What Fiction are you reading this week, May 12, 2024?

[hermetic]

Happy Mothers' Day, to those who participate.

A family owned bookshop in the heart of St Andrews, with over 50,000 titles, rolling ladders and complimentary tea and coffee.

I'm reading the amazing I Cheerfully Refuse by Lief Enger. Set in a not-too-distant future America, the tale of a bereaved and pursued musician embarking under sail on Lake Superior in search of his departed, deeply loved, bookselling wife. "A rollicking narrative in the most evocative of settings, this latest novel is a symphony against despair and a rallying cry for the future," dystopian as it appears to be.

Listening to The Lager Queen of Minnesota by J. Ryan Stradal. Just started this novel of family, Midwestern values, hard work, fate and the secrets of making a world-class beer. "Drink lots, it's Blotz!" Fun story.

Read any good family books lately?

[LuvLoogie]

1. The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu

I started it last year, borrowed from the library, which I left at a job site when I emptied my backpack looking for a tool. then I heard they had made a television series, which I want to see. But I had to read the book first, so I bought it at Barnes and Nobel. I went to pay the library finally, but they only take cash, so next paycheck.

[Diraven]

2. Dresden Files series

By Jim Butcher. Currently on book number 14, Cold Days.

[AKwannabe]

3. 5th Element

Just checked it out at the library but haven’t cracked it yet. Tonight…after work.

Happy Mother’s Day!

[MOMFUDSKI]

4. A Man in Full. Exquisitely hysterical.

Loving it.

[hermetic]

10. Tom Wolfe?

Great writer, but I never read that one.

[mentalsolstice]

5. Finished "The Winter Orphans" by Kristen Beck

It was about the Swiss Red Cross care of children during WWII, and their efforts to smuggle them to other countries. Now I’m reading about the Japanese occupation of the Philippines, When We Had Wings by Ariel Lawhon, Kristina McMorris, and Susan Meissner. It’s been hard to put down. I hope you enjoy The Lager Queen of Minnesota as much as I did.

Thank you for the thread and happy reading to all!

[hermetic]

11. Nice!

Thanks

[Bayard]

6. Finished, "First Family," by David Baldacci

A good cliff-hanger.

About half way through, "Never Tell," by Lisa Gardner. Another, wife shoots husband thriller, but its good so far.

[hermetic]

8. Alright!

I see that Never Tell is 10th in a series. Have you read any of the earlier ones? It does sound quite good.

[Bayard]

14. I didn't know it was a series,

But it does include some of the same characters, the detective and her advocate/informant. I have read several of them.

[NanaCat]

7. Other-Worldly week

Pierce Brown – Red Rising. Science fiction.
Guy in the lowest caste of a future society has toiled like a slave in horrible living conditions, only because he believes his work will enable future generations to live on Mars. Turns out the rich have been living the good life on the surface there for a very long time. Now he wants the good life for himself, and to bring down those who took advantage of him…by infiltrating the highest caste of all.

Charlaine Harris – Dead Until Dark. Paranormal romance/mystery.
I know—Unbelievable that I haven’t read this cult classic by now. That’s because I have a very low opinion of romance books, and I’m no fonder of the paranormal. I’m sure plenty of people enjoy one or both, more power to them, but only a book challenge can have me reading something like this. My highest hope is that I don’t get a terminal case of vertigo from the eye-rolling I expect from it.

[NanaCat]

9. I read the Enger

A couple of weeks ago.

Strange book, sad and terrifying by turns.

[hermetic]

12. Seriously

Quite unusual. He sure writes beautifully, though.

[NanaCat]

13. Indeed

I don't normally read that kind of book, but good writing can keep me glued to the page.

[rsdsharp]

15. I just finished the 14th Issac Bell novel entitled

Clive Cussler The Heist by Jack du Brul. Yes, Cussler died in 2020, but his name is still on the books — now in the title. The Bell series is one of only two Cussler series I still read.

