From the Bookshelf

While there isn't a lot of current exciting knitting content, I have been reading a lot, and I CAN share that with you. I joined a sort of book club/group on Goodreads late in the fall of 2012 that I've been enjoying a lot. It's a very active group, a lot of members, and several mods who do a great job with organizing and having interesting things going on in the group.

I have become completely addicted to their challenges thread.  Right now, they have their usual monthly themed challenge going on, which is to read re-tellings of various myths.

So far this month, I've read:

Sweet Hell, which is a 21st take on Dionysus, the god of wine.  Another group member had suggested it, so I thought I'd give it a try as it was a little lighter than some of the other ones I had picked.  It's a fun read - the heroine is wonderful.  There are a couple of plot twists that keep you guessing up until the last fewpages.  (And the heroine's cat, Cats Domino, is worth the entire book - priceless.)

Persephone:  This is a YA book, but it sure doesn't read like one.  Great characters and wonderful re-telling of the Persephone/Hades relationship.  It does help a little bit to have a passing familiarity with the original myth (with Persephone as the goddess of spring), but even without it, you can figure out the basics of the characters and get sucked right into the story.  

Dark Descendant:  The main character, Nikki Glass, is a private eye in Northern Virginia, who turns out to be a descending of the goddess Artemis.  This is the first in a series, and I liked this book well enough I'm planning on reading the rest of them.  My only criticism is that this really comes off as the first book in a series - meaning... the storyline isn't completely nicely tied up in a bow at the end.  It's finished to some extent, but there's a lot left to wonder about.  (which is either good or bad, depending on how much you think you'd like to read on and find out).

And finally, Norse Code:  I just started this last night, so I'm not very far along into it.  The main character is one of the Valkyrie, and we apparently will run into some other Norse gods along the way - I'm not quite as riveted by this one.  I'll report back after I finish it to let y'all know a final verdict.  I'm having a hard time getting involved into the characters, which is usually the thing that makes me not want to put a book down. 

I'm also doing two other longer challenges with the group (there's going to be some overlap of books in these).  The first one is a 6-month Bingo challenge (you get to pick your mix-&-match things from topics like books from your to-be-read list, new urban fantasy books, books being released in 2013, etc.).  The second one is a year-long challenge.  At the end of 2012, the group picked their top 100 paranormal books of all time, and the challenge is to read as many of those as you can.  Lots of blog fodder there!  I'll post some updates as I go along on all of these.

All for now...

 

Comments

[Terri]

Since I can not knit I have been reading a ton! I just finished The Art of Feilding which is very good. I think anyone will like it, but especially so if you like baseball. Now I have begun The Dog Stars. I am worried it is going to be sad, I hope not.

[The Infamous Blonde Sharon - who is no longer blonde...]

You've just renewed my interest in Goodreads - I've had a challenging past 3 months or so, and have not been online much, although I have been reading!

[Mary Lou]

I have been playing blog reading catch up, I read all the Simon Serailler books over the holidays, highly recommend them. The author's name escapes me right now. So much escapes my mind these days!