Tag Archives: TTT

Top Ten Tuesday: The First 10 Books I Randomly Grabbed from My Shelf 

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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is The First 10 Books I Randomly Grabbed from My Shelf.

It was hard to be totally random, since I have a pretty good idea of where all my books live — but I made a valiant attempt to close my eyes, circle my arms around a few times, and then point!

Here are the 10 I landed on:

Lute by Jennifer Thorne

Read? Yes!
Rating? 5 stars
Thoughts? Absolutely gorgeous. (review)

You Know When the Men Are Gone by Siobhan Fallon

Read? Yes!
Rating? 4.5 stars
Thoughts? A slim, affecting collection of interconnected stories about Army families. I read this before I started blogging, so I don’t have a review to share — but I highly recommend this book!

Tipping the Velvet by Sarah Waters

Read? Yes
Rating? 5 stars
Thoughts? Another pre-blogging read, and my 2nd Sarah Waters book (after Fingersmith, which is amazing). This one is terrific too!

Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds

Read? Yes
Rating? 5 stars
Thoughts? So powerful. A must-read. (review)

Autonomous by Annalee Newitz

Read? No (not yet!)
Rating? n/a
Thoughts? I absolutely intend to read this book! I’ve heard such good things.

The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray

Read? Yes!
Rating? 3 stars
Thoughts? This is the 3rd book in the Gemma Doyle trilogy. I had very mixed feelings about the trilogy as a whole, and at over 800 pages, this book really required determination to finish. Still, I liked the overall story enough to see it through. (review)

The Marvels by Brian Selznick

Read? Yes
Rating? 5 stars
Thoughts? If you check out my review, you’ll see the word “beautiful” repeated over and over again — and I stand by it!

Lady Cop Makes Trouble by Amy Stewart

Read? Yes!
Rating? 5 stars
Thoughts? I’m surprised that I didn’t write a review at the time, but I know I loved this 2nd Kopp Sisters book, and have since read every book in the series!

The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough

Read? Yes
Rating? 5 stars
Thoughts? I picked up this hardcover edition years ago at a library sale, because my battered old paperback got lost somewhere between moves over the ages since I first read it. I intend to reread this book at some point!

Wings to the Kingdom by Cherie Priest

Read? No
Rating? n/a
Thoughts? This is the 2nd book in the Eden Moore trilogy. I own all three… and haven’t touched them yet, despite the years they’ve been sitting on my shelf. The covers are all amazing and ghostly, and I’m committed to reading them… eventually.

Spinning around the room and randomly pointing at books was strangely fun! (And a good reminder that I still have tons of unread books on my shelves…)

How did you do with this week’s random picking?

If you wrote a TTT post, please share your link!

Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Audiobook Narrators

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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Favorite Audiobook Narrators. I do love audiobooks, and definitely have some narrators I especially love to listen to.

Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels.com

Here are my 10:

  1. Julia Whelan – I’ve listened to so many audiobooks that she’s narrated, but favorites include Thank You For Listening (which she also wrote), The Giver of Stars, and Daisy Jones & The Six.
  2. Moira Quirk: Narrator of the Custard Protocol and Finishing School series by Gail Carriger, and also the excellent The Midnight Bargain by C. L. Polk.
  3. Wil Wheaton: Does a great job with John Scalzi’s books. Most recently, I loved his hilarious presentation of The Kaiju Preservation Society.
  4. Zachary Quinto: Another Scalzi narrator — he’s great in the Dispatcher series of audiobooks.
  5. Mary Robinette Kowal: Besides being an absolutely awesome author, she’s also a wonderful audiobook narrator. In addition to her own books, I’ve loved her narration for Seanan McGuire’s many audiobooks.
  6. Lorelei King: Terrific narration of the Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs.
  7. Davina Porter: Narrates the Outlander series, and that’s not easy! She’s convincing as an 18th century Scottish Highlander as well as a 20th century British nurse.
  8. Jeff Woodman: In another of Diana Gabaldon’s series, Jeff Woodman is the perfect narrator for the Lord John books — his delivery as Lord John is fabulous.
  9. Juliet Stevenson: There’s not another narrator I’d rather listen to for Jane Austen audiobooks.
  10. Christina Moore: I love her narration of Amy Stewart’s Kopp Sisters books. She gives such personality to each of the characters.

