Showing posts with label TBR. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TBR. Show all posts

Monday, October 8, 2018

5 Reading Slump Killers ("with" Cynthia Bailey)


Every reader goes through this mess: you’ve finished a book (outstanding or awful) and can’t decide what to read next.  Or if you even want to follow up your reading so shortly.  So you ponder over what's your mood looking like–in concerns to your next choice in a book.  And sometimes that pondering goes on a little too long.  Sometimes... your decision gets clouded.  

After finishing a book, I usually take a day or two off from reading.  Sometimes that day or two sticks around a little longer.  And three days is always too long.  Then it begins to sting when I have four bookshelves riddled with unread titles glaring at me wondering what the hell I‘m doing sitting around without a book in hand.  One shelf wants to be chosen.  One book desperately wants to be elected.  And I just sit there like a chump biting my lip and as indecisive as ever.  Something has blocked me from reading.  My mood?  Energy?  Maybe solicitude from my last book?  All I know is days are ticking by and I can't seem to find a dang thing I want to read and it's pissing me off.



It's a reading slump indeed. 

So I, like many book bloggers, decided to create another remedy post for readers who need to get through a reading slump.  And if one method listed doesn't work, another one always will.  So let's go!


1.  GET ORGANIZED

Hell, I’ve learned long ago how throwing away and getting rid of old junk kills some spectrum of my anxiety.  There’s this sort of alleviating transference I get from donating old clothes; alongside tossing pay stubs, art supplies, and old birthday cards into trash bags.  Seriously, when miscellany leaves happiness circulates within the soul.  

So one method that often helps me pull out of a reading slump is getting my shelves organized.  By “getting organized” I mean going to a shelf to pull unread titles off to compile what I haven‘t read and how long its been hanging around–and deciding what should hang around.  Something about pulling unread books off, piling them up, and actually looking at them helps get me centered.  It’s revisiting titles long acquired that at one point I was excited.  That is until time and other books caused my enthusiasm to slip by, before deciding what's next for said title.  And, naturally, the benefit is I find myself donating piles of unread and clutter-clogging books after a change in interests.
  

This method allows me to focus on the now.  Not the then and not the later.  We hate to admit it, but there is a level of anxiety and agitation we get from being book lovers who simply can't read and take every book with us throughout life.  Heck, I would even equate books to friendships: they have their seasons, chile.  And only the most trustworthy, loyal and respectful can stay.  Oh, and enriching.  Never keep something around that doesn't enrich your life.

Monday, October 1, 2018

Book Raiding Reading TBR



I only read two books in September.  One was–undoubtedly–the latest J. D. Robb release, Leverage in Death.  The other was Tracy Clark’s Broken Places–which I wrapped on the 11th of the month.  And that’s it.  Nothing read since the 11th.  And that’s mainly because Shadow of the Tomb Raider came out the following day and it has consumed my life.  Both in good–considering I’m a long-time fan and veteran of the Croft–and wrong ways.  Nonetheless, a game such as this pulled me entirely away from my first passion: books.  However, I’ve already read about 60 books this year, so I think it’s okay for me to take it easy from here on out if I choose to.

But I just can’t do it like that.  I have to read.  I MUST be reading.  I covet and crave books.  Even when I’m not actively reading a book, I’m pausing to touch a book and rifle through the pages just for comfort.

So I decided to make myself an Book Raiding TBR.  I choose unread books from my shelves that’ll cover 5 areas that I love most about the Tomb Raider series (both old and rebooted).  One: Crafty Female Lead.  Two: Sprinkles of Mythology.  Three: Survival Adventures.  Four: Ancient Musty Tombs.  Five: History and Relics.  This TBR will work.  And it will stick.  And it will bring me back to reading daily.


