30 Days of Books: Day 7

Day 07 – Least favorite plot device employed by way too many books you actually enjoyed otherwise

I don’t know that it’s a plot device, but as I was reading 60-odd YA books for a judging gig this year, I was disappointed to find how many of them had undeserved happy endings. These books might be crunchy, gritty and tough in lots of other ways, but they end up with the girl getting the guy, or the best friend, or the winning result, or the happy family … and it just doesn’t ring true. It’s almost like authors (or editors, or publishers) think that YA books have to have happy endings, no matter WHAT the subject matter. But life isn’t LIKE that. And teen readers are pretty smart, and must be as dissatisfied as I am when the whole storyline is betrayed by the ending. 

30 Days of Books: Day 4

Ahem. Seems I missed one. In my defence, #4 & #6 are pretty similar questions… 🙂

Day 04 – Your favorite book or series ever

Very very hard call. I have a new favourite every week I reckon! For this one though, I’m going to diverge from my norm here and say Lightning, by Dean Koontz. I went through a huge Koontz phase before I got into SF&F proper (seriously though, what’s not proper about time travel?!), but this was the first of his I read, and I’ve reread it multiple times and still think it’s brilliant. It’s Koontz characterisation before Koontz characters got stale; it’s intricate, awesome plotting; and great action and tension. Love it, and it’s probably time for a reread!

30 Days of Books: Day 6

Day 06 – Favourite book of your favorite series OR your favorite book of all time

What a hard question! While I’m totally in love with the Vorkosigan series, I have to go back to my early fandom here. The White Dragon (Pern series) by Anne McCaffrey. This was actually the first one recommended to me by the very bad person who introduced me to Pern, and I’ve reread it more times than I can count. I think it has the best characterisation of the series, the best story of the world, and I love love love it!

30 Days of Books: Day 5

Day 05 – A book or series you hate

Hmmm. I’ve decided life is too short to read bad books (or, at least, books I don’t enjoy). So I’m not finishing, and not starting, more books these days than ever before. I’ve received some books for review (un-solicited) that were appalling, but I really don’t know of any book that has made me mad, want to throw it across the room, or actually HATE it. If there’s one that has turned me off wanting to read the rest of the series and that I found such hard work I simply couldn’t read the whole thing, I’d have to go with Kim Harrison’s White Witch, Black Curse – I don’t know whether I’d got so far as "hate" though. Really can’t think of any book to hate! I love books too much 🙂

Busy day…

Today was unexpectedly social. Turned out   was down in our neck of the woods and I had stuff to deliver to her (plus, always up for a catchup!). And   was (supposed to be) home alone. And I wanted to grab my Tupperware from   so I could use it for baking on Monday. And the kids wanted to know if they could play at their friends’ house. So between 10 and 11, after originally having no plans for the day, I organised the play date, tweeted with A & T to arrange visits, and on the way between the two dropped in on L&L, who very kindly invited me in for a cuppa as well! Was very pleasant indeed! I also need to say, I have the best baby – even though the poor little bugger kept getting woken up when we arrived at destinations, he didn’t get grumpy and was very good. He’s awesome.

While I was out, had a phone call from Helen to line up another play date for tomorrow as well, so the busy social rounds continue! Monday will be baking day (cake stall for school, prep for Tupperware party on Tuesday morn), Tuesday Tupperware, then meeting in Perth, then book launch in Freo! I’m pretty sure things are busy now right up to Aussiecon, no time for deep breaths…