Category Archives: TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader)

2015 Recap and 2016 Goals

Posted in #ReadingMyLibrary Reading Challenge, 2015, 2016, ARC August, Book Clubs, Book Riot Read Harder Reading Challenge 2016, Bookish Bingo Holiday 2015, Bookish Bingo: Jan-March 2015, For the love of books, Penguin Random House: Challenge Your Shelf A-Z Challenge, Pop Sugar Reading Challenge 2015 checklist, Pop Sugar Reading Challenge 2016 checklist, Reading Challenges, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader), Terryville - Fiction Lovers by

New Year 2015

When I set my goals for 2015 at the beginning of the year, I knew I had a lot to accomplish but I thought that the extra motivation would help me stay focused. My goals overall were more about trying new things and being more open to different types of books. And I can honestly say that I’ve read some books in 2015 that I would not have picked up on my own volition and I think I am a better reader for it. I just had no idea that becoming a book blogger was going to end up as a part-time job for me. I am so grateful to all of the authors and publishers and other media outlets that have allowed my blog to grow this past year and allowed me to grow as a reader.

So to recap how I did for my 2015 goals, I didn’t complete all of them but I think I did a fairly good job and I accomplished some extra things that a) distracted me and b) I never even knew existed. One lesson learned this year is that NetGalley approves most, if not all, of your review requests, so don’t request like 15 that are all being published in the same month (August & September were BIG NetGalley months for me, ha!). Another thing I learned this year is that if you have a blog where you review books, eventually authors and publishers will start contacting you asking you to review something for them. I was very honored to review a number of books for authors and publishers this past year and it was a great learning experience for me. Not only that but I read a lot of books I might not have heard of otherwise and I would have missed out on some great reads! So anyways, my original post about my 2015 goals you can find here. Below I’ll talk about how I did!

1. Read at least 20 different types of the books on the Pop Sugar Reading Challenge 2015 checklist – This one I did manage to finish! I read over 20 of the checklist items, you can browse through the ones I used to check off on this list here.

2. Post at least 2 non-book review related posts per month – I think I did pretty darn good on this one, though I have to admit I was better about coming up with ideas at the beginning of the year. Some of my favorite posts from this goal include my post about Gretna Green, post on my annual Reading Retreat, and my Author Interview with Andrea Lochen who is such a sweetheart!! I did end up skipping multiple months on this goal because I just ran out of time but I’m glad I tried writing about different topics and expanding my knowledge on certain areas.

3. Participate in one book reading challenge (on an external site) per quarter – Did this one too! For Q1 I did the Bookish Bingo challenge, Q2 I participated in #ReadingMyLibrary, Q3 I participated in ARC August challenge, and Q4 I am currently doing the Bookish Bingo holiday edition!

4. Post at least two posts per month concerning various book memes – Oh gosh I only missed one on this!!! Ugh if I knew it would end up this way I would’ve just done that one so I could check this one off. Anyways the one I missed was my second October post, monkeys! As you can probably tell by my posts I tend to favor the Top Ten Tuesday posts, followed closely by Friday Finds and Waiting on Wednesday ends in third. If anyone has suggestions for fun book memes that they participate in I am open to new ones!

5. Read at least 5 books from Amazon’s 100 Books to Read in a Lifetime – I don’t think I ended up doing this at all, which is unfortunate but I have a lifetime (ha) still to read them so I’m sure it will happen someday!

6. Participate in Roof Beam Reader’s 2015 TBR Pile Reading Challenge – I ended up only reading 7 of the 12 in my pile for this challenge, but I am still really glad I participated since I read some books that I had on my book shelf for quite a while! You can see the books I read for this challenge here.

So overall I think I ended up accomplishing A LOT this year, though the things I accomplished didn’t end up all being things I had planned at the beginning of the year as my goals. I had no idea that I would get so involved in NetGalley and also in author/publisher requests, and while they definitely side-tracked me from my original goals, I think that I grew a lot as a reader and a blogger because of these events. Another thing that came into my life this year that I’m really enjoying is joining a book club! I’ve found some great reads so far through my library’s fiction book club and I’m looking forward to the books we’re reading in 2016! You can see the books we read this past year for the book club here.

