JANUARY READS

[rapa]

Happy 2014 to all !!!  Shall we start thinking about listing our best and worst reads of 2013?

I'm almost finished Grisham's SYCAMORE ROW and totally enjoying it. Not yet finished Turow's IDENTICAL.  Have GUESTS ON EARTH: a novel by Lee Smith waiting at library.

What's on your plate?

[tnbopeep]

Oh yes, Best/Worst!!!! I love that!

I just posted about the Kerry Greenwood series, Phryne Fisher books, that I've started reading. I want to get the newest Fannie Flagg too. I just finished one for a book club I've been invited to visit. It's 22 Britannia Rd. It's a post WWII era that didn't really grab me. I was doing some research about it - after I read it & found it was an Oprah book. I've never read one of "her" books that was that great for me. 

[Mandy Muffin]

Finishing up, "W is for Wasted" by Sue Grafton.  I have to find out what she is going to do with the nearly one-half million dollars she inherited.  My next read is "The Goldfinch" by Donna Tartt which was named the number one book of 2013 by Amazon.  Amazon published a free book on the top sellers for 2013 which is a 93 page description of the top twenty books, including author interviews.  Tratt talks about doing all her writing in notebooks by longhand!  Who does that today?  http://www.amazon.com/Best-Books-2013-Readers-Guide-ebook/dp/B00GDO...

[Mandy Muffin]

Wow! "The Goldfinch" is almost 800 pages long.  It had better be good.  How much can you write about a painting?  As to Sue Grafton, although I enjoyed the "W" book, I think the book is way too long (almost 500 pages) and she rambles on a bit much.  The beauty of the first few alphabet books was the crisp language and simplicity of the story which she managed to tell in 300 pages or less.  Now I sense a 73 year old writer trying to live the life of a 38 year old.  Most of the characters seems more interested in going to the bathroom than engaging in hijinks.  The cat did steal the show. 

[Susan Gillmor]

Can't wait to get Sycamore Road!  Just finished The Himmler Brothers by Katrin Himmler, great niece of Heinrich Himmler.  It's a fascinating study of the Himmler family, particularly of Heinrich and his two brothers and their parents, meticulously researched and representative of how the descendants of the Nazi inner circle cope with their ancestry.  I couldn't put this one down.  I'm now finishing a mystery on my kindle called The Case of the Pig in the Evening Suit, the first installment of a series called The Dumfries Detective by R.R. Gall.  It's light and kind of fun.

[Carolyn Tewell]

Mandy...cracking up...I quit the W book at the 2/3 mark...so at least I know she finally gets some dough. LOL...seriously, I just couldn't get engaged with the story. Thanks for saving me 3 hours on AudioBook of my life that I can't get back!

Really...I did finish "Gods of Guilt" by Michael Connelly ..last night so technically I should have posted over on the December reads. It was so complicated and I'm not a Lincoln Lawyer fan anyway (other than Actor Mcconnehy) sp?in the film). But the conclusion was worth it and logical. You all know I like a lot of reality with my fantasy! Crack self up!

So...is this good/bad reads or just post what we want to share? Over the last 12 months I've had so many boring, disappointing selections everyone will run screaming to their wine glasses. But I may have tapped into an Author that I like a bunch! Tana French. Don't know if I was tipped by a member here or thru some other site like Good Reads? I just started Broken Harbor. Keep u posted.

I was going to regale my Soarkpeople Team members with a list of best selling authors of the last decade. So I'm thinking Stephen King, Michael Connelly, John Grishom? HA! Nope! 2 are children's book writers, #6 is Jamie Oliver the Cookbook celeb, JK Rowling is #1 and Dan Brown is #7 and I don't recognize any other names? Maybe I'm too locked into mysteries.

Okay, gotta hit the sack! Happy New Year and thanks for all the helpful ideas this year!~mellow

[Lip Service]

Tana French is a very good writer but I found her moods to be too dark and depressinng

[Joanne]

Rapa, I might have known you would be getting "Guests on Earth" by Lee Smith.  LOL  I just finished it.   I really enjoyed the book, if one can be said to enjoy a book dealing with mental illness and tragedy.    I never had heard about Zelda's demise, although I knew she had been in and out of mental hospitals.  What a sad life.

Also just finished "The Most of Norah Ephron" which contains about everything she ever wrote; her articles, screenplay of When Harry Met Sally; Excerpt of "I Feel Bad About my Neck" and "Heartburn".  She was so funny.  Really miss her.

[Ioruach]

For me, it is always tough to identify a "best" read of any year and nearly impossible for a "worst" read.  But my best would probably be between The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Stedman and the two Louise Penny novels I read, A Trick of the Light and Still Life. I suppose the worst book would have been one of the half dozen or so that I started but gave up on. (After a minimum of 50 pages. I almost always give an author at least that much.)

Yesterday morning, before the parade and football games, I finished No Way Back by Andrew Gross.  He writes easy to read can’t-put-down thrillers, but seems bent on killing off too many characters. 

I hope everyone in the Bookoholics group has a wonderful 2014 and discovers many great books during the year.

[Jick]

I finally finished Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson. I'm glad I stuck with it, he's such a good writer, can't believe how he tied things up at the end.  I'm now reading The Goldfinch  by Donna Tartt.  I was on most every best 10 lists for 2013. It's such a good story and a page turner. Being compared to a modern Dickens novel and I understand why. If I had started it earlier it would be my pick for book of the year, but there's always '14. Doubt if I read a book I like better, but I hope I'm wrong. 

[Mandy Muffin]

As I indicated in  prior post, I was turned off by the length of "The Goldfinch" which I just started this afternoon, but went through the first 75 pages in a snap as it is well written and keeps your interest.  I'm sure to read well into the nights to get the story finished as it is compelling.

I have "Crypto-Nomicron" on the shelf, by Stephenson, that comes in at 1152 pages, with small print.  One of these days I going to start reading it.   

[Lip Service]

I also started Cryptonomicon but on a paperback and found the print too small for such a long book. Now I have a copy on kindle and will "do it" sometimes this year. The character of Alan Turing is real. Stephenson also brought alive the character of Isaac Newton (and others) in his Baroque Cycle trilogy

Another wonderful work by Neal Stephenson is Anathem (it is not easy to read because Stephenson makes up his own language)

The free book that Mandy Muffin at the top of this page has a good description of The Goldfinch, in spite of its length, readers wanted to slow down the last 100 pages in order not to see it end.

[Carolyn Tewell]

Lip...I saw the clue on Tana in her earlier books. This one hopefully won't be as grim. However, Irish writers seem to have that type of attitude? Lol

Think I will put a hold on Goldfinch. It is a recommended read in our Plain Dealer. Drat! Oven timer just blared for dinner.