Top Ten Tuesday: Books that are Gathering Dust on My Shelves

Have you been to visit The Broke And The Bookish yet? Otherwise, you absolutely must. It is a great book! They do this great little meme on Tuesday called Top Ten Tuesday which is absolutely amazing. This week the topic is books that are gathering dust on my shelves... books that I bought because I really wanted to read them, yet somehow never got around to read. I am ashamed to admit that this is topic hits quite close to home for me...

10) "The Sixth Wife" by Suzannah Dunn
A book about the sixth wife of Henry VIII, the one who survived him. I read a biography which described the lives of all of Henry VIII's six wives and I got very curious about his last wife, who outlived him. Still haven't gotten round to reading it though...



9) "Fortune's Daughters" by Elizabeth Kehoe
A biography of three very special sisters, three American heiresses who traveled to Europe to marry impoverished aristocrats.



8) "The Dice Man" by Luke Rhineheart
Apparently a classic and my boyfriend really enjoyed it so now I need to give it a chance because I think I will like it again.



7) "The Outcast" by Sadie Jones
Have you read this one? I got it for a really cheap price but still haven't read it...



6) "The Night Watch" by Sarah Waters
I love "Fingersmith" by Sarah Water so I am sure I will like this one as well. I just need to get it off the shelf...



5) "A Game of Thrones" by George R. R. Martin
This is another book that I have read a few pages of and then forgotten. Why do I do that? It is such a horrible habit! I need to stop it - and I need to read this book that everyone is talking about.



4) "The Black Swan - The Impact of the Highly Improbable" by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
I've heard a lot of good about this book, it is a non-fiction piece about what happens when something highly improbable but with a huge impact happens. The thing that nobody expects. Just have to get round to it.



3) "1984" by George Orwell
This is actually my boyfriend's book and I have been wanting to read it forever but I am so scared to be disappointed that I shy away... Do you know that feeling?



2) "La Dame aux Camélias" by Alexandre Dumas Fils
One of the books that I really really wanted to get my hands one... Then read a few pages and somehow forgot it again. I liked it though so not sure why?! Will have to return to it soon and read it.



1) "The Age of Innocence" by Edith Wharton
A classic! I love the sound of it and it isn't even very long so what is scaring me? I don't know. There is no reason why it keeps gathering dust - so I will have to get around to reading it, sooner rather than later.

Review: "Mercy"

Rarely do I review a book that I didn't enjoy which is mostly because I tend to not finish books that I don't enjoy. Call it lazy, call it silly and ignorant - I can't help it. If I don't enjoy a book, I find it intolerable having to force myself to read it. Not an option. There are exceptions though and this is one of them. "Mercy" by Jussi Adler-Olsen is the first books in a series and I for some unapparent reason started with number four, then number three, then number two and then the first. Strange way of doing it which I don't particularly recommend. Anyway back to topic. I had enjoyed the other three, especially the second one and I thought that I would give this one a go.

The context of the story is one that you have heard many times before... the main character is a policeman who is very very good at his work but who has trouble working with others. His boss is somewhat understanding of this and lets him go and do more or less his own thing on his own. In this case, said policeman, Carl Morck is not entirely on his own, with him he has his cleaner, Assad, who happens to have real talent for policework. Coincidence.
Together these two strange characters get involved with a case of a young, successful, female politician who went missing years ago. And meanwhile the point-of-view shifts from Carl to this young woman, who has been captured and imprisoned in strange room with no windows, no contact to the outside world, while her captors demand that she explain why she did what she did - while she keeps asking why she is there.

So far, so good. This is a pretty run-of-mill crime fiction piece if you ask me. It really didn't impress me. Too predictable and too unimaginative but let me be more specific:

Five things I liked about "Mercy":
1) The dry humour of Carl Morck is pretty great, saves the book actually.
2) The Assad character is quite loveable.
3) The imprisonment part is imaginative and different if really disgusting.
4) Carl Morck's stepson figures a bit in this book and more in the next ones and I have to admit that these descriptions of the sullenness and mood swings of a teenage boy are pretty spot on and funny.
5) ... can't think if one....


Five things I disliked about "Mercy":
1) The title. The original title translates "The Woman in the Cage" which you have to admit is about a 100 times more interesting than "Mercy".
2) The character of the female politician is beyond predictable. She is pretty, she is compassionate, she has nice suitors whom she rejects to dedicate her life to worthier things, she has all the right opinions.... Honestly, it is just too much.
3) The villains are never really explored or explained. In some of Adler-Olsen's later works, he does a much better job of exploring the motives, making it much more interesting to read.
4) The predictability of Carl Morck, the essential renegade policeman. Why are there no crime fiction books about policeman who do things by the book and succeed? It seems like they all have to be rebellious and anti-social, I would like a bit of change please.
5) The political remarks here and there. They are so misplaced and have nothing to do with the story. They end up being really annoying side-remarks that break up the story and promotes the author's political opinions without adding to the story.

So there you go. If you like Scandinavian crime fiction maybe this one is for you. My advice would be to let this one go and head straight for the next book in the series.

