Today's a short one. The event for today is 'Favourite bookseller recommendation'. I've never been in the position where I've had to seek out new titles to read. Usually, I've had more books on the 'to read' list than I have time to get to. At present, the list is 151 titles long, and these are books that are either print volumes on my shelves at home, or in digital form on my iPad. So, I don't think I need any recommendations to grow that list, eh?
Showing posts with label Reading (process). Show all posts
Showing posts with label Reading (process). Show all posts
Sunday, 12 October 2014
#BookADayUK; A Reader Event For October. Day 12
Today's a short one. The event for today is 'Favourite bookseller recommendation'. I've never been in the position where I've had to seek out new titles to read. Usually, I've had more books on the 'to read' list than I have time to get to. At present, the list is 151 titles long, and these are books that are either print volumes on my shelves at home, or in digital form on my iPad. So, I don't think I need any recommendations to grow that list, eh?
Sunday, 1 June 2014
The Month of May(be)?
May; month of fertility rites and, in UK we hope, sunshine at last. Well,
we had a couple of Bank Holidays and the weather, a topic of supreme interest
in these islands, proved reasonable for one of those. 50% can’t be bad.
As for me; I’ve spent much of the month doing the read-aloud edit of the
last two books in the fantasy trilogy, ASeared Sky. As many of you will know, the first book, Joinings, was published by Fantastic Books Publishing at the end of
March. It continues to sell and attract interest and 5 star reviews. In
response to remarks in a couple of reviews and from other readers, relating to
the character names, I’ve produced a couple of lists of the players and the
names used in myth and legend. Dan, my publisher, converted these to PDF docs.
If you’d like to download or print them, you’ll find the players’ list here and
the myth and legends list here. These are now included in the books for those
who buy from now. I want my readers to be certain that they’ll have an
opportunity to read the entire trilogy, so I’ve been completing the series by
doing the final edit as a read-aloud from a printed script. That entails
reading 868 A4 pages of print. Book two is now ready for the publisher. Book
three is written and I’m a third of the way through the final edit of that
volume.
All that reading aloud has meant I’ve had a diminished taste for other
reading, unfortunately. And I’ve a couple of books I really must read and
review, so they’re next on the list.
The Sci-Fi novelette that’s anxious to escape from the back of my mind is
now really pushing, but it’ll have to wait a little longer before I release it
onto the page.
The month has been domestically quite busy, with my daughter returning
home from her 3 years at university, her final exhibition, and all the things associated
with such effort on behalf of a talented offspring.
I’ve written 17 blog posts, read and reviewed 2 books and penned a dozen
poems during the month, as well as partaking in a few online discussions, some
continuing on a guest post I did at the end of April on a great site, Writers’ Village, and others on a smashing site I’ve also contributed to in the past,
The Blood Red Pencil. I’ve updated the list of my writing successes and posted
that as a table at the foot of the Published Works page here on the blog, for
those who are interested, click here to take you that page. I’ve also answered
questions for an interview on a fantasy website, which should appear some time
at the beginning of this month. So, whilst I haven’t created as much as I would
have liked, I’ve been pretty busy with writing stuff. How’s your month gone?
The chart, explained:
Writing - initial creation of stories, blog posts, reviews and longer
works.
Editing - polishing of all written work to make it suitable for readers.
Research - discovery of info for story content, market research, contests
and blog posts.
Reading - books and writing magazines.
Networking - emails, Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, and
comments.
Admin - story submission, blog posting, marketing, organisation, tax, and
general admin tasks.
Sunday, 16 March 2014
The Bull at the Gate, by Linda Acaster, Reviewed
The Bull at the Gate, by Linda Acaster, is the second in the
Torc of Moonlight trilogy of occult romantic thrillers. I read the first and
have been waiting for this second with some impatience. It was worth the wait.
Linda Acaster is a writer with talent. That she’s done
research in depth for this book is clear. The detail, especially of the
archaeology and history of York, is superb. I thought I knew the city, but I’ve
learned things I never even suspected. York is, in fact, another character in
the book.
The story is complex; an intertwining of present day events
with those occurring in Roman York. And, ever-present, the raison d’être of hero
Nick’s every move, is the enigmatic and mysterious entity that may or may not
be Alice. The past returns to haunt Nick, literally, as he struggles to recover
from the devastation of loss that occurred earlier in his life. To complicate
matters, a new woman emerges uninvited into his life. Sophie is clearly a girl intent
on a good time and, when she goes missing, her association with Nick places him
in the field as a prime suspect with the local police.
Are Nick’s experiences real, imaginary, glimpses of another
world and time, or the product of a damaged mind struggling with a past event
too difficult to face? In weaving the tale, Linda Acaster keeps the reader
guessing, providing clues but muddying the waters with an unreliable narrator.
Is this book crime, romance, historical, occult, or is it
both a combination of these and something else entirely? And does it matter
that it crosses genres? As a reader, such classification isn’t important to me.
What matters is a gripping tale populated by characters I can empathise with
and others I can thoroughly dislike. And this book provides exactly that. Had
my circumstances been different, I would have read this at one sitting. As it
was, I found myself eager to read it whenever time and opportunity allowed. I
was driven to reach the end, to discover what would happen.
