I just got Skin Trade by Laurell K Hamilton yesterday. I started reading it at 11 a.m., and had finished it by midnight (this was in between physical therapy appointment, fixing and eating lunch, fixing dinner, keeping up with email and Google reader, etc). I think I spent a total of 6 hours reading 486 pages.
It was time well-spent, IMNSHO. There was way less sex in this book of the Anita Blake series, and a lot more about Anita's developing powers and her psychological problems with what she does, on the job and in her personal life. Don't get me wrong, the sex scenes in the books are good, but getting more into what is going on in Anita's mind and going deeper into her interactions with the vampires and weres that she deals with (not to mention her interactions with Edward and Olaf) makes for a much more interesting read.
I like all of the books in this series, but I think that this one is my favorite, to date (it's the first one I've read, cover-to-cover, the first day I got it).
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Dead and Gone
This is so not fair! I got Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris yesterday and read it in a couple of hours today. I have to say that it's one of the best books I've read, and on a par with the rest of the Sookie Stackhouse novels. But it doesn't neatly wrap up the saga, and it left me wanting more. So I sincerely hope that Ms Harris is planning on writing more books about Sookie and her life. I especially want to know how things turn out with the FBI, and what happens with her nephew who has her mind-reading ability, and most of all, which vampire was Niall talking about when he said "the vampire loves you". Too many loose ends left undone just has to mean there are more books to come in this series.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Lover's Bite by Maggie Shayne
I've read books by Maggie Shayne before, and I have to say that when I see her name on a book, it's probably one that I'm going to buy. Lover's Bite is a continuation of the story started in Demon's Kiss. A vampire worked for the CIA (and let me tell you, the CIA in these books is really good at playing games and fucking everybody over) and was programmed to become insanely violent when he heard a certain codeword, and the violence ended when another codeword was spoken within range of his hearing. Reaper (the vampire) has decided he no longer works for the CIA, and has gone to work for the vampire community, hunting and killing rogue vampires. Unfortunately for him, the CIA just doesn't want to let him go. He ends up saving an assortment of characters (a werefox who is now a vampire, a couple of female vampires who have been tortured). He has the sorta kinda maybe help of a vampire conman who takes advantage of women for their money, and a couple of Chosen women (Chosen have a belladonna antigen in their blood and if they don't get "turned" by a vampire, they die at a young age, Chosen can be male or female). This series is quite a mix of mystery, murder, romance, and crime with a supernatural bent, and I love it. I'm on the lookout for more books in this series.
I'm almost finished with Primal Needs by Susan Sizemore (another great author in the supernatural romance genre). This is also a book in a series, and I own and have read Primal Desires and Primal Heat. More vampires and weres and plots within plots within plots along with romance. Susan Sizemore is another of the authors who, when I see her name on a book, I usually have to buy that book.
I'm almost finished with Primal Needs by Susan Sizemore (another great author in the supernatural romance genre). This is also a book in a series, and I own and have read Primal Desires and Primal Heat. More vampires and weres and plots within plots within plots along with romance. Susan Sizemore is another of the authors who, when I see her name on a book, I usually have to buy that book.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Finally, done cataloging my library
Ok, I finished cataloging my library - well, at least I have all of the authors written down with the books of theirs that I have and have them marked as read or yet-to-read. Only 150 books, so it's not a huge library yet (give me time, it will be). Of those 150 books, I haven't yet read 32 of them. I also have about 6 books ordered that I haven't yet received, so that will up the number I haven't yet read.
I typed up the list (only took 3 1/2 pages to list them all) so I can fold it up and carry it in my wallet. That way, when I'm looking at books, if I'm not sure I've read the book (or I'm not sure if I own the book), I can check the list. And let me tell you, that's a necessary thing for me. I've read so many books, and purchased so many books, over my lifetime, that I have a damned hard time remembering which ones I've read and which ones I own. Since this list is on my computer, I can update it every time I buy a book. Now I just need to figure out where I can put a bigger bookshelf in this house so I can have all of my books in one place instead of having some of the upstairs in a bookshelf, and some of them downstairs in 3 different areas (behind knickknacks on bookshelves).
Holy shit! I just realized that I read the whole Sookie Stackhouse series (all 8 books) in 4 days. That's what happens when I get in a reading mood, I'll go through a lot of books in a very short amount of time. That's one of the reasons I never took speed-reading in high school or college, I already read so fast that I looked for the thickest books I could find that were also interesting (and why I like books in a series so well). Well, that and the fact that in 7th grade, I was told I was reading at a college sophomore level (back in 1966/67, yeah, I'm ancient...lol).
