Hello and here I am again with another reading roundup. Since my last reading roundup, I’ve read five books and COMPLETED MY GOODREADS CHALLENGE! Go me! This year so far I have read/listened to 83 books to beat my goal of 80. I was wondering if I’d make the challenge this year given how busy my new role has kept me. Of the books I’ve read since the last roundup the one I enjoyed most was probably Catalyst: A Rogue One Story by James Luceno, which I listened to in audiobook format. I almost always listen to Star Wars in audiobook format because the narrators, production and sound effects are invariably excellent. This really brings something special to the story. Catalyst: A Rogue One Story is a prequel to Star Wars: Rogue One and tells the story of the construction of the first Death Star. I really loved this story despite it being somewhat slow and lacking in action. The characters were beautifully written and the cat and mouse games between Erso, Krennic and Tarkin were excellent. Galen Erso is a fascinating character with his passion for knowledge blinding him to political issues. While I don’t believe it spoils…
Hello and welcome to another reading roundup. Since my last roundup I have read two pretty good books which I’d like to share with you. [book-info]I received an Advance Reader Copy of The Poisoned Blade by Kate Elliott at BEA. It’s been on my TBR for a while, but it’s only recently I read it. The Poisoned Blade is the second book in a planned trilogy (I believe) and continues the story of Jessamy, a young woman caught between two cultures whose passion in life is playing the game of Fives. In this second book, Jes is drawn into court politics and has to deal with the fallout of her decisions in book one. I listened to The Poisoned Blade in audiobook format and very much enjoyed Georgia Dolenz’s narration. What I liked The characters. I really liked our protagonist, Jessamy. Her conflicts between her love for the Fives, her need to protect her family, the limitations placed on her by her heritage and her affection for Kal were expertly written. The pacing. The Poisoned Blade didn’t suffer from middle book syndrome at all. There were enough conficts and resolutions to keep me well satisfied. I will certainly be…
The next few weeks are relatively quiet in terms of upcoming book releases about which I’m excited. I’m thinking therefore that this could be a good opportunity to catch up on my TBR pile, specifically in terms of catching up with series with which I have fallen behind. Generally, I like variety in my reading so it’s unusual for me to marathon a whole series, even if I enjoy it immensely. So, without further ado, here are some of the series I really should catch up on. (NB, these are series which are not necessarily complete, but for which I’ve not read up to the latest published book.) It goes without saying that I’m up to date on Game of Thrones and am eagerly awaiting Winds of Winter. The Iron Druid Chronicles by Kevin Hearne. This series is about an ancient Druid, Atticus O’Sullivan and his Irish Wolfhound, Oberon, who live in modern times. Each of the novels – currently seven, with an eighth due out next year – is relatively self contained, and tells of a new adventure, but builds up the world of the Druid and its inhabitants. I have listened to books one to three, and this…
One of my most anticipated reads of 2015 is V.E. Schwab’s A Darker Shade of Magic. It sounds such an intriguing premise – various parallel worlds and certain people can travel between them. This week Tor released an excerpt which I devoured. It has really whetted my appetite and I look forward to its release on February 24th. Speaking of excerpts, one very useful thing about the Kobo Aura is its ability to read articles you have saved to the online archiving service Pocket. This is built into the Kobo software, no extra setup needed. What I like to do with excerpts like these is email it to my Pocket account rather than read it on Tor’s website. A minute or two later it appears on my Kobo, with the convenience of reading on an eReader including font changes and other personal settings. This week I’ve been listening to Death Masks, the fifth book in The Dresden Files series. I’ll do a review soon, so won’t say too much more about it. Added to my library this week There were a couple of preorders I added to my list this week. The first of these is Fool’s Quest, the second…
It certainly isn’t a good week to be a bookworm in Quebec. Canada’s Globe and Mail is reporting that Quebec’s legislature has opened a hearing on pricing for new books. Being discussed is the question of whether or not to prevent the price of new books being discounted by more than 10% for the first nine months after release. The stated intention behind this is to protect the smaller bookstores, especially smaller Francophone ones, from the big hitters such as Amazon and Walmart. Now, while I can appreciate the sentiment, I’m really not certain that keeping book prices high is really going to help anyone. Smaller bookstores are never going to be able to compete with Amazon on price, so perhaps the government should concentrate on supporting them other ways. For example subsidising author signings in the province, sponsoring book groups, or subsidising the cost of Quebecois francophone books. Most Quebec produced books are still noticeably more expensive than their English counterparts. This week I have been working nightshift. As my job is very reactive – sitting around waiting on servers burping, not many human callers – I find it’s a perfect time to enjoy some audiobooks. The books help to keep…