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Athena's Reading List 2018


Athena

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During the February read-a-thon I read:

 

Paul van Loon (ill. Hugo van Look) - Foeksia: Foeksia's Miniheksenstreken
This was a fun little read of mini stories about a mini witch.


Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Chase Conley, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 1: Volume 1 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Andie Tong, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 2: Volume 2 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Marcio Fiorito, Francis Nuguit, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 3: Volume 3 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Andie Tong, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 4: Volume 4 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Marcio Fiorito, Francis Nuguit, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 5: Volume 5 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Andie Tong, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 6: Volume 6 (re-read)
It was nice to read these graphic novels again, this time as paperbooks. I'm really excited to continue on re-reading the series (the original books).

 

Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 1: Kristy's Great Idea (re-read)
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 2: The Truth About Stacey
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 3: Mary Anne Saves the Day
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 4: Claudia and Mean Janine
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 5: Dawn and the Impossible Three
It was really nice to re-read the first graphic novel and really nice to read the others for the first time. Very nostalgic.

 

Raina Telgemeier, Stephanie Yue - Smile 1: Smile (re-read)
Raina Telgemeiner, Braden Lamb - Smile 2: Sisters
It was great to re-read Smile, and nice to read Sisters. I prefer the first book.

 

Raina Telgemeier, Giruhiru - Drama
I enjoyed this story.

 

Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - Ghosts
This had some influences from Mexican culture, which was nice.

 

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During the past week, I read two books:

 

Francesca Zappia - Made You Up
This is a YA contemporary novel about a teenage girl with paranoid schizofrenia (so it's an unreliable narrator as she can't tell what's real and what's not). I thought it was a nice read. There was one great twist I didn't see coming. I liked the characters in the novel, for the most part (my favourite was Miles). I thought a couple of things could have been better. This is the author's debut novel, and I'm looking forward to read her second novel (which has received a lot of praise) in a while (I might wait for the paperback release or I might decide to get the hardcover).

 

Daniel Levitin - A Field Guide to Lies and Statistics
This is an information book about statistics and critical thinking. I thought it was quite interesting, I learned some things. It was also nice that the author explained a lot of examples and while the subject matter might seem like it's a dry and boring read, I didn't find that to be the case at all. It was really interesting and nicely written.

 

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I read Naoki Higashida - The Reason I Jump. This book had been on my wishlist for several years and I recently decided to buy it (and then read it soon after getting the book in the post). This book is an autism memoir written by a 13-year-old Japanese boy with autism. Most of the book is told in a question and answer format, in which the author answers a question in about 1 or 2 pages per question. The book also comes with a couple of mini-stories the author wrote.

 

I think it's very impressive that the author has written this book. He has (or had) trouble with spoken communication and managed to write this book using an alphabet grid (like thing).

 

I quite liked some parts of the book, I recognised myself in some of the answers the author gave. I was a bit disappointed not to recognise myself in other answers (and questions!) the author gave (to be the opposite even or to have very different reasons than the author for doing things). I didn't like how it seemed like he was speaking for all autistic people (often saying 'we' or 'us'), when some of the things he said just did not work for me in the same way that they did for him. I quite liked all the mini-stories, they were nice. There was a longer one at the end of the book, that was quite nice too.

 

Overall then I liked some parts of the book a lot, and other parts I was a bit disappointed by (by how it related to myself - I totally believe that that's how it works for the author! But I feel he cannot make generalisations that that's how it works for all people with autism).

 

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I read Steven Rowley - Lily and the Octopus. This book is about a (gay) man and his dog Lily. I feel tired right now, so this will be a short review. I quite liked this book. It dragged a bit in the middle, and I was a bit confused later on in the book. I cried while reading this book, it made me feel emotions. Overall I quite enjoyed reading this book.

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8 hours ago, Athena said:

I read Steven Rowley - Lily and the Octopus. This book is about a (gay) man and his dog Lily. I feel tired right now, so this will be a short review. I quite liked this book. It dragged a bit in the middle, and I was a bit confused later on in the book. I cried while reading this book, it made me feel emotions. Overall I quite enjoyed reading this book.

