Random update about stuff

So here I am again. Bringing this blog back from the dead once again. For some reason I can’t bring myself to abandon it completely, though I’m not sure there’s anyone left to read it by now.

My blogging life has been overtaken quite unapologetically by Tumblr for at least 4 years now, but there’s still some space, every now and then, for random updates and over-excited reviews about the things I’ve been reading, right?

Thing is, for a long while now, I haven’t had anything to add to my “books I’ve read” list. NOTHING. Not one single book in, like, months - could be even a whole year . And yet I have been reading. Not as voraciously and anxiously as I once did, but I have.

Fanfiction happened. Or more accurately, shipping happened. A shit load of it. Real shipping, not the light-hearted giddiness at two people I moderately love finally getting together that I often experienced before, with no serious consequences to my emotional health. No, this was painful, heart-wrenching, insane NEED for these two fictional people to be happy and together and forever because they’re my babies and they deserve it dammit. 

So last year I somehow found myself reading Stargate SG-1 fics like there was no tomorrow. Not before having acquired a kindle though, thanks to my lovely internet wifey, because how do people even read stuff on computer screens, I will never understand it. I even wrote a couple myself. But mostly I read, because the amount of brilliant stuff people have come up with over the years about these two idiots is astounding.

So, you see, I could hardly add Yet Another Fanfic By This Amazing Writer on my “read list”. Or, I suppose I could have, but I didn’t think anyone cared.

And then I discovered another passion, this time for National Geographic and for all things science. Black holes! Interstellar gas clouds! Giant squids! Mysterious Latin American tombs! Endangered, bizarre-looking birds that only exist in some protected areas of the north-east coast of New Zealand!

I can’t get enough of that shit.

So again, I left those ones out of the big list.

But now I’m back on the literature train, I think. I’m on my way to finishing The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay and I’m loving it and I will be raving about it quite profusely when I’m done with it. I hope. Don’t let me down Michael.

And I have a huge list of TBR stuff, because lists are cool even if you never stick to them. Next is totally gonna be the latest Sarah Waters BECAUSE LESBIANS! Yay! (I missed them too, Sarah)

                                     

So, I'll see you soon, blog.

Well...

I haven't been around much, have I? But that's how it is at the moment. I've read some incredibly good books, and I will one day talk about them, probably in one post filled with mini-reviews, but I will, definitely. For now, though, I'm going away again, to Sicily and to my beloved, tiny, magical island of Levanzo. I will have to spend the night in London airport, but I have lots of books with me, should I not be able to fall asleep on a chair.
For my 10-day-holiday I chose books that have been waiting for at least 3 years to be read:
Wolf Brother by Michelle Paver
A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray
Epic by Conor Kostick
and My Tender Matador by Pedro Lemebel.
With the exception of the last one, they are all YA and mostly fantasy (not sure about Wolf Brother), so it's pure indulgence. Exactly what I want on my holidays.
Oh and Framed by Cottrell Boyce which I'm halfway through it and loving it.

Talking about great books, I've literally just finished Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness, the third volume in his stunning Chaos Walking trilogy. I'm not going to write a proper review, I'm somehow too invested in it. Besides, lots of people have already done it brilliantly before me. I just want to join the choruses of "OMGOMGOMGOMG"s and "WOW"s and "I'm still recovering from it, I can't really talk about it"'s. It was just that good. I was forced to read it faster that I would have, cause I didn't want to bring the huge hardback with me, hence making it an even more intense experience. I have never been that much on edge reading a book as I was with this one. I was almost scared to turn the pages, knowing something terrible was gonna happen, but that didn't make me turn them any slower. I love the characters so much, I had to hope things were gonna turn out well for them, but at almost every end of paragraph, especially towards to end, I was like "f***k's sake! Can't it go smoothly for once?" And of course I can't tell you if it does, you'll have to read and suffer exactly like me! And no peeking ahead, it's wrong.
OK, off to the airport, see you when I'm back, all tanned and rested.

pic from http://tomorrowmaybe-megone.blogspot.com/

Other stuff I've listening to (and stuff I've been doing)

Slowly I'm returning to my usual self. I'm just back from a much needed holiday in Madrid. I had never been to Spain and I loved it. I struggled at first with the language, but by the second day I was already able to have a simple conversation with the locals! When they learned I was Italian they stopped answering to me in English and let me experiment with my elementary Spanish, which was fun. I took Spanish in school but that's like more than twelve years ago (at least)...I remember liking it very much but I never used it until this week. I was surprised at how much it came back to me speaking it.
It was also my first experience at travelling alone and it was definitely a hit. There were so many other people travelling alone and always ready for a chat or to join me to explore the city. I met some very strange but joyful people, and ate lots of delicious food (mostly tapas). I will post the pictures as soon as I develop and scan them (yes, I still don't own a digital camera...)

This holiday also brought me back to books. I started reading The Dreaming Place by Charles de Lint on the plane. I chose a short book as I didn't trust myself to read something too long. But by the end of the first day in Madrid I had finished it. So I went book-hunting. I found a bookshop which had books in English and bought My family and other animals by Gerald Durrell and I am enjoying it very much. Then I also got a YA book in Spanish, cause I plan to keep re-learning it. I've already read two chapters, for which I'm really proud. The book is El coleccionista de relojes extraordinarios by Laura Gallego García, who, according to the local bookseller, is a good author. I'm really intrigued by it so I'll let you know my thoughts on it.
I decided to leave Enna Burning at home, cause I only have the last few chapters left, and didn't want to finish it too soon and then carry it around for nothing. But I will finish it today or tomorrow. I did love it, although it has taken me ages to read it.