Who are your favorite audiobook narrators? Do we have any in common?

If you wrote a TTT post, please share your link!

Top Ten Tuesday: Books with animals on the cover

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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Titles with Animals In Them and/or Covers with Animals On Them. I love looking at interesting book covers, so I’m going with the book cover theme. Here are my 10:

  1. Hollow Kingdome by Kira Jane Buxton
  2. 100 Sideways Miles by Andrew Smith
  3. The Queen of Nothing by Holly Black
  4. Down the Mysterly River by Bill Willingham
  5. Misty of Chincoteague by Marguerite Henry
  6. American Hippo by Sarah Gailey
  7. The Spare Man by Mary Robinette Kowal
  8. Hunting Ground by Patricia Briggs
  9. Winter Rose by Patricia A. McKillip
  10. The Chronicles of Chrestomanci by Diana Wynne Jones

What books made your list this week? If you wrote a TTT post, please share your link!

Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Heroines

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snowy10

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Favorite Heroines. This felt like a familiar topic to me, but it looks like it’s been many years since I put together a similar list, and by now I have plenty of new ones to highlight!

Here are ten of my favorites (hint: the first one will not be a surprise!):

  1. Claire Fraser – Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon
  2. Mercy Thompson – Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs
  3. October Daye – October Daye series by Seanan McGuire
  4. Erin, Mac, Tiffany and KJ – Paper Girls graphic novels by Brian K. Vaughan
  5. Zinnia Gray – A Spindle Splintered by Alix E. Harrow
  6. Mika Moon – The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
  7. Marra – Nettle & Bone by T. Kingfisher
  8. Beatrice Clayborn – The Midnight Bargain by C. L. Polk
  9. Jane Ellsworth – Glamourist Histories series by Mary Robinette Kowal
  10. Sunny Nwazue – The Nsibidi Scripts series by Nnedi Okorafor

Who are your favorite heroines?

If you wrote a TTT post, please share your link!

Top Ten Tuesday: It’s all about LOVE… My ten favorite love stories from this past year of reading (new & improved for 2023)

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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Love Freebie, which means we all put our own spin on the topic of LOVE.

Focusing on my favorite love stories from the books I’ve read recently has become my go-to topic for the “love freebie” TTT topic — I’ve been keeping it going since 2020! Here are my ten favorite love stories that I read in the past year:

1. Boyfriend Material and Husband Material by Alexis Hall: I read both of these in 2022, and loved the development of the main characters’ relationship.

2. Tokyo Dreaming by Emiko Jean: This secretly-a-princess duology is a wonderful treat, and I really enjoyed the main character’s romantic dilemmas.

3. An Island Wedding by Jenny Colgan: The 5th and final book in the Mure series is a wonderful wrap-up (despite my frustration over one dangling plotline). So many of the characters get happily-ever-afters, which is great, because five books in, I adore these characters so much.

4. The Comeback by Lily Chu: The romance — between a non-famous woman and her incognito houseguest who ends up being one of K-pop’s biggest idols of all times — is definitely wish-fulfillment, but it’s just so much fun. Loved the audiobook!

5. The No-Show by Beth O’Leary: This book is heart-breaking as well as entertaining, and it takes quite a while to feel anything but exasperated with the male lead… but then? Boom. Loved this book, and highly recommend reading it with as little info in advance as possible.

6. Not Your Average Hot Guy by Gwenda Bond: I’m including this here because it’s so, so silly, and because I’m pretty sure this is the only book I’ve ever read with a romance between a woman who works in her family’s escape room business and the (literal) Prince of Hell.

7. By the Book by Jasmine Guillory: What’s not to love about a modern-day retelling of Beauty and the Beast?

8. A Season for Second Chances by Jenny Bayliss: I love a good small-town, new-chance-at-love story, and this one has so many great ingredients — lovely setting, a café, a sea rescue, and grown-ups in relationships!

