Signor Finzione

I've never heard of this book either, but have read and enjoyed both Jekyll and Hyde and Treasure Island. Glad you enjoyed this!

I'm really glad you enjoyed Storm of Swords - a perfect score, oh my! I remember really enjoying this one too. There are a few things that are in the TV series but not the books (such as the character of Ros), and with such a big series (with so many characters!) it's easy to get mixed up.

Oh god, this sounds GORGEOUS! Just to clarify: did you have the Yorkshire pudding (one of my favourites) with the turkey or with the antipasto? I have to wait another 9 days for mine . . . unless you fancy sending some of your leftovers my way??

Hi Jake! Welcome. There are a fair few fantasy fans on here, and most of us are familiar with ASoIaF - I'm sure we'll find plenty to chat about.

A shame you didn't enjoy it as much as I did, Tim. Glad you're sticking with the trilogy to the end, though! It was me who said I enjoyed it much more the second time round (though as you said, that's not going to help you much here . . .). I felt that Jorg was a lot more conflicted and sympathetic in this one, rather than being straight-up passionless. I also had similar issues with the lack of character development; I think it was Steve who suggested that this is part of Jorg's PoV - Jorg doesn't really give a damn about getting to know the other characters and therefore doesn't tell us much about them. But yeah, I think I said much of the same stuff in my review, though I liked it more. I liked how the story built to its climax, and I didn't mind the flashbacks - apart from the Katherine letters. I wanted her to just DIE.

Ohhh this sounds delicious Devi! *drools* I love food.

Wow, BB, that's one monster of a TBR you have there. I have to say: Do Worms Have Willies? made me giggle like a schoolgirl.

Hi Vixen. I hope you'll enjoy Jane Eyre - I loved it, and look forward to hearing what you think. I'll also be interested to hear your thoughts on Alif the Unseen, as it's been on my wishlist for a while.

You'll really enjoy Bleak House, I think. Rebecca and Oryx and Crake are both great, too.

Hi Maria! Welcome.

This is a great approach Julie. I hope to do something similar - just have a general list of books I want to read but no time limits or pressure. Hope you have fun with it!

Hi Vixen, and welcome! I loved The Book Thief too.

Ha, fair enough . Hope you enjoy ADWD more than I did. Every year (since they made Game of Thrones into a TV show) I've done a full re-read of the series before each season. But I think if I were going to do that this time round I should have started last month.

Me neither!

Review: 'John Dies at the End' by David Wong I bought this book for £2 from a charity shop a few days ago. This is not really a summary, but it’s from the back cover: STOP. You should not have touched this book with your bare hands. No, don’t put it down. It’s too late. They’re watching you. My name is David Wong. My best friend is John. Those names are fake. You might want to change yours. You may not want to know about the things you’ll read on these pages, about the sauce, about Korrok, about the invasion, and the future. But it’s too late. You touched the book. You’re in the game. You’re under the eye. The only defense is knowledge. You need to read this book, to the end. Even the part with the bratwurst. Why? You just have to trust me. The important thing is this: · The drug is called soy sauce, and it gives users a window into another dimension. · John and I never had the chance to say no. · You still do. Unfortunately for us, if you make the right choice, we’ll have a much harder time explaining how to fight off the otherworldly invasion currently threatening to enslave humanity. I’m sorry to have involved you in this, I really am. But as you read about these terrible events and the very dark epoch the world is about to enter as a result, it is crucial you keep one thing in mind: NONE OF THIS IS MY FAULT. Yeah. John Dies at the End is unlike anything I usually read (and probably also unlike anything I will ever read again). It’s weird. It’s about a young man named David and his friend John (who doesn’t actually die at the end . . .) who become accidentally involved in a battle between good and evil. After taking a drug called ‘soy sauce’ they find they can see things that most people can’t – such as shadow people and electric jellyfish – and must try and protect their friends from the forces of darkness, which are trying to infiltrate earth. In the process of saving the world they must fight meat monsters, murder possessed policemen, make dogs explode, and travel through a portal to another world which they nickname ‘Sh*t Narnia’. The whole book isn’t so much a story as a mixed satire on several genres – namely science fiction, crime and horror – and as such it feels rather hodgepodge for most of its duration, more like a series of sketches or skits than a cohesive novel. That said, it did make me laugh, though I did tend to find that a lot of the American humour and references went over my head. I’ve been a fan of the humour website Cracked.com for years (of which the author is the editor-in-chief), and as such am familiar with David Wong’s particular brand of humour. I think that helped me to overcome the general ‘WTF?’ experience this book instils in the reader. I think I would have appreciated this book more if I were more familiar with the genres it pastiches. I personally felt it to be a sort of mash-up of the content of Stephen King’s more terrible stories and Kurt Vonnegut’s odd writing style, but the blurbs on the back compare it to Douglas Adams, Philip K Dick and Hunter S Thompson, none of whom I’ve read. I’ve read all 466 pages of this book and I’m still not sure whether to recommend it, take it back to the charity shop, or burn it. Perhaps I’ll compromise and do all three. My rating: 3/5

