Catwoman's 2010 Reading log!

[catwoman]

Book #2: Stolen by Kelley Armstrong.

 

Synopsis

 

'A taut, sensual thriller that grips from the first page. Elena Michaels is at once sublime and sympathetic, a modern heroine who shows that real women bite back' Karin Slaughter, author of BLINDSIGHTED and KISSCUT It's time to bite back...Elena Michaels is a wanted woman. She hasn't done anything wrong. Well, not recently, anyway. But ten years ago her lover turned her into a werewolf: the only female werewolf in the world, in fact. And now, just as she's finally coming to terms with this rather startling situation, a group of scientists learns of her existence. They're hunting her down, and Elena is about to run straight into their trap. But they haven't reckoned on Elena's adoptive family, her Pack, who will stop at nothing to get her back. They haven't reckoned on Elena herself, either, and that's a big mistake...Breathtakingly thrilling, hip and funny, STOLEN is another page-turning triumph from an author who is going from strength to strength.

 

 

Ok so some people know that I did not really like the first one in the series all that much, but due to Charm saying to read the second I did, and I do not regret it. I took me a while to pick up the book and I tried and tried to stay away from it, I did not want another bore fest like I did with the first. But once I started I started to enjoy it.

 

I bonded with the characters in this book. I found Elena to be couragous, and a character that I was starting to really like, as I was with Clayton. Original story with lots of action and a few twists and turns to boot. I will be honest I did click the ending and

Who the baddies were, so to speak.

but I still found it entertaining and gripping in many many ways. This for me, showed off Armstrong's writing abilities, which for me I felt was lacking somewhat in the previous book, she was able to add in many new characters in this book and yet I was not lost in anyway. Now I am not saying that the book was a simple plot with non complex character's, Oh no! Far from that, She was able to describe each character so well, that I was truely sucked in (Which I did not find with Bitten) I was never confused with who was who, I just knew.

 

Apart from a few bits, where I rolled my eyes. I loved it. Oh also I found one character to seem out of place.

As I found cassandra an interesting character at the beginning (Come on she is a vampire ) I don't get where I character was heading, she did nothing apart from make a play at Clay, I do hope that there is more too her, if not then I do feel that was a rather pointless character.

 

 

I will be reading the next one thats for sure, yet I have a horrible feeling that just as I started to like Elena and Clay, they are not going to be so present in the next couple of books

 

PROS: Original story with complex yet easy to bond with characters.

 

CONS: Not much really apart from one part where I thought Elena was a little stupid, and a cassandra character annoyed me.

 

9/10

Edited January 12, 2010 by catwoman

[Charm]

Oh I'm so pleased you actually listened to me and did what you're told! Didn't I say it would be good eh? eh? Glad you ended up enjoying it

 

The next in the series is Dime Store Magic which, along with Industrial Magic straight after, are my two favourites in the series. DSM concentrates on Paige Winterbourne, the witch, and although I was a bit sceptical as to whether I'd like it or not, I ended up loving it. I hope you do too!

 

Great review catwoman!

[catwoman]

Oh I'm so pleased you actually listened to me and did what you're told! Didn't I say it would be good eh? eh? Glad you ended up enjoying it

 

The next in the series is Dime Store Magic which, along with Industrial Magic straight after, are my two favourites in the series. DSM concentrates on Paige Winterbourne, the witch, and although I was a bit sceptical as to whether I'd like it or not, I ended up loving it. I hope you do too!

 

Great review catwoman!

 

I will be reading the next one. I honestly did not think I would be saying that. *Goes and puts on Wish list.

[Peacefield]

Great review, CW! I'm so glad you liked Stolen . I just finished Dime Store Magic myself and loved it so I can't wait for you to read it too!

[catwoman]

Book #3: Witch Child - Celia Rees

 

When Mary sees her grandmother accused of witchcraft and hanged for the crime, she is silently hurried to safety by an unknown woman. The woman gives her tools to keep the record of her days - paper and ink. Mary is taken to a boat in Plymouth and from there sails to the New World where she hopes to make a new life among the pilgrims. But old superstitions die hard and soon Mary finds that she, like her grandmother, is the victim of ignorance and stupidity, and once more she faces important choices to ensure her survival. With a vividly evoked environment and characters skilfully and patiently drawn, this is a powerful literary achievement by Celia Rees that is utterly engrossing from start to finish.

