Archive for January 2014
WWW Wednesday is weekly meme hosted by Should Be Reading.
Welcome to my first WWW Wednesday. To participate in WWW Wednesday, you need to answer 3 questions:
- What are you currently reading?
- What did you recently finished reading?
- What do you think you'll read next?
What are you currently reading?
I have actually few books that I'm currently reading, not just one. I have also couple books that I have started, but then got bored or something and they're just waiting for me to finish them, but maybe I don't mention them this time, I'm going to just focus on those that I'm actually really reading.
Yeah, I know, too many at the same time. Laini Taylor's book I started just yesterday, so it's the most recent one and probably I'll finish it first too. Others I'll finish when I feel like reading them and I just really don't feel like it now. All are great books, but I don't know... I just don't feel like it. I'll try to finish them in couple weeks, but we'll see...
Salla Simukka: Valkea kuin lumi (Lumikki Andersson, #2)
(As White as Snow).
I read first book in this series few days ago and you can find it's review few posts down. Salla Simukka is finnish ya author and translation rights to this series has been sold to over 30 countries. Not more about this book, I'll publish review when I get the chance to write it. Great book, can't wait to read next one.
What do you think you'll read next?
I went to the library few days ago and loaned a pretty high pile of books, so that's my next project. There are few other Salla Simukka's books, next Laini Taylor's book and Stephen King's Under the Dome (I saw the tv show, so now I must read the book). I need to read American Specter too, I have eARC and I've promished to review it, it's publish date is next week.
AND... CRESS by Marissa Meyer!!!! Publish date is next week and I'm going to read it as soon as possible. I really hope that I wont be disappointed, I've been waiting it like forever.
3 comments
(TTT is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish)
I have read a lot of books where the world is something just awful. Something I'd never want to live in. Especially dystopian book have often worlds that are pretty ruthless and I'm not sure that I would be cut out for that. So here's my list.
Top Ten Worlds I'd Never Want To Live In
1. Suzanne Collins: Hunger Games
Don't get me wrong. I love this series. But the government and districts and the reapings and stuff. No thanks, not for me. I'm perfectly happy loving it from afar.
2. Veronica Roth: Divergent
Pretty much the same as before. And I don't want to spoil too much, but the last book. Ok, I haven't finished it, so I don't exactly know what happens in the end, but that whole world is little too much like Truman Show to me. Just awful, I don't want to be some kind of labrat. And there are of course a lot of things that are just too messed up.
3. Erica Stevens: The Captive
World where vampires are ruling race and humans are just bloodslaves or rebels living in woods or caves etc. No thanks. I love vampires, but I don't want to just a bloodbag.
4. J.A.London: Darkness Before Dawn
Same here. Vampires rules, humans are "bloodslaves". I'd never want to human in this world.
5. Julie Kagawa: Blood of Eden
This falls into same category too. Humans as blood cattle living in walled-in city. Nowhere is safe. Not for me, thanks
6. Teri Terry: Slated
A world where teenagers get their mind and memory wiped when they do something wrong. They get a second chance to be good citizens, but they also have this device that controls their emotions. That sounds really scary.
7. Justin Cronin: The Passage
"Dr. Strangelove goes to South America to find the cure for death and instead turns it loose. You can always count on your military brass for that sort of screw up." Read that from someone's review and it really sums everything up pretty nicely.
8. Bethany Griffin: Masque of the Red Death
"A devastating plague has decimated the population, and those who are left live in fear of catching it as the city crumbles around them." I think that says it all.
9. Suzanne Winnaker: The Other Life
"3 years, 1 month, 1 week and 6 days since I’d seen daylight. One-fifth of my life. 98,409,602 seconds since the heavy, steel door had fallen shut and sealed us off from the world."
Zombies... Thank you, but no thank you.
10. Lauren Oliver: Delirium
World where love is forbidden. That sounds really, really empty and meaningless. No thanks.
I liked (or even loved) all of those books, but I'd never want to live in them. I like my BigMac and laptop and electricity and freedom, so big no-no for all these.
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But hey, I have also some exciting news.
Next week we have a visitor. Author Rasheedah Prioleau will tell us her Top Ten Books That Will Make You Cry as part of her book tour for her upcoming book American Specter that will be published also the same day, Feb. 4th. I will also post my review next week, so stay tuned.
(As Red as Blood, The Snow White Trilogy, #1, pub. Aug. 2014)
5/5
In the midst of the freezing Arctic winter, seventeen-year-old Lumikki Andersson walks into her school’s dark room and finds a stash of wet, crimson-colored money. Thousands of Euros left to dry—splattered with someone’s blood.
Lumikki lives alone in a studio apartment far from her parents and the past she left behind. She transferred into a prestigious art school, and she’s singularly focused on studying and graduating. Lumikki ignores the cliques, the gossip, and the parties held by the school’s most popular and beautiful boys and girls.
But finding the blood-stained money changes everything. Suddenly, Lumikki is swept into a whirlpool of events as she finds herself helping to trace the origins of the money. Events turn even more deadly when evidence points to dirty cops and a notorious drug kingpin best known for the brutality with which he runs his business.
As Lumikki loses control of her carefully constructed world, she discovers that she’s been blind to the forces swirling around her—and she’s running out of time to set them right. When she sees the stark red of blood on snow, it may be too late to save her friends or herself.
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Once upon a time, there was a girl who learned to be afraid.I rarely read finnish literature, but this was one of those that I just had to read. Everytime I went to bookstore, it just sat there in the shelf watching me and I just couln't ignore it anymore. And I've read so many great reviews, that I thought that it has to be a great book. And the reason why I'm reviewing this book here is that the translation rights has been sold to Amazon and this book will be published in english in August 2014.
