Like I mentioned last week, I’ve signed up for back-to-back summer readathons for the last two weekends this month. The first is the 24 in 48 Readathon from 12:01 a.m. on Saturday, July 21, until 11:59 a.m. Sunday, July 22 (reading for 24 out of any of the 48 hours); the second, a reverse Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon, from 8 p.m. Friday night, July 27, until Saturday night, July 28, at 8 p.m.
I added one more book to the potential list for both readathons that I announced last week: Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue after seeing Tanya of the blog mention it as her best book she’s read so far this year in her and her co-blogger Kim’s post The 2018 Mid-Year Book Freak Out Tag [2018 Girlxoxo Edition]. The rest of the list (again) is as follows:
- We Were Eight Years In Power: An American Tragedy by Ta-Nehisi Coates
- The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
- You Don’t Have To Say You Love Me: A Memoir by Sherman Alexie
- Bluebird, Bluebird: A Novel by Attica Locke
- Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson
- Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi
- Leah on the Offbeat by Becky Albertalli.
In their post, Tanya also gave a shout-out to Children of Blood and Bone and I believe she is one of the bloggers I saw mentioning it that made me want to check it out.
As for what I’m reading before the two readathons or in between them, today I’m going to work on a recommendation from a patron at our library: The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver. I’ve had mixed success with her books. I think I liked Pigs in Heaven but I absolutely hated The Poisonwood Bible (sorry for all of you that loved it, but I just couldn’t get into it — at all). The patron mentioned he didn’t like that one either, but did like her first novel, so I thought maybe I won’t hate it and might actually like it. We’ll see. I also have the next Chief Inspector Armand Gamache book, The Cruelest Month by Louise Penny. Even though in the first two, we didn’t meet Gamache until a good 30 or 40 pages into the book, and I’m not usually a fan of multiple points of view, I really enjoy Penny’s writing.
Are you planning on participating in either or both readathons? Have you read either Louise Penny or Barbara Kingsolver? What do you think of their work, if you have? If no to the aforementioned questions, what are you reading this week?
I, too, have mixed success with Kingsolver. I thought Poisonwood was okay but Bean Trees was a nope. I loved Animal, Vegetable, Miracle but of course it’s not a novel. I thought Flight Behavior was pretty good. I have her new one so we shall see.
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Well, I’ll let you know how I fare with Bean Trees then. I have off Thursday and I will be giving it a go.
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I remember liking The Bean Trees when I read it in college. And like you I couldn’t get into Poisonwood Bible at all.
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Glad I’m not the only one. 🙂
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I’ve been absent for far too long, Bryan. There’s so much I want to comment on 🙂
First… thank you for sharing the read-athon events. I will definitely take part in the #24in48 celebration.
Secondly… Barbara Kingslover has been an author on my TBR list for years now, but I have yet to read any of her works. I look forward to reading your review.
Lastly, I have tried Still Life on three separate occasions and always abandon the book. Perhaps because it is as you say… the Chief Inspector is not mentioned early on. So many people recommend her writing style, however, that I am determined to try again (and finish).
Enjoy the rest of your reading July!
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Some books are not meant to be for us as readers. I keep trying Donna Leon’s first book too and never making it.
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Yet another reminder I need to get back to Louise Penny. I agree that her writing is so good.
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