 

Ok I heard about this book on here on the children's part of the forum, it sounded really good so I reserved it at my library.

 

I got the book and I found it to be really short with large font so I knew it would be a one day read.

 

This is a hard book for me to review because this is for a book for kids. It was not what I was expecting and for the first half of the book I was really not liking it, I was bored and wanted a book with more action. But once I got past my own wants, I actaully got into this little Gem, it took a while for the 'Witch stuff' to come in but once I did I really quite enjoyed it and found it to be a pleasant read. I actually read the book with my son last night and he asked me to get the follow on, which to me shows this is a good book.

 

To think this is about magic and spells and stuff like that you are wrong, this is about a girl and her everyday life in the 1600's in a time where religion explained everything and how the devil was still'within us' it shows a headstrong and yet logical and intelligent girl.

 

I lovely, light gem of a read

 

6/10

[Shin]

Happy New Year hun...xxx

 

See you started reading the House of the Night series.

I know it can get a bit childish and you would love to shake the characters a bit...like I did but after a read the second book I just wanted to keep reading them.

 

I am now onto book No 4...still say poopie and that but I just want to know what happens.

[catwoman]

Happy New Year hun...xxx

 

See you started reading the House of the Night series.

I know it can get a bit childish and you would love to shake the characters a bit...like I did but after a read the second book I just wanted to keep reading them.

 

I am now onto book No 4...still say poopie and that but I just want to know what happens.

 

 

SHIN!!!!

 

I have misssed you where have you been?!

 

Yeah, the 'teenage grammer' really annoyed me and contradicted the storyline when two lines later they talk bout Oral Sex, but I found the books to be different and wanting me to read more, I have the second book from the library.

[Shin]

I haven't been anywhere really, hun.

My computer is in a very cold place in the living room

and I just couldn't bare to sit on it for long periods of time.

I didn't even get to do full length reviews on my last 6 reads of 2009.

And 3 of those books were Ms Slaughters.

[catwoman]

I haven't been anywhere really, hun.

My computer is in a very cold place in the living room

and I just couldn't bare to sit on it for long periods of time.

I didn't even get to do full length reviews on my last 6 reads of 2009.

And 3 of those books were Ms Slaughters.

 

Oooooh when it gets warmer and you want to write the review. PM me so I know and I will read it, I can't wait to hear what you thought of them!

 

CW

[Shin]

I did mini reviews for them, lol.

 

My living room is warm but my computer is by the small window.

There must be a draft somewhere because when I get off the computer

my right side is ice cold.

I need a laptop!!!!

 

Anyway, yes did mini reviews last night.

This is also due to the fact I read them a few months ago.

And some detail has been lost in my brain, lol.

Those reviews are still in my 2009 log.

I have opened a 2010 one - both links are in my sig.

 

I loved the first book in the Altanta series

Have to admit that the second books to both Altanta and Grant County series wasn't that much exciting as the first books.

But I still think they are great...the best and exciting books I have read in a long time.

[catwoman]

I did mini reviews for them, lol.

 

My living room is warm but my computer is by the small window.

There must be a draft somewhere because when I get off the computer

my right side is ice cold.

I need a laptop!!!!

 

Anyway, yes did mini reviews last night.

This is also due to the fact I read them a few months ago.

And some detail has been lost in my brain, lol.

Those reviews are still in my 2009 log.

I have opened a 2010 one - both links are in my sig.

 

I loved the first book in the Altanta series

Have to admit that the second books to both Altanta and Grant County series wasn't that much exciting as the first books.

But I still think they are great...the best and exciting books I have read in a long time.

*Goes and hunts for the reviews*

[catwoman]

Book #4: Shiver - Maggie Stiefvater.