As with the first book in the series, this is a well-told
tale with real depth and multiple themes explored in a unique style. And, as
expected of a work of intelligence, it makes demands of the reader. There are
several WTF? moments, times when the reader has to pause to consider, times
when questions arise unanswered only to be clarified later in the story. I like
that. Reading is far from a passive activity and Linda Acaster’s writing brings
the occupation to life in a unique way.
I enjoyed the read and have no hesitation in recommending
the book. And, let’s have the final book as soon as possible!
Thursday, 9 January 2014
Starring the Reviews
Reader or writer (and
hopefully, the latter makes you both, since a writer who doesn’t read is, frankly,not doing the job properly), we consume books and often want to share our
opinions on them. So, we review. Many sites where reviews appear use a star
system to grade them. I’m not going to list them all, but I’ll use three of the
most popular as examples and try to gain a feeling for what reviewers might
understand by these gradings.
We all know that 5 star
reviews are considered the pinnacle from the point of view of the writer
assessing success or otherwise, and thought of as a damn good guide to
readability by readers. So, the grading is quite important to all of us. But
what does it mean?
If you hover over the
stars on Goodreads, you’ll get the following results:
1* Did not like it,
2* It
was OK,
3* Liked it,
4* Really liked it,
5* It was amazing.
Do the same for Amazon and
you get these results:
1* I hate it,
2* I don’t like it,
3* It’s okay,
4* I
like it,
5* I love it.
With Smashwords, hovering
over the stars produces no response and I can find no definitions at all on the
site (that’s not to say they don’t exist, of course, just that I can’t discover
them!).
So, there’s no consistency
in the systems. 4 stars can mean ‘I like it’ or ‘I really like it’ or whatever
the reviewer considers is the hidden meaning of the Smashwords stars.
Similarly, if a book is ‘okay’, then it could be awarded 2, 3 or 1-5 stars
depending which system in use. And, I don’t know about you, but I can ‘love’ a
book without necessarily considering it to be ‘amazing’.
My point? This system is
used by readers to gauge the potential readability of a book. I’m certain that
many readers won’t get beyond that * award, making their decisions whether or
not to read/buy, based entirely on this rather arbitrary symbol.
The tool isn’t up to the
purpose for which it was introduced. Perhaps, as readers, and writers, we
should get together and demand that the different sites conform to a uniform
system so that everybody knows exactly what is actually meant by these symbols.
Or perhaps you like the variations. Either way, I’d love to know what you
think.
Friday, 7 June 2013
Excellent Women, by Barbara Pym, Reviewed.
I read the
Folio Society edition of this novel, illustrated rather charmingly and with
considerable insight, by Debra McFarlane. There’s something essentially apt
about reading a book from the early 50s in the form of a hardback with
appropriate plates. Set in the period just following World War II, and written
in the first person by one of the ‘excellent women’ of the title, it should
really be entirely of its time. The simple brilliance of the writing, the
wonderful characterisation and the gently comic surface of a story bursting
with subterranean passion, angst, desperation and injustice elevates the novel
to the status of a minor classic.
There’s no
violence, no sex, no foul language; yet all of humanity is here amongst the
weary, caring, superficial, flirting, thoughtless, considerate, courageous,
resigned and loving people that inhabit the pages. Church, though neither
spirituality nor real faith, plays a significant part in the lives of the
protagonists who attend the edifice but appear devoid of any passion for their
religion, frequently gently mocking their membership of the club.
Miss
Mildred Lathbury, who describes herself in the fourth paragraph of the first
chapter as an unmarried clergyman’s daughter just over thirty and living alone
without apparent ties, is far from the dull spinster we might expect. The
gentle humour that suffuses the whole book often hides a deep pathos as the
excellent women of the title go about their daily lives without hope of
fulfilment in marriage, career or society in general. Being busy, showing and
dealing with concern for their fellow human beings, whilst living grey,
unnoticed lives, these are the women who make life easier, sometimes even
possible, for those surrounding them.
The
unexpressed intelligence, the unacknowledged charity, the unspoken desire, the
unrecognised hopes and dreams of these single women is so exquisitely drawn
that the reader feels every nuance of the subtle insults that surround them.
Taken for granted, patronised, ignored, relied upon and rejected without
thought, these women take on all those tasks that others find either boring or
irrelevant until the jobs are neglected; only then are the quiet duties seen
for the social glue they truly are, but not for very long, of course.
The
society in which this novel takes place has largely disappeared, but the people
and the circumstances remain. I laughed out loud many times whilst reading the
book but always, under the surface, was a recognition that the humour sprang
from deep inequalities of both gender and income. I was reminded of the best of
British sitcoms where humour is mingled with pathos, each quality emphasising
the other in a balance that works so well to entertain whilst putting across a
message.
This is a
story in which nothing of any significance to anyone outside the narrow confines
of the small neighbourhood takes place. There are no earth-shattering events,
no crime, nothing crude, nothing erotic. But it depicts lives lived in quiet,
courageous desperation and does so with a deep affection for those described. I
enjoyed it, and I suspect Mildred will live with me for a long time. Those who
enjoy action and adventure will find this hard to read, but I thoroughly
recommend it to all those who love romance in its best form, those who enjoy
books with real characters, and those who find enjoyment in gentle humour.
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