Desperately Seeking YA!

I have just published the post below about the books I have bought and I realized that I could really do with some inspiration - especially in the YA department. So please all of you wonderful people out there in blogland, write a comment and recommend a great book that you think I should read :-)

Soon in my mailbox!

It has been a long time since I have bought any books so the other day, I went a little bit crazy and bought quite a few. And now, all I have to do is wait for them to arrive which I must admit is testing my patience. I am currently reading a really really funny non-fiction book about feminism and gender equality (it is so funny that I keep giggling when I am reading it on the way from work!) but I have to say that I long for that special feeling of being absolutely absorbed in a good book.
So hopefully on of these beauties will make me feel exactly that:



Netherland by Joseph O'Neill



The London Satyr by Robert Edric



The Cure by Rachel Genn



From Where I Stand by Tabitha Suzuma

However... I want to get a few more. Do you have any suggestions?

Top Ten Tuesday: Reading Outside the Comfort Zone

Tuesday = Top Ten. If you don't know what I mean go to The Broke and The Bookish who created this amazing meme. This week's theme is Ten Books That I Read That Were Outside Of My Comfort Zone - doesn't matter if you liked them or not.



10) "Twilight" by Stephenie Meyer
Vampires? As if I'd ever read a book about vampires... well, that all changed post-Twilight.



9) "Londonstani" by Gautam Malkani
English is not my first language and slang and ghetto/East End/London speak was way out of my comfort zone when I read this one. It took me a bit to figure out how to read but it was absolutely worth it!

8) The Harry Hole series by Jo Nesbo
Crime fiction is not something that I read a lot of. Actually I more or less never read it unless somebody really recommends a specific book. However, I borrowed some of the Harry Hole books on audio to listen to on the way to work and got hooked on anti-here main character, the classic renegade, alcoholic policeman with a talent for hunting serial killers.



7) "Until The Final Hour" by Traudl Junge
Real life stories is not something that I really read a lot. Just don't find it that interesting but this one is different. It is the story of Traul Junge, the young women who was a secretary to Hitler and who was in the bunker with him until the final hour. A little piece of history.



6)"Just a Girl" and "They Sent a Woman" by Lise NoergaardNot sure that ehse have been translated into English but these were the first biographies I read and I must have been 13 or 14 years old. They are amazing, all about being a girl in a time when boys were worth much more and a girl was... well, just a girl.



5)"The Ice House" by Minette WaltersThis was one of the first adult books I read and definitely the first crime fiction. I found it during vacation time when going through my parents shelves, desperate for something to read. The cover was very artsy with lots of bright colours and I was very taken with it.



4) "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood
I thought I didn't like dystopian - actually was quite sure that I hated it - until I read this one. Now one of my fave books ever.



3)"Pride and Prejudice" by Jane AustenThis one figures on almost all my lists! And I do love it so it makes sense... When I read P&P it was the first time I read a real English classic. Totally out of my comfort zone (preferred chick lit) but Colin Firth in a wet shirt had tempted me too much - I had to read it. I am so happy that I did!

2) "Anne of Green Gables" by L. M. Montgomery
When I just starting reading, for years most of what I read was books about horses. There were a few classic contemporarty childrens books as well but mostly I loved the ones with horses. Then the older sister of a friend recommended "Anne of Green Gables" and from then on a whole new world opened to me.



1) "Collected Poems" John Betjeman
I don't actually read a lot of poetry but I go back to the collected poems of John Betjeman again and again and again. Bought the books out of curiosity as it was really cheap and I just fell in love with the words and the style. I even have some of his poems recorded on my ipod. Amazing, amazing artist.

Review: "Forbidden"

The story of how I came to actually read "Forbidden" by Tabitha Suzuma is a bit stumbly. I read a blogger review and bought it immediately, received it in the mail and kind of changed my mind... then left it on shelf for a few weeks, decided to give it a try, read two pages and gave up. Then desperately needed something to read before an afternoon nap last weekend (I know, I'm in my mid-20s but had worked out and been for a long walk so needed sleep) and decided to give it a second chance. And then something happened because I never got that nap. Never went to the shops to buy food, neglected to cook a nice dinner for my boyfriend as I had planned and spent the afternoon and evening reading. The first three hours I didn't even move but then my boyfriend came to say that he would go buy take-away at which point I relocated from bed to sofa. Without letting go of the book for a moment... I read it until I had turned the last page and then I spent days thinking about the characters and story.

Maybe you've heard about the plot already - it has been given some attention in the blogosphere. "Forbidden" is about five siblings who are just children but who have to take on adult responsibilities because their dad has left and their mother is too busy drinking and being with her boyfriend. The two oldest are Lochan and Maya who not only have to go to school but also have to be parents to their siblings, one of whom is only five and one who is a troublesome teenage boy with a rebellious side. Lochan is ambitious and responsible, willing to do anything for his family and a star pupil. He is also shy to a degree where it becomes a disability. Maya does okay in school and she is well-liked and has lots of friends. But she is a 16-year-old girl who lives the life of a 30-year-old mother of three. All the have is each other and one day brother and sister fall in love.
Now you are probably thinking something along the lines of sick, disgusting, creepy, wrong. But actually I didn't think it was - I was far more affected by the neglect of the parents, the pure and utter lack of love and responsibility, than I was about the sister/brother relationship.
By the end of this book I was ready to adopt the lot of them. They were so real to me and I felt so horrible for them, I was so sad when the book was over, I just wanted more. Which is why I am very happy that Tabitha Suzuma has written several other books that I will definitely be reading soon!

