Top Ten Tuesday, December 13th

It’s time for Top Ten Tuesday. It’s hosted by The Broke and The Bookish. Do visit this fun blog and read all the other lists. It’s a lot of fun and you’ll be sure to add books to your TBR pile. This week’s Top Ten Tuesday is: Top Ten Books I’m Looking Forward To For The First Half Of 2017.

Some of the books I’m looking forward to reading are new, but a bunch are some I’ve had the TBR pile for a long tome. And now in no particular order, my list:

The Mothers by Brit Bennett

The Daughters by Adrienne Celt

On Beauty by Zadie Smith

The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante

Eight Hundred Grapes by Laura Dave

The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher

Love, Loss, and What We Ate by Padma Lakshmi

So what do you think of my list? Are any of these books on your list? Let me know in the comments below. And be sure to leave the link to your TTT in the comments, too.

 

Top Ten Tuesday #3

It’s time for Top Ten Tuesday. It’s hosted by The Broke and The Bookish. Do visit this fun blog and read all the other lists compiled. it’s a lot of fun and you’ll be sure to add books to your TBR pile. This week’s Top Ten Tuesday is: Back To School Freebie — anything “back to school” related. I’ve decided to go with novels with academic or school settings and themes.

As always, Harry Potter series. Need I say more?

 

 

 

The Secret History by Donna Tartt. This one is set at an elite college in New England. It’s a creepy story about obsession, corruption, and evil. It’s been a while since I read it, so I may need to do so in the near future.

 

 

The Likeness by Tana French.  I read this and The Secret History very close together, and I think both books are very similar. This is the second book of Tana French’s Dublin Murder Squad series and the latest is coming out later this fall. I may need to do a re-read since it’s my favorite of the series so far.

 

Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld. This is set at an elite boarding school in New England. It’s more a coming of age story of a “poor” girl thrown in with the rich kids at an elite school.

 

 

 

Possession by  A.S. Byatt. This is the story of two Academics searching for the mysterious muse of a famous Victorian poet. Literary mystery! The life and death struggle to publish or perish!  Forbidden love! The struggles of being in the literature department and finding something to write a thesis framed in a mystery. I’ve read and enjoyed it even though A.S. Byatt is a terrible literary snob.

 

 

Doomsday Book by Connie Willis. This is one of my favorite time travel novels. It’s the story of a historian at Oxford University who travels back in time to do research first hand.

 

 

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. A historian researching the origins of her family in Romania and of Vlad the Impaler. The story travels around Europe to help the young female historian discover the answers to her questions. It’s a genuinely creepy read. I like to read it in October to help enhance the experience.

 

 

Tolstoy Lied: A Love Story by Rachel Kadish. Another academic trying to find answers in her research. But unlike the young female academic in The Historian, this one stays on campus.

 

 

A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness. An American professor at Oxford finds a magical book while doing research in the Bodleian library.

 

 

 

On Beauty by Zadie Smith. The only book on this list I haven’t read this yet. It’s currently floating near the top of my TBR pile, so I hope to get to it this fall. According to Goodreads this the story of an English academic teaching at a college in New England.

 

So what do you think of my list? Are there any books you would add to it? What would your own list contain? Let me know in the comments below.

 

 

 

 

Thumbnails of the covers are courtesy of Goodreads.

 

 

 

 

The Friday 56, #3 & Book Beginnings

Today, I’m going to participate in two similar book memes: The Friday 56 & Book Beginnings Friday.

The Friday 56 is hosted by Freda’s Voice. Here are the rules:
*Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader
(If you have to improvise, that’s ok.)
*Find any sentence, (or few, just don’t spoil it)
*Post it.
*Add your (url) in Linky on Freda’s Voice. Add the post url, not your blog url.
*It’s that simple.

On Beauty by Zadie Smith

” Jerome, in all his gloomy Jeromeity, had joined them. The ill-pitched greetings that compassionate age sings to mysterious youth rang out; hair was almost tousled and then wisely not, the eternal unanswerable question was met with a new and horrible answer (‘I’m dropping out.’ ‘He means he’s taking a little time out.’) For a moment it seemed that the world had drained itself of all possible subjects that might be discussed on a hot day in a pretty town.”

Book Beginnings on Fridays meme is hosted by Rose City Reader. The rules are simple! Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading, along with your initial thoughts about the sentence, impressions of the book, or anything else the opener inspires. Please remember to include the title of the book and the author’s name.  Be sure to visit her blog and add your Book Beginning to the linky on her page.

Graveminder by Melissa Marr

“Maylene put one hand atop the stone for support; pulling herself up from the soil got harder and harder every year. Her knees had been  problem enough, but of late the arthritis had started settling in her hips. She brushed the soil from her hands and from her skirt and pulled a small bottle from her pocket. Carefully avoiding the green shoots of the tulip bulbs she’d planted, Maylene tilted the bottle over the earth. “Here you go dear,” she whispered. “It’s not the shine we used to sip, but it’s what I have to share.”

So what do you think of this weeks books? Would you be interested in reading either? Or both? Let me know in the comments, and if you are participating in either meme leave a link in my comments and I’ll come by and visit your blog.

Have a great weekend.

WWW Wednesday

Welcome to WWW Wednesday! This meme is hosted by  Taking on a World of Words. Just answer the three questions below and leave a link to your post in the comments for others to look at. No blog? Just leave a comment. Please, take some time to visit the other participants and see what others are reading. So, let’s get to it!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

What are you currently reading? I’ve not made a lot of progress this week. I’m still reading S by J.J. Abrams and Doug Dorst and The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón. I’m also reading American Ghost: A Family’s Haunted Past in the Desert Southwest by Hannah Nordhaus and Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter.

What did you recently finish reading?The Painted Girls by Cathy Marie Buchanan &  Rooms by Lauren Oliver.

What do you think you’ll read next? This has not changed much from last weeks answer. I want to read  Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel, On Beauty by Zadie Smith, and My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante. And Geek Love by Katherine Dunn. Her recent death reminded me that I have Geek Love hiding somewhere on a bookshelf waiting for me to find it.

Have you read any of the books listed above? What do you think? Do you have any books you’d recommend? Leave comments and links below.

 

Surprise! I’ve been nominated for an award. Dezel Marie Ocampo at https://thefuninreadingbooks.wordpress.com nominated me for this lovely honor. I’ve been calling myself an award nominated blog all week and it’s been fabulous. So thank you for tagging me, Dezel Ocampo, you made my week. Please visit her blog to read her lovely posts and book reviews.

The rules of this award are:

• Thank your nominator
• Share the award on your blog
• State 7 things about yourself
• Choose 7 new nominees who have fewer than 300 followers
• Notify them via social media

As per the rules, here are seven things about me:

• I love to read. Not surprisingly my mother fostered that love by reading to me from a very young age.
• I read Gone with the Wind and Roots the summer I turned ten. I felt very accomplished.
• The second thing that attracted me to my husband is that he is a reader, too. He gets it if I’m busy reading.
• I own so many books that the movers complained/whined about it.  And it irritated me.
• I don’t organize my bookshelves to look attractive. In other words, I don’t care if my shelves don’t look like the ones on Pinterest or Restoration Hardware.
• I am nervous about blogging. Will anybody read or care about what I’ve posted?
• I’m hoping to get free books to review on my blog. Is that wrong? (If you have an suggestions about how to make this happen, makes sure to comment below!)