I've read the collected works of Edgar Allen Poe, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and William Shakespeare (that was when I was in junior high school). I've read a lot of Stephen King, Dean R Koontz, and John Saul as well. And I'm not even going to get into how many science fiction/fantasy authors I've read (but I'll tell you that a few of my favorites are Piers Anthony, Robert Heinlein, Jack Chalker, and Isaac Asimov). I've read most of the Doc Savage books, quite a few of the Tarzan books, and a bunch of the Bomba, the Jungle Boy books (my grandmother had the B,tJB books and I used to read them when we went to visit her on our vacations, wonder how hard it would be to find them now, they were old back then, some 40 years ago). Hmm, gonna have to do a search on them, I think. I also had a spell where I was reading a lot of the Executioner books by Don Pendleton, and the Destroyer series, too. And I had a spell of reading the true crime books written by Ann rule. I also wish I still had all the books I bought about the Viet Nam war, most of them were written by soldiers who had been over there, and gave a totally different perspective than the one given by the media at the time.
As you can tell, my reading interests are all over the map and I don't stick to any one genre, although it does seem to be cyclical. I'll read sci-fi/fantasy for a while, then horror, then true crime (Ann Rule is really good with those), then supernatural romances, then classic literature, etc.
I typed up the list (only took 3 1/2 pages to list them all) so I can fold it up and carry it in my wallet. That way, when I'm looking at books, if I'm not sure I've read the book (or I'm not sure if I own the book), I can check the list. And let me tell you, that's a necessary thing for me. I've read so many books, and purchased so many books, over my lifetime, that I have a damned hard time remembering which ones I've read and which ones I own. Since this list is on my computer, I can update it every time I buy a book. Now I just need to figure out where I can put a bigger bookshelf in this house so I can have all of my books in one place instead of having some of the upstairs in a bookshelf, and some of them downstairs in 3 different areas (behind knickknacks on bookshelves).
Holy shit! I just realized that I read the whole Sookie Stackhouse series (all 8 books) in 4 days. That's what happens when I get in a reading mood, I'll go through a lot of books in a very short amount of time. That's one of the reasons I never took speed-reading in high school or college, I already read so fast that I looked for the thickest books I could find that were also interesting (and why I like books in a series so well). Well, that and the fact that in 7th grade, I was told I was reading at a college sophomore level (back in 1966/67, yeah, I'm ancient...lol).
I've read the collected works of Edgar Allen Poe, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and William Shakespeare (that was when I was in junior high school). I've read a lot of Stephen King, Dean R Koontz, and John Saul as well. And I'm not even going to get into how many science fiction/fantasy authors I've read (but I'll tell you that a few of my favorites are Piers Anthony, Robert Heinlein, Jack Chalker, and Isaac Asimov). I've read most of the Doc Savage books, quite a few of the Tarzan books, and a bunch of the Bomba, the Jungle Boy books (my grandmother had the B,tJB books and I used to read them when we went to visit her on our vacations, wonder how hard it would be to find them now, they were old back then, some 40 years ago). Hmm, gonna have to do a search on them, I think. I also had a spell where I was reading a lot of the Executioner books by Don Pendleton, and the Destroyer series, too. And I had a spell of reading the true crime books written by Ann rule. I also wish I still had all the books I bought about the Viet Nam war, most of them were written by soldiers who had been over there, and gave a totally different perspective than the one given by the media at the time.
As you can tell, my reading interests are all over the map and I don't stick to any one genre, although it does seem to be cyclical. I'll read sci-fi/fantasy for a while, then horror, then true crime (Ann Rule is really good with those), then supernatural romances, then classic literature, etc.
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Sookie Stackhouse 3
Okay, I lied. I finished Definitely Dead, started and finished All Together Dead yesterday, and today I started and finished From Dead To Worse. I have to say that I like this series as much as I like the Anita Blake series, maybe more.
Sookie shows an amazing amount of personal growth throughout the 8 books I've read so far, as well as growth in her telepathy and how/why she uses it. From the looks of the ending of From Dead To Worse, there are going to be some surprises in the 9th book, Dead and Gone (like her cousin's very young son who has the same talent Sookie has, said cousin having been married, pregnant, and divorced before she became a vampire and then died the second, and final, time). Oh yeah, I'm very much looking forward to this book (maybe it will also wrap up the loose ends from the vampire war, and the Were war). And it looks like the Weres and the shapeshifters may be coming out of the closet, like the vamps did (that ought to be good for at least one more book, maybe more). Can you tell I want this series to continue for a while? :)
If you haven't read the books yet, I highly recommend them.
