BW35: Sunday's Book Babble - Ink and Bone

It's week 35 in our 52 Books quest and this month's fictional librarian is Jess Brightwell from Rachel Caine's Great Library series.

I'm currently reading Louise Penny's latest book in her Armand Gamache series - The Madness of Crowds.

"You’re a coward.

Time and again, as the New Year approaches, that charge is leveled against Armand Gamache.

It starts innocently enough.

While the residents of the Québec village of Three Pines take advantage of the deep snow to ski and toboggan, to drink hot chocolate in the bistro and share meals together, the Chief Inspector finds his holiday with his family interrupted by a simple request. He’s asked to provide security for what promises to be a non-event. A visiting Professor of Statistics will be giving a lecture at the nearby university. While he is perplexed as to why the head of homicide for the Sûreté du Québec would be assigned this task, it sounds easy enough. That is until Gamache starts looking into Professor Abigail Robinson and discovers an agenda so repulsive he begs the university to cancel the lecture.

They refuse, citing academic freedom, and accuse Gamache of censorship and intellectual cowardice. Before long, Professor Robinson’s views start seeping into conversations. Spreading and infecting. So that truth and fact, reality and delusion are so confused it’s near impossible to tell them apart. Discussions become debates, debates become arguments, which turn into fights. As sides are declared, a madness takes hold. Abigail Robinson promises that, if they follow her, ça va bien aller. All will be well. But not, Gamache and his team know, for everyone.

When a murder is committed it falls to Armand Gamache, his second-in-command Jean-Guy Beauvoir, and their team to investigate the crime as well as this extraordinary popular delusion.

And the madness of crowds."

Also have Rachel Caine's Great Library series in my virtual stacks and looking forward to rereading Ink and Bone as well as first time read of Heat Stroke, #2 in her Weather Warden series.

BW34: Sunday's Book Babble - Ray Bradbury

 


Today is the anniversary of one of my favorite writers Ray Bradbury who entertains with his writing and inspired my Feed the Muse challenge.   


Doing is Being

By

Ray Bradbury

Doing is being.
To have done’s not enough.
To stuff yourself with doing — that’s the game.
To name yourself each hour by what’s done,
To tabulate your time at sunset’s gun
And find yourself in acts
You could not know before the facts
You wooed from secret self, which much needs wooing,
So doing brings it out,
Kills doubt by simply jumping, rushing, running
Forth to be
The new-discovered me.
To not do is to die,
Or lie about and lie about the things
You just might do some day.
Away with that!
Tomorrow empty stays
If no man plays it into being
With his motioned way of seeing.
Let your body lead your mind —
Blood the guide dog to the blind;
So then practice and rehearse
To find heart-soul’s universe,
Knowing that by moving/seeing
Proves for all time: Doing’s being!

******************

Currently reading Hexing with a Chance of Tornados.   Think I need some heavier reads and will get back into reading the last Wheel of Time book after I'm done.  Need more meat with my fluff.   

We have a busy yet fun week coming up. Hubby and I celebrating 24 years of marriage on Monday and Wednesday is Hubby's 62nd birthday.  Party time! 

Bookish Notes -- Too many books in your TBR stacks

 


Yeah, a smoke free day today. The past couple days have been horrible and I feel really bad for the people who are directly in the path of the fires.  

I finished a couple books this week:

A Borrowing of Bones (#1 Mercy and Elvis Mysteries) by Paula Munier was very good and had a combination of factors that meshed with a lot of the mini challenges I've been doing and current events. And it all takes place over the long fourth of july weekend. The character an ex soldier who served in Afghanistan, working with a service dog which belonged to her late fiancée also a soldier. Mentions of the muses, art history and artists,  an abandoned baby, lots of kittens who need to be rescued, a mystery of buried bones, along with an arrogant investigator who doesn't appreciate Mercy's or Elvis's help. It was a very busy weekend. 😃

Also read a kindle unlimited story - Cloudy with a chance of Witchcraft by Mandy Roth about a witch who didn't know she was a witch and managed to ignore the fact that one of her best friends who talked to trees and animals and foretell the future, thinking she was just 'special', falls out of love with her cheating husband and moves back to her home town to live in a home she inherited from her grandma. And the house is hexed, but also haunted by her grandparents so.... I could go on. It's an amusing story and although the 40 year old characters may act more like their 20, I enjoyed it and now reading the 2nd book in the Grimm Cove Series - Hexing with a chance of Tornados


******

Just read Tor's post about Maybe You Can Have Too Many Books in Your TBR Pile by Molly Templeton. Great article but the ending question for some reason gives me a sense of anxiety.


