, who was a surprise addition as she turned out to be pregnant when I bought her, and a Shetland pony. Freda was my heart horse and I can’t even describe how much she meant to me…

Anyway, I did a read a little bit.

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING

I am reading Silver Under Nightfall by Rin Chupeco. I started this one two weeks ago, but after what happened I put it down. I was not in the mood for that story. I just picked it back up and I am enjoying it much more this time around.

I am listening to Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell. I am about halfway and I have to say it’s not exactly grabbing me. Do I dare say I am finding it boring? It’s just this woman relating life in this village. Generally I like quiet books where nothing much happens, but this one is rough going. I am disappointed as I really enjoyed Wives and Daughters when I read it a few years back. I hope I will end up liking it a bit more.

Because Silver Under Nightfall is a hardback, I chose a different book to read in bed. I randomly picked up The Apothecary Rose by Candace Robb. It’s a book I read before, but quite a few years ago and I always meant to dive deeper into that series. To do that I wanted to start at the beginning again. I am only 10 pages in and it will be a slow read if I am only reading it at bedtime, but I know the story already and I think I will enjoy the re-read.

FINISHED ANYTHING?

I did! Not much, but still… When my took a nosedive I picked up A Good Scot is Hard to Find. I needed something light and not too taxing on my brain. Not that Silver Under Nightfall was very taxing, but I just needed a different kind of story. A Good Scot is Hard to Find was the right choice. It’s a historical romance, but it has time travel elements. I read the first book in the Someting About A Highlander series a good while back and enjoyed it, so I knew what to expect and to not be fooled by the super crappy cover and crappy title. I enjoyed the read and it was definitely what I needed.

I also finished my audio book, which was Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake. That one is a non-fiction book about fungi and how they affect the world we live in. It was really interesting and I really enjoyed that one. If you like biology/sciency kind of books, this is a really good one and I would definitely recommend it.

READING NEXT?

I may actually read Drinkers of the Wind by Carl Raswan next. It is a non-fiction book that I have owned for twenty years and that I have been excited about for twenty years as well! I am shocked I haven’t read it yet. As far as I know it is about a man who goes to live among the Bedouin to go in search of the perfect Arabian horse. Something along that ilk anyway. I was really into Arab horses when I was younger, so hence I got the book at the time. It has been out of print for many decades. I am looking forward to reading it!

I am not sure yet what audio book I will pick up next.

WWW Wednesday: 22 March 2023

It’s spring!!! Yay, yay, triple yay! It’s raining though…. Booooo!

It’s been a tough week, because my beloved pony is not well and we’re not quite sure how it’s going to pan out. I’ve been quite emotional and my reading has been a bit all over the place because of that, but at the same time it’s good to get lost in a book for a while to forget the stress of having an animal that is suffering unless she is on painkillers.

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING

My main read at the moment is Fredrik Backman’s My Grandmother Sends her Regards and Apologises. I am enjoying it ok. I am almost 150 pages in and it is has not quite sucked me in the way other books by the author have done in the past. I am sure it will make me cry at some point though…

As a ‘side quest’ I am reading Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges. That one is on my 2023 TBR and one of my Spanish translation books I am reading a bunch of this year. I am a few stories in. They’re all stories about fictional books and it’s kind of interesting and weird. Not quite sure what to make of it yet.

Finally, I am listening to Daggerspell by Katharine Kerr on audio. It’s a book that is actually on my April TBR, but I am reading it early. The audio book was included in my Audible subscription and I was just in the mood for it. I am getting up to halfway. It’s quite an old fashioned style of fantasy – it was written in the 1980s – and it took some getting used to. Some questionable plot devices for sure. I am enjoying it ok though.

RECENTLY FINISHED

I only finished two books in the past week, but they both ended up really great. Skyward by Brandon Sanderson was a really fun read and it scored 9.14, whilst An Immense World by Ed Yong was a super interesting non-fiction book about animal senses and a scored 9.86!!!

SOON READING

The only book left on my March TBR after the ones I am currently reading is Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo, another one from my 2023 TBR and translated from Spanish. If I have time left to read another book this month I will likely read The Gypsy Morph by Terry Brooks to finish out the Genesis of Shannara series. Audio book wise I am not sure what I will pick up next.

