What Fiction are you reading this week, November 12, 2023?

[hermetic]

London Bookbarge

Reading Nathan's Run by John Gilstrap Fleeing down the dark highways of America, 12-year-old Nathan has no place to go, and the whole world is looking for him. Intense and brutal in places, but there's a big question no one is asking and it's kind of bugging me. I do hope there is a reason for ignoring this fact and it shows up soon. First published in 1996, one reviewer said this book has been banned in many places due to the extreme violence. It was re-released in 2019 with a different ending. Both endings can be seen on Gilstrap's website but I'm not going to look at them until I've finished the book. Gilstrap doesn't say anything about it being banned.

Listening to A Million Junes by Emily Henry, a Young Adult/Fantasy/Romance. Not my usual cup of tea but it's become impossible to find any good mystery audio books available at my library. They all have very long waiting lists. So, I took what I could find.

What books have you found this week?

[Diamond_Dog]

1. Just finished "Everything I Never Told You" by Celeste Ng

Her debut novel. I’m probably off base here but I liked her second novel, “Little Fires Everywhere” better.

Before that, “Class”, Stephanie Land’s biographical sequel to “Maid.” Very compelling.

Last night I started “Storm Watch” by C.J. Box, his latest in the Joe Pickett series which I have really enjoyed.

[niyad]

2. Second in the Veronica Speedwell series, "A Perilous

Undertaking", by Deanna Raybourn. Lepidopterist Veronica Speedwell and her partner Stoker are asked by Queen Victoria's daughter Princess Louise to clear a friend of murder.

"The Witch Is Back" by Sophia Morgan. Old secrets, nasty plots, hexes, as a witch agrees to marry the fiance who left without a word seven years ago, in order to save his dying mother.

"The Duke In Question" by Amalie Howard. Intrigue, agents and double agents for the Crown and the US, plot to kill Lincoln, attempted murder, dangerous attractions.

[Native]

3. I just finished Harlan Coben's latest, I Will Find You, for our book club & Garritsen's, The Spy Coast (Oct. 1st Reads).

Both were typical fare, and I'll have completely forgotten them by the week's end. Adding to my downward spiral of reading choices, I recently started the latest offering from Mindy Kaling's Book Studio, Woke Up like This (November First Read's bad choice). I'll finish it and consider it a palate cleanser if nothing else. On a more positive note, I've also started One Summer, America 1927 by Bill Bryson. It holds real promise!

[txwhitedove]

5. Ha, points for "downward spiral of reading choices." Consider all a

lesson learned, and I'll consider this a great review.

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

8. I have the opposite problem

I have more I want to read than I could ever get to.

Have you tried any of the book challenges out there? I'm not saying to do the challenges, but to use them for ideas about different things to read? Those have done a great deal to expand my reading horizons.

A comprehensive list of the various challenges for 2023:

https://candidcover.net/2023-reading-challenges-list/

[Native]

11. This is a fabulous resource! Thanks!!!

I actually have a shit ton of stuff I haven't gotten to and about 15 books I've started in the last 18 months or so but never finished. I blame it on Kindle & Audible. I'm like a puppy going down the treat aisle of a pet food store.

There is so much available to me and so much I want to read that I typically have a minimum of 3 books going on at a time, and therein lies my problem. If one of those books is particularly well written or a page turner, I focus on that to the detriment of the others, and that's when things start to fall through the cracks. Worse, I keep ordering and buying more. I'm the kind of person who also keeps buying condiments thinking I'm out when I actually have 2 or 3 bottles of whatever.

Back in the day when it was book stores and libraries, I was forced to finish something by a deadline or decide if it was renewal worthy. Not anymore!!!!

And don't even get me started on books made of paper. When we last moved, I decided it was time to donate some of our books. Even after donating 300+, I still have two entire walls in my living room completely filled with books. Now I only buy physical books if it's something I've read digitally that I absolutely loved - like The Goldfinch. I'll buy the hardback with the intention of mailing it to the author to request they sign it, but do I end up doing that? Of course not.

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

15. The challenges + Kindle Reading Insights

Have helped me 'focus' my reading better. I have goals to shoot towards, and that helps me get organized and motivated to read, even with difficult material. I figured out what worked to get me through books I normally wouldn't finish.

The technique is similar to yours, but with one alteration: When reading multiple books at once, I now limit myself to two. One is 'bloody hell, this is beyond tedious/stupid, so read a little at a time to get through it all' and the other book ranges from 'Maybe not the greatest but much more accessible,' to 'OMG LOVE IT, CANNOT, WILL NOT PUT IT DOWN UNTIL END--SLEEP, WHAT'S THAT?!'

[Native]

16. I think the Challenges will really help me. Thank you for that!!

[mentalsolstice]

4. I finally finished Jonathan Franzen's Purity this morning.

It was good, but not as good as The Corrections. I’m starting The Lies I Tell by Julie Clark later today. Have a good week!

[SorellaLaBefana]

6. KJV (really)

Getting towards the end of Exodus where Moses has just come down from the mountain to find the Golden Calf.

Can hardly wait to see what his response is to this discovery...actually, having read it several times before, I DO know.

Truly am re-reading the Pentateuch and hope to be done by Christmas

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

9. I read the whole book every few years

To brush up on the many reasons why I loathe it.

Reading it that first time when I was still in primary school made me an atheist.

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

7. Just started Theresa Fowler's

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. I'm only a few chapters in, and it's already the funniest book I've read all year.

Will be chuffed to bits if I can also get through The Queen's Gambit by Walter Tevis, We Are the Ants by Shaun Hutchinson and Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Taver.

