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Your Book Activity - April 2020


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Wow.. it's April 1rst today! I guess at least March is over but.. yeah.

 

These are strange times in many countries in the world. I hope you're all doing okay and staying safe.

 

Please post about your reading progress here if you like, as well as any book purchases or bookshelf organising or such, if you want to.

 

I've started reading Matt Parker - Humble Pi, a book about maths errors (written by a mathmatician). It's really good so far. I did try reading bits of the author's first book a few years ago (Things to Make and Do in the Fourth Dimension) but at the time got a bit confused, my brain wasn't quite feeling up to reading about complicated mathematics. I'll try that again another time.

 

I'm starting a buddy read today, Sandhya Menon - When Dimple Met Rishi, which is a YA contemporary fiction about two Indian teenagers (if I'm not mistaken?).

 

I also hope to start Peter F. Hamilton - The Void Trilogy 3: The Evolutionary Void (re-read) in a while, while the first 2 books are still somewhat fresh in my memory.

 

And seeing as I read 2 of Sigrid Landman's books in March, I'm hoping to read at least another one of her books in April.

 

I've been tempted to order some books (& other things) online, but so far I haven't. There are a couple of books I pre-ordered a while ago, still to be released.

 

Bookshelf organising.. well, with the current situation, our move to the new house may be delayed (my bookshelves at home are a bit of a mess, because I donated some books a while ago). We're sometimes working on the new house, with the materials we already have, but I'm not going out shopping (for furniture and other things a house needs) until the pandemic is over. Some things I can order online, and will do in a while (such as a washing machine or a freezer), when it is the right time (ie. when we're closer to moving and having the rooms done). But things like furniture (a bed for example) I really want to see in a shop for myself and sit on etc (in the case of a chair or bed etc).

 

 

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I have been reading favourite chapters / passages from favourite book series. Dipping in and out as the mood takes me. A bit of a butterfly approach, but I am enjoying myself. It'll keep things ticking over until I finally settle on a new thing to read. 

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18 hours ago, Raven said:

 

Or bumblebee...

 

Indeed! I remembered yesterday that in under a fortnight I have a book arriving on my kindle, the latest in a series. That will be good to get into. I also discovered a stack of magazines I had been given months ago that I can peruse at leisure. It's always good to know just how much of this seasons fashions I won't be wearing! 

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It has been a difficult time lately. I have been finding it difficult to concentrate on my book plan that i had made for the months. Since the shelter in home began, i have been dealing with my own fear and grief, as i assume many of us would be. Therefore, i have made peace with the fact that I will have to play it by the ear courtesy pandemic. I am finding refuge and familiarity in Americanah by Chimamanda Adichie, it is like a warm soup to the soul. I am also reading this new March set anthology of poetry by a Kashmiri gentleman called Agha Shahid Ali and finishing up a revision for school of Concepts of Biology for school. I am also somehow reading some writing on Konmari method to focus my anxiety-motivated cleaning sprees. Hope ya'll keeping well, too!

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I'm past the halfway mark with my re-read of Ready to Catch Him Should He Fall.  I'm liking it a little better this time around, but it's still STRANGE, and the main character is just so passive that it's infuriating.  He absorbs situations and people like a sponge, and doesn't possess any character or backbone of his own.  It's the sort of book that leaves you with an uncomfortable tickle in the back of your throat.

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9 hours ago, tracy18 said:

It has been a difficult time lately. 


You are not alone in this, I think many of us are struggling to concentrate on reading with everything going on in the world.

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16 hours ago, Brian. said:


You are not alone in this, I think many of us are struggling to concentrate on reading with everything going on in the world.

yes this is absolutely true. Thank you for showing solidarity many good wishes to you and yours

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On 06/04/2020 at 8:19 PM, Brian. said:


You are not alone in this, I think many of us are struggling to concentrate on reading with everything going on in the world.

 

I'm finding it's having the opposite effect, and am reading rather more than normal; I suppose we all deal with this sort of thing in our own different ways.  My reading has been a bit scattered because I've been preparing to do some Skype tutoring with my nieces in Ireland, so have been reading sections of textbooks on trigonometry and the Napoleonic wars, but have still been doing a fair bit, even if doesn't get reported on as 'reading'.  In between, I finished Michelle Obama's Becoming last night, and Jean-Paul Didierlaurent's The Reader on the 6.27 this morning.  The former was a book group read that I wouldn't have normally chosen, but am glad to have read (5/6 stars), the latter a light bit of French whimsy that grew on me (3.5/6 stars) - after a string of fairly heavy books/texts, something light was definitely needed!  I've got a stack of some 18 library books to tackle, mostly non-fiction, but might continue the lighter thread with the next book or two. Whatever, one of my slowest starts to the year looks like it's accelerating. Just hope that we all stay well enough to be able deal with the situation in our own individual ways.