Review: "Heart-Shaped Box"

I love real old-fashioned rockn'n'roll and the real rock'n'roll bands where the band members are no longer musicians but icons. The main character of Joe Hill's "Heart-Shaped Box" is one of those icons.
Judas Coyne (not the name he grew up with but the name he chose when he decided to dedicate his life to rock'n'roll) is an American hard rock icon who is now no longer a young, energetic biting-heads-of-bats type singer but a man in his 50's who is a little tired. He lives a rather quiet life on his farm with a personal assistant to take care of all of the practical stuff and a 26-year-old, gorgeous girlfriend to take care of his ego. His only real love is for his dogs - the personal assistant he regards as a strange necessity and the girlfriends are named for the states they are from, not who they are. In lieu of a real hobby and as part of his image, Jude collects odd things. Things that other people would regard with fear or suspicion or disgust. So when somebody is auctioning off an old suit and a ghost. Curious but disbelieving Jude buys it and then it goes horribly wrong. Because the suit does actually come with a real ghost, a real and very evil-spirited ghost that is out to get Jude, this is a ghost that holds a grudge. It all relates to Jude's ex-girlfriend, the frail and vulnerable Florida and the ghost has been sold to Jude by her older sister.

I would love to write me but I don't want to spoil anything so I will leave the story here and tell you why I really really enjoyed this book. It is a bit of gem really, different from any other book I have read - the only book that it reminds me of is "Horns", also by Joe Hill, but I liked "Heart-Shaped Box" better, mostly because of the characters. The storyline in "Horns" is much more interesting and different and cool but the characters of "Heart-Shaped Box" are outstanding.
I very quickly warmed to Jude, the rock'n'roll antiquity who is still wearing leather trousers even though he would probably prefer slippers. He is so clueless and that makes him likeable and cute actually. He also develops a lot through the book, discovering parts of himself that he seems to have lost while living life in the fast lane. And then there is his girlfriend, Georgia, who is one cool chick. A real tough girl on the outside but with a heart of gold, she takes no b-s from her less than charming boyfriend... Together they make quite a couple as they roadtrip through the south to get rid of a ghost.

You will like "Heart-Shaped Box" if: You enjoyed "Horns" by Joe Hill, if you are intrigued by Ozzy Osbourne and Mick Jagger or if you have ever bought something on Ebay that you didn't really know what was...

Top Ten Tuesday: You Make Me Feel

This week's Top Ten Tuesday is one that will have us all remembering those books that just made us feel a little bit more. It is: Top Ten Books I Had VERY Strong Emotions About. If you haven't already, remember to head over to The Broke and The Bookish ´http://brokeandbookish.blogspot.com/ - who are behind this amazing Tuesday tradition. They are one of the best blogs out there if you ask me.

10) "The Crimson Petal and The White" by Michel Faber
This is one amazing story. It is about a prostitute in 19th century London who falls in love and to some extent loses both her identity and her freedom. It is very touching and it made me incredibly APPRECIATIVE that I a women today, not 150 years ago...

9) "The Secret Dreamworld of a Shopaholic" by Sophie Kinsella
This is not a book that I like. Actually I was so ANNOYED by the frustrating lack of self-awareness and common sense of the character that the story ended up being irrelevant and all the fun parts of the book were lost on me because I was so ANGRY with the airhead heroine.

8) "The Book, The Film, The T-shirt" by Matt Beaumont
Told from many many angles with several characters, all of them with their own voice. One of the FUNNIEST books on my shelves, it never fails to make me LAUGH.



7) "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" by J. K. Rowling
Probably the Harry Potter book that touched me most deeply. The dictatorship of Umbridge and the absence of light was almost too much for me. It was so tough to read through, I almost couldn't deal with the pain that Harry went through and it almost HURT physically to read through it.



6) The Sooke Stackhouse series by Charlaine Harris
This series never fail to make me feel COMFORTABLE. I love Sookie and her southern charm and she never makes to make me feel all WARM inside.



5) "The Little House on the Prairie" by Laura Ingalls Wilder
I was quite young when I first read this one and the other in the series and it was a book that stayed with me for a very very long time. One of those that I kept coming back to, reading over and over again and marveling at the strength of the characters. The family values displayed in it really really MOVED me.

4) "We Need To Talk About Kevin" by Lionel Shriver
Scary, so scary. If you are pregnant and even just a little bit worried about whether or not you will be a good mum, it is not the right time to read this one. Or maybe it is. The ultimate fictional story about nature vs. nurture, questioning whether or not a person can be born evil. Really made me WORRIED about becoming a mother.