What can I say? I'm not only a fast reader, but also retired. We all know there are worse ways to fill time than with a book.

[Jeebo]

10. Still re-reading "1984"

For the fourth time, just to re-acquaint myself with the Orwellian universe before reading "Julia" by Sandra Newman, which is a re-telling of the "1984" story but from the point of view of Winston Smith's girlfriend.

-- Ron

[cbabe]

12. Dim sum smorgasbord bunch this week:

Thomas Perry/Pursuit
Still amazing after all these years. A sense of restraint in place and time. Chasing a serial killer. Perry manages to make him sympathetic and sickening almost in the same sentence.

Not yet:
Elizabeth George/the Punishment She Deserves

Ava Glass/Traitor

Ursula Parrot/Ex-wife

Just started:

W K Krueger/Mercy Falls
Think it was suggested last week? Read the series but don’t recall this title. Did *not* expect the immediate action in the first pages. Krueger really suckered me in. Stopped me short. Going to start over and savor.

[Number9Dream]

13. Just finished "The Cat Who Came for Christmas" by Cleveland Amory

Thanks for the thread, hermetic.

Though not fiction, this was an enjoyable read, especially for cat people. A good short read about a stray cat rescued by Mr. Amory on a Christmas Eve. The episodic story covers 'Polar Bear's' first year living with Mr. Amory.

[hermetic]

14. Aww, how sweet

I just saw the photo; what a cutie. I never knew it was the first part of a trilogy or that Amory was a big animal rights advocate. So thanks, I will have to get those.

[japple]

17. Thank you for the weekly thread, hermetic. I've just found out that one of my favorite

Last edited Mon Nov 13, 2023, 07:56 AM - Edit history (1)

authors has a new book, so I started that this week. I've read about 1/4 already and am already hooked. Elizabeth Crook's, The Madstone is the kind of book that I dream about--like Lonesome Dove, Ivan Doig, Paulette Jiles, Lief & Lin Enger books, where the characters come alive and the stories are true adventures.
From amazon:

Texas hill country, 1868. As nineteen-year-old Benjamin Shreve tends to business in his workshop, he witnesses a stagecoach strand a passenger. When the man, a treasure hunter, persuades Benjamin to help track down the vanished coach—and a mysterious fortune left aboard—Benjamin is drawn into a drama whose scope he could never have imagined, for they discover on reaching the coach that its passengers include Nell, a pregnant young woman, and her four-year-old son, Tot, who are fleeing Nell’s brutal husband and his murderous brothers.

Having told the Freedmen’s Bureau the whereabouts of her husband’s gang—a sadistic group wanted for countless acts of harassment and violence against Black citizens—Nell is in grave danger. If her husband catches her, he will kill her and take their son. Learning of their plight, Benjamin offers to deliver Nell and Tot to a distant port on the Gulf of Mexico, where they can board a ship to safety. He is joined in this chivalrous act by two other companions: the treasure hunter whose stranding began this endeavor and a restless Black Seminole who is a veteran of wars on both sides of the Rio Grande and who has an escape plan of his own.

Fraught with jeopardy from the outset, the trek across Texas becomes still more dangerous as buried secrets, including a cursed necklace, emerge. And even as Benjamin falls in love with Nell and imagines a life as Tot’s father, vengeful pursuers are never far behind. With its vivid characters and expansive canvas, The Madstone calls to mind Lonesome Dove, yet Elizabeth Crook’s new novel is a singular achievement. Told in Benjamin’s resolute and unforgettable voice, it is full of eccentric action, unrelenting peril, and droll humor—a thrilling and beautifully rendered story of three people sharing a hazardous and defining journey that will forever bind them together.

[yellowdogintexas]

18. Treasure Templari: Templars, Nazis and the Holy Grail

This is book 9 in this series Templars in America.

Historians Cameron Thorne and Amanda Spencer-Gunn uncover a stolen painting which the Nazis believed was a secret map to the Holy Grail and the lost treasure of the Knights Templar. Hitler planned to weaponize the Holy Grail and monetize the treasure as part of his campaign of world dominance. Cam and Amanda just want to find the legendary artifacts. The Nazis failed because they were unable to decipher the secret Templar clues left in the painting. Cam and Amanda may fail—perhaps fatally—because a group of modern-day Nazis remain obsessed with finishing Hitler’s work.

A thriller based on actual artwork, artifacts and events. Illustrated. Not recommended for readers with strong religious beliefs.

I also found out that this book is actually part of another series by this author. So many books, so little time The other series is Boston Law.

My book club is going to discuss Persuasion by Jane Austen. We meet at the end of the week, so I will probably put Templars aside and read a classic.

[txwhitedove]

19. On Friday finished reading historical fiction by Colson Whitehead,

The Underground Railroad. I first wondered why he won a Pulitzer Prize for this book. By the end, I could not stop thinking about it. Realized that while I was frustrated at so much poetic and historical license being taken because events researched were not factually true. The point was the life experience through eyes of those who lived it, which was all too true. Excellent, unforgettable.

Just finished Cat Sitter Among the Pigeons / Blaize Clement. Always a good story, funny and insightful, while learning about short hair cats and koi fish this time.

[ExWhoDoesntCare]

20. I met Mr Gilstrap

Around the time Nathan's Run was in the publication pipeline. Somewhere, I have a signed copy of the first edition. He was literally on air when that book hit the shelves.

He's a great guy. A little twisted in his humor, but that probably comes from working in a fire department, as a firefighter and paramedic. Gallows humor is how they cope.