Great review of World War Z - glad you enjoyed it! There are some really amazing individual stories in there, aren't there? The film is fine as long as you try and pretend it isn't anything to do with the book.

I enjoyed The Order of the Phoenix (book 5) and The Philosopher's Stone (book 1) the most, personally. Prisoner of Azkaban (book 3) and the last two books were my least favourite in the series, although I still enjoyed them. I was lucky in that I read the first book when I was 11, and grew up with the series: the age of the characters roughly matched my age as each book was released. Yeah, the last book is mostly poo, apart from the big finale, which is great. Not the epilogue, though. That was awful and had the feel of a fan fiction short story tacked on to the end. Definitely give the whole series a go at some point, though - you might be surprised.

I still plan on reading the books that were on it at some point, but lately I've found that what I want to read changes from day to day. I'll probably try and start a new one in a couple of weeks for the new reading log. Forgot to say that The Dragon's Path is one I hope to read soon - it'll be interesting to see what we both make of it.

Wow, those are great Devi! Well done. I tried growing my own veg once - I bought one of those little greenhouses you can put together yourself. Within a month one of the shelves had fallen down and destroyed all the things on it. The second month there was a storm that blew the greenhouse over. The third month, the covering ripped and the cold got in and everything died. Now I just limit myself to a pair of potted lavender trees and a tiny pot of coriander on the windowsill. There's a reason you don't see many lemon trees in the north of England, I guess.

Wow, 139 books! Congratulations. I don't think I'd like the books smelling of smoke either. A friend who smokes lent me a book once and I hated holding it as it made my hands feel dirty. If I buy from a charity shop I'll always have a quick sniff to make sure the pages don't smell bad.

Great review! I can tell you're completely infatuated with this era at the moment. I'm interested to know whether you think this book is weaker than the Cornwell for blending the historical with the supernatural? See! Not my fault. I knew it! Also have to say: that cover is gorgeous.

Well done on finishing your plan! Mine went down the toilet a few weeks ago. Look forward to seeing what you think of the Lawrence and the Martin.

I see you've been having your own read-a-thon, Gaia! There isn't a follow-up book, is there? A shame it wasn't as good as it could have been. My mum reads a lot of Ian Rankin, but I've never tried him. Have you ever read anything by Kate Atkinson? Perhaps you'd like her Jackson Brodie series.

Well, it's neither. It's pretty straight-up fantasy, but the magic is unique and I think the characters are interesting enough to set it slightly above a lot of the other stuff that's been out recently. I enjoyed it, anyway. That's almost as bad as his quote on the front of Mark Lawrence: "on a par with Conn Iggulden".

I do agree with this: I don't enjoy housework and use any excuse to avoid doing it. But I know a few people who spend their entire days at home and yet do not adhere to basic standards of cleanliness, either in their homes or with regard to their small children. It drives me batty, and I think that's why the writer's suggestion about doing less housework in general (no matter how ironic) got my back up a little. I don't usually take this sort of thing too seriously. I'm not a feminist, although I'm a woman, and I'm not the opposite of a feminist either. No doubt. As I say, knowing people that live in varying levels of squalor themselves probably made me a bit more outraged at the suggestion than I should have been. My husband and I both work (well, I'm not at the moment, but will be again shortly), and we compromise on the housework: why can't they? There's no excuse for sending your kids to school unwashed and smelly, when all you do yourself is sit at home and smoke cigarettes all day. (sorry, strong subject. I'll just stop now. ) Good title for the thread - I think it sums up the article perfectly. Although I didn't notice the 'filth' thing - my mind obviously isn't as dirty as Pixie's. .