I enjoyed this, although there was a giant legal error which caused me to grind my teeth. It’s just not that difficult to research. He also had Bell armed with a Browning 9mm. The first Browning 9mm, of which I’m aware, made its debut in 1935. This book is set in 1914. Other than that it was a fun, if rather typical, Cusslerian read.

[hermetic]

16. Good eye

Don't ya hate it when they do that? Yeah, well...

He was quite a writer, 27 novels, and explorer. Did you know he has a museum in Arvada, Colorado? That would probably be an interesting place to visit.

[rsdsharp]

18. It's way more than 27; I own more than that myself. By my count it's currently 99.

Of course, many of those are Clive Cussler with. . ., and for the last few years, they just bear his name.

It’s been a long time since Jackie Kennedy Onassis was his editor.

[japple]

17. I remember reading The Lager Queen of Minnesota many years ago. It was a fun book.

I've started something that is not fun, but it was on my list and I decided that since it won the Pulitzer Prize, I would read it now. Jayne Anne Phillips' book, Night Watch. Well, I started it last night and think I'm in for a dark, spooky, creepy story. The writing is so good, but (so far), I'm not liking some of the characters.

Thanks for the weekly thread, hermetic. Happy Mother's Day to all the moms and cat moms out there. I'm a cat mom and step mom and I'm celebrating.

[hermetic]

19. Cheers!!

Yeah, I put Night Watch on my list...

[yellowdogintexas]

20. I just started One Hundred Years of Lenni and Margot by Marianne Cronin

It's an actual book not an ebook and I am reading it for my book club.

Seventeen-year-old Lenni Pettersson lives on the Terminal Ward at the Glasgow Princess Royal Hospital. Though the teenager has been told she’s dying, she still has plenty of living to do. Joining the hospital’s arts and crafts class, she meets the magnificent Margot, an 83-year-old, purple-pajama-wearing, fruitcake-eating rebel, who transforms Lenni in ways she never imagined.

As their friendship blooms, a world of stories opens for these unlikely companions who, between them, have been alive for one hundred years. Though their days are dwindling, both are determined to leave their mark on the world. With the help of Lenni’s doting palliative care nurse and Father Arthur, the hospital’s patient chaplain, Lenni and Margot devise a plan to create one hundred paintings showcasing the stories of the century they have lived—stories of love and loss, of courage and kindness, of unexpected tenderness and pure joy.

Though the end is near, life isn’t quite done with these unforgettable women just yet.

I finished Poseiden's Fury: a Sean Wyatt Archaeological thriller (#22) I really enjoy this series!
Sean Wyatt of the International Archaeological Agency receives a desperate message from an old friend. It's a riddle from a five hundred year old text, a riddle only Sean and his team can solve.

Together with his wife, Adriana Villa, and best friend Tommy Schultz (the IAA Founder), the team travels to Istanbul, site of a grand theft at an auction in the affluent neighborhood of Besitkas. There, they uncover a mystery they never saw coming, and the rabbit hole opens wide.

But they aren't the only ones searching for this mythical treasure. With no end insight for the war in Ukraine, and casualties in the hundreds of thousands, the Russian president has sent his own team of elite soldiers to discover the location of an artifact they believe will not only end the war in one, swift stroke, but will make them the unstoppable superpower on Earth.

The adventure leads through the streets and hidden passages of Istanbul, where Sean and his team discover a secret they never imagined to be real.

[NanaCat]

21. eBooks are real books

They're not data bits pretending to be books The publishers don't make a different War and Peace for ebooks than they do for their treeware versions. eBooks are simply another method to access content that is the same as what one finds in a treeware book.

It gets old seeing people trash eBooks all the time. Hating on eBooks would be like disparaging Gutenberg's first books as 'fake' compared to illuminated books. And maybe there was a time when people thought bound books were anathema compared to scrolls. I guess some people are so stuck in their preferred ruts that they can't accept how technology moves on, like it or not.

Surely in a world with too few readers, what matters is that people are reading books, not the means of reading them.

[yellowdogintexas]

22. "actual" book refers to the physical format. Of course ebooks are real

I just very seldom read in printed format. Perhaps I should have said "actual physical book"