Funny Friday

Celebrate the end of the work week with a little book humor.

Monday’s Minutes

Monday’s Minutes is my weekly post where I share what I’m reading and what I’m reading next.

WHAT I’M READING

Triptych  (Will Trent #1) by Karin Slaughter. I read Unseen quite awhile ago not realizing it was part of a series (it’s #8, I believe). I enjoyed it and felt like it gave enough back story for me not to be lost in Will Trent’s world, but I’ve always wanted to go back and start it from the beginning. This came available from the library just when I was needing something not YA. (I love YA, but if I read too many in a row I sometimes get a little annoyed. That happens when you read characters about half your age.) I’m only a couple chapters in, but I’m liking it so far.

WHAT I’M READING NEXT

Fractured (Will Trent #2). This is the great thing about being late in the game to reading established series – little to no wait between books! I just borrowed this from the library, too, in anticipation of finishing the first one.

What are you reading?

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Things On My Reading Wishlist

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday, hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, is: Top Ten Things On My Reading Wishlist (if you could make authors write about these things you would. Could be a specific type of character, an issue tackled, a time period, a certain plot, etc.)

I really love this topic! I think mine will be a mixture of general ideas/characters and requests to specific authors.

1. While I love a good romance, I think I would like to see something where the main character does NOT end up with the guy/girl. Unrequited love in books often turns into the main character ending up with “the one you never expected who loved you all along” or something like that. I’d love a well done, realistic unrequited love story.

2. A realistic Christian character. In regular fiction, Christian characters are often portrayed as religious nuts who are more concerned with appearance and judging than anything actually Christ related. In Christian Fiction, the characters are often just on the verge of perfection. I’d like to see a more realistic portrayal: someone who has faith, but still has struggles. Who can hang out with his/her non-Christian friends and not be all judgey or boring.

3. Mermaids! I don’t know why.

4. Workplace Satires. I was recently talking to one of my newer co-workers about her previous place of employment that was just a horrible atmosphere. Even though our office has pretty great people now, there are still some of the same types of personalities in every office: The Suck-up, The Gossip, Everybody’s Friend, The Psycho, The Status-Climber. I’d love to read something funny and think, “Oh that’s so (Fill-in-the-blank)!”

5. Realistic appearances. The average person is not stunningly beautiful. The average man does not look like an Abercrombie model. Too many books use looks as a reason for the characters to be attracted to each other and then come up with the secondary reasons later. I’d like to see some slightly out of shape people get together once in a while.

6. An entire series released at one time. I HATE starting a series only to realize that there’s a long wait for the third or fourth, etc. book to come out next. I know that this is a completely unrealistic request, but wouldn’t it be great if you didn’t have to wait a year between books?!

7. More (well done) multiple 1st Person POV. Because it’s my favorite.

8.  Rainbow Rowell – More Lincoln & Beth! More Eleanor and Park! More Cath and Levi! Just more in general. I love you.

9. Suzanne Collins – How about a Gale Hawthorne spin-off? Because seriously, what happens with him?

10. Veronica Roth and Lauren Oliver – How about some Alternate Endings that I could pretend are the real thing to your latest series enders?

What do you want to read about?

Top Ten Tuesday: Book Turn-Offs

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday sponsored by The Broke and the Bookish is about Book Turn-Offs. For me, these don’t necessarily mean I’ll stop reading, but it usually means I won’t like it.

1. Too much description. I don’t want to read pages and pages of description at a time. I am much more interested in plot and character development.

2. Love Triangles. These are almost impossible to avoid when reading YA fiction, but it always annoys me. There’s always the obvious answer and it’s hardly ever the Best Friend from the beginning of the book (who I almost always favor).

3. POV changing between 1st and 3rd Person. As I’ve mentioned before, I feel like this is cheating.

4. Resolution to a mystery coming out of left field. We’ve all read a book where we think we know what’s coming and end up being totally wrong. I don’t mind that at all. I like to be able to look back and think, “yeah, that makes sense. I should’ve thought of that.” But I HATE when there is no possible way for you to figure it beforehand.

5. A slow pace. I don’t need action on every page (in fact, I don’t usually care for a whole lot of action), but I hate when nothing happens for chapters and chapters at a time. Move the plot along.

6. Adult behavior in YA books. Too much drinking, sex, and cursing from teenagers always annoys me. Also when they are constantly faced with more adult life situations than high school aged decisions.

