Books in Bed

Reading in November

2018, Books in Bed, Reading /

Sucked. It did and there’s not a good reason for it. Besides work and stress and fun stuff like that. Reading two pages a day is just not going to get the books read, is it? And, I keep quitting books 50 pages in because I am not loving them and that is really annoying. What a waste of reading time when you’re an hour or so in and decide you’re not going further. Whatever. Onward to… January? I’m going to need a #fakereadathon in January, I think.

8 total

2 audiobooks (one was a YA Cybil! First Cybil I’ve finished in ages!)
5 children’s/middle grade fiction. (One was LGBTQ themed.)

1 was written by a MOC

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Scythe (Arc of a Scythe)

2018, Books in Bed, Cybil Challenge, Fiction /

We listened to the first Scythe book on audio last month. It’s an actual real live Cybil, woohoo. It’s also pretty grim and gruesome but also very interesting.

Let’s suppose The Cloud takes over the world because human beings suck at taking care of the world (or themselves) and in doing so resolves all the world’s problems, including mortality. People keep being born but nobody is dying… that’s where the Scythes come in.

Makes sense… except that Scythes are humans and The Cloud hasn’t actually solved the fact that human beings are horrible… very interesting, really.

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Down Among the Sticks and Bones

2018, Books in Bed, Favorites, Queer, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

The sequel to Every Heart a Doorway, Down Among the Sticks and Bones was about Jack and Jill and their doorway “adventure.” Good story, even if it was bloody and sad. I’m not sure I’d have saved my sister if she’d done what Jill did. Jack’s a better woman than I am.

The next book will bring us back to Eleanor West’s boarding school. I’m looking forward to it.

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Five Children’s Books

2018, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Comics & Graphic Novels, Fiction, Queer /

I ordered some Halloween books for the little boys and forgot to blog about them. So here they are:

Bonaparte Falls Apart was a big hit with Pippin.

ET: The Classic Illustrated Storybook – It’s the story of ET with great illustrations. I didn’t have time to read it to Pippin when I was babysitting.

Spooky Pookie – this one was cute. Squishy liked it but mostly just wanted to carry it around and look at it by himself rather than have me read it to him.

You’re My Little Pumpkin Pie – I didn’t like this one quite as well, (I wouldn’t), but Squishy seemed to enjoy me reading it to him. He sat all the way through and didn’t try to take the book away from me, lol.

Princess Princess Ever After is a book I saw on some list of LGBTQ books in June or maybe October? I don’t know but it was in my Evernote mixed up with other LGBTQ titles. It’s a graphic novel for young middle grade kids. It’s cute – princess rescues princess and rescues a prince and then the other princess kind of rescues everyone and becomes queen. Then some amount of time passes (a lot, I’d guess) and the princess comes back to the castle to marry the queen. I could have done without that marrying the queen bit (patriarchy, etc. etc.) and time passed without us seeing the princess or the queen at work. That kind of stinks. If you were going to do that, it should be a series where we watch the kids grow up, do their own things, and then come back together again. (I clearly have strong thoughts about this book, lol.)

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To Die But Once

2018, Audiobooks, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Women /

We did it… we finished an Overdrive audiobook before it was viciously yanked from my account by the library’s annoying rule about NO renewals of Overdrive books. Hmph. Anyway, we listened to To Die But Once and yippee, Maisie Dobbs.

In the (very long) epilogue I started feeling some anxiety about how Maisie Dobbs and Maggie Hope are crossing streams. I keep picturing Maisie as the woman in the Maggie Hope books who oversees the Prime Minister’s special project, (what is her name? It isn’t Maisie Dobbs, that’s for sure.)… and the picture just doesn’t work. I might have to just be very careful not to read the two series really close together. (Big problem since there’s a Maggie Hope book waiting for us at the library and because I’m about to reserve the next Maisie Dobbs. Ugh.)

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Reading in October

2018, Books in Bed, Reading /

This wasn’t a horribly bad reading month, even if we didn’t have #Readathon. (Especially considering I was tired after GHC 18 and we went to the beach with the little ones.)

10 books finished (plus a couple of short stories, and I quit a couple of books in October, too.)

2 children picture books
1 audiobook
1 YA
1 Manga
1 non-fiction

1 had a lot of queer characters, both of the children’s picture books were about gender nonconforming characters, (and one I quit had lgbt characters, too.)

2 books were written by WOC (Asian).

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Every Heart a Doorway

1 Comment / 2018, Books in Bed, Queer, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

I did finish Every Heart a Doorway during our #FakeReadathon on Sunday. It’s a quick and easy read so there was little reason for me NOT to finish it. Also, it was good.