Sookie shows an amazing amount of personal growth throughout the 8 books I've read so far, as well as growth in her telepathy and how/why she uses it. From the looks of the ending of From Dead To Worse, there are going to be some surprises in the 9th book, Dead and Gone (like her cousin's very young son who has the same talent Sookie has, said cousin having been married, pregnant, and divorced before she became a vampire and then died the second, and final, time). Oh yeah, I'm very much looking forward to this book (maybe it will also wrap up the loose ends from the vampire war, and the Were war). And it looks like the Weres and the shapeshifters may be coming out of the closet, like the vamps did (that ought to be good for at least one more book, maybe more). Can you tell I want this series to continue for a while? :)
If you haven't read the books yet, I highly recommend them.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Sookie Stackhouse 2
Ok, I finished the fifth and sixth books in the Charlaine Harris series. What can I say, these books are really good. So Dead As A Doornail, and Definitely Dead are on the shelf of books I've finished. I'm starting on All Together Dead tonight (I'll probably be done with it by tomorrow night), and then I'll read From Dead to Worse. I wish I had the 9th book in the series already, but I guess I'll just have to wait for that one to get here. These are definitely books that I'll be keeping so I can read them again in a year or so (I've read the series about Anita Blake by Laurell K Hamilton about 4 times).
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Sookie Stackhouse 1
Okay, I finished the Rachel Morgan series, really good, but there's plenty of situations left unresolved. I'm hoping for more books in the series.
So, now I'm reading Charlaine Harris' books, on which True Blood on HBO is based. So far, I've read Dead Until Dark, Living Dead in Dallas, Club Dead, and am currently reading Dead to the World. I have to say that this is another series that is one which will grab you by the eyes and not let go until you've read it all (and I'm pre-ordering the 9th book in the series, Dead and Gone, since I have the first 8 books).
Spoiler Alert: If you haven't read the books, don't read any farther. One of the characters in the books, well, just let me say that his vampiric existence gives a very good reason for all the Elvis sightings that are reported in the tabloids (and his character is not at all what you would expect it to be). And that's all I'm going to say on that. He's not a major character, but he does pop in and out of the books, kinda like those Elvis sightings.....lol
Now, I haven't watched True Blood on HBO, so I don't know how closely the series follows the books, or how they've set up the series as far as how many series episodes cover how many chapters of the books. But if the series is half as good as the books, it's probably pretty good (but I hate watching movies/etc made from books I've read because they just aren't the same, no matter how faithful the movie/series tries to be).
But this is definitely another series of books I would recommend reading.
So, now I'm reading Charlaine Harris' books, on which True Blood on HBO is based. So far, I've read Dead Until Dark, Living Dead in Dallas, Club Dead, and am currently reading Dead to the World. I have to say that this is another series that is one which will grab you by the eyes and not let go until you've read it all (and I'm pre-ordering the 9th book in the series, Dead and Gone, since I have the first 8 books).
Spoiler Alert: If you haven't read the books, don't read any farther. One of the characters in the books, well, just let me say that his vampiric existence gives a very good reason for all the Elvis sightings that are reported in the tabloids (and his character is not at all what you would expect it to be). And that's all I'm going to say on that. He's not a major character, but he does pop in and out of the books, kinda like those Elvis sightings.....lol
Now, I haven't watched True Blood on HBO, so I don't know how closely the series follows the books, or how they've set up the series as far as how many series episodes cover how many chapters of the books. But if the series is half as good as the books, it's probably pretty good (but I hate watching movies/etc made from books I've read because they just aren't the same, no matter how faithful the movie/series tries to be).
But this is definitely another series of books I would recommend reading.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Kim Harrison's Rachel Morgan series
Ok, I have to admit that I haven't finished the series yet. I've read Every Which Way But Dead, A Fistful of Charms, For a Few Demons More, and The Outlaw Demon Wails. I'm currently reading White Witch, Black Curse.
I must say that this is a very good series, with a lot of twists and turns and surprises in store for readers.
If you like reading about vampires (living and dead), werewolves, witches, elves, faeries, pixies, demons, gargoyles, and magic mixed in with romance, suspense, and a bit of horror, this series fills the bill nicely.
I read For A Few Demons More first (I didn't know it was part of series), and then bought the rest of the series. I think each book would stand alone, but reading them in order gives a much better idea of why things are happening.
I must say that this is a very good series, with a lot of twists and turns and surprises in store for readers.
If you like reading about vampires (living and dead), werewolves, witches, elves, faeries, pixies, demons, gargoyles, and magic mixed in with romance, suspense, and a bit of horror, this series fills the bill nicely.
I read For A Few Demons More first (I didn't know it was part of series), and then bought the rest of the series. I think each book would stand alone, but reading them in order gives a much better idea of why things are happening.
Sunday, March 15, 2009
My library
As soon as I get all of my books cataloged, I'll be posting daily about the authors whose books I read, the books in my library, and small reviews of the ones I really liked.
Most of my library currently consists of supernatural romances (vampires, were-creatures, witches, demons, faeries, pixies, etc). I do have some science fiction still, but the bulk of that collection now resides with my son as I don't have room in this house for over a thousand books (and if I'm not careful, it won't be long before I'm back up to that size collection again).
Most of my library currently consists of supernatural romances (vampires, were-creatures, witches, demons, faeries, pixies, etc). I do have some science fiction still, but the bulk of that collection now resides with my son as I don't have room in this house for over a thousand books (and if I'm not careful, it won't be long before I'm back up to that size collection again).
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