3) "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" by J. K. Rowling
Read the last pages of this book on a train and cried. I could not stop myself. It was so sad, the end of an era and I was so not ready to say goodbye to Harry. Luckily this is one of those books that can be read and re-read because because it was both SAD and HAPPY at the same time.



2) "Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo" by Christiane F.
I was thirteen when I first read this one - the truthful and heartbreaking account of a teenage drug addict and prostitute in 1980's Berlin. It was the book that really made me realize that what I saw on the news actually happened to girls who were just like myself. Such an eyeopener and very very emotional read, it made me really SAD.



1) "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood
Most be the scariest book I have read in the sense that it all seems so real. This could happen. Reading this book actually scared me, not in the thriller-sense, but in the what-is-the-world-coming-to-sense and I actually ended up writing an article about it for a political blog as well as buying it as birthday presents for friends. Amazing book that really had me SCARED.

We Need to Talk About... a really amazing film!

Right so it's been a long long time - or at least many days - since I've done any blogging. The reason for this absence is not that I no longer love blogging or reading but that I have moved to: another job in another industry, another city and another country. Quite a bit of change in one go. So at the moment focus is on settling in, getting to know my way around etc. etc.

Last weekend after a rather tough week in new position in a new department, my boyfriend took me to the cinema and even let me choose the film so we went for "We Need to Talk About Kevin". I read the book by Lionel Shriver a year or so ago and loved it so I was quite worried about the film actually. Would they be able to tell this horrible story without resorting to overdramatizing or focusing too much on Kevin and too little on the family. The book is so special. Even though it is all about Kevin, he is hardly in it. A minor character that the entire plot centers around. And the narrator, Eva, is unable to see outside of her own context at all which means that the reader has to do his/her bit to understand what is at play here. It is a difficult book to translate into a movie.

When we left the cinema, I was more or less stunned by the fact that the director had managed what I had in no way expected: to make the film a natural extension of the book. A lot of this is down to the incredible Tilda Swinton, who is probably the only actress on earth able to rightly portray Eva. Distressed, broken Eva whose life has been taken from her and left her with a shattered existence as an outcast. Much of story is not told outright but by her actions, her facial expressions and she takes this movie to another level - it is not sensational or cliche or over-emotional as one could have feared. It is silently strong, it made me physically uncomfortable in the best possible sense because it is so obvious that this is a family doomed to tragedy. Ezra Miller as Kevin is beyond amazing. A great career awaits this actor, I am sure, because he does a great job of portraying a range of emotions from sadness to a burning rage.

If you are wondering what to do next weekend, going to the cinema to watch "We Need to Talk About Kevin" would definitely be my suggestion.

Top Ten Tuesday: Reading them again for the first time...

This Tuesday, The Broke and The Bookish ask us to think about this topic in our Top Ten:

There are just some books that leave you with such deep, intense feeling when you finish it for the first time. We've all experienced this at one time or another. The bad thing is, there's really no way we can go back and experience that feeling again, even with multiple rereadings. We already know what happens, if there are plot twists, a surprise ending, who the main characters ends up with , who dies, etc. Here are some books that leave me (Kelly) with these feelings of longing.

So here is my Top Ten of Books that I Would LIke To Read Again For The First Time...

10) "The Liar of Umbria" by Bjarne Reuter
Not sure this was ever translated to English which is a shame because it is a really really really amazing book.

9) Peter Pan and Wendy by J. M. Barrie.
One of the children's books that have most effectively captured my imagination. Such a wonderful book. Full of adventure and heartbreak.



8) "Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins.
I expected so little and got so much. I read the book right around Christmas time last year and it was a really amazing experience because I got so sucked into it.



7) "Stolen" by Lucy Christopher
The development of the stolen girl's Stockholm Syndrome and the changes in the relationship between captured and hunter had me completely enthralled. Loved the unpredictable parts of this story and loved the ending.

6) "The Three Musketeers" by Alexandre Dumas
I love both the villains and the heros of this story. They are all so vain, so selfish and so lacking in the self-awareness department - have loved it since I was a girl and wish I could remember the first time I read it.



5) The Silent Duchess by Dacia Maraini
So beauty and such emotional turmoil. On amazon.com they write: "Episodic and essentially plotless, but propelled by an inner tension..." and I definitely got caught up in that tension.

4) "Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo" by Christiane F.
The biography of a teenage heroin addict and prostitute in the Berlin of the 1990's. I was in a depressed state for days after first reading this when I was 13 years old. It was the first book that made me realize that it is up to us to take control of our lives and decide how we want to live it. A very very scary and emotional read.

3) "New Moon" and "Eclipse" by Stephenie Meyer
I long for the days when these were books that hardly anyone talked about and that didn't have people divided in lovers and haters. Because honestly I was completely addicted to these two. "Twilight" not so much but these two had me in a state of being where nothing else mattered except from Bella, Edward and Jacob. I miss the innocence of those days, before the movies and the R-Patz/K-Stew mania.

