frankie

Aww Here's hoping the rest of the year will be more rewarding and will make up for the first five months of 2016

Hello and welcome to the forum!

Better keep quiet, then I can't wait to get into This Is Life tonight. Absolutely loving it.

What would the Book Box say about that

Reading summary for May 19 - The Last of the Bowmans by J. Paul Henderson - library loan 4/5 20 - Here's Looking at You by Mhairi McFarlane - library loan 3/5 21 - Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs - re-read 4/5 22 - You Sent Me a Letter by Lucy Dawson - library loan 2/5 - Look Who's Back by Timur Vermes - library loan - abandoned for now - narrator was talking too much politics for my liking and I was fearing this would continue throughout the book. Not what I'm looking for in a book at the moment. - Jewelled Moth by Katherine Woodfine - library loan - abandoned for now - didn't suite my current mood 23 - No Safe House by Linwood Barclay - library loan 3/5 24 - Dry by Augusten Burroughs - re-read 5/5 - This Is Life by Dan Rhodes - library loan - currently reading Considering that I read only two books in April, I did pretty darn well in May! One 2/5 novel, the others were at least likable or very likable, and one 5/5, too. (I think I have only two 5/5 books so far this year, so it's not going all too well!) I'm really enjoying This Is Life by Dan Rhodes, so it's a good start for June. It might be my next 5/5 read...

What's your book activity today? What are you reading, which books have you acquired today?

How are you doing today? Any plans for June? Feeling all summery/wintery? Discuss your every day life here!

Hello and welcome to the forum, Sazza!

Thanks Athena!

108 pages in, loving it so far

I've been wanting to go to a flea market / recycling center for a while now, just to go and browse books that might be there. Just for fun. I haven't been doing that in ages and I've missed it. So I visited a flea market that's next to the subway station near my work place. I made a few great finds! I got: - The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair by Joël Dicker - I've been wanting to read this for almost a year, I think! I love the sound of the blurb I think it's going to be a great one, but it's so long that I've hesitated to start it before. I've borrowed it from the library many times, I'm happy that now I have my own copy for when the mood to read it strikes I got it for 3€. - The Bookseller of Kabul by Åsne Seierstad - I've had this on my wishlist for a while, I was so excited to find a copy of the book! This was 1€. - The Ladies of Missalonghi by Colleen McCullough - I read this some years ago, I don't remember why... I think I picked it up by accident and when I read the story was taking place in the Blue Mountains, I had to read it And I loved it! Such a darling story Very excited to have found an English copy of the book. 1€. Today was the last day of my 4 month trial period at work, and from tomorrow I'll be working for my Boss with a contract that will be valid until further notice So I guess I felt like celebrating a bit by going book browsing. Boss and I will be celebrating my first 'real' day at work, my 'inauguration' as she put it, by going to Sello where she's been wanting to go for weeks, and which happens to be the big shopping mall next to where I used to live. I haven't been there since September, so it's going to be rather nostalgic!

I have to come fourth. Pun intended. Maybe chalie and her family's just picked up on some really new really cool books and soon enough she's read them all and reviewed them, and we'll find ourselves buying the very same list of books

Oh yay! I wasn't completely off and not even far off!

Yes indeed

"Aurélie Renard was standing on the west side of the small square." - This Is Life by Dan Rhodes

I started reading This Is Life by Dan Rhodes last night, only 38 pages in but it seems very promising

I didn't know there was a book.. I just caught the show by accident and couldn't stop watching and didn't want to stop watching It was only afterwards I found out about the book.

Seems like a very successful bookish trip to London, Alexander the Great!

Yep, let's keep our fingers crossed It'll be fun to see how long it takes to get published (if at all).

Just got great 'customer service' from a Finnish publishing house... No, maybe I shouldn't be so surprised, but I'm very flattered! Like I've said before, Boss has become a huge fan of Augusten Burroughs and we've been sad that A Wolf at the Table hasn't yet been translated into Finnish. Boss is good at English but she's not accustomed to reading books in English so she said she'd take forever to finish a novel. Well, yesterday I just felt like I had to know: is there anything else by Burroughs that's going to be translated into Finnish? I searched the big wide web and found out which publishing house is responsible for the Finnish translations of Burroughs's works. It didn't take me long to find that the books have been published by Sammakko ('Frog'), and as they had a few e-mail addresses in their contact info, I just wrote to one of them asking about the whole thing. And now I just got an e-mail from them, saying that they'd considered translating AWatT, but there's been so many English wordsmithery moments in the book that it had felt like it couldn't be translated into Finnish. I was sad to hear that! However, they said that they are thinking about translating Lust & Wonder into Finnish. Boss has been talking about that book so she'll be happy to hear the news. Well, possible news, anyways. Nothing's decided yet. But to think that they would answer my e-mail so soon, and on a weekend, too! ... Very exciting!

