Top 5 Tuesday #49: Five 2-Star Reads

Top 5 Tuesday is a weekly meme created by Shanah, the Bionic Book Worm, and now hosted by Meeghan at Meeghan Reads.

This week’s topic:

Top 5 *freebie*

Ugh! I’ve been fighting to understand this Block editor thing, but it’s just NOT working well for me. It either doesn’t work in the way I want it to and includes too many parts in my posts or, when I think I’ve got it right, the preview is in no way what I was shooting for. I’m frustrated and annoyed, so here is a post of books I rated 2 stars that I’d recommend anyway because, yea, I didn’t like them and they frustrated me as I read, but I finished the book anyway. Quite like WordPress: annoying to use but, for now, I’m using it anyway.

(Btw, I managed to get this post to look the way I wanted because I started it out in the Classic block and, just so I could change the size of the photos, had to convert it to all Blocks. This thing is infuriating to me.)

The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory

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I Hate Spring Book Tag

If, unlike me, your body hasn’t alerted you to spring’s arrival with a suddenly stuffy nose, sinus headache, and your eyes threatening to itch although the trees haven’t yet started to spread their pollen around yet, then consider yourself lucky. I have a love/hate relationship with spring. I’m always grateful for its arrival after suffering through the harsh, cold, drab months of winter. My heart sings with the lengthening of the days and the hint of warmth in the air and is comforted (sometimes) by the beat of its rains. But I also suffer.

I sneeze. I sniff. I cough. I itch. My head pounds until I find a way to alleviate clogged nasal passages, and I sometimes spend days in fear of touching my eyes because doing so might make the itching worse to the point where I can’t open them. This wasn’t always the case. For years, I could enjoy spring without suffering. Then, suddenly, one year in college the seasonal allergies overtook me and I’ve been suffering through spring ever since…

And… that’s my sob story about spring. Now you understand why I’m doing this tag.

The I Hate Spring Book Tag was created the Biblionyan.

Time Tantrum: Name a book — either a standalone or from a series — that had large time lapses that frustrated you greatly.

I’m the only person I know who loves the time change, lol. After suffering through winter, I’m glad that I wake up with the sun twinkling in my eyes.

Kindred by Octavia Butler

“The Duke and I” by Julia Quinn, narr. by Rosalyn Landor

Yea, I’m one of those who watched and was hooked on Netflix’s Bridgerton. The drama and all the gossiping in it made it very entertaining, but it was the costumes and the acting itself that lured and held my interest throughout.

Since learning that it’s based on a novel, I’ve wanted to read the source material ever since to find out what happens next and to see in what ways it defers from the show. So, when I saw that the audiobook was available at my library, I quickly downloaded and began listening to it. It, too, was very entertaining.

Genre

Romance; Historical Fiction

Series

Bridgertons, book 1

Pubbed

2000

Quick summary

Taking inspiration from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (and probably other classic novels I do not know of), The Duke & I centers on the large Bridgerton family whose matriarch wants to see her children married off well. The story focuses on Daphne Bridgerton, who was recently introduced to society but hasn’t had many suitors, probably because her older brothers (there are three of them) are a bit intimidating.

Top 5 Tuesday #48: Middle Grade Books

Top 5 Tuesday is a weekly meme created and hosted by Shanah, the Bionic Book Worm, and now managed by Meeghan at Meeghan Reads.

This week’s topic:

Top 5 middle grade books

(What are some of your favourite middle grade books?)

I enjoy reading middle grade novels. My favorite genre in this age group is, of course, fantasy. It’s just so enjoyable and lighthearted (even when the story is dark, there’s still some lightness to it so it doesn’t pull down the reader too deep into heavy emotions). Unfortunately, I haven’t read middle grade books as often as I’d like lately, but I’m hoping to correct that soon and start reading at least one middle grade book each month.

The books below aren’t all favorites, but I enjoyed reading each one.

Watch Hollow by Gregory Funaro

“The Colour of Magic” by Terry Pratchett

Surprisingly, I struggled to read this one. I picked it up in February to read for a Turtle Recall readalong, but it took me the entire month of February to complete it. I didn’t expect to struggle so much with a Discworld book.

Genre

Fantasy

Series

Discworld, book 1
Rincewind, book 1

Pubbed

1983

Quick Summary

The Colour of Magic is the first novel in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, a satirical fantasy series set in a flat world that lies on the backs of four large elephants — Berilia, Tubul, Great T’Phon, and Jerakeen — that stand on the pockmarked shell of a giant turtle, the Great A’Tuin, who’s flying through space. It contains four short stories centered on the adventures of Rincewind, a failed wizard who dropped out of Unseen University after learning just one spell, as he tries to protect Twoflower, a tourist visiting Discworld from the Counterweight Continent with his Luggage made of sapient pearwood in tow. The Luggage follows Twoflower wherever he goes.

Weekend Reads #118: Kushiel’s Chosen Readalong, Ch. 71 – the end

Here we are at the end of the Kushiel’s Chosen readalong hosted by Imyril of the Wyrd & Wonder crew who blogs over at There’s Always Room for One More. This one was another good read, and I enjoyed it so much that I’ve placed it on my favorites book list. I really enjoyed it.

Each week, a different member participating in the readalong posts questions for the week’s discussion. For this past week, the sixth and final one, Lisa at Dear Geek Place shared the questions for the last chapters.

SPOILERS BELOW!

What did you make of Phèdre’s plan for stopping Melisande’s plot against the Crown, and Marco Stregazza’s power grab? And what did you think of how smoothly (or not) it went?

Book Haul #70: Birthday Haul

I celebrated my birthday last week and in addition to declaring a BOOK TAG WEEK on here, I also took myself on a little book shopping spree as a treat. 🙂 I got a lot more stuff than I intended, but I’m happy with myself. It was a wonderful treat.

(NOTE: If the layout below looks wonky, it’s most likely because you’re viewing this on your phone in the WordPress Reader app which, for some reason unknown to me, keeps messing up the layout when I use certain gallery settings to format image layouts. If you view it on the website instead, it will show correctly.)

PURCHASES
PHYSICAL

Book Haul #69: Gearing Up

I haven’t done a book haul since January, so this is actually the February haul, which includes a few purchases and a good bit of library books and ARCs.

(NOTE: If the layout below looks wonky, it’s most likely because you’re viewing this on your phone in the WordPress Reader app which, for some reason unknown to me, keeps messing up the layout when I use certain gallery settings to format image layouts. If you view it on the website instead, it will show correctly.)

PURCHASES

PHYSICAL

Weekend Reads #117: Kushiel’s Chosen Readalong, Ch. 56-70

I was so eager to see what happens next that I couldn’t help myself — I finished the book this weekend. But I’ll keep this spoiler-free for the upcoming chapters. SO much happens!

I’m reading Kushiel’s Chosen as part of a readalong hosted by Imyril of the Wyrd & Wonder crew. Each week, someone new pops in to host a discussion on the chapters read. This week’s discussion questions comes from the host, Imyril, who blogs over at There’s Always Room for One More.

Visit the Goodreads group if you’re interested in joining future readalongs.

SPOILERS BELOW!

What did you make of Phèdre’s interventions to save Kazan — first from the kríavbhog and then from the thetalos? Do you think he deserved it?

Books I Want to Read (But Don’t Want to Read) Tag

And here we are at the final tag for this BOOK TAG WEEK!!

It wraps up my weeklong birthday celebration, which, unfortunately, did not involve pancakes. But there’s hope for the weekend.

The Books I Want to Read Tag was created by Jamishelves. Since these are books on my TBR that I haven’t read, I won’t give brief descriptions of the plot as I usually do.

A book you feel the need to read because everybody talks about it

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas