frankie

Had you and Anna decided to read The Time Traveler's Wife together, or were you two just so much in sync that it just happened by chance? Wouldn't it be funny if it was the latter

I hope you have a wonderful reading year in 2016, Shyora! And I hope you have a lot of fun with your reading log and writing reviews I've not read The Clan of the Cave Bear myself, but I've seen it often compared to Linda Lay Shuler's She Who Remembers, both dealing with similar era and themes. I've read that book and would highly recommend it in case you're looking for more books like TCotCB

It happens all too often, unfortunately... I've been hearing on the forum about Haig's tweets but personally I haven't let that bother me I hope you don't either, at least not until you've read The Last Family in England

Hello and welcome to the forum!

Hello everyone! This is the thread for the Group Read of the Just William -series. Well at least the first novel, let's see how we get along with it You may discuss the book as you go along, so be warned, there will be spoilers! I wish you all enjoy the book! - Just William is the first book of children's short stories about the young school boy William Brown, written by Richmal Crompton, and published in 1922. The book was the first in the series of William Brown books which was the basis for numerous television series, films and radio adaptations. Just William is also sometimes used as a title for the series of books as a whole, and is also the name of various television, film and radio adaptations of the books. The William stories first appeared in Home magazine and Happy Mag.

No worries at all, someone's always bound to be the last and this time it was you I'll start the thread for the convos, and may the reading commence

Oh wow, I didn't remember any of the latter parts The ones I've boldened in your spoiler Shame on me!

Thanks Jessi! I had to abandon a book last night... Yes, it's happened before, but it's usually not such a sad case. This novel, however, was one that I really wanted to love, and it's about books, too. But after droning on for 70 pages, it been boring and melodramatic, I had to put the book down and decide it was not for me. The book I'm talking about is The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George. I'm so sad. (I won't say it's just a really, really bad book. If I find others have liked it on here, at least members whose tastes are similar to mine, I'm willing to think that it might have been the English translation that sucked, in my opinion. Who knows, maybe it might sound a lot better in Finnish.) I thought I'd lost my mojo, too, but then I picked up One of Us by Åsne Seierstad and realized that no, it was just TLPB that was getting in the way of getting any enjoyment out of reading.

I don't mind tenuous links if the book is good

After many weeks of temperatures over -10 degrees, we finally have warmer weather. Plus Celsius! T-shirt weather!

That's a difficult one!! (Although I have one in mind... The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George. But I've never finished the novel. I abandoned it last night after 70 melodramatic and boring pages. I don't know, maybe the Finnish translation might work better... But I didn't like it at all!! And I loved the book cover and I also wanted to love the book )

I also liked Big Little Lies better than Husband's Secret, although that one was good, too I can't believe that you got to this book so soon, as we only just talked about it what feels like a few days ago It seems like you're having a great start to the reading year!

So I think we all have copies now except we haven't heard from poppyshake yet...?

Hello and welcome to the forum!

Hello and welcome to the forum!

I've started reading One of Us by Åsne Seierstad.

Thank goodness, because I'd started to wonder if I'd read through the revelation and didn't remember a single thing about it But on the other hand.... for not telling the reader what had happened.

I think the one thing that polarized people is whether

Oh. Seems a bit of a bold statement to compare it to someone else's work if you've not actually read the book... I hope when you do read it it will be just as you imagined it I've still not gotten into any novel so far I'm not too worried yet, I've just not come across the perfect book for my current mood...

Whether you and I agree on Alice or not, I personally think that The Phantom Tollbooth is underrated as a novel. Or maybe it's just that as a Finn, I've never come across the high praise there might be for the novel. I've just posted on my FB feed to people I know are English language lovers that they ought to read the book

I feel bad about being the one who started the thread so we could read the book and discuss it together, and then couldn't finish it myself! But I've now read it and I've posted my thoughts on it in my reading log. Overall, I really loved it! The word play was so clever that it seems like it was out of this world!!! No wonder Kylie loves it so much. I remember the time when a professor was recommending The Eyre Affair to us in class, and it's made me wonder why no one in the English department ever recommended this book, because this is just the sort of thing language students would love! There's this one particular quote that just blew my mind away, and I felt so happy that I'd noticed it and not just rushed through it without getting it. But I can't remember what it was I find it absolutely hilarious that I read somewhere that the book has been translated into many different languages. Because this is the sort of book that is just simply impossible to translate!! It just doesn't work in the same way in any other language than English. A translator's nightmare Also, I remember how Alice in Wonderland was always spoken so highly of in English classes and professors talked about how it was impossible to translate into other languages because there's so much play on words... I think The Phantom Tollbooth kicks Alice in Wonderland's arse x 1000!!

I would say this is my second least favorite of Kinsella's books, and I've read quite a few of the standalone ones (as well as the Shopaholic ones). I'm pretty sure you've read more YA than me, so you'd know more about it, but in my opinion there are just so much better YA novels out there! (Well, not that you were looking forward to reading it as a YA novel, as you just said you'd forgotten it was such a novel, but anyways... ) You're welcome, I'm happy if I was of any service In case you will start doubting your opinion, go and read Athena's review of the novel, she's also read the book and I think she liked it better than I did

