Lots of catching up to do

I'm still here! Gawwd I don't even know where to start! I've been reading great books lately and I can't wait to share my thoughts about them, but first I'll try to do a very speedy weedy catching up cause I can't bare to not say something about some of my favourite reads of the year. I wont' even pretend to post proper reviews, just residual impressions on stuff I've read up to 3 months ago...

I'll start with The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.
It's just every bit as good as everyone is saying. I started reading it on the plane to Sicily, and those two and a half hours passed completely unnoticed! This rarely happens. I'm nervous at every shake, and can't wait to get down. This time though, it went so smooth, I kinda wanted it to last a bit more so I could keep reading! It wasn't just about the story. The writing was just as captivating. So clever. And so heartbreaking. The movie didn't completely do justice to it, but it could have been much worse!




Next is The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. Another book that, if you haven't read, you probably are tired of hearing about. Gripping it was. Exciting, fast and moving, too. The only thing it wasn't was being unpredictable. You can pretty much guess the ending, although this won't stop you from frantically keep turning those pages. Catching Fire was just as exciting. I probably enjoyed it a bit more because I knew the characters and cared for them. And I honestly didn't know where it was going. I'm definitely looking forward to the third one, because the ending left it veeeery open to anything!





Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. I'm so not ready to talk about this book now. All I can say is that it was beautifully written and I didn't expect that. Also I don't think I understood it completely, especially the final part. It was bleak, melancholic, suffocating, but lyrical too. I think I should read it again one day, when I'm ready to take everything in.






This summer I've started reading a (kind of ) new author to me, Sandra Scoppettone. I read a couple of her young adult books when I was younger, but nothing more. She's more well known for her series centred around the lesbian detective Lauren Laurano and that's what I've been reading. Unfortunately the Italian publisher hasn't released them in the proper chronological order, so I didn't follow the time line, but even then, I completely enjoyed them. There's something about the summer+beach+crime fiction combination that I can't explain, but that just works so well for me. These books were especially easy to enjoy in the sun, although they deal with tough subject such as rape, aids and violence against women. They are always socially conscious, but also ironic and funny. The writing style wasn't very polished, but it didn't matter much. I loved reading about Lauren and her love of her life Kit. In the first book I read, Everything You Have Is Mine, they had been together for 11 years and still rocking it. It's not usual to find such attraction and intimacy in a long-term relationship, not even in fiction. I loved their relationship so much that the mystery didn't even matter that much in the end. In the second book I read, Let's face the music and die, the mystery was an utter disappointment because I guessed it from the start. But Lauren's personal story made it worth reading. There was so much tension, what with her dealing with the man who raped her years before, and at the same time dealing with her growing attraction toward a much younger woman, while Kip is away. I think Sandra Scoppettone put so much into these story-lines that forgot to put some mystery into the mystery itself!

In the first story, I loved seeing Lauren trying to come to terms with computers and technology. The book has been written during the early days of internet, and I have to say the word "bulletin board" didn't mean anything to me, but it has a central role in the story so I had to look it up. Seriously prehistoric internet stuff! She becomes an internet junkie later on, and with that I can relate:P

I recommend these books as a light read with some edge and some good gay romance. Unfortunately they're not easy to find in the shops, but maybe libraries still stock them?

OK, I'll finish here, cause I'm tired. I hope I'll manage to finish the catching up part soon, so that I can talk extensively about the latest amazing reads!

LGBT Challenge - Once Upon a Time III Challenge wrap up

I had promise to myself not to join anymore challenges, because there is not much point when I don't actually read the books meant for that challenge. Even without lists! But since there's no challenge police, I'll join anyway! I can't resist this one.
It's hosted by Amanda at The Zen Leaf, and it requires the reading of 6 books in 6 months, all LGBT related, starting July 1 and ending December 31.
Incidentally, I'm already reading Baby Be-bob by Francesca Lia Block so the first book is sorted!
What else could I read?
I'm thinking:
Carol by Patricia Highsmith (The first lesbian novel with a happy ending, or so I'm told)
Beebo Brinker by Ann Bannon (lesbian pulp fiction of the 1950's)
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (the T is for Transgender, after all)
I'm not myself these days by Josh Kilmer-Purcell (about the life of a drag queen)
My tender matador by Pedro Lemebel (which has been waiting for 3 years now, as it's also about a transgender woman)
Also I should probably try to read Oranges are not the only fruit by Jeanette Wintersone again...

These are already at home...don't let me start with whatever I could get in the library because it's a road full of perils, we all know it ends in me wanting to read too many books as humanly possible.

ps: Here we say LGBT instead of GLBT. I'm used to it, and also I like it more ;)

Now for the Once upon a time III...er...


...I probably was in the mood for more realistic fiction than usual lately, because I managed to read 2 books only, out of the original 4:
-The Poison Throne by Celine Kiernan (fantasy)
-The Absolute Sandman vol 1. by Neil Gaiman (I decided to consider it mythology although it could fit in basically all four genres. But I thought The Sandman is a mythological figure, and these comics are a reinterpretation. Also there are many other mythical references in it).
I read some Charles de Lint stories for the Short Stories Weekend, but I reviewed only one, from Tapping the Dream Tree. Still have one to go, to finish the collection.

Speaking of Challenges, I think this year is the last for me. I know I haven't joined too many, but they're a lot for me and I feel constricted. Next time round I will stick to a VERY limited selection of these torture devises. I think they are fun only when they are the exception to my reading routine, not the norm.