"But the part of my brain that loves completing tasks and shelving books I’ve just read sometimes stares at the unread-books wall and wonders: What would it be like to catch up? To read them all? To clear the slate?"

I think I like the fact that there's always another story waiting in the wings that will suit my mood or entice me to read something different. There's always a reason why I add a book to my stacks, some for pure joy, others for enlightenment, education. But just like when I'm reading and get an epiphany, but forget to highlight or write that information down, later when I peruse the stack and see that book, the reason escapes me and makes me wonder what the heck was I thinking. 😃

Guest Post -James M's review of Archie Sonic Online Issue 251

 








Almost over a year and a half after Archie Sonic Online's last upload, Archie Sonic Online returns with the 251st issue of Archie Sonic and something massive: The long-awaited return of Hershey the Cat. Plus, the endgame of the King Naugus arc has descended and Naugus has gone crazy.

I just read the issue and this was insanely good, the fans put a lot of energy into this and there was so much passion. I'm very impressed with my fellow fans, Archie Sonic Online is a fan project worth reading and its doing a fine job showing us a glimpse of what could've been with the real Archie Sonic. It goes to show that the fans are just as good as the companies that produce games and comics.

While Archie Sonic may be gone, its legacy is never forgotten. The fans will do everything they can to honor long forgotten stories and projects, no matter what happens, as long as they don't come under fire from anybody like SEGA. I once again salute Archie Sonic Online and we wait patiently for the release of the long-awaited Sonic Underground epilogue with Sonic Underground Online Issue 50.

Peace out!

-James M

BW33: Sunday's Book Babble - Hugo Gernsback


 It's week 33 in our 52 Books Quest and this week we celebrated the anniversary of Hugo Gernsback's birthday. And the Hugo Awards are what inspired my Mind Voyages Science Fiction and Fantasy Challenge. 

I’m on the third book in the In the Garden Trilogy reread by Nora Roberts – Red Lilly.

Also reading A Bad Day for Sunshine by Darynda Jones.

“Del Sol, New Mexico is known for three things: its fry-an-egg-on-the-cement summers, strong cups of coffee—and, now, a nationwide manhunt? Del Sol native Sunshine Vicram has returned to town as the elected sheriff—thanks to her adorably meddlesome parents who nominated her—and she expects her biggest crime wave to involve an elderly flasher named Doug. But a teenage girl is missing, a kidnapper is on the loose, and all of this is reminding Sunshine why she left Del Sol in the first place. Add to that the trouble at her daughter’s new school, plus and a kidnapped prized rooster named Puff Daddy, and, well, the forecast looks anything but sunny.

But even clouds have their silver linings. This one's got Levi, Sunshine's sexy, almost-old-flame, and a fiery-hot US Marshal. With temperatures rising everywhere she turns, Del Sol's normally cool-minded sheriff is finding herself knee-deep in drama and danger. Can Sunshine face the call of duty—and find the kidnapper who's terrorizing her beloved hometown—without falling head over high heels in love...or worse?”

Recently added Rebecca Roanhorse’s Black Sun to my stacks for Hugo read.

And Saturday night James and I watched Minority Report (2002) which was loosely based off Philip K Dick's 1956 novella The Minority Report.  I watched it way back when but didn't remember much so enjoyed the film all over again. 

BW32: Sunday's Book Babble - Gods and Goddess


 

It's book week 32 in our 52 Books Quest and this week is all about Gods and Goddess, one of our 52 Books Bingo categories. 

Continuing with my read and reread of Nora Robert and currently rereading Blue Dahlia, #1 In the Garden Trilogy.

In my web wanderings and putting the 52 Books post together, fell in like with The Ill Made Mute from a 10 Magical Fantasy books inspired by Irish Mythology so added it to my stacks.

I seem to be in a cozy romance or mystery mode.  Just finished reading Spoiler Alert by Olivia Dade about a plus size woman falling in love with her celebrity crush and thoroughly enjoyed it. 

"Marcus Caster-Rupp has a secret. The world may know him as Aeneas, star of the biggest show on television, but fanfiction readers call him something else: Book!AeneasWouldNever. Marcus gets out his frustrations with the show through anonymous stories about the internet’s favorite couple, Aeneas and Lavinia. But if anyone discovered his online persona, he’d be finished in Hollywood.

