LShelby Reads Again

Keskustelu100 Books in 2023 Challenge

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LShelby Reads Again

1LShelby
Muokkaaja: maaliskuu 25, 2023, 1:06 pm

Apparently 2022 didn't even happen for me. But that's okay, This year I am doing awesome at getting books read. (At least, I am doing awesome so far. How long I can keep it up is another question.)

In case there is anyone new.... Hi, I'm L. Shelby
(It's a pen name and the L doesn't actually stand for much. Y'all can call me Shel.)
I am a fantasy and science fiction author and artist, and I also like to sing, code webpages, play boardgames, go hiking (or disc golfing) and tat. I am the mother of six -- now all grown up, and a Canadian, although I currently live in Ohio, ('cause I married a USian).

I read fantasy and science fiction, non-fiction, regency romances (of the 'sweet' variety), YA romance, cozy-mysteries, adventure fiction, and occasionally even classics. I also read manga/graphic novels. I spent most of last five years under the weather, and watching more TV than reading, which makes me sad. I want reading to be the default downtime activity, and TV to get saved for emergencies!


77 books read in 2023

Sub-goals:
20 New Authors

30 new authors in 2023

20 Old Favorites (SFF->RR->C/YA->O)

5 rereads in 2023

20 Non-Fiction Books (Largely to prevent me from counting these as new authors)

9 non-fiction in 2023

24 LT Authors (In the hopes I will actually complete my BINGO game.)

7 LTAuthors in 2022

Also:
11 Volumes of Manga/Graphic Novels
4 Asian Dramas

2LShelby
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 13, 2023, 10:03 pm

Books Read in January

1) False Pretenses by Isobel Linton
A regency romance. The hero doesn't care for women but he falls at once for the heroine when he sees her on the street. She becomes one of his housemaids because she is hiding, and he offers her a carte blanche which offends her to the point of quoting Shakespeare. I would have had her quoting the Bible myself, but maybe the author is more familiar with Shakespeare?

2) Aunt Dimity and the Duke by Nancy Atherton
This cozy mystery series features romantic and unexplained supernatural elements that don't really involve themselves in the actual mystery solving much. I read book one earlier; there is very little connection between that book and this one.

3) The Charmed List by Julie Abe
Teen romance where protags have magical powers. There's a cute couple, some angst and a road trip.

The Gifts of Asti by Andre Norton {short story}
Exploration of strange landscapes mostly.

4) A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Re-read. I have been a fan of this classic adventure series (there was no "science fiction" genre when it was first published) since I was eight or nine. Apparently I still enjoy the fights, escapes and strange creatures. I also find this sort of story romantic, but maybe that's just me.

5) Christmas at Stoney Creek by Martha Rogers
A super sweet story set in historical small-town America about people being good people.

6) The Ghost and the Bride by Bobbi Holmes
Haunted Danielle is a long running murder mystery series with a protag who sees ghosts. I never know what else to say about them, other that I'm still reading them.

7) Ravenfall by Kalyn Josephson
Children's fantasy book, with high stakes (death, the world doomed) but not overly dark otherwise. The cat who is not a cat is fun.

8) The Trouble with Kings by Sherwood Smith
Romantic fantasy adventure fiction about a princess that keeps getting kidnapped and is sick of it. Not particularly grim or gritty, but not frivolous or silly either. (Sherwood Smith is one of my favorite authors, she gives me what I'm actually looking for in a story.)

9) The Gods of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Re-read. If you've read one Mars book, you know what to expect from the rest of them. (Knowing what to expect can be a good thing.)

10) The Ghost and Little Marie by Bobbi Holmes
The next Haunted Danielle book. We started getting hints in this one that the romantic situation might actually someday progress. And there is also a murder, of course.

11) The Surrendered Wife by Laura Doyle
Non-fiction. Apparently I don't need to surrender because I never took up arms against my husband in the first place. This was acknowledged when I aced the quiz at the beginning, but the rest of the book assumed I was making the same mistakes the author had made. Which I guess makes sense for a self-help book, but sometimes I read those because I'm curious, not because I need help with anything.

12) Shinji Takahashi and the Mark of the Coatl by Julie Kagawa
Old Fashioned Fantasy Adventure a la Indiana Jones, but contemporary, with more magic and fewer stunts, and aimed at kids.

13) The Ghost and the Doppelganger by Bobbi Holmes
Another Haunted Danielle. The series really is moving the romance along finally. I feel that it might be doing some minor rule invention to accomplish this, but its not re-writing rules, so I'm pretty okay with it.

14) Murder on Black Swan Lane by Andrea Penrose
A murder mystery set in Regency London. The setting seems well portrayed. The tone is darker than most of the cozy mysteries I enjoy (and much darker than the regency romances I read.)