2)"Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen
I saw the BBC series before I read the book. Big mistake. Wish it was the other way around. LOVE this book, it really is one of the greatest love stories ever. And oh how I long for that first feeling of intense worry that Darcy and Elizabeth wouldn't have their happy ever after.

1) The Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling
Booking a week of vacation and spending the entire week reading all of the Harry Potter books in a row for the first time is more or less my idea of perfect bookish bliss. I loved being part of the HP adventure, lining up outside bookstores at midnight to get my hands on the newest book and I loved the sense of being a muggle, lucky to catch a glimpse of the magical world of Hogwarts.

Review: "The Summer Without Men"

Summer is most definitely over now - october has set in loud and clear in Copenhagen with lots of rainy days and brown leaves on the ground. Not unpleasant but not summer either. The season for staying inside with a cup of tea and a good book is here and I am not one to complain about that. Nothing beats the cosiness of being wrapped up in a blanket with a good book and a cup of tea on a rainy Sunday. Pure bliss.

One of my early-autumn reads this year was "The Summer Without Men" by Siri Hustvedt. I chose it for the title and the author and I must say that the title is oddly fitting for my life as my boyfriend and I have now lived in a long-distance relationship for four long months. However, this week is the final one. But it has been a summer more or less without men for me so this book made sense to me on a personal level. When Hustved writes without men, she means it. There are no men in this book except for the ones that we are told about by the women that this book is really about. The narrator is Mia, a poet, a mother and a wife to the philandering neuro-scientist Boris who has become so enchanted by a French colleague that he leaves his wife of twenty-odd years for her. And that leaves Mia with a mental breakdown, literally, which sends her straight to the psychiatric ward and from there to a summer of rest and recovery in her childhood town.

Coming back to the town that she left behind when she ventured into the land of adults is not easy for Mia but despite her frail mental state and her anger and frustration with Boris and his Pause, she manages to carve out a place for herself in the local community. As she teaches a summer class about creative writing, she gets caught up in the catty intrigues of teenage girls and as she visits her mother's friends, she has to face the difficulties of old age and the constant shadow of death that hangs over these ladies in their 80's and 90's. It is both sobering and hilarious reading at once because it is so easy to relate to. Hustvedt manages to perfectly capture both the confusion in the mind of a teenage girl and the resignation of a lived that has been lived and is soon to end.

Actually this book should come with a warning: "Read only if you are ready to think about some of life's big questions" because - at least for me - the reading opens up for a lot of thoughts about how to live life and how to make the most of the time we have. This is probably also the reason why it took me a long time to read this book - because I took it in little bites in order to be able to process it. However, it is not all as "heavy" as it sounds because as a narrator, Mia is full of witty remarks. Her sharp observations and dry sense of humor lifts this book to another level. Her internal dialogue and her anger with Boris is honestly really entertaining and this counteracts the many philosophical parts so that it ends up being a perfectly balanced book.

And I think this is where I end this review. By saying that this is a perfectly balanced book. I had me laugh, cry and worry and it also got me thinking. What more can you ask for in an autumn read?

Pictures from a sunny weekend in October

Spent the weekend hanging out at my parents' place and going for walks with them. Very relaxed and a pretty amazing way to spend a warm Indian summer weekend.

Here's the photo evidence :-)

Top Ten Tuesday: Endings that made you go "What?!?"

I haven't done a Top Ten Tuesday for a while and have to admit I missed it. So here we go - thanks to The Broke and the Bookish for facilitating this great game!

Today's topic.... endings that left me open-mouthing going "What happened?!?!"

10) "Rebecca" by Daphne du Maurier
So unexpected - and it makes it so much more than a love story!

9) "Changeless" by Gail Carriger
I was completely dumbfounded by the ending of this one and actually rather annoyed with the situation. As I remember it, my immediate reaction was "Men!!" in a very grumpy tone of voice

8) "Neverwhere" by Neil Gaiman
I am not even sure why but this ending really surprised me. In a good way. And if you haven't read this book, you must. It is really really good.

7) "The Collector" by John Fowles
I am not sure what I expected from this book in terms of ending but certainly not this. Loved it once I got over my initial surprise

6) "The Pearl of the Soul of the World" by Meredith Ann Pierce
I was quite young when I first read the Darkangel trilogy and I was really disappointed with the ending. Guess I was a bit of a romantic then - or at least more romantic than now. Because now I think it is the perfect ending - surprising but perfect.

5) "Catching Fire" by Suzanne Collins
All I can say is that I was very very happy that I had already bought book three and could start on it immediately. Otherwise I might have gone crazy trying to figure it all out.

4) "Never Let Me Go" by Kazuo Ishiguro
I won't say anything other than: Things are not what they seem.

3) "A Handful of Dust" by Evelyn Waugh
Definitely not a feel-good ending. I was completely taken by surprise when I read it - hadn't seen it coming. Until the last page I was hoping for a happy ending...

2) "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" by J.K. Rowling
Not only was I extremely surprised but I was also a little (tiny) bit angry at the author for letting this happen and very very sad. Think I even cried. One of the things I love about the Harry Potter series is that sometimes sad and bad things happen to good people and it affects not only the characters in the story but also the reader.

