~Andrea~
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Posts posted by ~Andrea~
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Shaman's Crossing by Robin Hobb
Nevare Burvelle is the second son of a Gernian noble and as such is destined for life in the military. His father, himself a second son and a soldier, promoted to noble status by the king, is concerned that Nevare doesn't have what it takes. He sends him off for survival training with a warrior of the Kidona tribe, a traditional enemy of the civilised Gernians and regarded as savages by them. His father hadn't bargained on the strange tribal magic Nevare would encounter there that leave his son changed and conflicted about where his loyalties truly lie. When Nevare eventually goes to military academy, he has to battle not only the prejudices and hostility of the old aristocracy who don't take kindly to the new nobles, but also the tribal magic within as it vies for dominance in the young soldier.
I'd heard that this was a slow trilogy so I was expecting to struggle with this, however I found it an easy and engaging read with plenty of action to keep me interested. It's set in an entirely different world to Hobb's other trilogies which all have overlapping places, characters and themes. It's perhaps not as good as some of her other stuff, but I still enjoyed reading it. Then again I am a bit of a die hard fan so maybe it's just me!
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Well hello again everyone! I'm so glad I can come back to this thread! Some reviews of what I've read in the interim will follow!
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This is fantastic!
Thanks Hayley, Michelle and Gaia.
I look forward to getting stuck in again!
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Bye Raven. And goodbye to anyone else not joining FB or GR. It's been a pleasure!
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I'll be gettiing my content this weekend too. Get well soon Sari
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Yes please I'll help. Err not sure actually.
I'll check later and join if not.
EDIT: I've joined!!
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Thanks Michelle. I'd be happy to give it a go if people want to use that group.
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I've just been right clicking the web pages and choosing "Save Page As". It then very slowly saves the webpage and a folder for all the images etc. You can view them offline in a web browser. Obviously once the site goes down any internal (BCF) links on those pages won't work.
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On 10/08/2018 at 10:46 PM, willoyd said:
I feel the same about you and others. Even though I'm trying to contribute to the Facebook page, it's not the same (of course, I know it's not meant to be!). With the best will in the world, it's a bit like moving from an in-depth and involving conversation to party smalltalk - hard to sustain anything of substance (but that might be my misunderstanding of Facebook), and I've never felt comfortable at parties. For the moment, I've set up a BCF-style blog thread on the BCF group in LibraryThing, which is less well organised but enables threads like this to be sustained much more easily than in Facebook. I do think that if more people used the LT group for reviews etc, it could be interlinked with the Facebook group (which does seem to have attracted more people back) to be almost as effective as BCF itself. Depends on what people want I suppose. Otherwise, I'll probably got a full scale blog at some stage; I'm looking to do one involving both the books and the birds!
You sum it up well! I'm not a huge lover of FB even though I use it quite a bit. I'll probably dip in and out of the group but like you I find it a bit busy.
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On 05/08/2018 at 3:55 PM, willoyd said:
(the one on GoodReads doesn't seem to have attracted anybody)
I wasn't even aware there was one! Do you have a link / name for it?
EDIT: Don't worry - I have it now (from the forum closure discussions thread).
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I'm thinking Goodreads might suit me quite well actually. It's like a kind of bookish facebook from what I can see so far. Also my main activity on this site was in the book blogs section (which doesn't seem to be a feature of any of the other book forums), so instead of a blog I'm going to have a goodreads shelf for each year so I can log what I've read. Then you can add a note to each book which will be my review. (People can comment on that I believe). It won't be the same as having a blog here but I'm hoping it will be ok. There are quite a lot of people from here there too.
EDIT: Apparently there is a BCF group on there but I can't find it. If anyone knows its name (or has a link) I'd be grateful!
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On 13/08/2018 at 10:59 AM, Athena said:
I'm saving content I want to keep, as HTML manually, but I'm not done yet. I have my recent reviews as documents (.txt) on the computer, but not my older stuff (yet).
That's what I was intending to do, just for all my reading blogs over the years, which are all thankfully quite short. (Finally there's an advantage to being a slow reader!) I've made a tiny start but it's a bit laborious.
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Thanks Pixie! I haven't read it properly yet but it looks good.
I need to make time first
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On 7/29/2018 at 5:36 PM, Madeleine said:
I'm on another forum which is a lot quieter than this one and still carries on,
On 7/29/2018 at 8:07 PM, willoyd said:I've explored one or two other forums in the past, and none have come close in terms of what you have provided over (for me) the past almost decade (one was lovely, but as Madeleine says it only just about carries on).
What's the forum? Maybe a few of us from here could join it, and give it a bit of a numbers boost?
I've also just joined the LT group! (I'm on the FB one as well).
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On 25/07/2018 at 9:50 AM, Madeleine said:
I've decided to dump a couple of series - Hidden - the Welsh crime drama on BBC4, I got halfway through and started to watch Ep 5 last night (it finishes this weekend) and thought, this is so dreary and I really don't care what happens to any of the characters, so I switched it off. Also gave up on Sharp Objects (Sky Atlantic), got fed up with the constant flashbacks and the endless roller-skating! So that's gone too after 3 episodes. Has anyone else dumped any series?