 

Grace is fascinated by the wolves in the woods behind her house; one yellow-eyed wolf in particular. Every winter, she watches him but every summer, he disappears. Sam leads two lives. In winter, he stays in the frozen woods, with the protection of the pack. In summer, he has a few precious months to be human ...until the cold makes him shift back again. When Grace and Sam finally meet, they realize they can't bear to be apart. But as winter nears, Sam must fight to stay human - or risk losing himself, and Grace, for ever.

 

Ok so I reserved my book when I read a review by Weave I think and though it would be a really nice book to read.

 

I would like to add that this book has had many great reviews so my expectation was pretty high.

 

First off. I really like Grace as a character and reminds me a little of myself at that age. I found her totally adorable, yet strong in many ways. Sam wamed to me throughout the book, I could not seem to get a picture of him in my mind. But he is still a lovely character.

 

The book is full of love's young dream, pure, sweet, innocent even. I don't do love stories and my favourite moments of Twilight are the action chapters, but I liked this.... alot. I found the ending brilliant and a lovely little twist. changes in characters, and some funny little scenes and dialogues bettween the central characters.

 

I do feel that this is a way to get on the twilight (YA sci fi fantasty genre) band waggon, yet it is good in it's own right, with some lovely changes to the much churned out warewolf genre.

 

Light quick chirpy lovely read.

 

Oh and it is fine for YA. Only two swear words in the book. B:censored:d twice. Other than that a lovely read for a love struck teen.

 

I will be looking for the book in July!

 

Pros: Quick to read, flowed beautifully, lovely to read chapters based on each characters perspective and thoughts. Loved the cold temperature twist of the warewolves.

 

Cons: No enough action for me, but that is a pure personal taste rather than a flaw of the book.

 

8/10

[lexiepiper]

So glad you enjoyed it CW

[catwoman]

Book #5: Fever of the Bone by Val McDermid

 

'You should have been a detective. If there's one thing the last year has proved, it's how good you are at finding things out. Not simple things. Hard things. Things that nobody is supposed to be able to find out. Things that are buried so deep nobody even thinks twice about them. The sort of things that turn people's lives inside out once they're exposed.' Meet Tony Hill's most twisted adversary - a killer with a shopping list of victims, a killer unmoved by youth and innocence, a killer driven by the most perverted of desires. The murder and mutilation of teenager Jennifer Maidment is horrific enough on its own. But it's not long before Tony realises it's just the start of a brutal and ruthless campaign that's targeting an apparently unconnected group of young people. Struggling with the newly-awakened ghosts of his own past and desperate for distraction in his work, Tony battles to find the answers that will give him personal and professional satisfaction in his most testing investigation yet.

 

Ok so I had a vacating mojo for the start of this book, so I can't give a good indication of the start of the book. But what I will say is that you should, must read the previous book in the series 'Beneath the Bleeding'. Fever of the bone continues with the story of Tony and his personal life. I can't really say more or I will ruin it for people who have yet to read either book.

 

I am going to be honest. Normally with Val McDermid, I never get an idea of what is going on, and if I do it is a slight snippet. I did to be honest get all of the ending and I started to get bored waiting for the characters to catch up.

 

Other than it was fast paced with the normal psychological information that you normally get from her books.

 

I am not saying this is a bad read and it is still a good read and would not say dismiss it, but if you compare it to The Mermaid Singing, or even Beneath the Bleeding it is definately not as good.

 

Pros: Two of my favourite characters, and a great insight into the Tony.

 

Cons: Not the most original of plots and I found myself pointing the points together.

 

7.5/10

[Shin]

Thanks catwoman for the great review....I still have Val McDermid books to put on my Wishlist but must get through Ms Slaughter first.

 

I got Fearless out of the library. Well, I also ordered the 2 books before this one but unfortunately this one came available first. I did get another 3 books out too so hopefully by the time I finish those the other 2 will be in.

[catwoman]

Thanks mate, glad to hear that you still like Slaughter.

[Shin]

I see you are reading The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest.

Remember that a girl in work lent me all three.

Well, I was taking so long to start them...as I had a pile of other to read

so she basically asked me to give them to another girl in the office to read.

