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Showing posts from January, 2013

Ball like a hedgehog and keep on rolling

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Oh dear, I haven't left my chair in way too long. Buying all five books in one set equals a very debilitating weekend of my curled in a comfy chair wrapped in blankets dreaming of tea and parasols and hedgehogs. Changless by Gail Carriger The beauty of stumbling on an author later in their career means you get to benefit from reading through a series continuously. You are able to enjoy the uninterrupted glory of a good story steaming right along with its plots and motivations. It can also mean that sometimes you take note of large continuity flaws if you have detail OCD like myself. So far I have been very pleased with the seamless tour through Gail Carriger's steampunk England. I continue on with my mind engaged in her intellectual wit, bursting into laughter at random and shocking the masses the around me. I try to approach sequels as an unattached reader. This levels my hopes from being disappointed if the author had one stroke of genius and ran out (or was rushed to

Continue on the steampunk train

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Lady of Devices got me back into the steampunk world and reminded me of Gail Carriger. I read her first novel Soulless on a whim at the library back when I was an avid card holder and relished the smell of spine glue and musty paper. I since moved and have not found the motivation to head out to my "local" (which is ridiculously inconvenient to get to and miles away) library. I live on Amazon these days . After going back to check on my first foray into the steampunk genre, I noticed all books in the series were now being sold in one boxed package. I am a huge sucker of buying an entire series in these beautiful boxed sets. One, it eliminates my need to keep bookends (which I do not like for some reason) on my bookshelf. Two, it fulfills my OCD to have every book in a series with matching size, print, artwork style, etc. Since it has been two years since reading Soulless, I decided to just restart the series. (I will admit here that I began reading the second book but felt

To make up for my sloth-like ways

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Two reviews in one day. Amazing! I am attempting to make up for my hibernation. After my renewed vigor from Tammy Blackwell, I was pursuing the recommendation section on my Amazon page and found way too many excellent choices.  I am a bit of a sucker for  a  printed  author who offers the digital copy free as introduction to the series. Tangent (ok, really it is a rant) here: I am aggressively opposed to digital copies costing more than the printed work. Publishing houses of the large scale variety are gouging the avid bookworm. Best sellers and large "brand name" authors should not receive double the standard paperback price. $15 for your book just because it made some hit list is ludicrous. When the paperback version cost $8, then the digital copy should cost $4. Digital storage is not an expensive endeavor to upkeep.  I would love to see the competitors to the major houses thrive and an economy of price arrive to the world of literature. Lady of Devices by Shelley Ad

Queen Procrastinator strikes again

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I am terrible with journals, blogs, diaries, etc. Anything that requires I record my thoughts just doesn't happen smoothlly. My mom says I go into my "ozone" and don't surface again for hours. This may be the leading cause, it may just be my laziness to type. Ironic when you were an English undergrad and had a paper a week to churn out. That is when Queen Procrastinator was born and she lives on to this day.  Fate Succumbs by Tammy Blackwell After the tedious labor behind reading a Wheel of Time novel, I decided for a quick palate cleanser. I was humbly surprised by the offering of Tammy Blackwell's Timber Wolves series. I started the first novel on a free Kindle give away (which has become one of my favorite marketing concepts from Amazon as it introduces me to wonderful authors I may have skipped over even at $3 a novel). Tangent here: I really was against the Kindle and the digital age for the longest time. I still hold to the belief it has hurt th

Back tracking a little

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I'll have to back track a little to cover the books I finished in the first two weeks before deciding to start keeping a record of what I read.  I count this in my list of 75, but it is a little bit of a cheat. I was already halfway through the book at the New Year. Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series consists of pretty hefty reading so even though I was halfway through the story, it was like reading a full book post New Year anyway. Lord of Chaos - Robert Jordan (Wheel of Time book 5) It has taken me some time to actually delve into the series. I first attempted to read Eye of the World back in high school and failed miserably after stumbling over so many names with their very odd spellings (plus I had the attention span of a gnat). After taking a linguistics class in college, I decided to give it another go.  All but the last three novels are already in publication at this point, so I won't have to dedicate a lot of time to rereading. Plus, by the time I manag

Here is to beginnings

I do not believe in New Year's resolutions.  Everyone fails at them, or forgets what they chose by February. Every day of every year you should be moving towards a goal that makes your life better, which in turn betters the world around you. I strongly try to be that better spirit that impacts the people in my life in a chain reaction of kindness and tolerance. To be a stronger person and more resilient role model, I do understand that we need to do things for ourselves that just focus on our core every now and again. So here is my mock resolution to myself this year: I will read 75 books. Seems simple enough; it isn't even two books a week. Well I gave myself the same goal last year and didn't even make it to 50. There are more influences in my life that keep me from my fondest past time that I must find how to juggle better this year. I got married last year and found an entire month go by without a single book in my hands. With the advent of www.goodreads.com , I h