I thought it was YA but quickly realized that it wasn’t. It definitely was not. It was also a lot darker and creepier than I expected it to be. Not that I really knew what to expect… this book has been in my Evernote TBR file for more than two years. I only barely remembered anything about it. And I didn’t realize it was part of a series until Saturday.

I enjoyed it enough that I’ve already reserved the second book at the library.

Oh, I almost forgot… this one has a Transgendered character (who I assume is a character we’ll see again in the rest of the series) AND an Aesexual character (who I believe was only in this first book — but I’m not really sure since this is fantasy and anything can happen in fantasy.)

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Post-#Readathon Survey and Update

2018, Books in Bed, Chick Lit, Dewey's Readathon, Fiction /

I crapped out at 12:20 p.m. last night with 90 pages left in Limelight. I just couldn’t make it. No big deal since I managed to get a Blackout on #Readathon Bingo, heh. Everything else was gravy.

Woke up late this morning and lazily finished Limelight out on the back deck with the dogs. Limelight was fun – a beach read or something to read before you head to NYC for a fun vacation.

We’re spending the rest of today doing a #FakeReadathon because we can. I’m reading Every Heart a Doorway next.

And, here’s my end of #Readathon survey:

1. Which hour was most daunting for you?
– 11 a.m. (and I took a nap, hah) and again at 11 p.m. – I didn’t manage to hold out much later than that last one.

2. Tell us ALLLLL the books you read!
– I finished The Bear and the Nightingale.
– I read a horror short story by Somer Canon and an essay/short story by Carole Maso.
– I read a Manga, The World’s Greatest Love.
– A cookbook, Dinner Illustrated.
– Two children’s picture books: I’m a Girl and Introducing Teddy.
– Some Maisie Dobbs on audio.
– And, most of Limelight.

3. Which books would you recommend to other Read-a-thoners?
– The Bear and the Nightingale was fabulous. The cookbook is pretty good. Anything by Carole Maso is amazing. I’m a Girl is really well done. Limelight is good, for a beach read.

4. What’s a really rad thing we could do during the next Read-a-thon that would make you happy?
– I really liked the bingo idea and I loved, loved, loved having all of the mini-challenges ready from the start, rather than having to check in hourly to see which new challenges are live.

5. How likely are you to participate in the Read-a-thon again? Would you be interested in volunteering to help organize and prep?
– Of course I’ll do #Readathon again. I almost always do. Volunteering to organize/prep… maybe.

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#ReadathonBingo!

2018, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Comics & Graphic Novels, cookbooks, Dewey's Readathon, Favorites, Queer /

Woot. I didn’t even know about #Readathon Bingo until I woke up this morning and loaded all of the Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon links I like to keep open when I do #Readathon, so I’m pretty pleased that I was able to adjust my TBR plan (who am I kidding, I didn’t have a plan) and get a Blackout!

#Readathon Bingo Blackout
#Readathon Bingo Blackout

To get it, I had to read the short stories/essays I mentioned earlier today and track down a book with a male protagonist… TW’s Comic Con LGBTQ Mystery Box to the rescue (thanks, Momal!) In it was The World’s Greatest Love: Vol. 1. and that fit the bill nicely!

Speaking of The World’s Greatest Love… typical Manga. I kind of wish it had been written by a man, I think it might have been slightly different… the best part was the information about the world of Manga publishing. That was really interesting.

Besides that book, I also finished Dinner Illustrated and found a lot of recipes I’d try. I’m almost tempted to buy it. I wonder what TW thinks of the book.

After that, since I was waiting for the dogs to come in, I read two children’s picture books about gender/non-binary. Both were well done. I’d recommend them: I’m a Girl and Introducing Teddy.

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#Readathon Mid-Event Survey

2018, Books in Bed, Dewey's Readathon /

It’s that time again! (How many of these have I done over the years? I should count them…)

1. What are you reading right now?
– I’m still working on the cookbook and Limelight.

2. How many books have you read so far?
– I’ve only finished The Bear and the Nightingale (but I’ve also read some short stories/essays and listened to some audio.)

3. What book are you most looking forward to for the second half of the Read-a-thon?
– I need to find a book I can read quickly that has a male protagonist… Help meeeee. I want Blackout BINGO.

4. Have you had many interruptions? How did you deal with those?
– No real interruptions, a few dog barking sessions but no big deal.

5. What surprises you most about the Read-a-thon, so far?
– Nothing ever surprises me about #Readathon… that’s one of the things I like about #Readathon!

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