15) Learn Enough HTML, CSS and Layout to Be Dangerous by Lee Donahoe
Non-fiction. This is an entry level book and I am not an entry level web-develloper. But the section on CSS grids was new to me. :)

16) Domesticating Dragons by Dan Koboldt (LT Author)
Science Fiction set in a near future. The 3D printing of living biologic entities has happened. And so there's a company who is creating dragons and selling them. I don't really get this book's stand on the ethical issues it raises.

17) Lady Runaway by Claudette Williams
Re-read. A regency romance I read last year and then read again this year because I forgot that I read it last year. But that could be my fault, I was pretty sick for most of last year.

18) The Ghost of Second Chances by Bobbi Holmes
Haunted Danielle again.

19) The Rising by Heather Graham
There are aliens secretly invading our world, and it is up to our teen protagonists to save it because all the adults who know amything about it are either flaking out or making matters worse.

20) The Poison Season Mara Rutherford
A teen fantasy romance set in a vague maybe somewhere in europe before industrialization world. It felt very claustrophobic to me... the heroine lived in a very small very insular society; the antagonists were all friends, family and neighbors. The author's note indicated that this is because it was written during COVID lockdown.

21) How to Date a Superhero (And Not Die Trying) by Cristina Fernandez
The title says a lot. This was more about surviving than about dating, IMHO.

22) TNT: Telzey Amberdon & Trigger Argee Together by James H. Schmitz
Collection of classic Science Fiction with psionics short stories. Dangerous and weird situations, intelligent solutions. More problem solving than action, although Trigger can certainly hold her own in a fight.

23) Mall Mayhem and Magic by Holly Lisle
Demon invasion at the local mall. The hero is a "loser who hasn't discovered his true potential yet" type. There is a bit of grue.

24) The Vanishing Volume by Marissa Doyle (LT Author)
25) The Forgery Furore by Marissa Doyle
26) Lyrics and Larceny by Marissa Doyle
27) The Cursed Canvases by Marissa Doyle
These four are from a series of magical mysteries set in regency London. The individual volumes are fairly short. There appears to be an over-arcing plot but it advances slowly.

28) Rust in the Root by Justina Ireland
Set in the a very magic heavy alternate history version of the Great Depression. Which was not caused by a market crash, but by some problem with white America's technological-based magic. So now the colored hedge-wizards must save the day.

29) Life is Sweet by Elizabeth Bass (LT Author)
"Sweet" Contemporary Romance in just about every sense of the word sweet.

30) Truly, Madly by Heather Webber
First in a Paranormal Mystery series where the detective is psychic. I put a hold on the second one, even though the romance is one of those "I don't want to like him (or anyone) but we have this mystic connection" things.

31) The Fossil Hunter by Tea Cooper (LT Author)
Set in two different historical periods (the turn of the century and post WWII), and mostly taking place in Australia. The setting seemed very well depicted. The mystery was more about atmosphere than about deciphering clues.

32) The Dress Shop of Dreams by Menna Van Praag
I think this book must be more literary than either fantasy or a mystery or a romance. There is a romance, there is a mystery, there is magic of the "small inexplicable gifts" type, but the way it is all put together felt different from my regular genre fare. Also, for the record, I don't believe in wheat that grows without water. (This was a minor point that probably wouldn't irk readers that weren't biology majors.) Without being watered, yes. Without water, no. Just saying.

...
Whew! I'm exhausted. I will add January's Manga and Shows in a different post.

3bryanoz
helmikuu 12, 2023, 7:51 pm

Hi Shel, great start to your reading year ! The Burroughs' Martian and Venus series were my introduction to scifi and fantasy many years ago.

4LShelby
helmikuu 13, 2023, 4:13 pm

>3 bryanoz:
I had been having trouble reading much for years now, so I decided I would switch around my schedule so that book reading was in my most productive time of the day, and then I told myself I would read a book a day or else. :)

After a week, reading stopped feeling like a strain. But by the end of the month I really wanted that most productive time slot back for other things. Today I went ahead and worked on a coding project, even though I hadn't read a book yet ::gasp!::

"The Burroughs' Martian and Venus series were my introduction to scifi and fantasy many years ago"

Although I have been a Burroughs fan since grade 2 or 3, I can't say the same, because even earlier than that my big sister was reading me Kieth Laumer Retief stories at bedtime. The Lord of the Rings, also. I got corrupted really, really young.

5jfetting
helmikuu 13, 2023, 9:13 pm

Ahhh you are flying through the books! Good job, and such an interesting mix.

6LShelby
helmikuu 13, 2023, 9:32 pm

>5 jfetting:
I wish I was reading more non-fiction though. Nothing else that I put on hold at the library was available yet. (That's what I get for sorting the catalog by "newest first" I guess.)

