Closing the lid of June and July

Due to tumultous events and overall busy times, I missed my June recap post, so I will do a recap of two months now.

 

June-July 2013:

 

* M. Flyte "City of Dark Magic"

* R. Yancey "The 5th Wave"

* D. Leon "Death at La Fenice"

* A. Tarttelin "Golden Boy"

* A.M. Homes "May We Be Forgiven"

* T. Gauld "You're All Just Jealous of My Jetpack"

 

448 + 460 + 338 + 343 + 480 + 160 = 2229 pages in two months. Jetpack-book doesn't actually have page numbers (which I found so odd!), so I'm relying on Goodreads information here.

 

This month it's Austen in August, and also Bout of Books, which I still haven't decided on.

 

I'm currently reading Mansfield Park (2 chapters a day), and The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde - I think Thursday Next are my choice for the best summer read.

Catching up - a bunch of mini-reviews

Since I am so much behind with my book-reviewing, I decided to just take the easy way out and write only a couple of words of those books I have read in the past months. (Except for the Classics Club ones, of which I want to write longer.)

 

 
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde - I loved this book so much. Booknerd's dream. I can't wait to get my hands on the sequels, if what I heard is true, the series will become even better.

 

5/5 on Goodreads.

 

 

 

The Forgotten Queen by D.L. Bogdan - this book is about a less-known Tudor, Queen Margaret of Scotland. Maybe her life has not been covered so much because there was not much to say? This is what I felt when finishing this book. Margaret's character comes out as really annoying by the end (she makes a lot of questionable decisions, especially when it comes to her relations with men, and she seemed to have some serious self-esteem issues). I appreciate all that I learnt from this book, but mediocre plot + nothing-special writing didn't suck me in that much (it took me a long time to finish the book).

 

2/5 on Goodreads (just as a reminder - 2 on GR means "It was okay", so it's not even a negative rating).

 

 

 

The Golem and the Djinni by Helene Wecker - I had problems with this book, partly maybe caused by high expectations (golems? djinn? I am bound to love it, right?) First, the writing just didn't appeal to me that much. I didn't write down a single quote from the book. It wasn't bad, but it just wasn't for me. The characters showed a lot of promise, but in the end, I wasn't emotionally invested into any of them. I see what the author was trying to do and say, but for me it just came out kind of lacluster. It's quite a long book and by the end I really just wanted to get finished. Given my slight obsession with the djinn, I was also disappointed because the djinni in the book wasn't humorous or witty at all, he mostly embodied the negative characteristics (selfish, with anger management issues). I don't know, seeing all the praise for this book I was kind of sad it didn't do that much for me. That all being said, the setting of New York in the turn of the century was kind of captivating.

 

3/5 on Goodreads.

 

 

City of Dark Magic by Magnus Flyte - this book proved how important it is to choose the right story for the right moment. I chose City of Dark Magic to read for the Prague trip, and it worked well, because the novel is set in Prague and it's the kind of easy reading that suits me when I have problems concentrating. I was bound to enjoy it because I was basically wandering around in those same places where characters of the book did. Aside from those subjective feelings, I got a lot of Dan Brown vibe from this book. At some point I had problems with info-dumping. Some of the things didn't make sense. I had no problems with the paranormal element. I will probably read the sequel, just because, you know, Prague.

 

3/5 on Goodreads.

 

 

The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey - this is a young adult dystopian book that I have seen getting a lot of praise. I am not a young adult reader, so I am always in fear that I am being unfair just because the genre is not my favourite. I think it's actually a decent book. I wouldn't jump on the fangirl/-boy wagon, but it was a decent story. A few things disturbed me - given that the novel was written by several different POVs, there was really nothing except for the plot itself to give any indication that these were different characters, so I don't think the different POV-thing was done well at all. But it was a gripping read and the whole idea of by whom the earth was taken over was kind of new and captivating.

 

3/5 on Goodreads.

 

 

Death at La Fenice by Donna Leon - I picked up this detective story after I heard the news that my grandmother has passed away and I knew for sure I won't be able to read anything heavy or actually anything that would require any kind of emotional investment. I think it served its purpose well, although it made me rething whether I want to continue with Leon's Brunetti-series. But I probably will because this being the first book of the series is definitely not the best one. The books are set in Venice, which was a huge pro-factor for me when deciding which contemporary detective series I'd like to start.

 

3/5 on Goodreads.