Tuesday, October 19, 2010

My Literary Week in Review

I have been reading more as of late, and reading things that have happy endings instead of the dystopic depressing stuff I had been choosing recently. It is always nice to offset thought-inducing dystopic views with a murder mystery and a romance novel. And that is exactly what I have done as of late. Which brings me to...

If you like romance novels or time travely fantasy and are not opposed to sex scenes, I highly recommend Karen Marie Moning's Highlander series. A while back I read Kiss of the Highlander, the fourth book in the series. It worked very well as a stand alone, as do most of the early books in the series. But now I am reading the Highlander books from the beginning. I just finished Beyond the Highland Mist. It was quite good, though I found myself frustrated with the characters because they were both too stubborn to discuss their real feelings. Gah! But then again, that is part of what made the book super steamy. As the reader, you know what they are both feeling, but they don't know what each other is feeling. Frustrating...but fun! I loved, Adrienne, the heroine of the story. Even though I wanted her to admit her feelings, I kinda dug how much she stuck to her guns and refused to be seduced. I like strong, sassy female characters in romance novels. I found the main man, Hawk, likable, if not exactly someone I would find myself going for were I the heroine. I just really enjoy Moning's writing style, fantasy elements, and humor mixed with the dramatic.

I also read another Blackbird Sister Mystery. I always really enjoy Nancy Martin's books, though I felt slightly not invested in this one, Have Your Cake and Kill Him Too. I love all three Blackbird sisters, despite, or perhaps because of, their unique brand of crazy. I just felt like the book didn't really amp up until toward the end, which once I got within a few chapters from the end I had to finish it despite it being midnight when I had to get up at 6am. Also, there was not a very satisfying relationship aspect to this one. And parts of it felt a bit forced. And my favorite character wasn't in it at all! I still enjoyed it and will read the next one, which will hopefully be back on track.

Another read from this week was Two Blonds, a Sookie Stackhouse short story by Charlaine Harris. I read it all in one sitting, which isn't that impressive since it was a short story. But still. It was super cute. It was nice to have a little bite (haha! clever pun) of the Sookie-verse while waiting for the next book to come out, which is apparently going to be a Sookie Stackhouse companion with a short story, but not a novel! Gah! Need new book! Must find out what happens next! Anyway...Two Blonds was really cute. It was just Sookie and Pam, which is always fun. I love Pam and am glad anytime she and Sookie are together because they are really funny. It was also nice to get back into the book universe as I have just finished watching season three of True Blood. I like both universes, but am terribly partial to the books.

Now, the big question is...what to read next? I am going on vacation starting tomorrow afternoon and need a book for the plane and in the afternoons I will spend sitting by the pool in the hot Florida sun. I had kinda been planning on reading The Historian, but feel like that isn't really a vacation book. I might read the next Blackbird Sister book, but what if I find that I am not crazy about it while on vacation. I need something guaranteed to be good. I recently got a couple Jennifer Crusie books and a book by Sophie Kinsella, so I can always read chick lit. That seems vacationy, right? The Cat Who... books are always good for vacation, but I would have to take quite a few since the read really fast. Oh, the decisions I need to make before tonight. The one nice thing is that I am vacationing with my parents, so I can always trade books with my mom if I finish mine.

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