23. No Safe House by Linwood Barclay Blurb: Seven years ago, Cynthia Archer was plunged into a nightmare that almost cost the lives of her family. Today, the past has finally been laid to rest but the memory of that terrible ordeal lingers on and Cynthia is finding it hard to give her daughter the freedom to make her own mistakes. Then two neighbours are murdered in what seems a senseless and motiveless attack, and the whole town starts to share a sense of foreboding. But it's only when Cynthia's daughter and her delinquent boyfriend break into a strange house and find something they definitely weren't looking for that the nightmare begins again for real.... Thoughts: As a novel in itself, there was nothing wrong with this one. It's fast-paced, there are twists and turns, and it's well written. However, having read a number of Linwood Barclay's novels, I was expecting a bit more from this one. I guess, truth be told, I was expecting more blood and mayhem Am I really getting too callous? 3/5

22. You Sent Me a Letter by Lucy Dawson Amazon: At 2 a.m. on the morning of her fortieth birthday, Sophie wakes to find an intruder in her bedroom. The stranger hands Sophie a letter and issues an threat: open the letter at her party that evening, in front of family and friends, at exactly 8 p.m., or those she loves will be in grave danger. What can the letter possibly contain? This will be no ordinary party; Sophie is not the only person keeping a secret about the evening ahead. When the clock strikes eight, the course of several people's lives will be altered for ever. Thoughts: What a wonderfully suspenseful premise for a thriller! But unfortunately, the execution of the novel failed in my opinion. One of the main 'twists' was discovered too easily and too soon, from the perspective of the protagonist, and I thought it had to be something else, because it was too easy and obvious and even boring.. But then I found out that that was it. Of course there were future twists in store but after the first one having been such a disappointment, I couldn't really muster up any enthusiasm for the rest. The blurb was so promising, but the novel was a let-down. 2/5

I'm very sorry for the late response! When I was going through new content on the forum back in April, I know I had still at least 7 threads to get to, but when I again clicked for new content to see the threads with new posts since my last visit, they were all gone. It's happened before, and it's so annoying when it happens... I think we should call it a Daddy tan White chicken legs Oh the mental images... I've only ever read that one book by Judy Blume... Goodreads tells me it's called It's Not the End of the World. I liked it okay when I was a kid. I think I tried reading another book of Blume's but didn't like it at all, so I've not been keen on her other novels.

I don't know anyone who's liked it... Although I have to say, I don't think I've discussed the book with many other people Nicola, who used to come on here on a regular basis years back, also had a huge problem with Lestat the book... It was going nowhere I don't know if I should give him another chance. Because I would definitely like to read the other books in the series! Mary Roach?! She must be so cool... I read Stiff in 2010 and totally loved it! It's in my top 5 of non-fiction books, for sure. I can't believe how hard it made me laugh, given the subject matter... A brilliantly written book You're so lucky you got to talk to her! Was she funny? I bet she was very easily approachable and nice Wow, that's a lot of celebrities! Poor Buzz Aldrin Oddly enough (us having mentioned Roz and Frasier), I think I remember him from Frasier... He was co-narrating a documentary on space with Frasier...? I now have to check whether I'm thinking of the right man! Edit: Oh crap, imdb doesn't give anything for Aldrin in Frasier. Who was I thinking about, then? Edit: Ah, Senator John Glenn or something. Well that's an egg on my face

Great review of Cranford, Janet! When I first saw the mini-series on TV; I immediately went and ordered a copy and I was so keen on reading the book! But it was vignettes, and I was so disappointed.... I was hoping or rather expecting a very similar storyline to the TV series Are there a lot of different characters, do you think one can get confused? (I don't remember the names of the characters from the TV series, and so I might be overwhelmed by them all...) Do the characters at least match the characters in the TV series? You mention a few discrepancies, but please tell me there are only a few! (I mean, for example, Fried Green Tomatoes was a mess to read after having seen the movie first, and in addition, Sex and the City was just crap and the characters were totally different, after first having watched the TV show.) Yay! I hope you will enjoy it There's also a novel called My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry, by the same author, but I've not read that one as oddly enough, it hasn't been translated into Finnish yet (which is so odd because it's now available in English, too! We usually get there before you, as we get a lot of the Nordic literature translated into Finnish before things get translated into English. As one would expect, what with the geological closeness and the history). Someone on here, though, has read it, and I think they enjoyed it. I can't remember what their username is on here...