 

Aww. It does sound like a worthwhile read. :)

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On 9.1.2018 at 2:04 PM, Athena said:

Today marks my 5-year BCF anniversary :D!! So in honour of that I thought I'd write a little piece about how much BCF means to me.

 

When I first visited this forum, I was looking for a forum to discuss books with other people. I googled on 'book forum' and BCF was one of the first hits. I found a very friendly community on here and I loved it. I've found several friends though this forum, and I'm very grateful for all of you lovely people. I love talking with all of you (not just about books, also about other stuff). I love going on this forum every day and reading all the new posts. I love going on the forum and post my thoughts about books I've read or other topics that interest me. A lot of you know about my autism and sometimes about my ADD and are very supportive and understanding. That to me is a rare occurance, as sometimes in real life some people in my past have not always been so understanding. I love the friendly culture of our forum. I love that we all can have our book (b)logs and post about what we read. It feels very personal.

 

In these 5 years it seems I have made 17,016 posts (which will be 17,017 when I post this). But what's way more important, is that I've made a lot of good friends on here. I would not be where I am today if it wasn't for this forum and the lovely people on here and those I met through here.

 

Anyway.. that's a lot of rambliness to basically say that I love this place and I love you all :hug:.

 

I'm so sorry I missed your anniversary! Happy 5th Anniversary, Gaia! :flowers2:     The thing I've colored in red is such a lovely thing to say! :smile2:   

I haven't been on here that much lately, so I'm still going around in other people's reading logs, to wish them a happy new reading year. I'm so late!! :(

 

In any case, I hope you have an amazing reading year in 2018, Gaia! I hope you get to read a lot of wonderful books! :smile2::readingtwo:

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15 hours ago, frankie said:

I'm so sorry I missed your anniversary! Happy 5th Anniversary, Gaia! :flowers2:     The thing I've colored in red is such a lovely thing to say! :smile2: 

 

Thank you :friends3:!!

 

15 hours ago, frankie said:

I haven't been on here that much lately, so I'm still going around in other people's reading logs, to wish them a happy new reading year. I'm so late!! :(

 

Awww :hug:.

 

15 hours ago, frankie said:

In any case, I hope you have an amazing reading year in 2018, Gaia! I hope you get to read a lot of wonderful books! :smile2::readingtwo:

 

Thanks :readingtwo:! I hope you have an amazing reading year in 2018 too, Sari :smile2:.

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I read Loes den Hollander - Onderuitgehaald. This was a suspenseful thriller, and I liked that the author managed to surprise me. I liked the short chapters. I was a bit confused at something on the last page. This wasn't one of my favourites of the author (though I've only read a few of her work, gladly plenty more to read :D), but I enjoyed reading the book and was often thinking of the story even when I was not reading the book.

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2 hours ago, Athena said:

I read Loes den Hollander - Onderuitgehaald. This was a suspenseful thriller, and I liked that the author managed to surprise me. I liked the short chapters. I was a bit confused at something on the last page. This wasn't one of my favourites of the author (though I've only read a few of her work, gladly plenty more to read :D), but I enjoyed reading the book and was often thinking of the story even when I was not reading the book.

 

I think it's always extra exciting when you are thinking of the book you're reading, even when you're not reading it. I don't think it's happened to me in a long while and I miss it! I hope your next read is another thinkable one :D 

 

2 hours ago, Athena said:

Thanks :readingtwo:! I hope you have an amazing reading year in 2018 too, Sari :smile2:.

 

Thanks Gaia! :friends3:  At least it ought to be better than last year! :D 

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1 hour ago, frankie said:

I think it's always extra exciting when you are thinking of the book you're reading, even when you're not reading it. I don't think it's happened to me in a long while and I miss it! I hope your next read is another thinkable one :D 

 

Thanks :D!

 

1 hour ago, frankie said:

Thanks Gaia! :friends3:  At least it ought to be better than last year! :D 

 

Definitely :D!