7jfetting
helmikuu 13, 2023, 9:38 pm

>6 LShelby: I go in phases with nonfiction, but I am definitely a slower nonfiction reader than fiction reader

8LShelby
helmikuu 13, 2023, 9:53 pm

Manga Read in January
Idol Dreams 2 - About a thirty-year-old who is given medicine to make her (temporarily) a teen again. Which revives her long forgotten dream of being an idol.

My Dress-Up Darling 1-2 - I'm almost embarrassed to admit I'm reading this series, there is a painful amount of fan-service which doesn't interest me (the reverse, rather). But between the gratuitous panty-shots, its about costuming, and the hero wants to be a doll-maker, and those do interest me.

Shows Watched in January
Unexpectedly Falling - Contemporary Thriller (with romance) - The newly widowed heroine discovers that her husband was in debt, and probably involved in something shady. A lawyer offers to help her, but can she trust him?

She and Her Perfect Husband - Contemporary Romance - Chinese attitudes toward unmarried females in the workforce lead to our heroine pretending to be married to someone picked at random on the internet... and then he shows up.

Lighter and Princess - Computer Geniuses, and Business Intrigue, and Romance.

Shining Just For You - "Ancient" Costume Fantasy Drama. A girl who is essentially an outcast because she has the gift of prophesy ends up working for the emperor. Romance, Politicking and battles ensue.

9LShelby
Muokkaaja: helmikuu 15, 2023, 7:56 pm

33) Pineapple Upside Down Murder by Jodi Rath
Fairly short. The protagonist's grandma is accused of murdering her best friend over who the family recipes belonged to.

34) Deeply, Desperately by Heather Webber
35) Absolutely, Positively by Heather Webber
36) Perfectly Matched by Heather Webber
37) Undeniably Yours by Heather Webber
These are books 2-5 of a mystery series I started earlier in the year. The heroine is a psychic. I must have liked them I read all five available in a very short span of time. :)

38) My One and Only Duke by Grace Burrowes
Regency Romance. The hero is accused of murder, sentenced to hang, marries the daughter of the clergyman who comes to preach to the sinners so that she can escape her father, and then he doesn't get hanged after all because just in the nick he inherits a dukedom. (I'm tempted to make jokes about silken ropes shortages.)

39-41) The Arwen Trilogy by Timothy P. Callahan
First contact in a universe with portable wormhole technology. The protags are military. A lot of people die in the last book.

42) Be My Ghost by Carol J. Perry
43) High spirits by Carol J. Perry
These are paranormal cozy mysteries set in the hospitality industry and featuring ghosts, just like the Haunting Danielle series that I've been reading. The feel is different, though I'm having trouble what that difference is.

44) Macaron Murder by Harper Lin
Murder mystery set in Paris.

45) Cursed Luck by Kelley Armstrong
This is a contemporary fantasy romance book. The heroine's family specializes in removing curses, her sisters are kidnapped, she makes a deal with the hero even though she thinks he's a jerk, so that he will help rescue them.

46) Taxi from another planet : conversations with drivers about life in the universe Charles S. Cockell
Non-fiction. A series of essays written by an astro-biologist (he studies microbes in extreme environments, and consults with space services about whether it might be possible to find any elsewhere in the solar system) that were "sparked" by things taxi-drivers said to him. He apparently talks to taxi-drivers a lot.

47) Veiled Threats by Deborah Donnelly
I'd say this is a thriller rather than a cozy. It features what my daughter describes as "the western take on romance: Aka "I think you are hot, let's sleep together."

48) The wide-awake princess by E. D. Baker
Children's fantasy set in setting where every fairy tale e er happened right here and probably in the past five years. Lots of be-spelled royalty, witches and fairies, not many ordinary people. But our heroine is bespelled to be magic proof. Energetic plot.

49) The Ghost Who Dream Hopped by Bobbi Holmes
Haunting Danielle #18.

50) Dragon flight by Jessica Day George
A sequel to a children's fantasy book that was loaned to me by a friend last year because it seemed like my kind of thing. I was actually already familiar with the author's fairy tale retellings. This series is original fantasy.

51) One morning in Maine by Robert McCloskey
Picture book by an award winning illustrator. Cute story, the protagonist is quite the believable little character. Lovely illustrations.

52) Revenge of the Librarians by Tom Gauld
Newspaper style Comic strips, on bookworm/writerly themes. I saw it on someone elses thread and had to check it out. I am a writer after all.

53) The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi
Scalzi descrbes this as a "pop song" of a book. By this he seems to mean: not particularly dark, but with plenty of danger, a little bit of action, some really strange creatures, and an unending stream of wisecracks.