1) "A Discovery of Witches" by Deborah Harkness
I didn't know that this was the first book in a trilogy and at first I was furious with the author for leaving such a cliff hanger. Then I googled the book to find out if others felt the same way and found out that there was more to come. So now I am waiting excitedly for the next book as I absolutely love "A Discovery..."

Ten Things I Love About... "Stardust"

I know, I know, you shouldn't see the film until you have read the book. But with "Stardust" - written by Neil Gaiman - I had no idea that there was a book until I had already seen the film. Twice. I really liked the film, I was completely sucked into the story so when I found out there was a book, I had to read it even though I was worried that it wouldn't live up to the film. How wrong I was. In my defense, I hadn't read anything by Neil Gaiman at the time so I had no idea that this wasn't just any author but a very very gifted one with a spark and an imagination that very few can match. It is hard to describe this book but it kind of reminds me of Willam Goldman's "The Princess Bride".

Since then I have loved "Stardust" and now I want to tempt you into reading it. So here are ten things I love about "Stardust" by Neil Gaiman:

1) One of the main characters is a fallen star and the reader meets this fallen star at a moment when said star is in a very bad mood and very ready to throw mud at our hero.

2) It manages to be both tough and whimsical at the same time.

3) The names of the characters - Tristran, Dunstan, Yvaine...

4) This quote from page 123: "As they travelled, the star cursed the day she had fallen to this wet, unfriendly world. It had seemed so gentle and welcoming when seen from high in the sky."

5) And this quote from page 167: "It has occasionally been remarked upon that it is as easy to overlook something large and obvious as it is to overlook something small and niggling, and that the large things one overlooks can often cause problems."

6) It features the word "gradiloquently" on page 37.

7) And on page 183 it features the words: "lackwit", "clodpoll" and "dunderhead".

8) Two goats are having to act human in one of the chapters. Not an easy task.

9) The villains are really evil. Not kind of nasty or had-a-bad-childhood-unpleasant. Evil.

10) This quote from page 135: "They sat side by side on a thick, white cumulus cloud the size of a small town."

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So... after having told myself for a looooong time that Twitter was definitely not for me (just as I always thought that blogging was not for), Willa now has a Twitter account!! WillaWWW - not very imaginative but hey, what's a girl to do when it's past midnight and she can't sleep.

If you guys are on Twitter, please let me know so I can follow you!!

Review: "The Gargoyle"

Do you know that feeling of picking up a book and starting reading it without having any expectations or any ideas about what the book is about? That's how I felt when I started reading "The Gargoyle" by Andrew Davidson. My sister had recommended it but not told me about the story so I was completely open when I read it and I liked that feeling of having no expectations and just going along with the story told by a cynical, bitter narrator eager to draw the reader into his own black world (and I mean that in the best possible sense).

It is a scary story - really scary. A man in his thirties is driving while under the influence of alcohol and drugs and when the hallucinations start getting to him, he loses his grip on the car and ends up in a horrible and painful accident. When he wakes up, he is in the hospital, in intensive care for burn victims and life has he knows it is no longer. He whole life is now the burn ward and the nurses and doctors that treat him and the day when he is able to leave the burn ward and go back to life is far off. Especially because the narrator makes it very clear that he doesn't think there is any life to go back to. Having made a living working in the porn industry, his looks are now ruined and his friends have disappeared. His loneliness is tangible through the pages and I felt it in every word as I read.
Then one day a mentally unstable patient from the psychiatric ward appears in his room. Marianne Engel is a sculptress whose speciality is gargoyles and who tells him about his long life and her years in a convent in medieval Germany. Her stories are wild and impossible but it is clear that she believes them and as time passes, Marianne's stories become as much a part of the narrators life as they are of hers.

On amazon.com they call it "An extraordinary debut novel of love that survives the fires of hell and transcends the boundaries of time." The book refers quite a bit to Dante's Divine Comedy, especially Inferno and if you have any interest in medieval history, you will enjoy this book. The love story is strong, especially because it is so strange and crooked - the love is not a teenage crush or a love-at-first-sight feeling. It is a painful memory of sharing yourself with somebody else. A bond between two people who don't seem to know what to make of each other. It is beautiful yet painful - a pain that even morphine can't dampen.

So what did I think of this story? Well, I liked it but giving you a picture of all that I thought and felt when reading this book is probably impossible because I went from laughing at Marianne's strange behaviour, feeling the narrators bitterness, being sad for his pain and intrigued by the budding love. This is an emotional rollercoaster but in a good way.

Read it if: You believe that love is more than just a happy, pink bubble of delight. If you like having your imagination put to work and if you like wondering what is really going on.

Friday - follow fun and series that I love

Follow Friday is hosted by Parajunkee’s View and Alison at Alison Can Read. If you want to participate, it's easy. To learn more and enter, check out: Parajunkee and Alison Can Read. Join the fun and make some new friends!



Q. Do you have a favorite series that you read over and over again? Tell us a bit about it and why you keep on revisiting it?

