Top 5 Tuesday #1: Sequels I Need to Read, Like, NOW!

Top 5 Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by Shanah, the Bionic Book Worm.

This week’s topic:

top 5 sequels I need to get to

I have a huge backlog of sequels I need to get to because I keep starting fantasy series but hardly ever complete them. Whenever I  complete one, I experience a little jolt because it’s that rare and thus shocking a thing to do. But the sequels I’d like to prioritize are:

The Fall by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan

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Top Ten Tuesday #39: My First 10 Book Reviews

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme that was created and hosted by The Broke and the Bookish but is now managed by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s topic:

(First Ten) Books I Reviewed

I didn’t know about this week’s prompt until I saw the post on other blogs and because I thought it would be a treat to revisit my early book reviews, I decided to do this post too. I enjoyed reading the early book reviews bloggers chose to share, and it was interesting to see how the style and skill of some bloggers has changed since their early reviews.

That’s the treat I seek in doing this post. I plan to reread my first couple reviews and reflect on how much my writing has developed and what has remained the same. Well, here are the first 10 books I reviewed on this blog.

The Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan

Weekend Reads #93: Week 2 — O.W.L. Progress Report

Weekend Reads is a weekly post in which I discuss a variety of topics and mention the books I plan to read on the weekend. However instead of a topic, I’ll instead share with you my progress on my O.W.L.s (Ordinary Wizarding Levels).

The O.W.L. Magical Readathon is in session. It began on April 1st and I’m sharing my weekly reading progress reports as I work toward becoming an Aurologist — someone who reads and studies auras.

I was doing well until last week when I took a road trip and forgot to carry the books I intended to read. Has that ever happened to you? I was close to finishing one book and, not wanting to be on a trip without a book, I packed a few others that I thought would would interest me and would apply to this reading challenge.

I threw in my bag Bram Stoker’s Dracula, which I’ve been reading on and off since last year. It’s slow reading. Though some parts interest me because of the tension and gothic atmosphere of certain scenes, the majority of the story so far has been boring, so I take long breaks from the book. I would DNF it, but I have my mind intent on completing the book. I enjoy reading horror stories about vampires and other parasitic monsters that hunt humans, so I’d like to finally complete this classic that has inspired such stories. So yeah, that’s why it was in my bag for this trip. I could only read a few paragraphs at a time because I tended to start snoozing after every third paragraph.

Two Audiobooks: “The Alienist” by Caleb Carr & “Red Dragon” by Thomas Harris

Considering that I was wary of audiobooks in the past, it’s a wonder that I listen to them so frequently now. I recently listened to three of them that were exciting and compelling, but I’ll discuss only two in this post because these two share some similarities.

In the past, I would struggle to focus on the story when I listened to audiobooks, so I instead listened only to audiobooks of stories I’d already read. It seems doing so has trained my ear or my brain to get used to this medium because now I focus on the story and remember what I heard, though my memory of the story isn’t as detailed as it is when I read the physical book or the e-book.

It could also be the genre of the stories I read that affected me so positively. By listening to the two in this post, I realized that the best type of audiobooks to listen to are thrillers. Thrillers often draw the reader in quickly and keep her hooked throughout as it twists and turns toward an explosive end. I was so hooked as I listened to these two that I completed both in a day each. I began with The Alienist because I am familiar with the show and wanted something to listen to at work. But I completed it on the same day I downloaded it, a Friday, so I downloaded Red Dragon to listen to on the following Monday. It was done by the Saturday evening.

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The Alienist by Caleb Carr, narr. by Edward Herrmann

Genre:

Historical fiction; Mystery

Series:

Dr. Laszlo Kreizler, book 1

Pubbed:

May 1994

Goodreads summary:

New York, 1896: Lower Manhattan’s underworld is ruled by a new generation of cold-blooded criminals…Police Commissioner Theodore Roosevelt battles widespread corruption within the department’s ranks…and a shockingly brutal murder sets off an investigation that could change crime-fighting forever.

Wyrd & Wonder Is Coming | Here’s What I’ll Read

“Last May, an intrepid band of like-minded bloggers and book lovers devoted themselves to all things fantasy. Lisa, Jorie, and I will be heading out in search of dragons, magic and Faerie again this year. Will you join us for Wyrd and Wonder?”

