Good morning and welcome to another reading roundup. And happy St Jean to my fellow Quebecers! [book-info]This week I read the wonderful Iron to Iron, the prequel novella to Ryan Graudin’s Wolf by Wolf. Like Wolf by Wolf, it is set in an alternate universe in which the Axis won World War II. It tells the story of Luka Löwe and Adele Wolfe’s burgeoning romance during the 1955 Axis Tour, a relationship which causes much of the tension in Wolf by Wolf. Within a couple of pages I was immediately back in the world created by Graudin and back following the Axis Tour. I listened to Wolf by Wolf in audiobook and although this novella is an ebook only, I still heard it in my mind with Christa Lewis’ voice. It’s not often that I have such a strong link with narration. For those of you who have not yet read Wolf by Wolf (and why not may I ask?) the Axis Tour is a motorcycle race between Berlin and Tokyo, with the winner receiving an Iron Cross and many accolades. Iron to Iron is told from Luka’s perspective, and we learn more about him. Both he and Adele…
Now that 2015 is almost done, it’s time to review my reading year. Thanks to GoodReads, I have a very good idea of how I did. I had set my reading goal at 75 books, and I completed 87 with a total of 29,110 pages. This is a little lower than the last few years, but I did enjoy many of these books in audiobook format, which does take longer. The shortest book I read was Two Tales of the Iron Druid Chronicles by Kevin Hearne which had a total of 39 pages, and the longest was Voyager by Diana Gabaldon which weighed in at a hefty 870 pages. I read some pretty amazing books this year. So without further ado, in no particular order, here are the books I enjoyed most. Fool’s Quest by Robin Hobb is pretty much defaulted to my top books list because I am so, so invested in the characters of Fitz and the Fool and their unconventional friendship. Of course I was going to soak up every nuance of their continuing tale. Hobb would have had to really mess it up for me not to like it. Fortunately, she produced a wonderful continuation to…
Wolf by Wolf by Ryan Graudin is a young adult alternative history novel set in a world in which the Nazis won the Second World War. We follow our protagonist, Yael, who is a death camp survivor, and her mission to kill Hitler. This mission hangs on the fact that Yael’s experiences in the death camp gave her the ability to change her appearance to look like any other woman. She must impersonate famous motor cyclist Adele Wolfe, the only person in recent times who has been able to get close to the Führer. To achieve this goal she must first compete in a trans continental bike race from Germania (Berlin) to Tokyo while not revealing her secret to Adele’s brother and former flame Luka Löwe. I have to say this book really got under my skin. I was completely invested in Yael’s story and rooting for her. I lay awake at night thinking of her story What I liked The protagonist. I loved that Yael is a blend of kick ass heroine and vulnerability. Graudin did an excellent job of making the mission personal to Yael through the use of flashbacks and the imagery of the wolf tattoos. Her…