Often I find myself revisiting favorite series when I need a bit of comfort-reading. It feels like hanging out with old friends and it makes me feel safe and happy. Incredible what books can do really. The series that I keep coming back to are very different and I love them for different reasons.

The Elenium Series by David Eddings
Following the adventures of Sparhawk and his brave friends as they try to save Queen Elena is such an adventure. I love Sparhawk for being such a battered, grumpy thing who can swing into action at a moments notice and beat the bad guys. Another favorite character from this series is Sparhawk's horse, a gruff creature which can definitely hold its own in a battle. Not a horse to mess with.

Anne of Green Gables series by L. M. Montgomery
I have loved Anne since I was a ten years old spelling my way through Anne of Green Gables and since then I have loved red hair with a passion. Anne has helped shape the way I think about things - especially about family and friends and the importance of giving all people a chance. She is not just a character from a series, she is a role model.

The Hellesta Saga by Margit Söderholm
This is truly a family saga that spans years (nearly a century) as we follow the family who lives at and around the stately home Hellesta in Sweden. It all starts with a young girl who gets married off to an older man that she doesn't like, brokenhearted she toils to make money enough to buy her old childhood home Hellesta so that it can stay in the family. My favourite books are the ones that centres on Will Anckarberg, her youngest son, who gets his heart broken by the cold and ambitious Julie and then marries her sister, the mild Annette and has a brood of children that all grow up and have their own romances and adventures. If you like historical romance that is well-written and full of emotions then this is for you.

Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling
Guess I don't have to explain why :-) It is just one of the best series ever writtten and I love it to bits. However, I never read book five "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" if I am feeling down or in a bad mood because it is such an emotional book for me and yes I do sometimes cry when I read it...

And staying with the magical theme, if I look into the future, I will probably end up re-reading the Discovery of Witches trilogy by Deborah Harkness many times.

White Nights

Oh Land - White Nights. This song is so beautiful, had to share it with you all. I think this would make the perfect soundtrack for when reading "I Capture the Castle" by Dodie Smith, it has that same whimsical soul and it is such a hopeful tune as well somehow. Listen to the song and tell me what you think :-)

Review: "Smokeheads"

Is there such a thing as dude lit? If there is - and I think there is - then "Smokeheads" by Dough Johnstone must surely be part of that genre. It is such a dude-ish book, written by a guy for guys focusing on things that guys should like. So I am probably the wrong audience for this one and I have to say I didn't love it. It was alright but nothing special, nothing that made me want more.

The storyline is quite good though: A group of friends who all share a love of Scottish whiskey from far-away, misty islands go on a weekend road trip to celebrate whiskey. Kind of like "The Hangover" in the sense that everything that could go wrong, goes wrong. From the moment they step foot on the island, they make enemies and when you throw into the mix a whiskey-loving hottie, vengeful local police and liberal quantities of whiskey, it all becomes dangerous. Especially because these guys are such different characters that they are bound to get into fights.

It is doomed to go wrong and it does. One bad thing after another leads to death, destruction and a chase across a remote Scottish island. Not really my kind of fun to be honest.

Maybe I am just more of a French cinema girl than an action-packed road trip girl but this book didn't do it for me. Or maybe it is because the characters are wooden with no depth whatsoever. Or because the plot is seriously difficult to believe. Or because the storyline goes from "has potential" to "please just get this over with". Not sure but it wasn't for me.

Best thing about this book: It got me interested in whiskey!

Read it if: You drink a lot of "on the rocks"... or if your idea of a great night in is to rent any movie with one or more of the following elements: 1) Arnold Schwarznegger 2) Sylvester Stallone 3) liberal doses of car chases and violence

Thank goodness for sequels!

To whoever invented sequels: I thank you!! Have finished Deborah Harkness's AMAZING, WONDERFUL book "A Discovery of Witches" and luckily there is a sequel!! Not yet but it is in the making. Dear Deborah Harkness, of course I appreciate that it takes time to write such great books but please hurry up. If I be of any help walking your dogs, doing your dishes or something along those lines so that you have more time writing, please let me know. Until the second book in this trilogy comes out, I will be daydreaming about Matthew Clairmont.

Ps. For more info about the delicious Matthew, please watch this space as review will be posted soon.

Review: "Moon over Soho"

Not so very long ago I reviewed "Rivers of London" and I absolutely loved that book. So of course I couldn't wait to get my hands on the sequel "Moon over Soho" by the amazing writer Ben Aaronovitch whom I would very much like to meet in person. If his books are anything to go by (and I guess they are), he has a wicked sense of humour!

"Moon over Soho" picks up where "Rivers of London" left off - our dear hero (sometimes anti-hero) Peter Grant has put the Covent Garden riots behind him and is focusing on the future. His best friend Lesley is recovering at her parents' place, still both physically and mentally crippled by what happened. So Peter is more or less on his own which just adds to the pressure of being the only constable-and-wizard-apprentice in London, well England really. However, there is lots to do because even though he has brokered peace between the river deities. London is still full of magic, and when a body turns up playing an old jazz track, Peter throws himself into the investigation. This leads him of course into some danger and (also of course) into the arms of a beautiful woman, the mysterious, patisserie-loving Simone. Good think that Peter has grown up with a jazz-loving father because music plays an important role in the crimes that he must put a stop to before more victims turn up in the London streets, dead and jazzing.

