As it's a quarter of the year gone by, though I don't know how that happened so fast, I thought it was worth reviewing things. I set my reading target for the year low, at 45, with the intention of reading less and focusing more on the rest of my life. Only none of that worked out and the book total shot up very quickly. It's fair to say that some of the books are considerably short. Two Fredrik Backmans were just short stories which I read in about an hour or two and the Chronicles of Narnia in particular are not long either. I use both Storygraph and Goodreads and I actually counted the books differently. On Goodreads I counted the Narnia books as one volume, but on Storygraph I counted them separately, purely as a way of marking to myself how it would look either way. For this post, I am referring to the numbers on Storygraph as I use it more these days, and that app marks the pages and hours listened to, not just the number of books read.
Number of books read: 28
Audios: 13 (113 hours so far)
Digital: 3
Paper: 11
Pages read: 1581
Favourite Reads
The Last Library
Why I liked this is simple. I identified with the lead character. It talks about books and libraries which I love. The plot was engaging and the ending was pretty good and not too cliched or predictable.
And Then There were None
It was a perfectly, brilliantly, thought out mystery. Simple as that really. You never really knew what would happen next as the ending was genius.
Least Favourites
Night of Demons and Saints
I feel a little bit bad about this one as it was a Christmas present and I don't like to seem ungrateful. In general the initial plot was intriguing and sounded very much my kind of thing. Unfortunately it was a sequel, so I was missing information. But something within the plot and the way it was written, the language, just didn't work for me and it seemed a bit ridiculous in some ways.
Eat, Pray, Love
Though this book is so much raved about, I just didn't enjoy it. I found it boring and long winded, though quite honestly I think that's just because I am not like the author. I don't have any desire to travel, learn any new languages. So I could not identify with the author and narrator, I can't find this book inspiring.
Books that surprised me:
The Tattooist of Auschwitz
I didn't actually know what exactly what to expect from this book. Based off true events, I knew it would be somewhat grim, showing one of the darkest parts of history, the worst of humanity. But this was a story of hope and finding light and love in the worst of places. The two following novels, Cilka's Journey and Three Sisters had the same effect.
Future outlook:
I have a fair few books in line. There's still a whole wide world of literature out there, after all. Currently I am still finishing The Queens Assassin by Melissa De La Cruz on audio.
I have several Agatha Christie's I'd like to get stuck into. I don't think I will actually manage to get through all of them particularly soon and I don't want to be reading too many mystery books altogether, but I'd like to understand a wide range of her writing. I've read one of her most well regarded stand alone novels, the first Poirot with another sat waiting for me to get stuck in. I'd like to read a Marple book to get a feel for that character and maybe one of the Mary Westmacott books. I've read The Colour of Magic and although I am not, as yet, enamoured with the discworld, or Terry Pratchett, I think I could well be if I read more of his work. It is something that has happened before.
There are numerous others in line, of course. I'm trying to explore non-fiction as well as fiction and I will be listening to Everything I know About Love, as I've heard good things about it and the adaptation. Having also had a bit of insight into that era, I'm also interested to listen to the Diaries of Anne Frank. I've found it easier to listen to, rather than read, non-fiction. Following an episode of Between the Covers I am reminded that I have not yet read The Darling Buds of May. I'd like to read Freya Sampsons other book, as I enjoyed the first so much and more of Kazuo Ishiguro. I've also been waiting a long time for All the Light We Cannot See.
There are still two challenges to get finished on The Storygraph as well. One requires two more prompts to be completed. A popular fiction book and a book about start ups. The tricky bit is just finding one to grab my interest. There's nothing worse than trying to get through something that's of no interest. I also have to read something from Storygraph recommends, the community page, something to match my readers profile and a book that is longer than the longest book I read last year.
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