Athena

Nice photos, everyone ! I agree, it's nice to have a face to go with the names.

You're kind of spoiling it there.. I've already seen it but perhaps you could edit your post to add [ spoiler ] tags?

Most of mine have a black spine, though I think I have one (a double copy of something I also have in an omnibus) with a yellow spine. I didn't know the yellow spine meant newer. I also prefer the black spine. Steve, that's pretty cheap !

x Excellent news! I might go and see it in the cinema while I'm on holidays (although it'll be a bit difficult without subtitles). Will have to see how tired I will etc.

Thanks, Peacefield ! You have fun too!

So many nice pictures in this thread ! @ Tesla S I'm glad to hear the comments .

x I hope you enjoy this one! I'm awaiting the paperback release. x x I have a lot of classics, however most of them are on my TBR, so unfortunately I haven't read enough to recommend much (other than Dutch literature, but I don't think you know Dutch?). I loved Charlotte Brontë - Jane Eyre, I didn't like Truman Capote - Breakfast at Tiffany's (though I liked In Cold Blood) and should really read more classics. I also read some children's classics, but don't think that's what you're looking for. I have a lot of classics on my TBR though and I've heard good things about those. But I can't give you a more personal recommendation at this point in time.

x I believe these are the ones I've read, and I'd recommend them too. I have a few more books of the series but I haven't read them yet. I have read other books from the list but I have them in different editions (Dune, Hyperion, The Fall of Hyperion, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Time Machine)0. I would recommend all of them. I also have some books from the list on my TBR but in different editions. Some others are on my wishlist.

x Thanks . Who knows, maybe someday in your life (maybe when you're retired?) you'll get to do a lot of reading.

No, I haven't. It's also on my wishlist . I recently read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and quite liked it and so added some other books by the author to my wishlist. Glad to hear you really like A Scanner Darkly, I'll definately have to get it at some point!

! Wow, that's pretty terrible though. I used to notice a lot of spelling errors when I read books as a child, but these days (reading English books) I'm not seeing as many of them (and I'm normally good at spotting spelling errors). That said, maybe it depends on the books I read or something (I sometimes tend to wait a while for prices to drop, so many of my books aren't first editions). Thanks ! I've put The Winter King on my wishlist.

As per usual, I've picked one Roald Dahl book to read during this read-a-thon, I picked James and the Giant Peach. I read this one when I was a child and it's one of the ones that are a bit longer (about 100ish pages I think). I also picked a classic to maybe read during the read-a-thon: Anna Sewell - Black Beauty. Other than that there's still quite some books left from previous piles I made (some I discarded for now and put back on their shelves). I plan to also read a QuickReads, I recently bought a few more of those though I haven't quite decided which one of the QuickReads I'll read. I don't want to start reading a big paper book just before my holidays (I'm bringing my Kindle and no paper books) so I want to try and pick shorter reads. The current plan is to participate Friday at least, then see how much time I have on Saturday and Sunday. I'll need to make holiday preparations, look things up, print things, think about packing, etc (I'm one of those people who prefer to do it sooner rather than at the latest possibility). If there's time and energy left after that and my boyfriend wants to do something on his own (rather than doing something together), then I could read during that time. Has anyone else decided yet what they'll read?

I started to read Anita Shreve - Body Surfing but couldn't get into the writing style so I've put it aside for now (I'm in the mood for something easier to read). Instead I've started to read Delphine de Vigan - No and Me, I've only read 10 pages so far but it's quite good. It reads easily and it seems like an interesting story.

Has it happened to you often that a Kindle version is wrongly formatted or has a lot of spelling errors? I try to check it before I buy a book, by reading the reviews etc. So far I've had no unsurmountable problems, but I've only had my Kindle for a few months. Congrats on your new purchases, btw . If I were to start with one of his books, which one do you recommend I put on the wishlist? Or do you think they aren't books for me?

Nice review ! I've put The World Jones Made on my wishlist.

Thanks frankie .

Wow.. that's really hot. Outside it can be that hot here on occasion, but inside our farm it's usually under 30 degrees. In most other houses though it's warmer than in ours. On the downside, in the winter it can be pretty cold here in this house. Maybe you can make the agreement that if the temperature drops below a certain value (which is comfortable for you) that you then go to jog again? Let's say the maximum temperature predicted in the afternoon is 25 C. Then if you jog in the morning or in the evening it should be 20 degrees or lower. Would that be doable?