 

15 minutes ago, Lau_Lou said:

That is a lovely feeling :) 

 

It is :).

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Below follow three reviews of books I read during the past few days.

 

I read Seanan McGuire - Wayward Children 1: Every Heart a Doorway. I quite liked this book. I did guess the mystery, but I still really enjoyed spending time in this world with these characters. I hope we get to find out more things in the other books in this series. I would've liked it if the book had been a bit longer, that would have been nice. On the other hand, I do feel like a lot was packed in this small book (some people have called it a novella, but I'm not sure if it is one or not, others say novel, so I don't know).

 

I read Seanan McGuire - Wayward Children 2: Down Among the Sticks and Bones. The events in this book happen before book 1, but it is better to read book 1 first, as things will make more sense that way (of the world) (so, read the books in publication order). It was nice to explore the 'origin story' of 2 characters that we met in book 1. One of the themes of the book is gender roles. I thought the book was interesting and enjoyable, and I liked reading it.

 

I read Seanan McGuire - Wayward Children 3: Beneath the Sugar Sky. This book takes place after book 1 and there are spoilers in the book for what happens in book 1, so I definitely recommend to read book 1 first (best to read the series in publication order, so 1-2-3). This was another nice read. It was nice to see some of the old characters again and have some events wrapped up. It was also nice to learn more about the different worlds.

 

I really like the diversity of the characters in these books. In most cases it is done in a very natural way and I loved that. These books have LGBTQIA+ elements and I really liked that, there are also some minor elements regarding different cultures. Book 2 talked about gender roles, that was good too. One thing about book 3 is that the main character of book 3 is fat (that's the word she and others use in the book), and I feel there was maybe a bit too much emphasis on it, I guess I would've liked to read a bit more about other parts of the character, ie. hobbies or things like that. But I did enjoy reading about a character who was bigger and it was good to see this represented in a book. There are a couple of illustrations in each of the books (in my editions anyway).

 

Overall I really enjoyed reading these 3 books. I've heard that more books are planned in the series, and I definitely plan on buying those and reading them once they are published.

 

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February 2018 Summary

Books read: 24
Pages read: 4917

Genres:
Fantasy: 10
Science-fiction: 0
Contemporary Fiction: 2
Rom-com: 5
Historical Fiction: 0
Literature: 0
Detective / Mystery: 0
Thriller: 0
Horror: 0
Paranormal: 1
Biography: 3
Information: 1
'Disney': 0

Age Ranges:
Infants: 0 book(s)
Children: 6 book(s)
Young-Adult: 8 book(s)
Adult: 8 book(s)

TBR vs. R:
Re-reads: 7 book(s)
New Reads: 15 book(s)
Combination: 0 book(s)

Types of books: Novels: 17
Short Stories / Short Story Collections: 1
Information: 1
Biographies: 3

Most impressive / Favourite(s) of the month:
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 1: Kristy's Great Idea (re-read)
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 2: The Truth About Stacey
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 3: Mary Anne Saves the Day
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 4: Claudia and Mean Janine
Ann M. Martin, Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - The Baby-Sitters Club Graphic Novels 5: Dawn and the Impossible Three
Raina Telgemeier, Stephanie Yue - Smile 1: Smile (re-read)
Daniel Levitin - A Field Guide to Lies and Statistics
Francesca Zappia - Made You Up
Seanan McGuire - Wayward Children 1: Every Heart a Doorway
Seanan McGuire - Wayward Children 2: Down Among the Sticks and Bones
Seanan McGuire - Wayward Children 3: Beneath the Sugar Sky
Steven Rowley - Lily and the Octopus