7. Tiny misunderstandings turning into major turmoil. I think this most often happens in Chick Lit. When one tiny thing happens and instead of fessing up, the character lies about it and it just grows more and more ludicrous and out of control. I just want to shake them and yell at them to tell the truth.

8. Weak characters trying to save the day. This mostly happens in YA fantasy/dystopian. It’s always a girl who tries to go up against supernatural creatures or characters much stronger than her and always just ends up making things worse.

9. Predictable plots. When you can call every single thing that happens in a story. I don’t want things coming out of left field, but I still would like to be surprised by something.

10. “I’m so Pretty” rhetoric. When a major character trait is how beautiful someone is. Especially when it’s the main character that keeps mentioning it. And especially when they’re lamenting that they’re only seen as a pretty face.

Monday’s Minutes

Monday’s Minutes is my weekly post where I share what I’m reading and what I’m reading next.

WHAT I’M READING

Siege and Storm (The Grisha, #2) by Leigh Bardugo

I just finished Shadow and Bone and really liked it. It’s another one of those books where you read the description and think, “eh.” But I’ve read so many blogs where people raved about it so I thought I’d give it a try. I think a full review is in order. As soon as I finished it I started Siege and Storm. I’m only a couple chapters in and so far so good.

WHAT I’M READING NEXT

The Silent Wife by A.S.A. Harrison

I started this book a couple weeks ago and haven’t made it past the first chapter. It’s a review copy so I really need to get to it. I’m hoping it gets better as it goes along.

What are you reading?

Top Ten Tuesday: Best Sequels Ever

This week’s Top Ten, sponsored by The Broke and the Bookish, is about the best sequels ever. My picks aren’t necessarily sequels that I liked better than the first, but ones that were just as enjoyable. (Click on the cover for synopsis.)

1.
Circles of Time by Phillip Rock, the follow up to The Passing Bells. This book is a little more like what I thought the first book would be. And there is lots of Martin Rilke, one of my favorite literary characters ever.

2.
Unravel Me by Tahereh Mafi, the second book in the Shatter Me series.

3.
Scarlet by Marissa Meyer, the second book in The Lunar Chronicles. I actually enjoyed this book more than I did, Cinder.

4.
Onyx by Jennifer Armentrout, the second book in the Lux series. As I’ve said many times, I love this series.

5.
Insurgent by Vernoica Roth, follow up to Divergent. This book ramped up the action, the romance, and the “mythology”.

6.
Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, follow up to The Hunger Games. The first book in the series will always be my favorite, but this series is one of my all time favorites and Catching Fire did not disappoint.

7.
Pray for Silence by Linda Castillo, the second book in the Kate Burkholder series. I think this one might actually be my favorite storyline of the series.

Ok, so I only have a top 7 because I can’t really think of any more. I’m sure as soon as I post this or read through some other’s lists I’ll come up with some more. What sequels do you think are the best ever?

Monday’s Minutes

Monday’s Minutes is a weekly update on what I’m reading and what I’m reading next.

WHAT I’M READING

The Golden Lily (Bloodlines #2) by Richelle Mead

So because of how annoyed I was that so much of the last book of The Vampire Academy series was used to set up the spinoff series, I was determined not to read this series for a long while (I thought about ignoring it altogether, but I must know what happens to Adrian). Then I fell into a little bit of a reading slump. I started a couple other books and couldn’t maintain interest. I kept hearing about how this series was so much better than VA so I decided to try it. Now I’m just about done with the second book. Other than these being completely predictable, I’ve been enjoying them. I actually like Sidney more than I did Rose. And, of course, Adrian.

WHAT I’M READING NEXT

The Indigo Spell (Bloodlines #3) by Richelle Mead

Of course now that I’m into the series, I have to keep reading. The third book in the Bloodlines series, The Indigo Spell, is next on my list.

What are you reading?

 

Top Ten Books on your Fall To Be Read List

Today’s Top Ten are the books on your Fall To Be Read list. Some aren’t coming out until fall and some I just haven’t read yet. As always, it’s hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

1.
Allegiant by Veronica Roth. I’m pretty sure this has been on every list I’ve seen. It’s an obvious choice. I have been dying for this book since I finished Insurgent.