So begins Imyril’s post over on There’s Always Room for One More that introduced me to this year’s Wyrd & Wonder event. I’ve been looking forward to this event since last May because I was unable to participate then. This year, I intend to be part of it in any way I can.

What is Wyrd & Wonder?

It’s a month-long celebration of all things fantasy. Participants can participate in any way they like, just make sure to sign up (there’s no deadline for signing up) and check the Master Schedule to see what others plan to do or to add your posts.

I Heart Characters! #17: A Female DRAGON

I Heart Characters! is a weekly meme hosted by Dani at Perspective of a Writer to share our love of great characters. Each week, Dani assigns a topic/type of character that we must find examples of in the various media we consume (books, TV shows, movies, comics, podcasts, etc.).

Since I often skip a week (or two), I mash the character types Dani assigns into one to create a bonus character type that I include at the end of the post. The title of my post indicates the bonus character type I’ll feature at the end. But for now, here are the topics Dani assigned.

March 14 topic:

A Woman You Want to Be

Literally any female character that you want to become. Just slip right into their life and take over! It can be for whatever reason, revenge, the world, her personality or loves, whatever!

Atomic Blonde

Weekend Reads #92: Week 1 — O.W.L. Progress Report

Weekend Reads is a weekly post in which I discuss a variety of topics and mention the books I plan to read on the weekend. However instead of a topic, I’ll instead share with you my progress on my O.W.L.s (Ordinary Wizarding Levels).

The O.W.L. Magical Readathon is in session. It began on April 1st, but because I’ve been so busy lately, I wasn’t able to start my reading until this week. Since it’s a month-long readathon, I’ve decided to share my progress at the end of each week so you all can see if I past my subjects to become Aurologist — someone who reads and studies auras.

Aurology is an esoteric subject, quite like divination, and so far I’ve done a great job reading books that fit it. By the way, I’ve already deviated from my TBR for this readathon. If you’re familiar with my blog, that’s probably not surprising to you. I hardly ever follow those things although I enjoy creating them.

The first book took me on a wild, stream-of-conciousness ride filled with drugs, random hookups, and many bad decisions. I didn’t like it. It was disconcerting and I couldn’t make sense of anything, though there were brief moments of clarity. It totally fucked with my aura reading, and I’m sure many straight-laced professors would disagree with dabbling in such a book. Although, if one is to be an aurologist, one can’t be too uptight and the book did show a possible, though chemical-inducing, way of transcending reality.

2019 Reading Wrap-Up: First Quarter

I began the year well, reading-wise. I read 18 books and enjoyed/liked the majority of them. There were only three that I didn’t like, and only one of the three that I hated — The Stand. But read on to see my stats for this year’s first quarter.

Books | Audio Books | Comics

Let’s Rewind: March 2019

Let’s Rewind March, which was a lot more fun than I expected, and also my birthday month! 🙂

Let’s Rewind is my version of a monthly wrap up but instead of talking about only books, I include all types of other shit, like articles… bookish news… commercials… random-ass links… movies… art… podcasts… cartoons… and whatever the hell happened to me in the month. You know, the usual stuff that people talk about in monthly wrap ups. So read on to see what I did and read this month. You might stumble upon something that interests you.

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March was wonderful and not because my birthday popped up because it didn’t go as planned. Still, I enjoyed my birthday for what it was and hope to partake of some of things I had planned for it later this month.

As is often becoming the case lately, I was super busy in March with my jobs, but I enjoyed them although I was sometimes tempted to quit my second job because of how tired I was on some days and how much my free time has shortened. These days, I have to make plans weeks in advance to hang out or run a simple errand because of the amount of work hours I put in on the weekend. But there’s a reason for this, a goal, which I’m not yet ready to share on here, so I’ll persist with juggling these two gigs.

Blog Tour | Excerpt: “Wicked Saints” by Emily Duncan

Today’s post is a little different from what you usually see about here. Today, I present my first blog tour post! 😀

Thanks to Wednesday Books, I am able to participate in the blog tour for Emily Duncan’s young adult fantasy novel, Wicked Saints, which was published yesterday, April 2. It’s about a girl who can speak to gods but must team up with two guys to stop a war.

Here are the details on the story!

Wicked Saints by Emily Duncan

Pubbed: April 2, 2019 by Wednesday Books

Genre: YA fantasy

Series: Something Dark and Holy (Book 1)

Synopsis: