It’s December! It’s Friday! Reading thread 12/1

[charlatti]

What have you been reading this week? If you set any book-related goals for this year, will you meet them?

QOTW: Are there topics, settings, types of characters, etc. that you tend to avoid when choosing books? For example, maybe you usually skip books set during WWII or you don’t generally pick books with characters who work at coffee shops.

[Vespasia]

I finished Fragile Threads of Power. It took a bit to get going and suffered from too many characters/points of view but I enjoyed it. I also think the ending lined things up nicely for the sequel. 

I started The Paris Diversion by Chris Pavone a few days ago. I haven't made a ton of progress but it's fine. My expectations were pretty low though. 


QOTW: I actually do avoid WWII because there's just so much fiction set during that period and I feel like I've read more than enough. I also generally avoid romance novels or other genre books that have a heavy romance angle because the characters invariably do something idiotic in furtherance of the narrative and piss me off. 

[travella]

I finished:

Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, by Winifred Watson (2*, this book did not age well).

The Appeal by Janice Hallett (3*, it was interesting, but there was so much going on that it was hard to keep everything straight. I also didn't like that the crime wasn't revealed until the end; it made everything all that more difficult.)

Plainsong by Kent Haruf (4*, a little dark especially in the beginning, but it was still a good story).

I decided to start December by reading a bunch of shorter Christmas books. I always feel like reading a Christmas book in December, but hardly ever enjoy them so I'm hoping I'll like the shorter stories better. I'm currently reading A Boy Called Christmas by Matt Haig.

Qotw: I usually try to avoid books dealing with sex crimes, especially against children. It always makes me feel physically nauseous when I find it in my book. I also try to avoid anything too gory and too heavily romance (usually too corny).

[tacokick]

There Should Have Been Eight by Nalini Singh (ok)

Wild Fire by Ann Cleeves (eh)

How to Survive Your Murder by Danielle Valentine (fun)

Invitation to a Banquet: The Story of Chinese Food by Fuchsia Dunlop (interesting)

QOTW: I don’t like historical fiction and try to avoid books by and about men

[charlatti]

I finished The Proof of the Pudding by Rhys Bowen, which was fun, and am still reading A Wretched and Precarious Situation (Arctic explorer, nonfiction).

QOTW: I always think I don’t like books set in the 80s, and I avoid most books with characters suffering from dementia or Alzheimer’s.

[mrspez07]

Well, I’ve come into some additional reading time this week with an appendectomy, so my book numbers might finish the year higher than I was tracking.

Finished reading Mariana on Thursday and I’m a good way into Nora Goes Off Script.

QOTW: I’ve been avoiding books set in the near future after a disaster/climate change/post apocalyptic or even apocalyptic. I have Station 11 on my to-read list but just can’t do it. Same for Light Pirate, when everyone was talking about it earlier this year.

[charlatti]

mrspez07, I hope you’re healing well!

[krystee]

I read Assistant to the Villain (kind of a fantasy rom com), Winter in New York, Door to Door Bookshop (super heartwarming if you love books and old people), and I’m reading Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers.

QOTW: I only read a few romances a year because the tropes just grate. December tends to be my heaviest month on those. I am pretty much over WWII books unless they sound absolutely amazing. And I think I would love cli-fi books otherwise, but I am so freaked out over climate change and the implications it will have that I cannot bring myself to associate my greatest love (reading) with one of my biggest fears. I also can’t bring myself to read most 650+-page books. There are just too many books I want to get to! I have Wellness and Covenant of Water, but it never feels like the right time because the idea of reading two or three books in the same amount of time is more appealing.

[dearprudence]

Finished Sweet Coriander and Kissing Kosher. I liked Kissing Kosher better, Sweet Coriander seemed too much like a draft.

Started listening to The Book Eaters about a...people (?) who get their nutrition and knowledge from eating books.

Started reading The Winter Garden about a woman's search for a magical garden that appeared to her as a child.


QOTW: Are there topics, settings, types of characters, etc. that you tend to avoid when choosing books? For example, maybe you usually skip books set during WWII or you don’t generally pick books with characters who work at coffee shops. I'm terrible with this. As a general rule I avoid books dealing with trauma - I think I've mentioned this before, but I'm a super-empath, so when bad things happen, even to fictional characters I have a really hard time. Hamnet had me sleeping in my son's bed. In Thin Air had an entire airplane crew concerned about my uncontrollable crying.

[litskispeciality]

I finished "I'm Glad My Mom Died" by Jennette McCurdy. I started "Bad Nurse". I somehow missed the Netflix show/doc?.

At the beginning of the year I had a lofty goal of 30 books, and right now I've completed 16. Hoping to finish up, and read new books to hit 20 by the EOY.

QOTW: I don't do a lot of historical fiction or romance novels. I read YA which has "romance", but not the same. Also never really got in to fantasy or most sci outside of maybe some Dystopian YA or the guy who wrote Project Hail Mary his name is escaping me right now.