I ended up reading 125 books during 2015, which was an increase over my last year’s number. And I hadn’t really set a number goal for 2015 since i didn’t think I could read more than I did last year but I ended up doing just that. I’ve summarized the number of books I read per month for not only 2015 but also 2014 & 2013, below is a depiction of the data:

Per month chart for end of year post

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And so on we move to 2016!! Very excited to embrace the coming New Year and continue on my reading journey. I’m going to be trying to consolidate some of my 2016 goals so that I’m more able to achieve them while also tying in requests from authors/publishers and my NetGalley reads. I am also hoping to expand my reach in 2016 in terms of Advanced Reader Copies and hopefully establish a couple contacts/relationships with some of the publishers that I like. Below is a summarized listing of what my goals are for 2016:

  1. PopSugar 2016 Reading Challenge – Read at least 20 books off this checklist. I really enjoyed doing this checklist for 2015 so I decided to participate again for 2016
  2. Book Riot Read Harder Challenge 2016 – I heard a lot about this checklist this past year at the Book Riot Live conference and online and I’m excited to try this checklist this year!
  3. Penguin Random House Challenge Your Shelf: Books A-Z Challenge – This was technically a 2015 challenge but I liked the list so much that I’m going to use it for 2016 just for my own purposes. I’m going to try and read at least 10 books off this list.
  4. Participate in one shorter reading challenge per quarter. And since I’m a planner by nature I’ve already picked out which ones I plan to participate in:
    1. Quarter 1 – I’m currently participating in Bookish Bingo: Holiday edition which runs through end of February 2016 so this one will be my Quarter 1 reading challenge
    2. Quarter 2 – I’ve been wanting to participate in a Bout of Books challenge for a while now but the timing never lined up for me in 2015 so I am planning on definitely participating in the one in May 2016.
    3. Quarter 3 – I really liked participating in the ARC August challenge this past August and I am sure I will have a bunch of ARC’s on my schedule at that point so I am planning to participate again this year.
    4. Quarter 4 – I found this listing of the 24 Best Books About Witches to Get You in the Halloween Spirit and I noticed a lot of the books on the list were already in my TBR list so for Sept/Oct I am gong to work my way through this listing (this will be my own reading challenge hosted by my site).
  5. Other general goals that are less defined but are just overall goals I’d like to work on:
    1. Establishing contacts/relationships with publishers
    2. Continue to review ARC’s from authors
    3. Try doing some shorter reviews on books that I don’t necessarily have as much to say on. I’ve been having trouble keeping up with all the reviews I have to do and I’m hoping to write some shorter reviews this year for the books I’m just reading on my own
    4. Try to wrap up some of the series that I’m in the middle of, I feel like there are just so many and I lose track of the characters. I know its unreasonable but I almost wish authors would release a full series at the same time and be like “ok that’s it I’m not doing anymore.” I’ll start reading a series because the “finale” is out and then there’s somehow another sequel released and while excited it is also incredibly frustrating.

SO! That is everything. Gosh that was a lot of typing but that is my 2015 wrap up and my 2016 beginning. I will also be posting my WordPress summary in a separate post as well. And for anyone interested here is a link to my Goodreads summary for the year. I hope everyone had a successful 2015 and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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2015 Book #56 – Lightning by Dean Koontz

Posted in 2015, Book reviews, Fiction, Reading Challenges, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader), Thriller by

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Title: Lightning
Author: Dean Koontz
Date finished: 6/12/15
Genre: Fiction – Thriller
Publisher: G Putnam Sons
Publication Date: 1988
Pages in book: 355
Stand alone or series: Stand alone

Blurb from the cover:

In the midst of a raging blizzard, lightning struck on the night Laura Shane was born. And a mysterious blond-haired stranger showed up just in time to save her from dying.
Years later, in the wake of another storm, Laura will be saved again. For someone is watching over her. But just as lightning illuminates, darkness always follows close behind.