WWW Wednesdays: 15 February 2023

And so February continues. To be fair, it was lovely weather the past few days. Spring was definitely in the air. Unfortunately from tomorrow we’re back to miserable rain. Blegh!

Anyway, on to the books!

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING:

My reading has been practically non-existent the last few days. I have been busy and tired. My main read is The Mad Ship by Robin Hobb and when I actually read a few pages I REALLY enjoy it. I am just struggling with a bit of focus. A me thing, not a book thing. It will pass in a day or two. I hope anyway! I have four books (including The Mad Ship) left on my Feb TBR and only 13 books left to read them in. If I don’t make it – no big deal, I will just move what’s left from my TBR on to March – rollover! That’s how we roll these days. I am about 100 pages in, so I have about 800 pages left – YIKES!

On audio I am listening to My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell. I picked it up for GBP 2 at some point on Audible. I have the 1950s hardback version on my shelf. I picked it from my husband’s great-aunt’s shelf after she passed and the house was being cleared. I took a small stack of old hardbacks and this was one of them. It has her name in it as well and I like that it makes me think of her. Listening to it I can imagine her reading and liking it. It’s a memoir and it is quite a joy!

RECENTLY FINISHED

I finished The Tiger and the Wolf by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Unfortunately I did not end up loving that one. After that I read The Fires by Sigríður Hagalín Björnsdóttir, which was translated from Icelandic. It was just ok for me. There were elements of it I liked and some I really didn’t. I really did not like the ending at all, even if I could appreciate it.

I between I read The Tea Dragon Society Boxset (The Tea Dragon Society, The Tea Dragon Festival and The Tea Dragon Tapestry). Absolutely adorable graphic novels, which I enjoyed immensely!

I also finished The Angel’s Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. I listened to that one on audio and I really enjoyed it! The atmosphere was amazing! After that I listened Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S Thompson, which was quite a ride. I did not love it, but it was certainly something and I am glad I read it!

READING NEXT

I have three books left on my TBR. A sci-fi, a middle grade and a novel translated from Arabic. It really depends whether I will pick up the pace with The Mad Ship.

WWW Wednesday: 18 January 2023

I actually first wrote 18 June in the title. June! Someone has spring on the brain. To be honest, I can’t wait for winter to be over. At least it has stopped raining every day and I have actually seen some sunshine in the last couple of days. It does a human bean good to see that star in the sky again, even if it’s for just a while. I had almost forgotten she existed – it has been so miserable!

Anyway, on to the books!

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING:

I have three books on the go at the moment. A physical poetry collection, which is Sound Mind by T J Singh. The first part of that is a collection of poems that form a story about wolves, but which is really about humanity. I am just over halfway through that story. The second half is just a poetry collection. I have heard mixed things and I am feeling mixed things. Sometimes I think some stanzas are great and others are just… * shrug*. This was a collection I bought this month, so it’s nice to be getting to it swiftly.

I am reading The Visitor by Katherine Stansfield on my Kindle. I think it’s supposed to be a historical mystery. I am about 50 pages in and I am not quite sure of the vibe yet. So far I find it a bit depressing. It’s set in Cornwell, a timeline in the 1880s and another in the 1930s, one following Pearl as a girl and the other as an old woman in a seaside town undergoing big changes. I am enjoying it, but like I said, the vibe is not cheerful.

Finally, on the opposite side of the spectrum I am listening to The Penguin Lessons by Tom Michell. This is a non-fiction memoir of a guy who finds a penguin that is a victim of an oil spill and takes it home. It’s funny and light hearted and I am enjoying the listen so far. It’s narrated by Bill Nighy.

RECENTLY FINISHED:

I only finished the two books that I was reading last week, which were The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, which was a lovely cozy classic middle grade listen, and Armageddon’s Children, the first book in the Genesis of Shannara series by Terry Brooks. The latter is a dystopian/fantasy novel and as I read so much Terry Brooks when I was younger, his writing feels so warmly familiar. I like that feeling and the story was better than I remembered. Well, to be fair I did not remember much at all. They both ended up being 4 1/2 * reads.

