Tag Archives: Top Ten Tuesday

It’s not all about books

Posted by Kate W in Stuff and Nonsense and tagged with ,

It’s true, I spend a vast amount of time reading – books, book blogs, book reviews – but in all of that time, not a lot of it is spent reading stuff that is not book-related. My Twitter-feed is heavily weighted to publishing, authors and book reviews; my blogroll features predominantly fellow book-bloggers; and I don’t do Facebook or Insta… It’s only my (rarely used but nonetheless loved) Pinterest account that reveals online interests other than books – namely gin, cooking, swimming pools, and travel destinations I dream about.

Here are my favourite websites that aren’t about books –

01. Dear Photograph and Back to the Future – I’m going to do this one day. Just trying to find denim as ace as what I wore then:

backtothefuture 1 Continue reading →

My childhood champions

Posted by Kate W in Stuff and Nonsense and tagged with , , , , , , , , , ,

sweet-valley-high-8

This week, the crew behind Top Ten Tuesday suggested we revisit our favourite childhood characters and speculate on where they might be now. I’m flouting the rules and leaving my favourites JUST THE WAY THEY ARE. Continue reading →

Memoir fans – remember to put these books on your reading list

Posted by Kate W in Non-fiction, Stuff and Nonsense and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , ,

It’s Top Ten Tuesday time and the topic this week is ‘Ten Books Every X Should Read’. In my case, the X is for memoir fans.

The first five are those type of memoirs that are so horrifying that you have to keep checking whether they are not, in actual fact, fiction. The next bunch are not misery-memoirs at all – quite the opposite – they made me laugh. Continue reading →

To Be Read next (actually, this post is about my favourite Madonna songs)

Posted by Kate W in Fiction and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , ,

madonna-rebel-heart-melbourne-3

It’s Top Ten Tuesday and the topic this week is Ten Books on Your Spring Autumn TBR List. That’s good except that I went to the Madonna concert on Sunday night and I would rather talk about my top ten Madonna songs. So that’s what I’m going to do. I’ll pair them with one of the eleventy-hundred books in my TBR stack. The rationale behind the pairings will be tenuous, to say the least. Continue reading →

In the mood for Irish misery porn? Yes, always.

Posted by Kate W in Stuff and Nonsense and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Last week, my Goodreads buddy, David, remarked on my reference to ‘Irish misery porn’ – I don’t think I coined that phrase (although a quick search suggests that the most frequent use of the phrase is on this blog…hmmm) but for the purposes of this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, I’ll claim it as my own.

Irish misery porn refers to those particular types of stories that involve bleak childhoods, mams full of woe (usually with husbands that spend the money on pints of Guinness rather than pints of milk) and relentless rain. I love them.

irish-misery-porn Continue reading →

Reading in the danger zone

Posted by Kate W in Stuff and Nonsense and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

kenny-loggins

Do you start singing a certain Kenny Loggins hit when you hear the words ‘comfort zone’? I do. Even though comfort and danger are pretty much opposites… Anyhoo, my comfort zone is contemporary literature. I don’t stray often but there have been some notable (and excellent) exceptions in the last year or so –

Speculative Fiction Continue reading →

The best book soundtracks begin with ABBA

Posted by Kate W in Fiction, Stuff and Nonsense and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , ,

ABBA-1

I have a very, very deep love for ABBA. I won’t try to explain it because if you’re not an ABBA fan, you’ll never understand (and why waste my time when I could be singing along to excellent tracks such as Bang a Boomerang?).

I’m not sure if I’m doing this week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic right, but I figure if Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid can pose for a photo in tin foil, then anything goes. So, I’ve taken ten ABBA songs and matched them (very loosely) with ten books.

1. My Love, My Life – Wilful Disregard by Lena Andersson Continue reading →

Sweet Dreams are made of very crappy, really wonderful teen romances

Posted by Kate W in Fiction and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

top-ten-sweet-dreams-romances

The eighties bring to mind all sorts of ace things for me but when I think about what I was reading, it was all about the Wakefield twins* and Sweet Dreams.

I’m not afraid to admit that I still have a vast (complete) collection of Sweet Dreams books. I know the stories were all the same, I know they were lame, but there must have been something in them that made me anticipate the new release each month.

I haven’t re-read any of my Sweet Dreams favourites. Why not? A combination of fear of disappointment (all the same, all lame) and the fact that reading about Elizabeth Wakefield having an orgasm has scarred me for life. I can never un-read that.

So instead, I’ll indulge with a walk down memory lane and list my top ten Sweet Dreams romances – Continue reading →

Top Ten Books I’ve Recently Added To My TBR

Posted by Kate W in Fiction and tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

top-ten-tuesday-new-releases-2016

2016, the year of buying no books, does not mean the year of no new releases for me. Bless you and your generosity, publishers.

Here are ten ARCs hovering near the top of my staggering TBR stack –

1. Why We Came to the City by Kristopher Jansma – twentysomethings in New York. Brilliant. Continue reading →