6. The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster Blurb: "It seems to me that almost everything is a waste of time," Milo remarks as he walks dejectedly home from school. But his glumness soon turns to surprise when he unwraps a mysterious package marked ONE GENUINE TURNPIKE TOLLBOOTH. Once through the Phantom Tollbooth Milo has no more time to be bored for before him lies the strange land of the Kingdom of Wisdom and a series of even stranger adventures when he meets the watchdog Tock who ticks, King Azaz the Unabridged the unhappy ruler of Dictionopolis, Faintly Macabre the not so wicked Which, the Whether Man and the threadbare Excuse among a collection of the most logically illogical characters ever met on this side or that side of reality. Thoughts: Back in 2010, Kylie got me a copy of this at the magical Book Fair in Canberra. She made it sounds like a book I could not pass by, and I do trust her tastes. Thank you for the copy Kylie! I know I've given her grief for not having read the book earlier... I've promised her many a time that I would soon get to it, but there's always been stress or something. And the two occasions when I did pick the book up, I enjoyed it but then lost my mojo. I'd gotten far enough, though, in the novel to know that I would really like it and so I wanted the timing and my mood to be perfectly right.... I don't think anything I could say could really do justice to the novel. Unfortunately enough I could sort of relate to Milo's sentiments in the beginning... Sometimes life can seem a bit dreary and nothing feels much like anything. But then it all took off... The writing in this novel is just too much!! It was so clever that I would stop mid-sentence, in awe. And time and time again, Juster kept surprising me with how he could continue with the most amazing wordsmithery I've come across with in a novel. I mean, I've not gone through all the books I've ever read in my life, to check, but I wouldn't hesitate to argue that this book is so cleverly written that it's most likely the most clever book, words-wise, I've ever read! I also liked the storyline, how it started, how it took off, and where it went. One tiny niggle that I have is that as I was so concentrated on spotting all the wittiness of the book, I was on a few occasions lost regarding where the story was going. But that's a teeny tiny niggle! I have so many quotes I want to write down on my notebook... I don't think my wrist could take writing them all down There's this one particular one I'd like to present to you but I can't find it at the moment... I'm going to Goodreads and see what they have on there and copy+paste a good one! - “Whether or not you find your own way, you're bound to find some way. If you happen to find my way, please return it, as it was lost years ago. I imagine by now it's quite rusty.” - “Let me try once more," Milo said in an effort to explain. "In other words--" "You mean you have other words?" cried the bird happily. "Well, by all means, use them. You're certainly not doing very well with the ones you have now.” - “But why do only unimportant things?" asked Milo, who suddenly remembered how much time he spent each day doing them. "Think of all the trouble it saves," the man explained, and his face looked as if he'd be grinning an evil grin--if he could grin at all. "If you only do the easy and useless jobs, you'll never have to worry about the important ones which are so difficult. You just won't have the time. For there's always something to do to keep you from what you really should be doing, and if it weren't for that dreadful magic staff, you'd never know how much time you were wasting.” (This speaks to me ) - For more, you have to read the book yourself! Recommended!! 5/5

7. Finding Audrey by Sophie Kinsella Blurb: Audrey can't leave the house. She can't even take off her dark glasses inside the house. Then her brother's friend Linus stumbles into her life. With his friendly orange-slice smile, and his funny notes, he starts to entice Audrey out again – well, Starbucks is a start. And with Linus at her side, Audrey feels like she can do things she'd thought were too scary. Suddenly, finding her way back to the real world seems achievable. Thoughts: I was very keen to read the book because this is Sophie Kinsella's first YA book, and I was also very interested to read about Audrey and what her mental issues might be and where they would stem from, as I do quite enjoy books to do with psychological issues. The story flowed well enough, and I thought Kinsella dealt rather well with the mental issues, but for me, this didn't really compare with the usual successful writing of Kinsella. I liked the book well enough but there were two rather major niggles, first being the storyline between Audrey and Linus. I thought it was rushed and not very plausible. It lacked depth and it just happened all too quickly and I just didn't believe any of it. Which is kind of annoying, because so far I've really enjoyed the romantic aspects in the novels of Kinsella (except the one in The Undomestic Goddess, which I didn't enjoy at all). Sure, Kinsella's books aren't in general all that complicated and they don't profess to be complicated, but this storyline was just a big disappointment for me. The other niggle is that, as far as I'm aware, the 'it', the 'big thing', 'the catalyst event', that led Audrey to the state she was in was never revealed in full detail!!!! It was the one thing I was most looking forward to in the novel and then there were only hints of what might have happened, and even those were very tiny, tiny hints. I was so p*ssed off when I finished the novel realizing I didn't know what had happened! (Or did I miss something????? Athena, I know you've read the book. Did I miss something???) 3/5

I have a copy of Faulks on Fiction and I was so eager to read it when I got it for Christmas two years ago, but then I was looking through the pages, I realized I couldn't read it through without him spoiling the plots of certain books for me And I'm really bad at reading only certain parts of a book and then leaving the rest for later... Boobs or chippies. Sometimes dogs. Boobs are fun! It's no coincidence they are called funbags I wonder if you offered to bake a cake for Claire, would she do a nice and rational end-of-the-reading-year summary for you I remember this one year when I did mine, and mentioned the number of 1/5 and 2/5 etc etc ratings of all the books I read. I'd also calculated what the average rating was. Then Claire swooped in and she noticed that the number of ratings didn't match with the number of books I'd read She has a keen eye!! But I couldn't be bothered to go through the list again to make it right I appreciated her comment but I was too lazy to do anything about it That's a very good point re: the majority of people not traveling that much and therefore gobbling up all the nature descriptions and stuff like crack addicts! I didn't think of that. I suppose I'd forgotten you had your own copy... Or, didn't you in fact have a mini bookcase with two shelves full of copies of the very same book? I think Alan posted a picture about it in April... He probably bought them all in case you 'accidentally' lost one... (Or maybe he got a discount on them because they weren't selling well otherwise ) But this really reminds me of a book that in my humble opinion was perfect in that there was book talk and a plausible and enjoyable romance storyline! Namely, The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry. That book was simply marvellous!