Wow, that sounds really nice. I wish you the best of luck ! Yesterday we went out for dinner, to celebrate the holidays (my parents' idea). The restaurant we wanted to go to, was completely full already so we went somewhere else. It was really nice! It was noisy though and so I was really tired. I listened to my iPod while we were waiting for food to arrive (not while eating), it was just too noisy not to. I was a bit bored too just sitting there listening to music (I didn't really want to listen to music but the music's better than the chatter of all the people so..) so I played a bit with my phone. I made my first English wordsearch (a free app I found by browsing the games section) and did a variety of other things, including looking at my books (3G is expensive for me so I didn't use the internet). It was fun talking with my family and my boyfriend. Yesterday evening when we came back home, my mind was so full that it took me some time to fall asleep (also I felt really warm). Today I plan on mostly resting, I'll need it after yesterday. It does make me a bit worried about my holidays, what if I get very tired then too? Or will the fun offset some of the tiredness, like last year? Well, I just hope it'll be allright, that we can have some fun.

Nice to see photos of all of you!! I don't think I've ever posted my photo here (have I?) but I don't have a really recent one on hand at the moment (unless I go and pose for it and ask someone else to take the photo). I'm a little bit hesitant to post a photo online because in the past it's been abused (someone stole my picture and used it to post as me, turning me into a big bullying spot on purpose, it was really mean.. anyway..) and people have left bad comments on it. Anyway, I don't think anything like that would happen here, you're all such awesome people. Here are two photos of a few months ago: After my holidays I might have a more recent photo to show you.

Ryanair's prices are usually pretty good when we use them (we mainly fly from Eindhoven to London and/or back)! My boyfriend's had a flight of 5-10 euros before (of course, Eindhoven to London is a shorter distance than from Finland to Italy). If you book a bit in advance (for London at least a month or so) then prices are pretty reasonable to excellent (unless it's holidays), in my opinion. I hope you get to visit Italy some day . I've been there twice I believe (and once passing through) and really liked both times (I've been to Tuscany and the Rome area). PS. I'm also allergic to cats.

I hope the best for you, frankie !! I don't know about Finnish, it'd take me longer than two days to translate a Dutch article into English, but less than a month (assuming I work 38 hours per week, which I couldn't do because of my disability but anyway..). I think I'd be able to do it in 38-76 hours worth (or one-two weeks worth if you work full-time), if the article contains some complicated words and sentences. If it's easily written with very common words, I could do it faster. I'm not a professional translator though! I think professional translators would do several times more checking to make sure everything's perfect-ish, whereas when I translate things I don't check it as often (just once or twice afterwards). Btw, the more you translate (and the more often you do it), the easier it becomes! In my opinion. I help my dad translate some of his writings, now and then (and also of course for secondary school).

I've added The Shrinking Man to my wishlist. Your review is very nicely written and makes me want to read the book !

Wuthering Heights is on my TBR, I'm glad to hear you really like this book. I look forward to see more of your thoughts on it when you return from your holiday .

x !! I hope both of you get your mojo back soon !

Emily Giffin - Baby Proof Genre: Chick-lit Format: Paperback Pages: 356 Synopsis (GoodReads): First comes love. Then comes marriage. Then comes....a baby carriage? Isnt that what all women want? Not so for Claudia Parr. And just as she gives up on finding a man who feels the same way, she meets warm, wonderful Ben. Things seem too good to be true when they fall in love and agree to buck tradition with a satisfying, child-free marriage. Then the unexpected occurs: one of them has a change of heart. One of them wants children after all. My thoughts: I read this book because I wanted something different, easier, shorter to read after reading A Clash of Kings. I bought this book at a book fair for cheap because it sounded good. I didn't actually know much about this author or this book beforehand, so there wasn't much hype surrounding the book. I really liked this book. It was easy to read yet discussed difficult issues. I thought certain things were going to happen that didn't, or the other way around. That was quite good, some of the plot twists were unexpected. The writing was pretty good, easy to read. There were some pretty nice characters in it. I really liked Claudia, but also some of the other side characters were pretty well written (ie. Claudia's sisters and best friend). I didn't care for Claudia's mother, she seemed really annoying to me. One of the things I liked about the book was that it made me think - about children, motherhood and so on. The main character in the book, Claudia, is somewhat surrounded by people with children, ie. a lot of her friends have children. It makes me wonder what it will be like for me, when ie. my siblings have children (assuming that they will, that is. I know they would like to). One of my cousins has two children, and I remember when she had her first one, that my aunt (her mother) said something like, you next. I really don't care for such comments (I'm not sure if she would ever say it again, I don't know, I don't see her that often and I don't feel like we get along well. I feel much closer to my other aunt, my mum's sister, rather than my dad's sister.) Maybe someone will mention children at my wedding, it's possible (I hope to marry my boyfriend in a few years). Anyway, it made me think. Claudia has several different reasons why she doesn't want children and while I agree with all of them, I have some reasons added on top of that (that are even more important to me). Anyway, the book is thought-provoking, for me at least. Rating: **** (8/10)