Booklog #9

Happy New Year!

As this is my first proper post (excluding the extra Book Challenge one that I did last week) of 2011 I'd like to take a moment to wish you health, happiness and prosperity for the coming year.  I hope you had an enjoyable festive season - apart from being struck down with a bit of a cold, I enjoyed my twelve days off work very much.  Received some nice new books as Christmas presents, including the phenomenally heavy Nigella Kitchen...seriously, it weighs a ton...I hope hubby isn't expecting me to have a go at every single recipe in it!  I also got Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks, which I'm very much looking forward to getting stuck into - it includes two previously unpublished Poirot stories! *hysterical squeee*

Excitingly (for me, at least) I have at last joined the smartphone community that I have envied for so long and am the proud owner of a shiny new HTC Desire.  Of course the first app I downloaded was 'Kindle for Android'!  I didn't think reading on such a comparatively small screen would be enjoyable, but it actually isn't as bad as I expected - very smooth page turns and good clear text.  In a pinch, if I don't happen to have the Kindle with me (though this is rare) it makes a very good alternative. 

Of course it wouldn't be a Booklog post without me confessing that the Kindle 'To Be Read' category has increased (again).  It's not my fault though - they had a 12 Days of Kindle sale where loads of books were either free or £1!  How was I supposed to resist?!  The TBR count now stands at 91, which is a good thing really as it means I'll have a lot of choice when it comes to getting through those 100 books for the challenge...

Speaking of that very challenge I should have a lot more to post in these Booklogs from now on, as I hope to get through at least one or two shorter books within each week, as well as plodding on with the longer things that I'm reading.  Luckily for me, I've always been a fast reader, so it's not like I'll be skim-reading or anything (that would be cheating anyway!) - I assure you that I savour everything I read, be it 10, 100 or 1000 pages long!

Since the last Booklog I've started:
* Murder on the Flying Scotsman ~ Carola Dunn (this is for book club, it's an Agatha Christie style 'cosy' whodunit - hurrah!)

* In Search of Adam ~ Caroline Smailes

Since the last Booklog I've finished:
* Shatter (The Children of Man) ~ Elizabeth C. Mock
If you recall, I was unsure about this when I started it.  It was a free Kindle download and as such, I couldn't help but wonder whether that might be a sign of the level of quality of the writing.  It's a fantasy story and there were a lot of peculiar names and places, and references to the particular theology/magic-use to get to grips with very quickly.  I'm glad I stuck with it though because once the story really got going it was very good.  I'll be honest - I can't remember most of the places or different 'religious' orders that were involved, but the main characters are well-written and very memorable, which is probably more important really.  If you have a Kindle - and it's still free - I would recommend you give it a go, though be prepared...the ending is quite abrupt and clearly a set up for another story.  Not a huge fault, but I was hoping for a bit more resolution than I feel I got.  3.5/5

* Wish List ~ John Locke
One of my Kindle sale downloads (only 49p!), this is a short thriller with an dark edge of comedy to it.  It's difficult to describe how I feel about it as the idea of the story - that the main character types his wildest wishes into a mysterious website and later finds them coming true, but at an unexpected price - is good, but I didn't really enjoy the execution of it.  Some unpleasant stuff happens, which is not usually a problem for me, but for some reason it made me feel quite uncomfortable, as did the ending.  If you like edgy reads and this is free or very cheap then do try it (there are also others in the same series), but otherwise I couldn't say I recommend it.  1/5

* Clover ~ Susan Coolidge
The fourth (and previously unknown to me) book in the 'What Katy Did' series.  I loved the Katy books when I was little and read them over and over.  Something about the way everything was described was just magical, so heart-warming and homely - I very much wanted to live in olde America!  I was a bit worried that the story of Clover (who is the second sister of the family, after Katy herself) wouldn't live up to my nostalgic memories of the other books, but was pleased to find that it is just as lovely.  It's so nice - and very relaxing - to get absorbed in something simple, something that isn't out to shock, thrill or otherwise provoke an extreme reaction in you, just a nice tale of the lives of ordinary people from a different time.  5/5

I'm still reading:
* Pillars of the Earth ~ Ken Follett (Kindle says I'm 45% through it)
* The Children's Book ~ A.S. Byatt (I'm up to chapter 31 of 53...was hoping to get it finished over Christmas but there were too many other more interesting things to be doing!)

Till Wednesday then, when optimistically I'll be back to doing some writing...but realistically I'll be working on the OU assignment that's due next Friday!  ;o)
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