Book Buying 2014 #2

Luckily I didn’t sign up for any challenge to not buy books this year. Because I just went crazy in my favorite Danish bookstore and well, I bought about a billion books. The thing I did right – or wrong, depending on your point of view – was to make a list of books I wanted. This was in part compiled of the list I made of the books I missed in 2013. And well, armed with a list and then exposed to all the other amazing books in the store, I just went nuts and assembled to huge piles – which my boyfriend didn’t even want to help me carry, because he thought he thought I had to experience the consequences of buying giant piles of books. He caved later – I’m sure I won’t.
So here are all the amazingness I bought. Who said you couldn’t buy happiness?

    

Joyce Carol Oates: Carthage. So Joyce Carol Oates is one of my favorite authors and I sometimes forget why exactly but when I then pick up one of her books, I’m just blown away by her writing skills. She is just an amazing writer and this book about a girl who goes missing, possibly because of a disabled Iraqi veteran, sounds amazing.
Jasper Fforde: The Eyre Affair, The Well of Lost Plots and Lost in a Good Books: I’ve read the first book in the Thursday Next series, The Eyre Affair, and I loved it and have been wanting to read the rest ever since. So when I saw the entire series at the store, I almost bought them all but well, I sort of tried to be just a bit responsible and only bought the first three…
Carol Rifka Brunt: Tell the Wolves I’m Home. This book just sounds amazing. It takes place in the 80s and deals with AIDS and homosexuality in a time, when these things weren’t well-known parts of everyday life. June looses her uncle to this illness, she knows nothing about and doesn’t quite understand and then suddenly she notices a strange man attending her uncle’s funeral and a bit later he tries to get in touch with her. I’ve only heard good things about this and I want to read this one soon.

Brandon Sanderson: The Final Empire (Mistborn Book One). I first heard of Brandon Sanderson when he was chosen to finish the Wheel of Time series after Robert Jordan died. He seems to be a really great fantasy writer and the Mistborn series is seemingly universally loved so I can’t wait to read it. Still, I only bought the first volume because I wanted to check it out for myself before committing to the whole thing.
Hannah Kent: Burial Rites. This one has been making it’s way all over the blogging world. Everyone has read it, it seems. And no wonder, it sounds amazing. Hannah Kent went to Iceland as a teenager and heard the story of the last woman executed in Iceland and that inspired her to write this book. It reminds me of Alias Grace and everybody seem to love it so I am really looking forward to it.
Leigh Bardugo: Siege and Storm (The Grisha book 2). I loved the first book in this series. It was a great thrilling ride and I can’t wait to find out what happens to Alina and Mal when the Darkling catches up with them – as I’m sure he will.This is pure fantasy brain candy and I’m looking forward to diving into this second book.
Chang-Rae Lee: On Such a Full Sea. I heard an interview with Chang-Rae Lee where he said he wanted to write a book about Chinese factory workers and did all the research and somehow ended up writing a dystopian fantasy novel instead. I have read several books about China and taking place in China and I so want to read this book.
Helene Wecker: The Golem and the Djinni. I first heard about this on the New York Times Books podcast and it sounds like a wonderful combination of fantastic elements, mythology, love and great storytelling. I’ve been fascinating by Golems ever since we were in Prague and heard about them so this one is another book I’m looking forward to.

   

Margaret Atwood: Oryx & Crake, The Year of the Flood and MaddAddam. So I’ve read Alias Grace and The Handmaid’s Tale by Atwood but nothing else and really want to read more because she write great and very interesting books so I’ve been wanting to read this series ever since it started coming out but kept myself waiting until the entire trilogy was out. And I’m really looking forward to find out who Snowman, Oryx and Crake are.
Connie Willis: Blackout and All Clear. Historical fiction, time traveling – it seems to be rather popular to combine these two. Just think of the Outlander series and Kindred by Octavia Butler. It’s about a time travel lab in 2060 who goes bad to WWII and it sounds amazing and so many people have recommended it to me so another one I’m really looking forward to.

