When I started this blog almost ten years ago, I had an idea for a meme (it’s still sitting in draft posts). The idea was to read the books that my friends considered their ‘favourite’. I never progressed the meme, but I did get a nomination from Rory – Empire Falls by Richard Russo. Yes, shameful that it has taken me so, so long to read this book. And Rory commented on Goodreads that she was nervous that I wouldn’t love it as much as she did. Well… Continue reading
Tag Archives: Richard Russo
Three speedy reviews
Somehow I’m back to a spot where I have dozens of books read but not reviewed… Three recent audios – Continue reading
My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante
Dear Book-Blogging-Corner-of-the-Interwebs,
I respect and trust your opinion on almost #ALLTHEBOOKS* but I feel like you’ve let me down on the Ferrante-front. You know what I’m talking about. You loved it. You promised a sinuous, immersive tale of life in Naples, of violence and fierce love, of female friendship and deep loyalty. You didn’t tell me it would be such a wretched slog. But I pushed through, trusting you. Continue reading
Six Degrees of Separation – from A Prayer for Owen Meany to Fates and Furies
It’s time for #6Degrees – join in! Link up! Get amongst it!
We begin this month with John Irving’s classic, A Prayer for Owen Meany. The story centres around a terrible accident involving two young boys. Likewise, the plot in Wiley Cash’s A Land More Kind Than Home, also focuses on the tragic consequences of an incident involving two boys. Continue reading
Bookish (and not so bookish) Thoughts
1. Charlie and Lola have recently celebrated their 15th birthday. I mention this because the name of this blog is a little nod to Charlie and Lola. I love them to bits (especially when it comes to Sizzles). Continue reading
Top Ten Tuesday – A Bookish Wish (Bucket) List
I’m not really a fan of the ‘bucket list’. I find them a bit depressing. Although I don’t have a bucket-list per se, I do have a list of things I wouldn’t mind doing if time and money were no object. As it happens, I crossed one thing off my wish list a few years ago, when I went to Vegas with a friend to see Barry Manilow in cabaret. It was everything I’d hoped (because music and passion are always the fashion).
The Broke and the Bookish have asked readers to nominate their bookish bucket list. I thought I’d play along because there are a few bookish things on my wish list.
You MUST read this!
Books that intimidate. That is the topic of The Broke and the Bookish Top Ten Tuesday for this week. It had me thinking for a bit… And then had me facing an uncomfortable truth.
Size of a book? Not a problem, although big books and I do have commitment issues (Edward Rutherford’s New York is case in point – at 860 pages in the world’s tiniest font I’m not sure I have the stamina).
Topic? I can’t think of a topic that intimidates me as such, although there are some things that I have simply no interest in reading about.
Here’s the thing. I’m an absolute book pusher (that’s the uncomfortable truth bit). Ask anyone who’s told me they’ve never read any John Irving. And so to the intimidating bit – books that are favourites of friends/bloggers, whose taste in reading matter I trust.
When someone says that I must read a particular book I automatically get nervous – what if I don’t like it? And yet I’m always pressing books on others. So, it’s time to man up. I either read all of the books on the list below (the favourites of friends and other bloggers, you know who you are) or I stop pressing books that I love on other people. Fair’s fair and all that. Continue reading
What’s in a Name Reading Challenge
What’s in a Name reading challenge is hosted by Beth Fish Reads.
It’s a quirky little challenge – read one book that fits each of the six ‘categories’ between January 1 and December 31, 2013. The ‘categories’ are good fun –
- A book with up or down (or equivalent) in the title
- A book with something you’d find in your kitchen in the title
- A book with a party or celebration in the title
- A book with fire (or equivalent) in the title
- A book with an emotion in the title
- A book with lost or found (or equivalent) in the title Continue reading
Top Ten Tuesday – Top Ten Books I Resolve to Read in 2013
Resolutions. Some years I embrace them, other years I save time and discard all thoughts of them one minute into the New Year. I have no grand plans for 2013, short of a vague desire to ‘get back on the water’ (in my life before kids I rowed. I miss it. Every time I see a crew on the Yarra there’s a twinge of envy. Maybe 2013 is the year to get back in a boat… Just to see if I still love it as much as I did then).
But on to resolutions I can keep. Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature created and hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Each week a new ‘top ten’ challenge is posted – anyone can join in. This week’s topic is Top Ten Books I Resolve to Read in 2013.
So I’m cheating a little on this. My first five book resolutions are actually book lists… See what I did there? I cleverly turned a Top Ten into a Top Forty (of fifty… or sixty). Continue reading