What are you reading?

[Ryrin]

 

I’m reading “The Cellist” by Daniel Silva, his 21st book in the Gabriel Allon series. 

[LadyWordsmith]

I am currently on a re-read of the Collegium Chronicles by Mercedes Lackey. They have been good for spurring my creative juices for the novel I am currently working on. ?

 

 

[LilyElizabeth]

I'm working out the final book in the Earth Children's (Clan of the Cave Bear) series. It's a reread. Then I'm going to start on the Twisted Tale Collection. They are YA books that ask questions like "What if Belle's mother cursed the Beast?" or "What if Aladdin never found the lamp?" I love YA literature and Disney, so this should be good. 

[Ryrin]

16 hours ago, LadyWordsmith said:

I am currently on a re-read of the Collegium Chronicles by Mercedes Lackey. They have been good for spurring my creative juices for the novel I am currently working on. ?

 

 

 

What’s it about? Tell us more about the novel? 

 

 

14 hours ago, LilyElizabeth said:

I'm working out the final book in the Earth Children's (Clan of the Cave Bear) series. It's a reread. Then I'm going to start on the Twisted Tale Collection. They are YA books that ask questions like "What if Belle's mother cursed the Beast?" or "What if Aladdin never found the lamp?" I love YA literature and Disney, so this should be good. 

I love the Clan of the Cave Bear series. I’ve been considering a re-read too. I so enjoyed those books.  I enjoy YA literature as well. 
 

Has anyone read “The Book Thief?”

[LilyElizabeth]

I haven't. Tell us about it?

[LadyWordsmith]

20 hours ago, Ryrin said:

 

What’s it about? Tell us more about the novel? 

'This' series takes place at a point in Valdemar's (the main country in the series, if anyone hasn't read it) history before the original/primary plotline that spanned nine novels. It follows a young boy who was raised as a mine slave (he was found as a toddler in a den of raiders, his parents dead) and the plot of this particular five-book series covers not only his rescue and training as a Herald, but also the unraveling of his mysterious history (which involves dealing with some people who keep trying to murder the king ... and then trying to kidnap him and he has no idea why). It's very dramatic and fun. ? Lackey spent 11 novels with this character (and his children for one trilogy). This is my first re-read since I read them as they came out. (She usually puts out several novels a year, in a variety of worlds. So she averages 'one' in a particular world roughly at a time). 

[Ryrin]

On 11/27/2021 at 9:37 AM, LilyElizabeth said:

I haven't. Tell us about it?

It’s interesting because “Death” is the narrator and a little German girl is the main character. The setting is Nazi Germany. It’s located in the YA section of the book store. It became an international best seller and sold 63 million copies. 

 

 

18 hours ago, LadyWordsmith said:

'This' series takes place at a point in Valdemar's (the main country in the series, if anyone hasn't read it) history before the original/primary plotline that spanned nine novels. It follows a young boy who was raised as a mine slave (he was found as a toddler in a den of raiders, his parents dead) and the plot of this particular five-book series covers not only his rescue and training as a Herald, but also the unraveling of his mysterious history (which involves dealing with some people who keep trying to murder the king ... and then trying to kidnap him and he has no idea why). It's very dramatic and fun. ? Lackey spent 11 novels with this character (and his children for one trilogy). This is my first re-read since I read them as they came out. (She usually puts out several novels a year, in a variety of worlds. So she averages 'one' in a particular world roughly at a time). 

 

This sounds really good. I think this will be my next series. Have you read “An Ember in the Ashes” series? It’s fantastic. It’s written by a woman, Sabaa Tahir. It’s also considered YA but I really enjoy those. 

[LadyWordsmith]

On 11/28/2021 at 5:06 PM, Ryrin said:

This sounds really good. I think this will be my next series. Have you read “An Ember in the Ashes” series? It’s fantastic. It’s written by a woman, Sabaa Tahir. It’s also considered YA but I really enjoy those. 

Not yet! Though I should add them to my list. ? I just finished the series I mentioned before on my re-read and am honestly contemplating jumping into a full WoT re-read for the first time in a long time (watching the show just makes me want to go read the books again. lol). I haven't had the chance to read them all from the beginning through since A Memory of Light came out. (So while I've read up through book 8 like 6 times back when I was a high school and college student with plenty of time, I haven't had the pleasure of rereading up through the rest, and it's been over a decade or more for most of the books). At this point a lot of it will feel new again even though I remember quite a bit. ?

 

[JamesBrown]

Hello, friends.

 

So far this year I've read "Never" by Ken Follett. It's a departure from his standard historical fiction which I so enjoy. This one is a novel set slightly in our future, which explores how one minor decision after another can inevitably lead to a nuclear war. Very well-done and chilling. 

 

One passage that resonated with me. The U.S. President has been dogged by a political rival who talks tough on TV saying America should just nuke anyone who tries to push the country around. Meanwhile, the President's teenage daughter is trying to understand how war seems imminent even though no one wants it. "Why is everything so complicated?"

 

The President replies, "The easy problems get solved right away, so only the hard ones are left. That's why you should never believe a politician with simple answers." (emphasis added)

 

 

Next I read Cormac McCarthy's "All the Pretty Horses". John Cole Grady is the last of a long line of Texas ranchers who finds himself adrift. With a friend, he rides his horse to Mexico to find work as a horse wrangler, meets and falls in love with a beautiful girl far above his station, and fights for his life in a Mexican prison because of the foolishness of an acquaintance.

 

This is the first of McCarthy's Border trilogy, and the writing is as spare and beautiful as an Arizona sunset. Be warned. McCarthy writes short sentences. Like this. His prose is not for everyone. Page after page of short, clipped, one-line paragraphs. But occasionally he'll stretch and expand a passage describing the landscape and the world around the characters into something that seems to have fallen out of a god's treasure box. 

 

Quote

They rode out along the fenceline and across the open pastureland. The leather creaked in the morning cold. They pushed the horses into a lope. The lights fell away behind them. They rode out onto the high prairie where they slowed the horses to a walk and the stars swarmed around them out of the blackness. They heard somewhere in that tenantless night a bell that tolled and ceased where no bell was and they rode out on the round dais of the earth which alone was dark and no light to it and which carried their figures and bore them up into the swarming stars so that they rode not under but among them and they rode at once jaunty and circumspect, like thieves newly loosed in that dark electric, like young thieves in a glowing orchard, loosely jacketed against the cold and ten thousand worlds for the choosing.

 

 

After those two heavy books, I'm currently reading "Small Gods" by Terry Pratchett as a palate cleanser.

[Ryrin]

I just finished getting all of the WoT on audible!

 

I’m currently reading The 2nd book (The Fell Sword) in “The Traitor Son Cycle” by Miles Cameron. You have to pay attention while reading them. It’s very good and I think you would like it, James. 

 

Miles Cameron weaves an epic tale of magic and mercenaries, war and depravity, politics and intrigue in this action-packed fantasy. 

I thought it was a trilogy but there are two more books! 

 

[LadyWordsmith]

Hooray! Sounds good.

I just started my first FULL Re-read of the WoT since the series ended (I had done many leading up to that point, but several of the last books I've only gotten to once, as they came out because life was busy). All the renewed interest has given me people to talk about it with again and I have another friend starting a re-read so we can chat about it while we do. ? Currently leaving Baerlon. 

[LadyWordsmith]

Well, about a month and a half later I'm starting The Fires of Heaven! At this rate I should finish my re-read sometime in August. But I'm loving it and I've now hit text I haven't read in almost 20 years, so it's honestly even-better than reading it the first time. I remember some things very clearly, others vaguely, and often run into things I had entirely forgotten.