On a photography assignment in the northern territory of Mount Marsabit, American adventuress Jade del Cameron and her friends hope to film the area's colossal elephants. Instead, they discover the mutilated remains of four elephants and a man. Although the authorities suspect Abyssinian poachers and raiders in search of ivory and slaves, Jade has her own suspicions. Could it have been Harry Hascombe, her nemesis and unremitting suitor? Soon the Kikuyu boy accompanying her is captured by slave traders. Ultimately, it will take all of Jade's mettle to rescue her guide from slave traders, protect the animals, and expose another kind of beast.
As of today (October 1st) I’m already 140 pages away from the end of the first book on my Book Raiding TBR, Stalking Ivory by Suzanne Arruda.  Last time I read a book in this series was as far back as 2014.  More or less moved by that entry [Mark of the Lion], I haven’t picked up anything by this author since.  However, last year I did purchase the following three books for potential future reading.  And here I am finally jumping back into African safaris during the 1920’s with Arruda’s bold and sharp war vet (does being a nurse in WWI count as a vet?) turned photographer Jade Del Cameron.  Though Arruda’s plotting often comes across as “random” and “rash,” I’m having fun.  I can definitely see this series sticking around after all.

Thursday, March 29, 2018

3 Female Sleuth Debuts | #MarchMysteryMadness


3 Female Sleuth Debuts (Well, technically 2).

Amazon Affiliate Links:

1.  Contents Under Pressure by Edna Buchanan: https://amzn.to/2IfoEXQ

With a police cover-up and citywide outrage brewing in the wake of a black football star's suspicious death while under police custody, Cuban-American crime reporter Britt Montero steps in to uncover the truth. Tour.

2.  The Silent Dead by Tetsuya Honda: https://amzn.to/2GlBYh6

When a body wrapped in a blue plastic tarp and tied up with twine is discovered near the bushes near a quiet suburban Tokyo neighborhood, Lt. Reiko Himekawa and her squad take the case. The victim was slaughtered brutally---his wounds are bizarre, and no one can figure out the "what" or the "why" of this crime.

3.  Blue Moon by Walter Wager: https://amzn.to/2J4NLxZ

Alison B. Gordon finds herself aiding a Mafia ganglord whose Las Vegas interests are threatened by an international terrorist group that will destroy the city's casinos and hotels if its demand for five million dollars is not met. 

Saturday, February 18, 2017

2017 #MarchMysteryMadness Challenge



GROUP & LINKS
#MarchMysteryMadness GOODREADS GROUP
#MarchMysteryMadness on TWITTER

CO-HOSTS ON YOUTUBE
~~~~~ The Classic Mystery 50 Years or Older~~~~~
(Read a classic mystery from or before 1967)
“But suppose one doesn't quite know which one wants to put first. Suppose," said Harriet, falling back on words which were not her own, "suppose one is cursed with both a heart and a brain?

'You can usually tell,' said Miss de Vine, "by seeing what kind of mistakes you make. I'm quite sure that one never makes fundamental mistakes about the thing one really wants to do. Fundamental mistakes arise out of lack of genuine interest. In my opinion, that is.” 


Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers

There’s a phrase that’s been popular at lot less longer than these old classic pioneers of the mystery genre. It’s “she gets it from her mamma.” In this case, we’ve tumbled deep into getting it from our great-grandmothers and fathers. Now I’m not one to manage numbers well, but anyone shooting for Patricia Wentworth or Mary Roberts Rinehart will nail this one. Unless I’ve miscalculated once again.

But hey. The default is anything by Poe or Christie, right?

They’re always a safe bet. But who wants to be safe this year?
~~~~~ The First or Sequel~~~~~
(Read the first book in a series, or the sequel to another) 
“Even at a glance, even in this light, I could tell my friend was dead. He lay on his side in what common sense told me must be blood. Only it didn’t smell like blood.

My fingers clutched the flash. I stood for a moment, several moments. It seemed like hours. Finally I knelt and dipped my finger into the pool of liquid. It was thick and sticky. Paint. Bright-red house paint.

I straightened, wiping my finger on my jeans before I realized what I was doing.

‘Oh, Jake,’ I said, louder. My words echoed in the cavernous room, and then the old house enveloped me in ponderous silence. From outside came the bellow of foghorns on San Francisco Bay.


The Cheshire Cat’s Eye by Marcia Muller

The question everyone wants to know is what happens next to our sleuth? What is the next logical or illogical step? Should the sleuth immediately call the police? Should the sleuth exam the body and, effectively, tamper evidence? Or the most important question: what is our sleuth's background? Or are you acquainted with his or her background and here for the next row of shenanigans? Or are you totally new to his or her system?

I guess the question is would you rather have new shoes or stick with your old hats?

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