9. Heading Over the Hill by Judy Leigh: Main characters Dawnie and Billy are absolutely #couplegoals! I need to read more (much more!) by this author.

10. The Unplanned Life of Josie Hale by Stephanie Eding: When’s the last time you read a romance with a single, pregnant woman as the main character? This was a first for me, and I really enjoyed it.

What were the best love stories you read during the past year?

If you wrote a TTT post this week, please share your link and let me know your topic!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

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Top Ten Tuesday: New-to-Me Authors I Hope to Try in 2023

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snowy10

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is 2023 Debut Books I’m Excited About — but I really don’t tend to get very excited about debut books in advance (and don’t even keep track of upcoming debuts), so this topic was a non-starter for me.

Instead, I thought I’d spin off from the designated topic, moving from books by new authors to books by authors who are new to me. Much easier to come up with a list of ten!

Here are ten authors whose books I plan (or hope) to try in 2023:

  1. Farrah Rochon
  2. Deepa Varadarajan
  3. Victor LaValle
  4. Claire Keegan
  5. Nikki Erlick
  6. Colleen Oakley
  7. Jenni Fagan
  8. Trish Doller
  9. Nita Prose
  10. Deesha Philyaw

Two of these (Nikki Erlick and Claire Keegan) are authors of books my book group will be reading later this year, and the rest are an assortment of books that I’ve had on my radar for a while plus a couple of ARCs.

Have you read any of the books pictured above, or read other books by these authors? Are there any in particular you’d recommend?

If you wrote a TTT post, please share your link!

Top Ten Tuesday: New-to-Me Authors I Discovered in 2022

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snowy10

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is New-to-Me Authors I Discovered in 2022.

I actually have a very long list for 2022 — but I’ll narrow it down to the the 10 I enjoyed the most. So hard to choose!

  • Darcie Little Badger
  • Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton & Jodi Meadows (yes, these are three people, but they co-authored the book I read!)
  • Jennifer Thorne
  • Sara Novic
  • Julia Whelan (I’ve listened to her narrate audiobooks before, but this was my first encounter with a book she wrote herself)
  • Judy Leigh
  • Malinda Lo
  • Zoje Stage
  • Alexis Hall
  • A. G. Slatter

If you’ve read any other books by these authors, please let me know which you’d recommend!

What new-to-you authors did you discover in 2022? Any particular favorites? Do we have any in common?

If you wrote a TTT post, please share your link!

Top Ten Tuesday: Bookish Goals for 2023

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snowy10

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Bookish Goals for 2023.

At the risk of being totally repetitive, I’m basically repurposing the version of this topic that I did in 2021 (apparently, I didn’t bother writing one in 2022!). Year after year, certain basic goals, resolutions, concepts remain true.

I really don’t believe in making resolutions, but I do have some general ideas about how I want to focus my reading in 2023, so here we go:

Read whatever I feel like. Okay, I say this every year… and every year it’s worth repeating! Other than book group reading commitments, I’m going to mostly be sticking to reading without a plan. It’s a wonderful feeling!

Keep ARCS to a minimum. I feel like I’ve been getting better at this. It can be hard to resist requesting every shiny new book that comes up on NetGalley, but I know I’m happiest when I’m not overloaded with obligation books.

Read at least a few of the books/series I highlighted in my series-to-read post for this year.

Tackle at least a few books outside my comfort zone or that will take a bit of extra effort. The main one I have in mind is The Silmarillion (but don’t hold me to it — plans may change!)

For the sake of keeping bad habits in check, don’t hit the Buy Now button for Kindle books just because they’re a price break! I have more books in my Kindle library than I know what to do with. I’m trying to get better at only buying e-books when I’m ready to read them. (This already seems like it’ll be tough to stick with… but it’s worth making the effort.)

And one ongoing task — I should probably reorganize my bookshelves (yet again) and put together a new stack of books to donate. One of these rainy days, I’ll get around to this one!

That’s about it for me. I hope to have a year full of fun, enjoyable reading with very few requirements about when I finish a certain book or what to read in any given moment.

What are your bookish goals for 2023? Wishing everyone a very happy and healthy year… with plenty of great books to read!