April Whittier has secrets of her own. A hardcore Lavinia fan, she’s long hidden her fanfic and cosplay hobbies from her “real life”—but not anymore. When she dares to post her latest costume creation on Twitter, her plus-size take goes viral. And when Marcus asks her out to spite her internet critics, truth officially becomes stranger than fanfiction.

On their date, Marcus quickly realizes he wants more from April than a one-time publicity stunt. But when he discovers she’s Unapologetic Lavinia Stan, his closest fandom friend, he has one more huge secret to keep from her.

With love and Marcus’s career on the line, can the two of them stop hiding once and for all, or will a match made in fandom end up prematurely cancelled?"

*********

We watched the reboot of Tomb Raider  which was pretty good but had it's moments of implausibility and typical movie physics.  The original is much better.   

"Lara Croft (Alicia Vikander) is the independent daughter of an eccentric adventurer who mysteriously vanished when she was a teen. Determined to forge her own path, she refuses to take the reins of her father’s global empire just as she rejects the idea that he’s truly gone. Against her father’s final wishes, Lara leaves everything she knows behind in search of her dad’s last-known destination: a fabled tomb on a mythical island. Her mission will not be easy; just reaching the island will be extremely treacherous. Against all odds and armed with only her sharp mind, blind faith and inherently stubborn spirit, she must learn to push herself beyond her limits as she journeys into the unknown. If she survives this perilous adventure, she could earn the name Tomb Raider."


 

Bookish Notes: Dr Who, Wolves, and Invisible husbands, OH MY!

 



Yesterday was James 22nd birthday and he was very pleased to receive Dr Who: The Movie with the regeneration of the doctor to Paul McGann.  Eric Roberts made for a silly over the top Master. 

I finished Jenn McKinley's first book Books can be Deceiving which was a fun cozy murder mystery and look forward to reading more in the series. 

Claimed (#1 Lair of the Wolven) by J.R. Ward set in the world of the BDB was a hot mess which is disappointing.   Characters were one dimensional and too many plot threads left in the air and of course ended in a cliff hanger. I most likely won't be reading any more of the wolven series. 

Currently reading The Invisible Husband of Frick Island by Colleen Oakley which I'm totally enjoying.  Love the characters and the mystery involved.

"Piper Parrish's life on Frick Island—a tiny, remote town smack in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay—is nearly perfect. Well, aside from one pesky detail: Her darling husband, Tom, is dead. When Tom's crab boat capsized and his body wasn't recovered, Piper, rocked to the core, did a most peculiar thing: carried on as if her husband was not only still alive, but right there beside her, cooking him breakfast, walking him to the docks each morning, meeting him for their standard Friday night dinner date at the One-Eyed Crab. And what were the townspeople to do but go along with their beloved widowed Piper?
 
Anders Caldwell’s career is not going well. A young ambitious journalist, he’d rather hoped he’d be a national award-winning podcaster by now, rather than writing fluff pieces for a small town newspaper. But when he gets an assignment to travel to the remote Frick Island and cover their boring annual Cake Walk fundraiser, he stumbles upon a much more fascinating tale: an entire town pretending to see and interact with a man who does not actually exist. Determined it’s the career-making story he’s been needing for his podcast, Anders returns to the island to begin covert research and spend more time with the enigmatic Piper—but he has no idea out of all the lives he’s about to upend, it’s his that will change the most."

BW31: Sunday's Book Babble - Fictional Librarian of the Month


 It's book week 31 in our 52 Books quest and this month's fictional librarian is Lindsay Norris in Jenn McKinlay's Library Lovers mystery series. 

Currently reading J.R. Ward’s Claimed, the first book in the Lair of the Wolven, set in the world of the Black Dagger Brotherhood. 

“Lydia Susi is passionate about protecting wolves in their natural habitat. When a hotel chain develops a tract of land next to the preserve, Lydia is one of the most vocal opponents of the project—and becomes a target.

One night, a shadowy figure threatens Lydia’s life in the forest, and a new hire at the Wolf Study Project comes from out of nowhere to save her. Daniel Joseph is both mysterious, and someone she intrinsically wants to trust. But is he hiding something?

As the stakes get higher, and one of Lydia’s colleagues is murdered, she must decide how far she will go to protect the wolves. Then a shocking revelation about Daniel challenges Lydia’s reality in ways she could never have predicted. Some fates demand courage, others require even more, with no guarantees. Is she destined to have true love... or will a soul-shattering loss ruin her forever?”


Haven’t made much progress in the 14th and last book in the Wheel of Time series, A Memory of Light which will probably take me a while since it’s a chunky book.