2.
Trust in Me by J. Lynn. I’m a total sucker for retelling of stories from another character’s POV.

3.
These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman. I don’t not read books for their cover, but there are some books I definitely read because of the cover. This is one of those.

4.
Word After by Susan Ee. I wasn’t in love with the first book, but I liked it. It’s an interesting take on the angel genre and I’m looking forward to see how it continues.

5.
Resist by Sarah Crossan. The second – and final – book in this series. I’m a fan of authors who don’t stretch things out to trilogies or beyond, when they can tell the story in less books.

6.
The Dancing Master by Julie Klassen. Klassen can always be counted on for a sweet romance.

7. Untitled Shatter Me novella by Tahereh Mafi. This doesn’t have much info yet, but I’ve heard it will be from Adam’s POV.

8.
The Unexpected Gift by Berna King. I got my signed copy a few weeks ago and am excited to finally start it.

9.
Replica by Jenna Black. I thought this looked interesting and got it awhile ago, but I haven’t started it yet.

10.
The Hallowed Ones by Laura Bickle. Amish + Vampires. I’m so in.

Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Secondary Characters

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday hosted by the Broke and the Bookish is about your favorite secondary characters.

1. Finnick  from the Catching Fire and Mockingjay. He starts out as just charming and funny and conceited and turns into a really complex, wonderful character.

2. Boggs from Mockingjay. He’s not in the book for long, but in the short time he was, he became one of my favorites. Mostly for this line: “Well don’t expect us to be too impressed. We just saw Finnick Odair in his underwear.”

3. Mary Musgrove from Persuasion. She has no filter. No self-awareness. No tact. I love her.

4. Simon from The Mortal Instruments series. He’s sarcastic and wonderful.

5. “Captain” Thorne from Scarlet. He’s narcissistic, but in a totally amusing, lovable way. He provided a great counterpart to Cinder and was my favorite new character added to the series in this book.

6. Park’s dad from Eleanor and Park. Yes I am too lazy to look up his actual name right now. Though he has flaws, he’s a great husband and a great father. And he gets Eleanor and her situation.

7. Glock from the Kate Burkholder series. He’s everything a good cop should be and is always there for Kate.

8. Penryn’s mom from Angelfall. (I’m still too lazy to look up her actual name). She’s crazy, but she knows it. And she owns it.

9. Chris from Ashes. Pretty much everyone wants to use him for some purpose or another and he tries to please everybody. I think he’s really more complex than what he first appears.

10. Adrian from The Vampire Academy series. I didn’t like his character at first, but he totally grew on me. He’s charming and sarcastic and tortured and a little crazy. He’s the reason I have to read the spinoff series because he was completely shafted at the end of this series.

What are your favorite secondary characters?

Waiting on Wednesday

I’ve been experiencing in the past couple days something that very rarely ever happens to me: Reading Burnout. Normally it doesn’t take me any more than 2-3 days to read a book – unless it’s the weekend when I can often knock one out in a day. But I started the last book in the Vampire Academy series on Sunday and I still have 8 chapters to go and I just don’t feel like reading it. I was planning on being able to post a review of the whole series today, but since that’s obviously not happening, I’m going to do another first-time Meme: Waiting on Wednesday, a weekly event that spotlights upcoming releases that we’re eagerly anticipating (hosted by Breaking the Spine).

The book I’m waiting on is:

Origin by Jennifer Armentrout
Book #4 in the Lux Series

Synopsis (from Good Reads):

After the successful but disastrous raid on Mount Weather, he’s facing the impossible. Katy is gone. Taken. Everything becomes about finding her. Taking out anyone who stands in his way? Done. Burning down the whole world to save her? Gladly. Exposing his alien race to the world? With pleasure.

All Katy can do is survive.

Surrounded by enemies, the only way she can come out of this is to adapt. After all, there are sides of Daedalus that don’t seem entirely crazy, but the group’s goals are frightening and the truths they speak even more disturbing. Who are the real bad guys? Daedalus? Mankind? Or the Luxen?

Together, they can face anything. 

But the most dangerous foe has been there all along, and when the truths are exposed and the lies come crumbling down, which side will Daemon and Katy be standing on?

And will they even be together?

Anyone who has read some of my previous posts knows that the Lux series has become on of my favorites. The first three were all published when I stumbled across this series and I devoured them. Waiting for Origin has been agonizing. I’m so looking forward to this book coming out on Tuesday, August 27th!