It feels weird to read these kind of book in finnish, all this druglord-stuff feels so absurd, when events happen in a town that's less than 100 miles away. Of course we have crime here in Finland too, but Finland is so small country that it's usually in lot smaller scale. Or maybe it just isn't in media so much, that we don't notice it. I mean, we have 5,5 million people in the while country and our biggest city Helsinki has about 600 000 people. So the stuff in this book feels so far away, it almost unreal. I guess that it's possible that it really happens, but it just feels weird. But yeah, that's it about that. Maybe I just need to focus on this book and not in Finland general...
I love how this book is written. It's really detailed, so you can really almost imagine you're in there. I could close my eyes and I could imagine everything and how it would look. I don't know if I know how to say it right, but the wording in this book was interesting. I mean that sentences weren't straight. I don't know. I'm not probably saying it right. But yeah, it was really interesting way to write, it was different and it was really detailed.
Second thing that was interesting was that there were multiple pov's. And sometimes there were little timejumps, like flashbacks. There were few times when I was a little lost at first and there were some scenes that didn't make sense, they felt like they didn't have anything to do with the story. But this is a trilogy and maybe htere are things that will make sense when I read the next book. I loaned it too from library and I'm going to read it next.
I don't know what more can I say about the plot, synopsis says everything you need to know. There isn't much I can say without spoiling too much. But I really liked it, even when it's not the usual genre I read. Lumikki is a character that feels real. Like a real person and not just a character in a book.
Salla Simukka, you are my new favourite finnish author and I'm definally going to read more your work.
5/5
NEWSOUL Ana is new. For thousands of years in Range, a million souls have been reincarnated over and over, keeping their memories and experiences from previous lifetimes. When Ana was born, another soul vanished, and no one knows why.
NOSOUL Even Ana's own mother thinks she's a nosoul, an omen of worse things to come, and has kept her away from society. To escape her seclusion and learn whether she'll be reincarnated, Ana travels to the city of Heart, but its citizens are afraid of what her presence means. When dragons and sylph attack the city, is Ana to blame?
HEART Sam believes Ana's new soul is good and worthwhile. When he stands up for her, their relationship blooms. But can he love someone who may live only once, and will Ana's enemies—human and creature alike—let them be together? Ana needs to uncover the mistake that gave her someone else's life, but will her quest threaten the peace of Heart and destroy the promise of reincarnation for all?
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"Who am I?" My first spoken words.----
"No one," she said. "Nosoul."
I finally read it, and it was AMAZING. Really. I loved every word of it. I can't believe that I ignored this so long. It had been hounting my goodreads recommends list for months when I finally added it to my tbr-list and then it was there about a year. And then I finally read it. It was perfect.
I loved every aspect of this book. I love the world, characters, story, everything. Everything is so well thought and all. It's amazing that there is this whole new world and it felt so real. I could imagine everything and how it looks and sounds and feels. This is one of those books that I'd love to see as a movie. This world is interesting mix of old and new. They have all this computer stuff etc., but they don't use cars. There are lot of other things too, but I can say everything in one word, amazing.
Ana is a great character. She's smart and she's strong and she really is completely unique. This is great story about her journey to find herself and answers to questions about why she even is alive, when it should be impossible.
One great thing about this book is the way it is written. I love the cover, but somehow I still postponed reading it, because I thought that this would be boring. I was wrong. It wasn't boring, not at all. There was romance, and mystery and little bit action and betrayal... I don't know what more I can say, I'm just positively impressed about this book. So read it, if you haven't already. I postponed it too long. One good thing about it is that I can read the whole series now and I don't have to wait.
I've read a lot of postings and discussions about this topic and I want to offer my opinion too. And I'm going to say both. I love real books and I own lots of them, but I think that I own ebooks even more. And main reason is that I live in Finland. Books are here really really expensive. And I read mostly in english, so it's so much easier to download ebooks than order them from the other side of the world. Here's a little example, Cassandra Clare's City of Fallen Angels. Lets look at the prices.
suomalainen.com (finnish bookstore)
City of Fallen Angels (hardcover) 17,90€ (24,57$)
Langenneiden enkelten kaupunki (translated hardcover) 25,20€ (34,58$)
Langenneiden enkelten kaupunki (translated paperback) 9,80€ (13,45$)
Langenneiden enkelten kaupunki (translated ebook) 25,10€ (34,45$)
bn.com
City of Fallen Angels (hardcover) 16,94$
City of Fallen Angels (paperback) 8,50$
City of Fallen Angels (ebook) 6,99$
City of Fallen Angels (audiobook) 27$
Crazy, right? Finland is a booklover's nighmare. Ebooks are sometimes even more expensive than hardcovers. 5 ebook from BN costs as much as one translated hardcover from Suomalainen. It really is crazy. So no wonder that I read mostly ebooks. So that is one number one reason. Second reason is that it's way more easier to take reader with me everywhere. I have hundreds of books in my reader and they're always with me where ever I go. I can read everywhere, at home, work, beach, train, car, etc.. I love my reader. It's pretty simple, it doesn't have wifi of touchscreen or even colors, it's simple e-ink reader, but I love it. I have my iPhone and laptop if I want to take pictures or go online, so I don't need them in my reader. The battery lasts about 2-4 weeks depending how much I read.
(^ my heaven ^)
So, I love both. Both have their ups and downs.