I really really enjoyed this book. As with "Rivers of London" the dry humour is really amazing and Peter has some great one-liners here and there. And Peter himself is pretty amazing as well. I have totally fallen for his geekiness, his intelligence and his inability to focus when in company of beautiful women. He has so many flaws yet is such a lovely guy - probably one of the most likeable main characters that I have come across in a long time. Thanks to Aaronovitch for creating this magical version of London and for making Peter the focus of this great series.

Read it if: You love laughing and listening to jazz while reading. If you are a single girl looking for a guy with a sense of humour, good career prospects and the ability to light up a room using magic.

Review: "The Pregnant Widow"

There were so many reasons to pick up "The Pregnant Widow" by Martin Amis. First of all, I really like "London Fields" by Martin Amis and I quite enjoyed "The Rachel Papers" so it seemed like a reasonable assumption that I would enjoy "The Pregnant Widow" as well. Also I think the title is really cool - the paperback cover on the other hand I am not too keen on but hey, you can't get it all and I chose the hardback cover to accompany this review as I think that is quite pretty.

"The Pregnant Widow" is Amis's 12th novel and in my opinion it is a really great one. The story is quite interesting and multi-facetted with lots of details that kept me fascinated and with beautiful descriptions that made Italy - where the story is set - really come to life.

The narrator is a 20-year-old male with all the trouble and issues that come with being way too focussed on sex and at the mercy of women... Poor guy! Keith Nearing is quite the anti-hero, he is a days away from his 21st birthday and far away from home on a holiday in Italy. It is the 1970's and girls are intent on behaving like boys and being liberated which means that Keith's relationship with girlfriend Lily is not going to well, she is too liberated and to little in love with Keith, who sees her as some sort of sister. Instead he has his eyes on her friend, the gorgeous upper-class girl Sheherazade with the amazing body who is starting to understand exactly how much power she has over the male gender. As if that wasn't enough to cook up a dramatic story, Amis then throws a bunch of interesting minor characters into the mix - such as every-girls-dream the Italian count (with only with drawback that keeps him from ever getting Sheherazade) and the depressed twentysomething who is hiding out in shame. It is a dangerous mix and Keith is too messed up by a mix of his own hormones, feelings and dreams to take caution. He spends his days in a frenzy of reading - only disrupted to have conversations with the girls or looking at their breasts.... It is a summer that he will always remember and that will change his life forever.

It is a fantastic book if you ask me - I read it and loved it and some day I will read this in Italy on a warm summers day and it will feel like I am almost there with Keith as he faces the difficulties of youth and the conundrums of women.

Read it if: You love early Martin Amis - or if you are no longer a teenager but remember how difficult being hormonal was...

Review: "Rivers of London"

On the back of Ben Aaronovitch's novel "Rivers of London" and on amazon.co.uk it says:
My name is Peter Grant and until January I was just probationary constable in that mighty army for justice known to all right-thinking people as the Metropolitan Police Service (as the Filth to everybody else).

A few lines that actually tells you quite a lot of important facts about this book:
1) The narrator is Peter Grant, a London copper trying to make a career with the Metropolitan Police
2) The story takes place in London
3) In January something happens that changes Peter's career quite drastically
4) This book is really funny - it is written with a great sense of dry humour and keen observations about the follies of man.

Peter is a man like everyone else. He comes from a lower-middle class home, has decent a-levels and modest ambitions and a crush on his sharp-tongued colleague Lesley. As it turns out, he also has a talent for magic.
One day when he is on patrol in Covent Garden, a man is killed and a strange witness comes forward. A dead witness... And suddenly Peter is promoted from bar-brawl-stopper and report-filer to appretince to the last police wizard and a whole new world opens up as he has to learn how to interview ghosts, deal with turf wars among minor deities and create light with magic. A lot to handle for a guy who didn't believe in anything supernatural. Not to mention that he also has to investigate murders and woo Lesley.

There are so many things that I loved about this book so I am going ahead and putting it in a list - easier to keep track that way:

1) The dry humour. I found myself laughing, chuckling and having an altogether great time while reading this book. Perfect for a day when you need to smile. Elegant jokes and fun observations.

2) Peter. Great character who develops and changes as the plot unfolds. Very easy to like and his relationship with his parents is a great side-story.

3) The scenery. I love London and this book evokes the city very well.

4) The minor characters, especially the rivers deities such as Lady Tyburn, Berverley Brooke and Mama Thames. Talk about dysfunctional families and strong female characters!

5) The plot. The crime/whodunnit part of the story actually works quite well and there were twists and turns that I hadn't seen coming.

Read it if: You'd like a bit of adult Harry Potter. If you love London. If you ever considered joining the police. If you believe in magic.