My rating: 2.75 stars out of a scale of 5

My review: This book will be counting towards my goal for the Roof Beam Reader TBR Pile Reading Challenge, #3 on the list I set for myself at the beginning of this year. One of my friends (technically my best friend’s mom and my mom’s best friend) wanted me to read this book to try something new and to see if I would like something a little darker/scarier. She originally wanted me to read something by Stephen King (if I remember correctly) but gave me this book instead since it is one of her favorites and not quite as scary as Stephen King. Being delinquent in my duties as reviewer, I have had the book for probably close to a year and so earlier this year I thought it would be a good encouragement to put it on my TBR reading challenge listing.
So this story is about a lady named Laura and I’m going to spoil it for you, time travel. Laura has a “guardian” who pops in and out of her life at important moments, saving her from dying over and over again from the moment she’s born right up until the end of the book pretty much. Laura goes through life not knowing that she’s really living in an altered timeline since Stefan (the guardian) keeps jumping across the time stream to fix things for her. Living in ignorance, Laura grows up and forms relationships and sustains significant losses in her life, all the while surviving as best she can. Eventually though, she comes face to face with Stefan and he asks her to help him save the world.
Overall this was not my favorite book. The book itself was good enough but it is not my usual style/genre of book and I had some trouble getting into it. There was a lot of complicated discussion on time travel and I (like Laura) got a massive headache trying to keep track of the paradoxes of people traveling through time. Also the main character lived through such heavy losses through her life, it was depressing. And poor Chris going through this experience as an 8 year old. I don’t think I found it too scary necessarily, but it was darker than I usually like and I had trouble connecting with Laura. I would probably try another book by Koontz in the future to see if it was just this plot I wasn’t a huge fan of. I want to thank my friend Sandy for recommending this book to me. I am trying hard to expand my horizons and try books that are outside of my comfort zone and this book definitely fit the bill! Thanks Sandy!

The bottom line: I don’t think I would encourage or discourage readers to try this book. It was a good book just not my style.

Link to author website
Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

2015 Book #51 – Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Posted in 2015, Book reviews, Literary Greats, Reading Challenges, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader) by

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Title: Pride & Prejudice
Author: Jane Austen
Date finished: 5/30/15
Genre: Literary classics
Publisher: Dover Publications
Publication Date: 1813
Pages in book: 262
Stand alone or series: Stand alone

Blurb from the cover:

One of the most universally loved and admired English novels, Pride and Prejudice was penned as a popular entertainment. But the consummate artistry of Jane Austen (1775–1817) transformed this effervescent tale of rural romance into a witty, shrewdly observed satire of English country life that is now regarded as one of the principal treasures of English language.
In a remote Hertfordshire village, far off the good coach roads of George III’s England, a country squire of no great means must marry off his five vivacious daughters. At the heart of this all-consuming enterprise are his headstrong second daughter Elizabeth Bennet and her aristocratic suitor Fitzwilliam Darcy — two lovers whose pride must be humbled and prejudices dissolved before the novel can come to its splendid conclusion.

My rating: 4 stars out of a scale of 5

My review: This book will be counting towards my goal for the Roof Beam Reader TBR Pile Reading Challenge, #1 on the list I set for myself at the beginning of this year. I can say with complete honesty that I have no idea how its possible that I haven’t read this book yet. I started it a few years ago and never finished it, which in itself is not all that surprising, though it is rare for me to do that. But this combined with the fact that the movie is probably one of my all time favorite movies and that I have at this point watched it well over one hundred times makes the fact that I haven’t read the book simply boggling. Therefore when I was lining up my list for the TBR Pile Reading Challenge at the beginning of this year, this one was the first to go on my list.
I expected this but I absolutely loved the book. The prose is magical and beautiful in and of itself, I was forever drawn into the way Austen would describe certain scenes and marveled that simply the way the words were strung together could give my heart such joy. The story I’m sure everyone is familiar with so I will not go into detail on the plot. I will comment that both Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy evolve so much as characters in the book, it is interesting to see how they grow and change as people through the story.
This is an excellent love story, exactly as it is purported to be.

The bottom line: I would definitely recommend this book, everyone should read it. I think this is one of the staples of a well-rounded young reader.