Just as well as by then I had lost my mojo and couldn't even start the book anyway.

[catwoman]

Oh you need to borrow them again ASAP. If not I am sure your library will have copies, at least of the first two. He is becoming one of my favourite authors ever, I adore him. I agree the beginning of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was pretty slow to begin with but now reading it and reflecting back, it had to be. The second one is absolutely amazing, and this one is turning out to be amazing also. I am pretty gutted that it has to go back to my library before my trip to the states next week, I would have loved reading this on the plane! I don't have a clue what to read I have so many books, I am thinking Dan Brown. I have read both the Robert Langdon books while flying, they were easy to read on a plane.

[catwoman]

Book #6: Betrayed (House of Night Bk 2) - P.C & Kirstin Cast

 

It seems that (un)life is going pretty well for Zoey Redbird. She's settled in at the House of Night finishing school and is coming to terms with the vast powers the vampyre goddess, Nyx, has given her. She even has a boyfriend...or two. Best of all, Zoey finally feels she has found somewhere she belongs. Then the unthinkable happens.Human teenagers are being killed, and all the evidence points to the vampires at Zoey's school. While danger stalks the humans from Zoey's past life, she begins to realise that the very powers that made her so unique might also threaten those she loves. Then, when she needs her new friends the most, death strikes the House of Night. Zoey finds herself facing a betrayal that could break her heart and jeopardise the very fabric of her world. Not suitable for younger readers.

 

I read this book after leaving The Girl who Kicked the Hornets' Nest for my up coming flight. My mojo as a result was floundering by the second and I needed something that was quick and not to in depth. This I hoped would do the job.

 

This is the second book in the series, and as expected it was Ok. It did take me a little longer to read and I was a little bored half way through. The ending was pretty good though and like the first I will at some point read the third.

 

The language used did not annoy me quite so much as the last, and was not a huge annoyance of the book unlike the first. This is however not a book for young readers, yet not adult enough for it to be an adult book, I still felt that you could tell that it had the imput of two writers.

 

I did find the plot of

The added love interest (The poetry teacher) highly unbelievable, even at some points laughable, why they feel they need t add another love interest is beyond me

 

 

All in all it is Ok, and with most series that I start to read I tend to want to finish them off. I won't be in a major, OhmygodIneedtoreaditnow panic to read the next one, even though at some point I will

 

6/10

[Shin]

I did find the plot of

The added love interest (The poetry teacher) highly unbelievable, even at some points laughable, why they feel they need t add another love interest is beyond me

 

Because you will find out in later books.

[catwoman]

Book #7: The Fourth Bear by Jasper Fforde

 

The Gingerbreadman: Psychopath, sadist, genius, convicted murderer and biscuit is loose in the streets of Reading. It isn't Jack Spratt's case. He and Mary Mary have been reassigned due to falling levels of nursery crime, and The NCD is once more in jeopardy. That is, until a chance encounter during the Armitage Shanks literary awards at the oddly familiar Deja-Vu Club lead Jack and Mary on the hunt for missing journalist Henrietta 'Goldilocks' Hatchett, star reporter for The Daily Toad. She had been about to break a story involving unexplained explosions in Herefordshire, Pasadena and the Nullabor Plain; The last witnesses to see her alive were The Three Bears, comfortably living out a life of rural solitude in Andersen's wood.

But all is not what it seems. How could the bear's porridge be at such disparate temperatures when they were poured at the same time? Was Goldy's death in the nearby 1st World War themepark of Sommeworld a freak accident? And is it merely chance that the Gingerbreadman pops up at awkward moments?

But there's more. What does a missing scientist with a terrifying discovery in subatomic physics, a secret weapon of devastating power, a reclusive industrialist known only as the Quangle Wangle and Colonel Danvers of the National Security all have in common?

 

 

Quite simply FANTASTIC! As the last book in the NCD series, it is funny, witty and quite often laugh out loud hillarious. Easy to read with some fantastic characters and some even more fantastic plots. This book is to be read if you want something different.

