What Fiction are you reading this week, December 22, 2024?

[hermetic]

Reading Ghost Night by Heather Graham. Murders in the Bermuda Triangle. Mystery, suspense, and ghosts. Good escapist fare, though not very festive. But then, neither am I.

I listened to Spirit of the Season by Fern Michaels, but the season turned out to be mostly Thanksgiving. It was a nice little romance though, with a hint of Christmas.
Fern is a good storyteller. so now I'm listening to her Fear Thy Neighbor. Turns out it's a good companion to the story I'm reading. More like our reality now.

I do hope your Christmas, Hanukkah, or holiday choice is really great and you get lots of books.

[txwhitedove]

1. Happy Holidays to you, from fellow DUer not quite so festive either. Naked lighted tree up,

though, and wreath on the door. Three grandkids went to NYC for an eye opening Christmas with actual snow, big deal for south Texas kids.

I'm still reading Crow Mary by Kathleen Grissom. Very good, but not a favorite. Love her characters.

Got my son hooked on the Chet & Bernie series by Spencer Quinn. He's a world traveling dog lover, taking the paperbacks along with him, and spreading joy by passing them on when finished.

[hermetic]

2. Good boy!

What a great kid. You must be very proud.

Crow Mary sounds like a must-read for me. Thanks for that.

[pscot]

9. Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells

I'm up to book six and Martha Wells is my new favorite sci-fi author. She's won a Hugo and a Nebula for these stories of a rogue security unit serving humans in outer space. Strong story lines, convincing technical details and a righteous but deadly protagonist who, freed of human controls, details his travails with wit and irony. Great fun; highly recommended.

I also just started Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. I'm 70 pages in and haven't quite decided what to make of it.

[LisaM]

15. I threw in the towel on "Cloud Atlas".

I really liked "Black Swan Green", but I found "Cloud Atlas" to be turgid and unnecessarily oblique, to the point where I began to think people who said they liked it were only pretending. A very narcissistic attempt by the author.

[pscot]

17. Turgid is apt

And I disliked the characters. I gave up after about 150 pages. My library is holding Possession for me by A.S. Byatt. The reviews seem promising.

[LisaM]

18. It's pretty good.

It was a quick read. I should pick it up and re-read it.

[pscot]

19. That's encouraging

i've been wallowing in trash lately

[yellowdogintexas]

11. at the moment we also have a naked lighted tree.

I just spent an hour plowing through our huge collection of ornaments looking for some unbreakable ones since we have hard floors.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

3. The God of the Woods

by Liz Moore. Camper goes missing from her family-owned camp, the same camp her brother disappeared from a decade earlier.

[hermetic]

4. That sounds quite good.

"Moore's multi-threaded story invites readers into a rich and gripping dynasty of secrets and second chances. It is Liz Moore's most ambitious and wide-reaching novel yet."

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

10. So far, so good.

I'm only about 60 pages in .

[mentalsolstice]

5. Cloudstreet by Tim Winton

From Goodreads:

From separate catastrophes two rural families flee to the city and find themselves sharing a great, breathing, shuddering joint called Cloudstreet, where they begin their lives again from scratch. For twenty years they roister and rankle, laugh and curse until the roof over their heads becomes a home for their hearts.

Merry Holidays 🎄!

[hermetic]

6. Nice

Tks.

[Number9Dream]

7. Finished "Conclave" by Robert Harris

This was not so much about religion, as it was about ambitious men. I guess I'll probably get to see the movie someday to compare. A neat twist ending.

[hermetic]

8. Hi, good to see you

Sorry it took so long. I was baking cranberry muffins and lost track of time. Happy holidays to you and the family.

[Number9Dream]

14. Have a great Christmas and a Happy & Healthy New Year

May Santa bring you "Dark Side of the Moon" on vinyl (if you don't still have a copy).

[yellowdogintexas]

12. .I am still reading "The Isis Covenant" . It was my book last week too

I had just started it. It has been busy and I have not had much reading time.

It's that time of year

Happy ChrismaHannaKwanzica to all!!!

[question everything]

13. The Plot by Jean Haniff Korelitz

On the book jacket flap it lists definitions of Plot:

- a sequence of events in a narrative as in a novel

- an immoral or illegal plan

- a designated section of land for a gravesite

A man who wanted to be a writer and had a successful book listed on the New York Tome bestseller list but since then his imagination dried.

Now he teaches in a writing group in a small school and is left in awe when a student details a plot of a book which will create a storm among readers, critics, talk show, Oprah!

The book was never published and when the teacher finds that the promising writer died, he convinces himself that that “spark of the idea” has to be published and he does.

But now he gets a text: you are a thief and we both know it.

This is where I am now.

It took me awhile to get used to the style. Long meandering sentences with many in parentheses. It became easier once descriptions moved to actions.

[LisaM]

16. "The Wren, the Wren" by Anne Enright.

It's an Irish narrative that features a grandmother, mother, and daughter and their relationship to the grandfather, a famous poet who left the family. The narrative shifts, and mostly moves backwards through time. It's very good.