SOON READING:

I still have an ‘unlikely book’ to read and my choice ( reduced to two since I already DNFd one) is between Green Rider by Kristen Britain and Decider by Dick Frances. So either YA fantasy or a horseracing mystery. I will let it depend on my mood.

At the moment I would be leaning towards Green Rider, as I am in a fantasy kind of mood, but that may well change! It’s a bigger book (500p vs 350p appr), so if I have lots of time it would be a great way to go.

I am happy with how I am going through my January TBR. I may even have some time left. If I do, I may just pick a book from my February TBR or maybe pick a book from my Winter TBR.

WWW Wednesday: 11 January 2023

I love my reading mojo at the moment! How was the start of your 2023? Any early favourites?

WWW Wednesdays’ home is at Sam’s blog Taking On A World of Words. Check it out!

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you will read next?

***

CURRENTLY READING:

I am currently reading Armageddon’s Children, the first book in the Genesis of Shannara series by Terry Brooks. This is a re-read. I am hoping to read a chunk of the all the Shannara series in the recommended re-reading order, which is different from the publishing order. Many of these books I haven’t read in many many years. There is one trilogy I will skip, because I read it not too long ago. This first trilogy I read about seven years or so ago and I don’t remember much about it. I am only 10 pages into the first book and so far I am enjoying it. It’s a prequel trilogy to the original Shannara books and it’s kind of dystopian fantasy, taking place at a future point of our own world.

On audio I am listening to The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I am enjoying it quite a bit. It is a bit dated in places, especially when it comes to privilege and race, but overall it’s quite a sweet story so far. It works great as an audio book and the narrator does a fantastic job with the Yorkshire accents. I’m about a third of the way in. This one is on my 2023 TBR.

RECENTLY FINISHED:

Bad news first. I DNFd two books, which is almost unheard of for me, but I think it’s actually a good thing. I DNFd Darkfever by Karen Marie Moning at 25% – I just hated the writing. It felt lazy and surprisingly sexist. The plot could have been ok, but by the 100 page mark I had just had enough when there was another mention of how pretty the main character is, etc. No, just no. I also DNFd My Name is Light by Argentinian author Elsa Osorio. I only got 10 pages in and I was not enjoying myself. The writing was awful (though that could have been the translation) and I had had enough. I felt oddly pleased with my DNFs, as I simply have too many good books to read! One was an e-book and the other a paperback. Still, they can both be struck off my TBR. The paperback is on the unhaul pile of course.

Now, I did finish some books as well! I read Snow Like Ashes by Sara Raasch. This is a YA fantasy story, which I enjoyed well enough, but I will not be continuing the series. I am happy with where it ended. To be honest, I have already forgotten most of it!

On the very positive side, I finished two books this past week that will end up on my favourite books of the year list! A Little Devil in America: in Praise of Black Performance by Hanif Abdurraqib is a fantastic non-fiction book about a variety of artists that made an impact throughout the past century. This one is also part memoir and social commentary and Hanif has such a poetic turn of phrase and so much passion in his prose that this was truly a joy to read. All the chapters and people he talked about were really interesting as well. I would highly recommend this one.

The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell was incredible. Such a wonderful historical novel. I loved it start to finish, maybe even more than I loved Hamnet by the same author. It was such a sensitively written novel, kind of slow, but beautiful. I loved the ominous undercurrent as well.

SOON READING:

I have a poetry book on my TBR this month, which is Sound Mind by T J Singh, so I am likely to get to that in the next week. I started to read one of my unlikely books (one of my January prompts), but DNFd it, so I will probably choose one of the other two, so either Decider by Dick Francis (mystery) or Green Rider by Kristen Britain (fantasy). I also have an unlikely e-book to read. I have three choices for that and I am not sure what I will be in the mood for yet. I am going through my January TBR at a good clip, so I am hoping to finish my reads early, so I can get started on The Mad Ship by Robin Hobb, which is on my February for sure, but I hope to bring forward if I can. I am SO looking forward to that one!

Good times ahead! (I sincerely hope!)