Pretty enjoyable:
Raina Telgemeiner, Braden Lamb - Smile 2: Sisters
Raina Telgemeier, Giruhiru - Drama
Raina Telgemeier, Braden Lamb - Ghosts
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Chase Conley, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 1: Volume 1 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Andie Tong, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 2: Volume 2 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Marcio Fiorito, Francis Nuguit, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 3: Volume 3 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Andie Tong, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 4: Volume 4 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Marcio Fiorito, Francis Nuguit, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 5: Volume 5 (re-read)
Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Andie Tong, Nicholas Chapuis, Bill Tortolini - The Wheel of Time Graphic Novels: The Eye of the World 6: Volume 6 (re-read)
Loes den Hollander - Onderuitgehaald
Paul van Loon (ill. Hugo van Look) - Foeksia: Foeksia's Miniheksenstreken

Somewhat enjoyable:
Naoki Higashida - The Reason I Jump

Disappointments / Least favourites of the month:
None!

Abandoned book:
None!

Shortest book(s) read this month:
Paul van Loon (ill. Hugo van Look) - Foeksia: Foeksia's Miniheksenstreken (60 pages)

Longest book(s) read this month:
Francesca Zappia - Made You Up (430 pages)
Daniel Levitin - A Field Guide to Lies and Statistics (292 pages)
 

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Some thoughts on recent reads.

 

Kathy Hoopmann - Alle Honden Hebben ADHD (All Dogs Have ADHD)
Kathy Hoopmann - Alle Katten Hebben Asperger (All Cats Have Asperger)
Kathy Hoopmann - Wat jij ziet en wat ik voel (Inside Asperger's: Looking Out)
These are short books, consisting mainly of pictures of dogs, cats or animals (see origintal titles in brackets) with a bit of text about ADHD or Asperger / Autism. Out of these three, I liked the last one I listed, the best. It was written from the point of view of people with autism, and I thought the pictures seemed to fit the text the best. I also liked the other two books, but I felt like I couldn't relate to them as much as to the third book.

 

Vera Bachrach and Bart Eysink Smeets - De Tostifabriek
I bought this book at a library sale because of its unique format. The 'book' consists of two triangles, together the triangles form the full book cover. The text inside is mostly the same, but the pictures of both also form the full pictures (if that makes sense). This made reading the book(s) a bit more awkward, but it was a concept I've not seen before. The book is about some people who start a tosti factory. I'm not sure how I feel about the pictures of first the pigs (that they named) and then the pictures of the slaughtering process and all that. I'm also not sure what the target market for this book is exactly. The cute pictograms and huge text made me think it was for children, but then I wouldn't recommend showing the children certain pictures in the book. Anyway, the book was okay, the concept about it was the most unique thing about the book.  

 

Christine Kliphuis (ill. Helen van Vliet) - De Ziekenboeg Extra 5: De ADHD van André
This is both a bit of an information book as well as a little novel about a boy with ADHD (but at first him and his parents don't know what it is). I thought it was a nice read.

 

Jacques Weijters - Zoeklicht Thriller: Doe wat de clown zegt (re-read)
I read this book in my childhood at the school library, and it was one of the books that really got my love for reading going. I'd been looking for a copy for it for a long time, and recently finally managed to find one for sale online at a website. It was such a joy to read this book again after many years, and to see the illustrations again. I loved it. Of course, my love for the book is probably largely based on nostalgia, I don't think the story would be the best book ever to read for all adults or anything. But I enjoyed it a lot and it was so fun to read it again.

 

Sophie Kinsella (ill. Marta Kissi) - Mummy Fairy and Me 1: Mummy Fairy and Me
These were four short stories about a girl named Ella and Mummy Fairy (her mother, who is a fairy). I quite liked the first story, but after that they got a bit repetitive and predictable (at least for me as an adult!), which was a shame. I can imagine it's a lot of fun for children though! But I think it's less suitable for adults. I still liked the other stories, but it was just an okay read for me overall.

 

Ichigo Takano - Orange 6: Orange: Future
This was the next volume in the Orange series. I liked the Orange series (1-5), but I felt this volume didn't really add much to the overall story. It jumped around a bit between their teenage years and their older years and it was a bit confusing.

 

Konami Kanata - The Complete Chi's Sweet Home 1 (1-3): Part 1
This is a manga (I think?) about a cat and the new family it/she finds. It was cute and funny, I really liked it. I liked that the illustrations were coloured. The book also contained an extra bit.