OK, so now for the music part of this blog post:

I love love love the Slow Club. I wish they played here. I wished they did the Electric Picnic, it'd be perfect. I need to see them live! I love almost all their songs but this one, I can't get enough of. I love singing along to it, it's lovely.
ps: I was sure there was a beautiful music video for this song, but I can't find it anymore.


Another band I'm loving for their soft 60's sound is Camera Obscura. This is their best song i think:


As most of these artists, I've only started to listen to Cathy Davey very recently, but I immediately loved her style. She's playing here soon, but I'm still thinking whether I should go. 26 euro seems a lot for someone I just started to know, but I know I would enjoy it. Hmm, dilemmas...
This is her latest single:


On an extremely different note, I'm loving the latest Beth Ditto look on Gossip's new video for Pop goes the World. The song is cool, but her hair is the best part. It's purple! And Blue! And her make-up! And her whole thing! Fantastic.

GOSSIP - POP GOES THE WORLD from V Magazine on Vimeo.

I'm finishing here with a treat for myself, basically. It's Florence's new song. She debuted it in Dublin, but I couldn't get tickets. Thank the Internet Gods for Youtube. I knew she was going to play something new, and I couldn't wait to listen to it. You can barely understand any lyrics, but it doesn't matter. It's Florence's new song for Pete's sake!! What else could *you* want?!

Slowly but surely...

I've finished a book! After starting I don't know how many books and never finishing them, I'm very proud of myself. It was the second volume in the Song of the Lioness series by Tamora Pierce, In the hand of the Goddess. It was alright, nothing earth-shattering, but it was such an easy read that I finally made through the last page. So for the next book I've decided to scrap the rules, and forget about Mt. "To be Read". I've picked The Knife of Never letting Go and so far it's going good. I still don't feel great, I'm going through some pretty hard times, but knowing that I can read again makes me feel a tiny bit better!

A quick update

I'm back to civilization and internet, although not at home. I had a wonderful time in Sicily and I will post some photos when I can use my laptop. For now I thought I'd write few lines about what I've read recently. I can hardly keep my mouth (fingers?) shut! I loved absolutely everything and I finished both books so fast that I had to borrow the next book to read on my flight to Pisa.

The Time Traveler's Wife is everything that I thought it'd be, only I didn't think it's be such a page-turner. My flight to Sicily was more than 3 hours long and I didn't feel them at all! I kept reading like a mad thing till I finished it. I cried a bit almost at the end, and felt sort of melancholic from then on, but it was beautiful and it was worth it! Now I can't wait to watch the trailer for the movie.

The Hunger Games was also incredibly absorbing, adventurous and even sort of romantic. I thought it was the perfect summer read, mostly because it made me feel good that I was lying on the beach sunbathing while those poor souls had to fight for their lives with little water and food.Ahah!I can't wait to read the sequel, obviously. Has it lived up to the expectations?

My third book is La Danza del Gabbiano, the new inspector Montalbano book by Andrea Camilleri. I thought it was very good, better than the last two. It was also a very quick read.

Now I've borrowed Fahrenheit 451 and I'm already half-way through. All I can say now is that I'm happy it shows just how horrible a society without books would become. Ugh!

So, yes, I'm loving my summer holiday reading so far! But I miss blogging and reading other people's blogs. Hope everything is good in the bookblogging sphere.

Any new amazing unmissable books I should know about?

So, still no reviews...

...I will have so much to catch up with in the next months! I'd like to say that I have being writing like a mad thing, but sadly I've actually slowed down a lot. First I got discouraged by reading The Goose Girl. The writing and the imagination was so superior I just couldn't bring myself to love my story anymore. So then I decided to put The Goose Girl down for the moment. I tried to read only non-fiction while in writing mode, but fiction just lured me to it again when I was innocently browsing a library shelf. I ended up taking out "How I live Now" by Meg Rosoff, and man, that was good! And thankfully I didn't compare it to my writing that much, because the genre is so different. The ending wasn't what I hoped for, but still the characters, the style, and the story itself was worth it.


Now I'm reading a book that's not published yet. It's called The Thirteen Treasures by Michelle Harrison. It could be chosen as Kids Book of the Month in our shop and our buyer wants to know what we think of it. So far I'm liking it even though nothing has happened yet. There's nasty fairies, and a girl who can see them, and a mysterious ancient house, and an old gypsy woman living in a caravan in the forest. And some children disappearing. It sounds very promising, doesn't it?
Anyway, today I should get lots of writing done. But I'm scared because I got to a very important part, maybe the key scene for the whole story, and I've thought about it so much and put so much expectations on how it should be that now I'm intimidated by it! So instead I've been "researching" without actually writing anything :P
Maybe I should stop thinking how important it is and just write it! I can always edit it later...hmmm. Easy to say...

Ok, I should get going and stop procrastinating!