Between the 1st and 7th of January this year, I read;
In Stitches - Nick Edward's memoir of his time as an A&E doctor. I read quite a few books by NHS personnel last year. This one was pretty good. Split into nice short chapters, some good anecdotes, etc. I gave it four stars.
Charmed Season 9, 3 and 4 - I bought myself both of these for Christmas. The television series, Charmed, ended with eight seasons, but a further season was produced in comic format. It reintroduces Prue in her afterlife, brings Cole back, and generally carries on with the series. I liked it a bit better than the last few season; although Phoebe still suffers from fantastic racism against Cole, she's not as much of a Mary Sue when Alyssa Milano isn't in charge. I gave both collections four stars.
Poems - Edna St Vincent Millary (Everyman Library) - I first heard of Millay a few weeks ago, during some random wikisourcing. I loved what I read on there, so requested this for Christmas. It's amazing. I love so many of her poems. She reminds me of Dorothy Parker. I also love the fact that she preferred to be called Vincent and that she won the Pulitzer prize for poetry in 1923. Five stars.
Gibbon's Decline and Fall - Sheri S. Tepper is one of my absolute favourite authors, and this is one of the books of hers that I like best. Five stars.
Wednesday, 8 January 2014
Saturday, 4 January 2014
In Which We Discuss 2013
Last year, I read a total of 324 books, 244 of which were new to me.
Annoyingly, this has not resulted in a huge decrease in my unread pile. At the start of 2014, it had 177 books in it. That's now crept up to 186.
My goal is to reduce that pile to a more manageable size. I'll have less time to read this year; last year, I read thirty books in a week simply because I had nothing better to do than challenge myself. Now I have a job, which is pretty awesome, but means I can't read four books in one day any more.
I'll try to write regular updates, mostly to keep myself on track. Maybe go back to writing those weekly updates of what I've read. We'll see.
Annoyingly, this has not resulted in a huge decrease in my unread pile. At the start of 2014, it had 177 books in it. That's now crept up to 186.
My goal is to reduce that pile to a more manageable size. I'll have less time to read this year; last year, I read thirty books in a week simply because I had nothing better to do than challenge myself. Now I have a job, which is pretty awesome, but means I can't read four books in one day any more.
I'll try to write regular updates, mostly to keep myself on track. Maybe go back to writing those weekly updates of what I've read. We'll see.
In Which We Discuss Night Shift
So, it took me a while (from August 2nd to August 26th, according to GoodReads) but I finished Stephen King's Night Shift.
It didn't take so long because I wasn't enjoying it. It's more because it's short stories, which you can dip in and out of at will. I read a few other things during this time purely because I could, without breaking the flow of a longer novel.
Anyway, Night Shift. Published in 1978, it consists of short stories from early in King's career, the majority of which were published in various magazines in the years before Carrie came out. In various introductions and interviews (don't ask me which ones) Stephen King has discussed the way in which the pressure to raise money for his family - a wife and a baby during the majority of those years, if I recall correctly. I believe both he and Pratchett have talked about what a huge motivator it is to really need to earn money from writing.
...I started that post back in August. Dear god, it's already January. How did that happen?
Oh, I know. It involved full time work, rather than being unemployed, and a couple of twelve hour shifts. They were overtime and I got time and a half, my workplace isn't that cruel.
Stephen King's next book is The Stand, which I have on kindle. I'll get to it at some point.
It didn't take so long because I wasn't enjoying it. It's more because it's short stories, which you can dip in and out of at will. I read a few other things during this time purely because I could, without breaking the flow of a longer novel.
Anyway, Night Shift. Published in 1978, it consists of short stories from early in King's career, the majority of which were published in various magazines in the years before Carrie came out. In various introductions and interviews (don't ask me which ones) Stephen King has discussed the way in which the pressure to raise money for his family - a wife and a baby during the majority of those years, if I recall correctly. I believe both he and Pratchett have talked about what a huge motivator it is to really need to earn money from writing.
...I started that post back in August. Dear god, it's already January. How did that happen?
Oh, I know. It involved full time work, rather than being unemployed, and a couple of twelve hour shifts. They were overtime and I got time and a half, my workplace isn't that cruel.
Stephen King's next book is The Stand, which I have on kindle. I'll get to it at some point.
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