Link to author website
Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

2015 Book #48 – The Wonder of All Things by Jason Mott

Posted in 2015, Book reviews, Fiction, Reading Challenges, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader) by

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Title: The Wonder of All Things
Author: Jason Mott
Date finished: 5/23/15
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Mira
Publication Date: September 30, 2014
Pages in book: 303
Stand alone or series: Stand alone

Blurb from the cover:

On the heels of his critically acclaimed and New York Times bestselling debut novel, The Returned, Jason Mott delivers a spellbinding tale of love and sacrifice.
On an ordinary day, at an air show like that in any small town across the country, a plane crashes into a crowd of spectators. After the dust clears, a thirteen-year-old girl named Ava is found huddled beneath a pocket of rubble with her best friend, Wash. He is injured and bleeding, and when Ava places her hands over him, his wounds disappear.
Ava has an unusual gift: she can heal others of their physical ailments. Until the air show tragedy, her gift was a secret. Now the whole world knows, and suddenly people from all over the globe begin flocking to her small town, looking for healing and eager to catch a glimpse of The Miracle Child. But Ava’s unique ability comes at a great cost, and as she grows weaker with each healing, she soon finds herself having to decide just how much she’s willing to give up in order to save the ones she loves most.
Elegantly written, deeply intimate and emotionally astute, The Wonder of All Things is an unforgettable story and a poignant reminder of life’s extraordinary gifts.

My rating: 4.25 stars out of a scale of 5

My review: This book will be counting towards my goal for the Roof Beam Reader TBR Pile Reading Challenge, #10 on the list I set for myself at the beginning of this year. I had seen this book featured in a lot of different places last year towards the end of the year and after reading the description of the book, I really wanted to give it a try. There were a lot of things going on in this book, and so many feels. Word gets out to the world that Ava can heal people almost as if by magic. People start flocking to the small town of Stone Temple, almost all of them wanting something from the girl who can perform these miracles. Ava can’t just heal people with no consequences though, and the more times she has to use her “powers” the worse her health deteriorates.
What amazes me is that even as people realize that helping people in this way makes Ava sick, they still expect her to use her gift to heal people. This astounded me. It was very thought-provoking, realizing that people in desperate situations expect a little girl to give up her health in order to save people she doesn’t know. It is overwhelmingly depressing at the same time thinking that there is so many things in the world that are unfair, like the little boy that the Reverend wanted Ava to heal in the book who was dying of brain cancer. To think of this little boy’s parents, if I were them yes I would demand that Ava do everything that she could to help my boy. But would I want her to hurt herself to help my family? I can’t honestly say what I would do in that situation. Its easy to claim that I would do the right thing but at the same time I would do anything possible to save my son.
I loved Ava’s character, and Wash’s too. Their friendship was pure and innocent and would’ve grown into something more at some point I’m sure. This story’s ending was a bit tragic to be honest but I found it both touching and moving. It was overwhelmingly emotional, I ended up crying for pretty much the whole last chapter. There were a lot of characters in this story, and I wouldn’t necessarily say they were good or bad people but most of them had their own agendas and they were just acting within that scope. Overall I thought this was a great story and was interesting and very moving.

The bottom line: I would recommend this book, I would have a box of tissues handy though.

Link to author website
Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

2015 Book #47 – Lethal by Sandra Brown

Posted in 2015, Book reviews, Reading Challenges, Romantic suspense, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader) by

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Title: Lethal
Author: Sandra Brown
Date finished: 5/21/15
Genre: Romantic suspense
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Publication Date: September 20, 2011
Pages in book: 472
Stand alone or series: Stand alone

Blurb from the cover:

When her four year old daughter informs her a sick man is in their yard, Honor Gillette rushes out to help him. But that “sick” man turns out to be Lee Coburn, the man accused of murdering seven people the night before. Dangerous, desperate, and armed, he promises Honor that she and her daughter won’t be hurt as long as she does everything he asks. She has no choice but to accept him at his word.
But Honor soon discovers that even those close to her can’t be trusted. Coburn claims that her beloved late husband possessed something extremely valuable that places Honor and her daughter in grave danger. Coburn is there to retrieve it — at any cost. From FBI offices in Washington, D.C., to a rundown shrimp boat in coastal Louisiana, Coburn and Honor run for their lives from the very people sworn to protect them, and unravel a web of corruption and depravity that threatens not only them, but the fabric of our society.