Edited by willoyd
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I'll be making a start on The Longest Journey by E.M. Forster later today.  I've loved most of everything I've read of his (A Passage to India being a notable exception; that was flipping dreadful), so am looking forward to this early work, which is supposedly autobiographical.

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I finished The Skeleton Road by Val McDermid last night and I really enjoyed it. I've read a few duds recently so it was a welcome diversion at the moment. Not too sure what I will pick up next but it will probably be something non-fiction.

Edited by Brian.
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I am reading SM Reine's Descent series of books, described as; 

 

A dark, gritty urban fantasy series featuring an emotionally scarred exorcist, her witch partner, scary demons, scarier angels, and the looming threat of apocalypse. 

 

I'm enjoying the mindless demon fighting violence wrapped around a story arc. Easy reading, fast paced and just not-of-this-world enough to appeal to my brain right now. 

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Just finished Pale Rider by Laura Spinney - a history of the Spanish Flu. Distinctly better than the book on the same subject by Catherine Arnold, Pandemic 1918.  4/6 stars: a (very) good read.  I've gone back to Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries, which I read to about the half way mark back in February. 

Edited by willoyd
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A quick break from The Luminaries to read John Williams' Stoner for one of my book groups (it's also part of my Tour of the USA challenge), which I finished tonight.  Beautifully written, but utterly depressing, I can't say that I overly 'enjoyed' it, although appreciated its excellence.  My grades, however, factor in the former, and I just didn't, really didn't, enjoy it after the first 50 pages or so.  3/6.  

Edited by willoyd
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9 hours ago, willoyd said:

A quick break from The Luminaries to read John Williams' Stoner for one of my book groups (it's also part of my Tour of the USA challenge), which I finished tonight.  Beautifully written, but utterly depressing, I can't say that I overly 'enjoyed' it, although appreciated its excellence.  My grades, however, factor in the former, and I just didn't, really didn't, enjoy it after the first 50 pages or so.  3/6.  

 

Even though I loved Stoner (It was probably my favourite read of 2018) I understand what you mean about it being utterly depressing. That level of emotion coupled with the beautiful writing meant I really enjoyed it but equally I can understand how that constant dark cloud could make is less enjoyable for others.

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11 hours ago, Brian. said:

Even though I loved Stoner (It was probably my favourite read of 2018) I understand what you mean about it being utterly depressing. That level of emotion coupled with the beautiful writing meant I really enjoyed it but equally I can understand how that constant dark cloud could make is less enjoyable for others.

I was in a distinct minority in my book group.  I scored it 6/10: one other scored it lower, at 4, whilst everybody else went for 9s and 10s.  We low scorers are the only men in the group - may be coincidence, or may be relevant.  We often think very differently, but had very similar reactions this time.  For me the writing compensated a bit - for my partner in 'crime' it didn't!

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Finished The Easternmost House by Juliet Blaxland, describing a year living in a house on the Suffolk coast, threatened with coastal erosion (by the end of the book, the edge is only 19m from the house - it's been subsequently demolished, just before Christmas).  More a series of thoughts on aspects of living there, not least the relationship between town and country.  Not quite as much depth or nuance as I had hoped, but still a good read.  4/6.

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Finished listening No Time Like the Past (The Chronicle of St Mary's #5) by Jodi Taylor

 

Another cracking story. Plus the narrator, Zara Ramm, is excellent.

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Two more books finished to day.  First was Napoleon by David Bell, one of the excellent OUP Very Short Introduction series (I'm getting addicted to these!); they may only each be 120 or so pages long, but all those I've read so far have been jam packed and highly readable.  The second A Game of Birds and Wolves by Simon Parkin, a history of the man and his Wren team who set up and developed the wargaming unit that trained naval officers fighting the Battle of the Atlantic in how to combat the U-boats.  Sounds a bit geeky and dry, but is anything but - an absorbing narrative history that brings the people involved thoroughly to life, even if (or perhaps because?) it takes a hundred pages before it actually gets on the history of the unit itself.  4/6 and 5/6 respectively.

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