 

 

10/10

[Shin]

I was actually going to buy the first book in the Thursday Next series by Jasper Fforde...The Eyre Affair. Have you read those?

[Chrissy]

So glad you enjoyed 'The Fourth Bear'. I adored the P.D.R aspect of the book, as the character's awareness, or the lack if it just hadn't occured to me in the earlier book. Mr Fforde is just such a clever clever writer.

[catwoman]

I was actually going to buy the first book in the Thursday Next series by Jasper Fforde...The Eyre Affair. Have you read those?

 

No I haven't I will be reading them at some point, even though I am not sure if I will like them as much as this series. I got them because it was a different apprach to the Crime Genre.

 

So glad you enjoyed 'The Fourth Bear'. I adored the P.D.R aspect of the book, as the character's awareness, or the lack if it just hadn't occured to me in the earlier book. Mr Fforde is just such a clever clever writer.

 

He is fantastic! A totally original author I feel.

[catwoman]

Book #8: The Lost Symbol - Dan Brown

 

Synopsis

 

WHAT WAS LOST WILL BE FOUND...Washington DC: Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned at the last minute to deliver an evening lecture in the Capitol Building. Within moments of his arrival, however, a disturbing object - gruesomely encoded with five symbols - is discovered at the epicentre of the Rotunda. It is, he recognises, an ancient invitation, meant to beckon its recipient towards a long-lost world of hidden esoteric wisdom. When Langdon's revered mentor, Peter Solomon - philanthropist and prominent mason - is brutally kidnapped, Langdon realizes that his only hope of saving his friend's life is to accept this mysterious summons and follow wherever it leads him. Langdon finds himself quickly swept behind the facade of America's most historic city into the unseen chambers, temples and tunnels which exist there. All that was familiar is transformed into a shadowy, clandestine world of an artfully concealed past in which Masonic secrets and never-before-seen revelations seem to be leading him to a single impossible and inconceivable truth. A brilliantly composed tapestry of veiled histories, arcane icons and enigmatic codes, The Lost Symbol is an intelligent, lightning-paced thriller that offers surprises at every turn. For, as Robert Langdon will discover, there is nothing more extraordinary or shocking than the secret which hides in plain sight...

 

 

 

 

Ok so this was one of the most hyped up pre-ordered books of all time apparently. The third and latest Robert Langdon book. Wow! So did it live up to the hype?...

 

Ok so I have a couple points/ feelings towards this book. First off: De Ja Vu. This is without giving the plot away the normal Robert Langdon story. Langdon sees himself brought into to some kind of situation. All of a sudden it is a race against time, normally involving a car chase. Robert 'super Kriss cross solver' Langon has to solve loads of clues runs around loads of historical sites (always a library close to hand) and solves the clues to unviel many 'secret' idealogoies that could change the world... Oh and lets not forget the strong, beautiful, intelligent, yet damsel in distress sidekick... Thats it.

 

I was looking forward to this as I loved The Da Vinci code and liked Angels and Demons. I have never heard much about the Freemasons to begin with so this intrigued me alot, and was hoping that by the end of the book I would want to hook up to google and get me a piece of freemason action. The start was good. The first page was a message from Brown stating that the organisations involved in the story, all arts, places etc etc were all FACT! Wow! I was salivating already. As the book goes on I felt like this was actually, the least 'realistic' of all three books. I could not imagine, nor care for the 'facts' that he was exposing. I was quite often thinking really? Are your sure? I just felt like he was bending the truth more than Uri Gellar bends spoons.

 

But apart from my moans and grumbles, I read the book in two days, and the quick pace of the books got me through it.Yet I was turning every page thinking where is that Dan Brown "Kerpow" That little piece of information or thought that gets you thinking. I personally found nothing like that in the book.

 

All in all it was not that bad where I put it down could not get ito it, and leftit beside the bed. It was a run of the mill thriller. That's unfortunately all that it was.

 

Pros: Typical Dan Brown. Easy to read.

 

Cons: Same old. I found the storyline not as good as the rest.

 

6/10

Edited February 16, 2010 by catwoman