My rating: 4.25 stars out of a scale of 5

My review: This book will be counting towards my goal for the Roof Beam Reader TBR Pile Reading Challenge, #6 on the list I set for myself at the beginning of this year. I discovered my great love for Sandra Brown’s romantic suspense when I read Deadline in 2013. She always seems to include just enough good plot twists to keep readers interested but not so many that you start to get confused (or whiplash). And Brown definitely did not disappoint with this novel. I was riveted from the beginning and I couldn’t put the book down.
I have to say I didn’t expect the bad guy to be who they were revealed to be at the end. Sandra Brown is a great story-teller and I always devour her books. I was drawn into this story and the characters. Honor specifically really became alive to me as a person and I thought it was really interesting that we see her grow as a person through the novel.
The only character that I actually had trouble delving into their psyche was the main villain of the story. I would have liked more insight into why they resorted to this extreme amount of violence to make their way in life. Other than that though, I loved the story and would definitely encourage everyone to read something by Sandra Brown!

The bottom line: I would definitely recommend this book, I didn’t want to put it down. It was great!

Link to author website
Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

2015 Book #45 – Running for Women by Kara Goucher

Posted in 2015, Book reviews, Non-fiction, Reading Challenges, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader) by

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Title: Running For Women: From First Steps to Marathons
Author: Kara Goucher
Date finished: 5/17/15
Genre: Non-fiction
Publisher: Touchstone
Publication Date: April 5, 2011
Pages in book: 291
Stand alone or series: Stand alone

Blurb from the cover:

KARA GOUCHER is crazy, madly, head-over-heels in love with running, and she wants to help you feel that love, too. Whether you’re just getting started or already a seasoned runner, this is the book that will take you to the next level. Kara Goucher’s Running for Women contains her expertise, tips, and tricks targeted specifically at female runners to help you become a better, happier, healthier, and more fulfilled runner. She’ll teach you how to:
• GET STARTED WITH THE RIGHT GEAR
• BUILD A SUCCESSFUL SUPPORT TEAM
• FIND THE RIGHT TRAINING PROGRAM FOR YOU
• OVERCOME PSYCHOLOGICAL SETBACKS
• BALANCE RUNNING WITH FAMILY AND WORK
• AND MUCH MORE
Designed to fit your busy lifestyle, Kara Goucher’s Running for Women is packed with quick tips, pearls of running wisdom, and sample training schedules and nutrition plans, as well as sections dedicated to running during and after pregnancy, managing the special challenges of the female athlete’s body, and maintaining a balance between sporting and family life. Kara Goucher’s Running for Women is the ultimate guide for women who want to train for the gold or simply discover their personal best.

My rating: 4 stars out of a scale of 5

My review: This book will be counting towards my goal for the Roof Beam Reader TBR Pile Reading Challenge, #7 on the list I set for myself at the beginning of this year. I actually started this book last year and I’ve read it off and on over the last year or so. This has been a very motivational book for me. I’ve struggled with my weight most of my life and I’ve always had issues with exercising. I just find it so boring and honestly I hate being sweaty and just being out of breath and the whole thing. But this book really inspired me to try running and I like it better than most. And more than that, reading this book encouraged me to try harder to be healthy.
This book includes a lot of great tips for both beginners and experienced runners. Kara does an excellent job at interweaving her own personal experiences and background with tips and also with workout plans, meal plans, and other useful items. Whether you’re already in love with running or you’re looking for a new way to get in better shape, this is a great book!

The bottom line: I would definitely recommend this book, it is a great motivational book for runners or even just people who are thinking about starting running as their main exercise.

Link to author website
Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

2015 Book #38 – Girls of Tender Age by Mary-Ann Tirone Smith

Posted in 2015, Book reviews, Memoir, Reading Challenges, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader) by

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Title: Girls of Tender Age: A Memoir
Author: Mary-Ann Tirone Smith
Date finished: 4/27/15
Genre: Memoir
Publisher: Free Press
Publication Date: January 11, 2006
Pages in book: 285
Stand alone or series: Stand alone

Blurb from the cover:

In Girls of Tender Age, Mary-Ann Tirone Smith fully articulates with great humor and tenderness the wild jubilance of an extended French-Italian family struggling to survive in a post-World War II housing project in Hartford, Connecticut. Smith seamlessly combines a memoir whose intimacy matches that ofAngela’s Ashes with the tale of a community plagued by a malevolent predator that holds the emotional and cultural resonance of The Lovely Bones.
Smith’s Hartford neighborhood is small-town America, where everyone’s door is unlocked and the school, church, library, drugstore, 5 & 10, grocery, and tavern are all within walking distance. Her family is peopled with memorable characters — her possibly psychic mother who’s always on the verge of a nervous breakdown, her adoring father who makes sure she has something to eat in the morning beyond her usual gulp of Hershey’s syrup, her grandfather who teaches her to bash in the heads of the eels they catch on Long Island Sound, Uncle Guido who makes the annual bagna cauda, and the numerous aunts and cousins who parade through her life with love and food and endless stories of the old days. And then there’s her brother, Tyler.
Smith’s household was “different.” Little Mary-Ann couldn’t have friends over because her older brother, Tyler, an autistic before anyone knew what that meant, was unable to bear noise of any kind. To him, the sound of crying, laughing, phones ringing, or toilets flushing was “a cloud of barbed needles” flying into his face. Subject to such an assault, he would substitute that pain with another: he’d try to chew his arm off. Tyler was Mary-Ann’s real-life Boo Radley, albeit one whose bookshelves sagged under the weight of the World War II books he collected and read obsessively.
Hanging over this rough-and-tumble American childhood is the sinister shadow of an approaching serial killer. The menacing Bob Malm lurks throughout this joyous and chaotic family portrait, and the havoc he unleashes when the paths of innocence and evil cross one early December evening in 1953 forever alters the landscape of Smith’s childhood.
Girls of Tender Age is one of those books that will forever change its readers because of its beauty and power and remarkable wit.

My rating: 4 stars out of a scale of 5

My review: This book was lent to me by my friend from work, Jim Lyons. He lent it to me last year though, and since I am an awful person I haven’t read it yet. Therefore at the beginning of the year I added it to my list for the Roof Beam Reader TBR Pile Reading Challenge. I might have put this off a little because I usually read mostly fiction and this book was a memoir. I have to be honest though, I loved this book. It was interesting, emotional, and riveting. It was especially interesting for me since I’ve lived in Connecticut my whole life and the book has a lot of different Connecticut facts included in the memoir.
I don’t usually read many non-fiction books but the author lays out the story in a very interesting way. There are a variety of issues addressed in this memoir, including the murder of Mary-Ann’s friend when they were young, dealing with Tyler’s autism before anyone knows what autism is, and a look at how sexual assault cases are addressed in the 1950’s. It looks at the friend’s murder from a child’s point of view and talks about how this affected her growing up. There were many emotions throughout the book, I was tearing up by the end. This was a very well written memoir and I am very glad that my friend Jim lent it to me to read!

The bottom line: Not my usual cup of tea but I loved it. Would recommend, particularly to people from CT.

Link to author website
Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

2015 Book #21 – I Adored a Lord by Katharine Ashe

Posted in 2015, Book reviews, Book series, Historical Romance, Prince Catchers, Reading Challenges, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader) by

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Title: I Adored a Lord
Author: Katharine Ashe
Date finished: 3/24/15
Genre: Historical fiction
Publisher: Avon Books
Publication Date: July 29, 2014
Pages in book: 356
Stand alone or series: #2 in the Price Catchers series

Blurb from the cover:

Three very different sisters beguile society with their beauty and charm, but only one of them must fulfill a prophecy: marry a prince. Who is the mystery Prince Charming, and which sister will be his bride?
All that clever, passionate Ravenna Caulfield wants is to stay far away from high society’s mean girls.
All that handsome, heroic Lord Vitor Courtenay wants is to dash from dangerous adventure to adventure.
Now, snowbound in a castle with a bevy of the ton’s scheming maidens all competing for a prince’s hand in marriage, Ravenna’s worst nightmare has come true.
Now, playing babysitter to his spoiled prince of a half-brother and potential brides, Vitor is champing at the bit to be gone.
When a stolen kiss in a stable leads to a corpse in a suit of armor, a canine kidnapping, and any number of scandalous liaisons, Ravenna and Vitor find themselves wrapped in a mystery they’re perfectly paired to solve. But as for the mysteries of love and sex, Vitor’s not about to let Ravenna escape until he’s gotten what he desires . . .