Salman Rushdie: Haroun and Luka. I really like Salman Rushdie and I loved reading his autobiography of the years of the Fatwa, Joseph Anton. And what he wrote about especially Haroun and the Sea of Stories made me really want to read it. Especially since he wrote the book to his son. So it’s supposedly an easier book than most of Rushdie’s books and it sounds imaginative and wonderful. And as a bonus, when you turn the book over, you get Luka and the Fire of Life so two books in one.

So yeah, these were the only books I bought. Yeah. I’m not sure I’m exactly proud of myself but I’m very much excited about all of these. Such good books. And I’m actually already almost done with the first of these – Joyce Carol Oates’ Carthage. Loving it. Hopefully all the rest of these are as good – and I’m pretty sure that at least a bunch of them are. So happy reading to me!

Related post:

• Book Buying 2014 #1

Top Ten Series I Haven’t Finished

So yeah, I like series. I mostly read fantasy series and I love diving into a completely different world and explore it through multiple books. It all began with the DragonLance shared world series. I fell in love with both the world and fantasy while reading Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weiss’ books.

As usual, the Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. And did I mention this is the fifth week in a row I’m participating in Top Ten Tuesday. And there are a lot of us, check out The Broke and the Bookish blog to see the links to the other participant’s blogs.

So most of these series are fantasy series – but there are other series I enjoy as well. Here’s my top 10 – with a bonus at the end.

1. Adrian Tchaikovsky: Shadows of the Apt. A wonderful refreshing fantasy series set in a world with insect kinden. The praying mantis are assassins, the beetles are hardworking people, the mosquitos are vampires etc. It’s the usual story – band of unlikely heroes goes against the big bad. But the insect kinden makes all the difference and makes it interesting. I’ve read the first four in this series of ten and enjoyed them all.
2. Robert Jordan: Wheel of Time. Sighs. Every fantasy reader knows this series. And I think everyone agrees that it’s way longer than it had to be. I’ve read the first four and they are not great. They are okay but I have my issues with them – especially because Jordan repeats himself. Every time a character appears, he looks at his character description and says ‘oh yes, the girl with the braids’ or whatever and then he writes that. Every single time. I can’t really say why I keep reading them but I do. I plan on finishing the series – as far as I can tell the last books in the series, the ones not written by Jordan, actually get better…
3. Diana Gabaldon: Outlander. A woman accidentally stumbles upon an opening to the past in Scotland, goes back and has great adventures and falls in love. I’ve read the first two and really need to get more of these. I sort of tend to forget how great this series is but it is actually really good and I enjoy reading them.
4. Carlos Ruiz Zafón: The Cemetery of Forgotten Books. Just the name of this series is amazing. I’ve read the first of the trilogy and it was a very very good book. I want to read it again and then read the rest of the trilogy in succession. Luckily, I own all three.
5. Lev Grossman: The Magicians. Harry Potter, Narnia… This is kind of a mix-up between the two. I liked the first and I’m looking forward to the rest of the series. I have the second one, the third has not yet been published.
6. Anne Rice: The Vampire Chronicles. So everyone knows Lestat and Interview with the Vampire. And that’s what I know too. I’ve read that one and seen the movie. And then I didn’t get any further. I have The Vampire Lestat and I also have Pandora and Vittorio, the Vampire of the New Tales of the Vampires series. I enjoyed Interview with the Vampire and I want to read further into the series and see what I think.
7. Jean M. Auel: Earth’s Children. I loved these books. The first one, The Clan of the Cavebear, was so good. And the next two installments in the series were really great too. But the fourth one … The Plains of Passage was just so bad. It just went on and on and on – walking across the plains, detailing the plants, various tribes, sex scenes … But it was clearly just meant to get Ayla and Jondalar from A to B – and it was boring. Still, both Jean M. Auel and I took a break after that and I have the two last books in the series waiting on my shelves and I plan to read them later this year, actually. Hopefully, they will be as good as the first three books!
8. Gail Carriger: The Parasol Protectorate. I really like this series. It’s steampunk, it’s vampires and werewolves and it’s a a fun, light and very enjoyable read. I only need to read the last one in the series, Timeless. Luckily, Gail Carriger has more books coming out, also set in this world.
9. Jasper Fforde: Thursday Next. I read the first of these, The Eyre Affair, and I loved it. It was an amazing romp through Jane Eyre and it was so, so good. However, one of the things that made it so good was that I had already read Jane Eyre. So I decided that I wouldn’t read more of this series before I had read more of the classics, Fforde uses in his plots. And that’s what I’m sort of working on. I do look forward to reading the rest of this series!
10. Various authors: DragonLance. This is series of books based in a shared world. This means that a lot of different authors write these novels and editors are then making sure that chronology and everything else is correct. Or at least supposed to. This shared world concept unfortunately means that not all these novels are of the same quality. I don’t think I’m ever going to read the entire series but I am going to go back and read the main novels and my other favorites from the series again.