 

Jomny Sun - Everyone's a Aliebn When Ur a Aliebn Too
This was an interesting graphic novel. It's about an alien who comes to earth to try to learn, he talks to a lot of different animals. The novel made some good points. I liked the illustrations, and the way the spelling was done, just added to it (though it did take me a little bit of time to get used to it).

 

Tillie Walden - Spinning
This is a graphic memoir about a girl who does figure skating. She is gay but no one else knows. I quite liked this graphic memoir. I didn't know a lot about figure skating, it was nice to learn more about that. This was a pretty good read.

 

Katie Green - Lighter Than My Shadow
If I'd have to choose one stand-out read of these recent reads, then this would be it. This is a graphic memoir of a girl struggling with an eating disorder (and may be triggering for people who are sensitive for certain triggers). I was really impressed with it. The illustrations are really nice and it was really nice how they were used to tell what was in Katie's mind and what happened and everything. I loved it, it was really really good.

 

Akiko Higashimura - Princess Jellyfish 1 (1-2): Volume 1 (Kuragehima Volumes 1 & 2)
I've seen the anime of this series, and I really like the anime so I decided to buy and read the manga. This is volume 1 in English, which is a bindup of the first two original Japanese volumes. I quite liked reading this manga. I look forward to read the other volumes (that are out so far), and see how the story eventually evolves beyond the anime series.

 

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15 hours ago, Little Pixie said:

Hurray for your childhood book being as good as you remembered. :D

 

Thanks :D!

 

15 hours ago, Little Pixie said:

Off to look at the cat anime. :wub:

 

I think you'd like it :).

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15 hours ago, Little Pixie said:

Those covers looked so cute. :kiss:

 

I agree :), they were part of the reason I picked up the books. I plan to read the second book for the next read-a-thon, in April (and the third one in May and fourth in June).

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I read Claire Kann - Let's Talk About Love, a YA contemporary fiction book about a 19-year-old biromantic asexual black woman. It's the author's debut novel. I finished the book in one day. I found it an interesting read. I've never read a book about an asexual main character before, and while I don't know if it is an accurate portrayal, it was nice to read about something that I haven't read much about before. A couple of things about the novel could have been better, I felt the side characters weren't as fleshed out as the main character, but overall I enjoyed reading the book a lot.

 

ClaireKannLetsTalkAboutLove0125.jpg

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I read Alison Evans - We Go Forward. This is a story of two girls who are both travelling (and who are both from Australia) and who meet in Berlin. They decide to travel together. I liked spending time in the places they travelled to (I've been to one of them myself) and reading about the things they did and saw, and I liked the characters. I couldn't quite understand a few of their traits / things they did though (ie. one of them gets drunk), though that's probably because I was never the typical teenager. One of the main characters, Christie, is aromantic asexual and the other, Roslyn, is bisexual. One of them is a person of colour, though it doesn't play any role in the book and I think it's only mentioned once or twice. The book is told from both of their points of view, alternating. I sometimes forgot whose point of view I was reading from, I felt the two voices could have been more distinguinshed from each other. The book is relatively short, ~164 pages, and I wish we'd have seen a bit more of the sibling of one of the main characters (Jalen, who identifies as non-binary).

 

It was nice to read about the adventures they went on, though I did feel there didn't seem to be many twists or suspense. The book did contain a few heavy moments that I liked a lot. I struggled a bit about halfway through the book, I found myself not so much in the mood anymore to read it, for some reason, I didn't really feel like continuing on reading. I think I just felt in the mood for a different genre of book, but I didn't want to read two books at once. Later though I got more into the mood of this book as more things happened in the story with the characters, the story became a bit more interesting. I liked the focus on friendship in this book. There aren't a lot of books with an asexual main character, so it's definitely nice there are a few for those people who identify as such. Overall it was just an okay book for me.

 

AlisonEvansWeGoForward_0125.jpg

 

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