3 hours ago, Madeleine said:Oh yes Mosaic, I watched the first one, maybe two, and then gave up on that as well, in fact I'd completely forgotten about it. Shame - as with Sharp Objects - a waste of a good cast and setting.
I also forgot about Picnic at Hanging Rock last night, not sure if I'll go back to it either.
That's interesting. I have Hidden recorded. I've watched about one and a half episodes but never seem to find myself going back to it. Maybe I should give up on it.
And picninc at hanging rock is another one I'm not sure about. Again I've watched one and a half episodes, but it's not really doing it for me. It seems a lot of episodes for a story
Spoilerwith no resolution
I did enjoy Keeping Faith recently. Another welsh one - about a missing husband. They're repeating it right now I think. I thought Eve Myles was brilliant in it, and while it's a missing person thriller, it wasn't dreary or depressing at all because her character was so interesting.
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Ooh, now A Book of Silence sounds interesting. I think I'd be quite tempted by that, or something similar, but it's probably be one of those books you'd have to be in the mood for.
I do love silence. (Or maybe I just hate noise!)
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17 hours ago, Little Pixie said:
Talking of finding/making time to read - I read a good article recently about Laura Vanderkaam ( who writes Time Management books ) - she recommends spending a week writing down what you do all day, and finding time which you can repurpose, eg, for reading ( it did make me think of quite how much time I can spend playing spider solitaire...
) I can copy the article if you fancy reading it ( it was on the Times site, which has a paywall ). 
Oh yes please Pixie.Thank you! Though I dread to think what I'd find out about how I spend my time
. Doing not very much I expect - especially in this heat. It's making me very lazy!
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Pasta! I've been eating tonnes of it in this weather, with mediterranean type sauces.
I've also been munching on crisps, tortilla chips, and some mexican food. I've had quite a few BBQs so lots of burgers. And lots of salad!
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Ooh, I like the sound of The Question of the Missing Head! I'm going to add it to the wish list.
You have some great looking books in your collection Gaia!
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On 15/07/2018 at 2:59 PM, frankie said:
That's great!
It's really hot in here, too, which I think is actually a great excuse to be lazy about other things and focus on reading 
It's too hot to do anything else! Reading outside sounds really nice I've not done it yet this summer, I need to jump in the bandwagon! Great job!
I agree about you probably needing a bit of momentum. Once you get going, you want to read more and more!
Thanks! I'm going to make 15 pages per day my new rule and set deadlines on all my reads from now on! Re the weather, I'm longing for it to cool down now!
3 hours ago, Athena said:Well done on finishing it! Two weeks early too! I'm glad you enjoyed it
. I must try some Robin Hobb some time.
Thanks Gaia. I absolutely love Robin Hobb! I find them really escapist reads I can really lose myself in. I hope you get to try one day!
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I finished Shaman's crossing - two weeks early!! All I can say is: Boom!
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Bear in mind I've only read 8 books so far this year.
1 Best book you’ve read so far in 2018.
Robert Goddard - Take No Farewell
or maybe Shaman's Crossing by Robin Hobb.
2. Best sequel you've read so far in 2018.
N/A
3. New release you haven't read yet, but want to.
Don't know
4. Most anticipated release for the second half of the year.
Don't know
5. Biggest disappointment.
The Witch Tree Symbol - Harriet Adams as Carolyn Keene (Nancy Drew mystery) it was so bad I couldn't understand how I could have enjpyed these books as a kid!
6. Biggest surprise.
Either Robert Goddard - Take No Farewell because I had no knowledge of the author so I was surprised how much I enjoyed it
Or The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold because I expected it to be depressing and it wasn't reallyOr The Screwtape Letters which was a re-read which I'd found heavy first time round but surprisingly readble this time.
7. Favourite new author. (Debut or new to you)
Robert Goddard (new to me)
8. Newest fictional crush.
Um what??
9. Newest favourite character.
No standouts really.
10. Book that made you cry.
I can't remember but it's possible that The Lovely Bones made me cry
11. Book that made you happy.
Shaman's crossing by Robin Hobb - because I was reading a Robin Hobb I'd never read before, and it's just so escapist and comforting.
12. Favourite book to film adaptation you saw this year.
N/A
13. Favourite review you've written this year. (Booktube version: Favourite video you have done so far in this year)
Not sure I have one
14. Most beautiful book you've bought so far this year (or received).
None of them have been particularly beautiful. I mostly buy second hand paperbacks and ebooks!
15. What books do you need to read by the end of the year?
Nothing planned!!
Thanks for finding the questions Gaia!
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Hi Loretta. As I see you've discovered, the introductions section is the correct place.
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Hi and welcome! Your English seems pretty good to me!
Andrea's reading in 2018
in Past Book Logs
Posted
Definitely the Farseer trilogy Hayley. It's the first chronologically of 4 trilogies (plus other books) all set in the same world. The first book is Assassin's Apprentice. I hope you get to read it (and love it!)