And as a bonus, some series I haven’t started but which I’m definitely going to read.

1. Patrick Rothfuss: The Kingkiller Chronicle. I own the two of these which has been published so far and I expect so much from them. And they look gorgeous!
2. George R.R. Martin: A Song of Ice and Fire. I’ve seen a few of the tv series episodes and I think that at the right moment, I will just love these. I don’t own any of them yet but I will!
3. Robin Hobb: The Farseer Trilogy. My best friend Henrik told me years ago that he thought I would love this if I could stomach it. I think these will be so good – if I don’t ruin them by tears…!
4. Deborah Harkness: All Souls Trilogy. I own the first of these and I think it’s going to be a really great read although I have read both good and bad reviews of it.

10 books I’m looking forward to in 2011

Each year brings new and exciting books to dive headfirst into. I love it when you hear about a book and you just can’t wait to get your grubby little fingers on it and just read, read, read. (Although, truth be told, if I’m ever to get my to-read list down to a manageable number, there should be published no new books for the next … 9 years would do it, I think – provided I read 100 books a year…)

Anyway – here are 10 of the books I’m looking forward to this year:

1. Haruki Murakami: 1Q84 (this is without a doubt my most anticipated book of the year!)
2. Gail Carriger: Heartless (the fourth book in the Parasol Protectorate series – lovely fluffy steampunk.)
3. Lev Grossman: The Magician King (I liked The Magicians with it’s Harry Potter meets Narnia feel and with it still being so much more than just a rip-off of these two classics so I’m looking forward to how he will continue the story. It didn’t have the feel of a first book in a series to me so I don’t have any loose ends I would like to see him tighten so this can go in any direction he sees fit but I think it will be a nice read.)
4. Jasper Fforde: One of Our Thursdays is Missing (I’ve only read the first Thursday Next novel but loved it so I’m looking forward to any in the series – hopefully I will get a lot of these read this year – but I prefer having read the classics he is using in the books before reading them so I think I have some Dickens and more ahead of me first.)
5. Joyce Carol Oates: A Widow’s Story: A Memoir (I love Joyce Carol Oates so for that reason alone this is interesting. JCO tells about how she became a widow – and I lost my father late last year, leaving my mother a widow as well, so that’s the second reason this book is high on my list.)
6. Carol Wallace: Leaving Van Gogh (I love Van Gogh – he is one of my favourite painters. This is the story of his death – told by his personal physician.)
7. Benjamin Hale: The Evolution of Bruno Littlemore (A chimp who can articulate deep thoughts on art and philosophy and who falls in love with a human… What’s not to love? Definitely looking forward to this one!)
8. Patrick Rothfuss: The Wise Man’s Fear (The second book in the Kingkiller Chronicle – and although I haven’t read the first book or anything at all by Patrick Rothfuss, both these books sounds great!)
9. Adrian Tchaikovsky: The Sea Watch (Shadow of the Apt #6 – another series I haven’t read anything of but I own the first three and besides the coolest covers, these books sounds like they could have some depth in them and not just be fluffy fantasy.)
10. Jean M. Auel: The Land of Painted Caves (I loved The Clan of the Cave Bear, liked the next two in the Earth’s Children series – but the fourth one was so boring. Having gotten up the courage to read the fifth installment yet but now the series is finally coming to an end so hopefully I will read both vol. 5 and 6 this year.)

(Note: Not all the books on my list have covers yet.)