Somehow in August I read 13 books, so I am one ahead of my challenge to read 12 books a month. It helped that I had two short children's books on the list for the month. I have not read any translated literature for a while and plan to correct that in September.
The places I went: Wales, the fictional planet called Darkover and a fictional moon by the name of Alphane, England, Hungary, Mexico and various locations in the United States.
Authors new to me: Richard Powers, Lloyd Alexander, Mark Sarvas, and Ruth Wariner.
Stats: 13 books read. 12 fiction. 6 written by women. 2 for children, 1 Young Adult, 4 for My Big Fat Reading Project. 4 Sci Fi/Fantasy. 1 memoir.
Favorites: The Overstory, White Houses, La Rose (which was a reread), Bellman & Black.
Least favorite: All Clear
I hope you enjoyed your August reading. Which books were your favorites?
I envy you so much reading. ;-) I'll be reading The Overstory in December (hopefully); I have been tweaking my reading list on and on. I wanted to read it earlier in case it was shortlisted for the Booker, or a finalist, but it's OK. I have two ARCs from Netgalley that I want to finish before year's end, one spooky one to coincide with Halloween, and a new release by Diane Setterfield that has been receiving great reviews, so I find quite a coincidence that you read Bellman and Black this month. I'm not concerned about The Overstory being overhyped; I have only read three reviews of it from bloggers I follow, Dorothy and you being two of them.
ReplyDeleteI am beyond excited that you will be reading The Overstory. I assure you it is not overhyped. I knew about Diane Setterfield's new book. I have been waiting so long for her to write another novel. I've had Bellman & Black ever since it was published, I had read some negative reviews, so I never started it. I loved it and now I am ready for the new one! When I used to use Netgalley they were so strict about how long one could have the galley and they would disappear from my reader, so I gave up with them. Do you have any tips?
DeleteThe galleys stay now in your reader forever; you just have to send them to your reader before the archival date, which is when they are no longer available for download. You give them your reader e-mail address (from the cloud). If you use Kindle, you can find the info on your Amazon account. On Netgalley, to guarantee more success in getting approved, you write your blog stats (e.g., I get this number of visitors/month, and this number of pageviews/month. You can also mention how may followers you have and how many books you read any given month.) I bet that with the amount of books you read in a month, you will be approved for lots of ARCs. Hope that helps. If not, let me know.
DeleteThank you Carmen. That was extremely helpful!
DeleteI never got interested in acquiring or reading Bellman and Black precisely because of those negative reviews. No doubt reading is a personal experience; sometimes reading a book at the right time makes all the difference. Still, back then most reviewers probably had fresh in their minds the experience of reading her phenomenal The Thirteenth Tale, and Bellman paled in comparison.
DeleteI put it off for the same reason! I suppose it could have paled in comparison but I also think sometimes we readers, when we love a book, want another one just like it from that author. When I finally read Bellman & Black, I realized that if I wanted another Thirteenth Tale I should just have read it again-:) She had another story to tell, it was a quite different story, though still had that gothic feel. I am going to talk about all that in my review.
DeleteLooks like you had another month of excellent reading!! I like the book cover for Bellman & Black.
ReplyDeleteThanks, I did. Yes, isn't that a great cover? The story is filled with crows.
DeleteJudy, you had a terrific August for books. I have The Overstay on my TBR list (because of you) and have read White Houses (audio). I'm intrigued by The Sound of Gravel. Hope you are having a nice weekend and happy September!
ReplyDeleteI hope you love The Overstory as much as I did. Glad we can share good books. Happy September to you!
DeleteThirteen books? Wow!
ReplyDeleteWell done on being one ahead of your challenge to read 12 books a month. I am also pleased to have read six books in August - one of my best months. Happy September reading :-)
ReplyDeleteThank you Jessica. I did see that you had an excellent reading month. We shall keep it up!
DeleteYou continue to be on a Roll this summer. I'm glad you read Memento Park because I had wondered about reading it awhile back. Any good? I will wait for your review. Enjoy your September!
ReplyDeleteI liked Memento Park but it is probably not for everyone. I am going to see the author read in September and my review will appear soon.
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