My rating: 3.25 stars out of a scale of 5

My review: This book will count towards my TBR Pile Reading Challenge, marking off #8 on my list. Many of my thoughts on this book are similar to the first book in the series. There was a lot going on in this book all at once, and while it was easier to follow than the first book it was still nonetheless slightly difficult to follow the train of thought. There are references made early on that are confusing instead of subtly intriguing and made it hard to follow the choppy thoughts of the hero and heroine. The story line had a lot of promise and was interesting but,same as the last novel, this book alternated between being too detailed/slow-paced and too fast-paced. I liked the heroine of this book better than the last, she wasn’t quite as wishy-washy. She still didn’t seem to value herself very much though, while I understand it makes sense for that time period, I hate to think that the heroine believed she wasn’t a good match for the hero just because of her birth. Other than that she had a good amount of backbone though, which I like to see in novel’s heroine.

The bottom line:  I liked this book better than the first in the series but I still wasn’t thrilled with it. There’s one more in the trilogy though so I’m going to read it, I’m guessing she marries that Tali guy and turns out he’s some kind of prince even though he’s an orphan.

Link to author website
Link to Amazon

2014 Recap and 2015 Goals

Posted in For the love of books, Pop Sugar Reading Challenge 2015 checklist, TBR Pile Reading Challenge (Roof Beam Reader) by

2014-books

Looking back on 2014, I feel I’ve accomplished and grown a lot in my book travels. I started out this year blog-less and having no idea how much I would love blogging and how much I would become involved in it. Blogging, and even specifically book blogging, is this whole other world that you can become immersed in. There is such an audience out there for book bloggers, it is just astounding. And while there are many things I’d like to improve about my blog in the coming year, I think that this past year has been very successful. I held my first reading challenge on my blog, and though I was the only one who participated, it was still very fun.

With regards to my 2014 reading goals, I accomplished many of them but not all. One of my goals had been to read Pride and Prejudice, it is one of my absolute favorite movies and I started it years ago and just never finished it. Unfortunately, I did not read it again this year so I will most likely be rolling that goal over to next year. I also had a goal to read at least 2 books that were made into movies that I like. I read one (Beautiful Creatures) but did not read a second. I actually ended up reading the whole series and it was very interesting. My goal for 2014 was to read sixty books and I far surpassed that during the year. I slowed down in my reading towards the end of the year due to having to work a lot of overtime and therefore not having a lot of extra time for reading but I read over 100 books for the year so I am still quite pleased with my accomplishment.

It’s very hard to decide what my favorite book of 2014 was. Fortunately, I was able to narrow it down to 4 favorites out of the 100+ I read this year. I loved Divorce Papers by Susan Rieger because it was very interesting and different. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn was a fan-favorite this year and became a fantastic movie. Glass Kitchen by Linda Lee Francis was beautiful and touching and magical. And finally, In Your Dreams by Kristan Higgins was just as wonderful as I expected it to be. Higgins never lets me down, I devour her books as soon as they’re released.

New Year 2015

My 2015 goals will not include a specific number goal for the year. I don’t think I will be able to hit the 100 book mark again between having a house now and acquiring 3 pets at the end of 2014 and also dealing with my job, I’m lucky if I can find 20 minutes to read each day. Nor do I want to read books just to get the numbers in and to get up to my number goal. This year I want to focus more on expanding my horizons and reading different types of books that maybe I’ve never read before. I’m also creating goals this year that are more blog-related than reading-related. The following will be my goals for 2015:

1. Read at least 20 different types of the books on the Pop Sugar Reading Challenge 2015 checklist
2. Post at least 2 non-book review related posts per month
3. Participate in one book reading challenge (on an external site) per quarter
4. Post at least two posts per month concerning various book memes
5. Read at least 5 books from Amazon’s 100 Books to Read in a Lifetime
6. Participate in Roof Beam Reader’s 2015 TBR Pile Reading Challenge

My books for this reading challenge are all books that I currently have on my TBR shelf and that either I own or someone has loaned to me and I few thrown in that I will get from the library. My goals will be:
1. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
2. Girls of a Tender Age by Mary-Ann Throne Smith
3. Lightning by Dean Koontz
4. The Help by Kathryn Stockett
5. The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
6. Lethal by Sandra Brown
7. Running for Women by Kara Goucher
8. I Adored a Lord by Katharine Ashe
9. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
10. The Wonder of All Things by Jason Mott
11. The Cage by Meghan Shepherd
12. Cemetery Girl by David Bell

I am looking forward to what 2015 will bring! Happy Reading everyone!