Reading Adventures in February

...and in January, because if you've spent your holidays right, January is one big read-fest!

Now that the silly season is done and done, and we're back some kind of normal, now's the time to get back to our scheduled reading...

This month, we have the full gamut of bookish feedback.

Exciting!  Let's get into it!


Claire Baxter has been reading...

A Duchess to Remember (Ministry of Marriage, #3)

by Christina Brooke

Untamed

by Anna Cowan

Partners (Language of Love #1 - Orchid)

by Nora Roberts

The Law Is a Lady (Language of Love #2 - Hollyhock)

by Nora Roberts

Size 12 Is Not Fat (Heather Wells, #1)

by Meg Cabot

Friday's Child

by Georgette Heyer

Cityglitter

by Carla Caruso (Completely awesome fellow SARA - Em)

Oooh, some top titles there, Claire.  (Check out where I reviewed Carla's Second Chance here, and Catch of the Day here - Em).

Eleni Konstantine has been turning some pages, too:

Temptation in a Bottle (Which is supercool, because Eleni's alter-ego HelzKat Designs designed the cover!)
by Shona Husk

Rapture in Death (In Death #4)
by JD Robb (Eleni did this in audio, and thoroughly enjoyed the narrator's telling.)

The Sandman Volume 4 Seasons of Mist
by Neil Gaiman

Fast Women 
by Jennifer Crusie

A Sporting Chance : Hot Down Under
by Rhyll Biest


Virginia Taylor has been reading, as well:

I have just finished reading Ruth Rendell's The Saint Zita Society.

I love Ruth Rendell and her stories never disappoint me. However, her writing does because of the way she uses POV. I can never quite decide what she is doing with her switching POVs. Is she using authorial viewpoint or is she just a slick head-hopper? Often when I'm reading I don't know whose head I am in and have to read back to find out. It's vital for me to know because I don't like being fooled by an unreliable relator. I like to be right there working out who is doing what.

Anyway, despite the irritation and the interruption of having to read back from time to time, in this story she has again given the reader a mishmash of ordinary characters, none likeable or easy to identify with, not that I want any killed. I take that back. I'm kind of normal so I don't want anyone killed but a few of her characters are so darned unpleasant that the world can do without them. In this story, she disposes of only one who also might be the nicest if you like characters who are weak and indecisive, which I don't, but I didn't feel any great distress when she died because she was set up so well but so obviously to die. And so is the next who will die. Yum. Though neither deserves to die, which I suppose is the point of the story and why it is so good.

Ruth Rendell is the mistress of the first page. On the first the reader is hooked and has to read until the last. With this first page you might wonder what it has to do with the rest of the story. The character or the page just lurks and lurks and keeps the reader going forward. I find here I'm not going to tell any of this story. I hate people telling me stories of stories. It makes my eyes glaze. I'm not interested in stories of stories. I want to read stories - not be told stories.

There's a moral here. Show, don't tell. Ruth doesn't, except in what I think of is a faulty use of POV. But it works for her and would never stop me reading the book. If you have never read a Ruth Rendell and you want to see a great first page, ask to borrow this book from me. Or buy a copy.



Thanks to Claire, Virginia and Eleni for sharing what they've been reading.  Some fabulous titles, and excellent insights there.

Until next time, happy reading!

Emmeline.  x