Top Ten Tuesday: [FREEBIE TOPIC] Books my book group will be reading in 2023

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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is a freebie — we all choose our own topics!

I haven’t done a TTT post in a while and my brain cells are not feeling up for anything too challenging… so I’m keeping it simple. My book group picks our monthly discussion books for an entire calendar year ahead of time, and we’ve just finalized our selections for 2023!

So yes, that makes this a top 12 list — but I couldn’t decide which two to leave out, so I’m going for it.

Here’s what we’ll be reading in 2023:

  1. January – Miss Austen by Gil Hornby
  2. February – An Easy Death (Gunnie Rose, #1) by Charlaine Harris
  3. March – The Heroine’s Journey by Gail Carriger
  4. April – Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson
  5. May – Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert Heinlein
  6. June – The Matchmaker’s Gift by Lynda Loigman Cohen
  7. July – The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict & Victoria Christopher Murray
  8. August – Cotillion by Georgette Heyer
  9. September – The Measure by Nikki Erlick
  10. October – Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson
  11. November – Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
  12. December – Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

As you can see, we aim for a mix of genres as well as a mix of newer and older books. I have to say, I think we’ve done a great job planning for next year! I’ve already read our March and November books, but I’m happy to read them again, and I’m excited for all the new books I’ll be reading and discussing with my amazing group.

Have you read any of these? What do you think of our choices?

If you wrote a TTT post this week, please share your link!

Top Ten Tuesday: Series I might (but probably won’t) finish

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Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Series I’d Like to Start/Catch up on/Finish.

I feel like I’ve done variations on this topic several times and don’t particularly want to repeat myself… but I’ll give it my best shot anyway. The following are series that I’ve started, but which I think I’ll probably never go back to.

(I only came up with eight… but that’s plenty!)

1) Poldark series by Winston Graham: I’ve read 7 of the 12 books in the series, and the 7th takes the story up to the point where the TV adaptation wraps up. And you know what? I think I’m good. As far as I understand, the next books start shifting the focus to a younger generation, and I’m just not as interested. Will I ever continue this series? Unlikely.

2) The Witcher series by Andrzej Sapkowski: I’ve read 4, and have 4 more left. I like the books, but didn’t want to get too far out in front of the Netflix storylines. Will I ever continue this series? I’d say it’s about a 50/50 chance.

3) Miss Peregrine series by Ransom Riggs: I read the first 3 books, when they were described as a trilogy, but lo and behold, the author continued the series! I felt like the story wrapped up pretty well with the 3rd book, so… Will I ever continue this series? Nope.

4) Discworld by Terry Pratchett: I had big plans to read all the Discworld books, in publication order, one per month. My ambitious goal lasted me for four books, and then I decided I’d had enough and needed a break. I know that publication order is NOT the way most people recommend approaching Discworld, so I haven’t written off the possibility of returning to the series and trying specific story threads. Will I ever continue this series? I want to say yes… but let’s leave this as probably, if I’m being realistic.

5) Murderbot by Martha Wells: I read the first four novellas, then stalled out when it came to book 5, which is a full-length novel. I didn’t stop for any particular reason, other than just not being in the mood at the right moment. Now I’m afraid that it would be hard to restart, without going all the way back to the beginning for a reread first. Will I ever continue this series? Probably yes. I liked what I read, so there’s no reason not to want to read more.

6) Maisie Dobbs by Jaqueline Winspear: I read the first two books in this historical mystery series, and thought they were okay. There are 17 books out so far! Will I ever continue this series? Probably not. I didn’t love the first two enough to want to keep going.

7) Grishaverse books by Leigh Bardugo: I read the first trilogy (Shadow and Bone), then read the first book in the next duology, but honestly, that felt like enough. Will I ever continue this series? I don’t think so (but I will keep watching the Netflix adaptation).

8) Cormoran Strike books by Robert Galbraith (J. K. Rowling): I read the first three books, didn’t quite get around to the 4th, and around the time I was considering reading it, JKR became a person I no longer wanted to support. Will I ever continue this series? Nope.

Are there any on my list that you think I should reconsider?

If you wrote a TTT post this week, please share your link!

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