All posts filed under: Rambles

The Pros and Cons of being a Book Polygamist

Published by

There are definitely two types of readers:  The committed reader who gives their heart away to only one book at a time. The wavering, indecisive reader who has a hundred books open at once, constantly moving between them. I can see them now. The Book Monogamist sitting at a neat table, a freshly brewed cup of tea, hair and clothes neat, rose-scented candle burning, reading peacefully while Pines of Rome plays softly in the background. A single tasselled bookmark sitting next to the book. And then I see the Book Polygamists. I see them hunched over their desk, messy hair, still in their pyjamas despite the approaching lateness of the day, six mugs of varying ages of coffee, surrounded by piles of books, pages dog-eared and marked with receipts, teetering backwards and forwards while A Night on Bald Mountain heralds their impending suffocation under the pile, where they will lie until they are eaten by stray cats. Okay, so I clearly have a slightly warped view of reading habits, and clearly admire the ability of those in the first category …

Unpopular Opinions Tag

Published by

I was tagged by Typewriterink 1. A POPULAR BOOK OR SERIES THAT YOU DON’T LIKE Divergent. I hate it. I seriously hate it. 2. A POPULAR BOOK/SERIES EVERYONE HATES BUT YOU LOVE How is it popular if everyone hates it? Um… I know a lot of people dislike this book, but I love it! You will never stop me from loving it!!! 3. A LOVE TRIANGLE WHERE THE PROTAGONIST ENDED UP WITH THE PERSON YOU DIDN’T WANT THEM TO BE WITH. I’m going through my Read list on Goodreads, and I’m having trouble finding love triangles. I know this one isn’t done yet, but I chose it because I totally hope she ends up with the other guy! 4. A POPULAR GENRE THAT YOU HARDLY READ. Contemporary. I just like my books a little further removed from reality. 5. A POPULAR CHARACTER THAT YOU HATE/DISLIKE. Mal from the Grisha Trilogy. Okay I don’t know if anyone likes Mal but I do not care for him one bit. 6. A POPULAR AUTHOR YOU CAN’T SEEM TO …

My top books of 2015 (so far)

Published by

So we’ve reached the half-way point in the year. That wonderful time when we think “thank the stars that it’s half over” concomitant with “holy crap! how is it halfway through the year already!” I have to say I’m not particularly impressed with my progress with reading this year. I haven’t read anywhere near as many books as I wanted to by this point, but as I am in the final year of my PhD I will have to cut myself some slack. But here are my top five books of 2015 so far (in no particular order). 1. Golden Son by Pierce Brown I absolutely LOVED Red Rising and pre-ordered this one as soon as I could. Now while I know that I loved this book, I can’t really put my thoughts into any kind of logical thread. While I was reading it I was suffering from appendicitis/in hospital/recovering from surgery so I’m a wee bit scattered on it, but I know that I absolutely loved it! You can see my review of Red …

Goodreads Trolls getting you down? my personal story, but also a solution!

Published by

So, I have a self-published book, well two actually. A friend and I wrote them together, self-published them, and eagerly frequented the Goodreads page to see what people thought. To our surprise, we received mainly 5-star reviews. We weren’t expecting them, as I really don’t think our book is perfect. There is a lot I would change and I think the sequel is a huge improvement (and yeah I’m pretty proud of that improvement). But anyway, I digress… One day while checking how our book was going I saw one review that just said something along the lines of “What a crock. These reviews are obviously paid for.” I was shocked by this, as firstly, I didn’t know that paying people for reviews was actually a thing people did, or that someone would make such a damning claim without any evidence what-so-ever, besides the fact that we self-published our book. Anyway, understandably upset, I did the stupidest thing you can do. I defended myself (although very politely). Bad Idea. Very bad idea. This Goodreads user …

Are you all insane? – the ridiculous habits of publishers and booksellers and how they should be punished severely.

Published by

One would think that publishers and booksellers, to have ended up in such an industry, would have to have at least a casual fondness for the written word and the pages those words are contained within. Yet, for some unfathomable reason, they keep committing sins so atrocious one might find themselves questioning whether they actually like books at all, or if they are all just monsters. As book lovers, we’ve all been the victims of this uncivilized behaviour at one time or another, and I think it’s time we call these book-abusing scoundrels out and demand they start treating our books (and their readers) with the respect they deserve. This is just a list of some of the abominations that are frequently committed at the hands of publishers and booksellers. 1. Stickers Possibly the most barbaric of all the sins committed by those we expect to love books the most. They range from advertisements to prices and they are all evil. Sometimes they can be removed without causing major damage to the book, but often they …

I am an adult, I read YA, and I am not the slightest bit ashamed.

Published by

Every single one of us who is an adult and reads YA fiction has faced one thing in their lives: Pretentious, judgmental assholes. They are ubiquitous and unfortunately unavoidable. You know who I mean. The ones who look down their nose at your copy of Percy Jackson while waving their dog-eared copy of Infinite Jest in your face before imparting their wisdom to your lowly YA-reading self, always the same; “Why don’t you read REAL fiction?” We have all had one of these self-important wankers judge us, probably numerous times. We’ve been told over an over again that YA fiction is just fluff, that it’s too simple and doesn’t deal with complex issues. There’s nothing more frustrating than being berated with this sort of condescending bullshit, because it’s utter rubbish. No one who has read something like Patrick Ness’ Chaos Walking Trilogy, for example, could claim that YA is either fluff or simple. I read a lot of YA, and I also read a lot of adult fiction as well, I probably even prefer adult fiction, but …

In which you discover how neurotic I am about books…

Published by

I’m obsessed with collecting pretty collections of books, mostly classics, I have quite a beautiful and vast collection. But for some reason I have neglected a fairly ubiquitous and worthy collection, and I don’t know why. Nearly ever booklover has at least one of the Penguin Clothbound Classics. They are beautiful and I just don’t know why I haven’t been collecting these. I only have five of them, which for me is strange. I collect series of books and I get a little obsessed about it, but this series has not driven me crazy like some of the others. Trying to get the last two books in a certain series over the last few days had completely consumed me after my fourth attempt (every bookseller cancelled my order saying the books weren’t in stock) to purchase them. I was acting like a crazy person. I was seriously distressed about not being able to have that full set. I actually get quite upset about it if I had the opportunity to buy the book at one …