54) The Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
My husband bought me an omnibus of the first five books in this series. Two more to go. :)

MANGA
My Dress-Up Darling 3-5
My Next Life as a Villianess 1 - Heroine wakes up from a bump on the head and realizes she has been reincarnated into a romance videogame as the villainess character. (Don't try thinking too hard about that, it will never make sense.) She is determined to avoid the untimely but well deserved end that was her fate in most of the game's endings. I had started watching the anime so I didn't have much hope for it. Cute, but repetitive and a bit saccharine.
7th Time Loop She relived a certain segment of her life (ending with her death at age twenty) six times previously. This time she wants to relax and enjoy herself -- why does marrying the man who previously killed her seem the only way to do that?

10LShelby
Muokkaaja: maaliskuu 8, 2023, 2:17 pm

55) The Sword Is Drawn by Andre Norton
This is a historical adventure set in WWII. The hero starts out bit unfocused, but after world affairs have dragged him into a number of adventures he finds his purpose. It felt to me like this book was mostly setting up the following books.

56) Erotopharmakohymnia Onorio by Dionysius Rogers (LT Author)
The fictional depiction of a vision of religious mysteries. I read this one because I know the author. I imagine it is a perfectly good representative of a genre that hasn't had much of a market since the Restoration.

57) A useful woman by Darcie Wilde
A mystery novel set in the regency period. The heroine maintains her position on the edges of society by trading on her cleverness, contacts, social acumen and organizational skills. She discovers these are also useful tools for solving crimes.

58) The Joy Choice by Michelle Segar PhD.
The author assumes her reader is having difficulty maintaining a healthy lifestyle because their busy schedule and many responsibilities interfere with their plans for improvement. (Not my situation at all.) The book's style is enthusiastic, repetitive and prescriptive. If you follow the three steps and memorize two clever acronyms you can change your life. The behavioral science basis underlying it all seemed sound and possibly useful to me in spite of the complete irrelevance of every single example given and scenario described.

59) A Quiet Rebellion: Posterity by M. H. Thaung (LT Author)
Third book in a triology set in a post-apocalyptic world with psionics. The protagonists are attempting to protect themselves from the neighbors they didn't know they had.

60) The Ghost of Christmas Secrets by Bobbi Holmes
I'm still reading this series. :)

61) The Hands of the Emperor by Victoria Goddard
This was a recommendation from the new recommendation system, and a successful one.
In a fantasy world that has recently (relatively) suffered from a cataclysm the former god emperor wants to retire, so our hero must bring about government reform. He has some interesting ideas on ideal governance. The magic remains mystical and vague and any civil unrest happens off screen, so the the book is almost entirely taken up with court maneuvering, family dynamics and cultural details.

MANGA
My Dress-Up Darling 6
Skip Beat! 47

11LShelby
maaliskuu 10, 2023, 5:29 pm

62) A purely private matter by Darcie Wilde
63) And dangerous to know by Darcie Wilde
Second and third installment of a Regency Mystery series started in the last post.

64) A life on our planet by David Attenborough
Biodiversity is falling, if we don't fix it the result will be catastrophic, here's what to do to fix it, here are a few thing we are already fixing. My kind of book. Thanks for the book bullet.

65) Beautiful News: Positive Trends, Uplifting Stats, Creative Solutions by David McCandless
Interesting concept. The book is made up of infographics: charts, graphs, posters, etc.

67) Lumara by Melissa Landers
YA Fantasy. Darker than I might like, but well put together and compelling.

68) Surrounded by Idiots: The Four Types of Human Behavior and How to Effectively Communicate with Each in Business (and in Life) by Thomas Erikson
Described four 'types', and explains how to communicate with them. Admits that most people are a mix of these types.
Does not explain how to figure out which communication advice to follow when dealing with mixed types. (Try one and if it isn't working switch to the other?)

69) Right Ho, Jeeves by P. G. Wodehouse
Everyone already knows who Jeeves is, right?

MANGA
My Dress-Up Darling Vol. https://www.librarything.com/author/mccandlessdavid

12LShelby
Muokkaaja: maaliskuu 25, 2023, 1:05 pm

70) Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure, by Diane Kelly
Mystery with an IRS special agent as the protagonist. I loved the IRS parts. I wasn't as into her angsting over the dangers of her job, her relationship, or her obsession with fashion/materialism. I might try the next one.

71) The Price of Tomorrow: Why Deflation is the Key to an Abundant Future by Jeff Booth
Non-fiction. Called the economy we are currently living in a "Ponzi" economy, which amused me. The book made me think. I appreciate that in a book.

Day by Day by the Kollin Bros
This is a speculative fiction short work with an interesting premise, but I'm not so sure I enjoyed it much.

72) Mutiny on the Omaha by Don Holman
The author is my uncle. My son claims that the genre is "Engineering slice of life", but technically it's Science Fiction.

73) The monsters we defy by Leslye Penelope (LT Author)
Historical Fantasy, with a voodoo flavor, set in Washington in the thirties? The magic held together well, and the story was engaging. It is set pretty much entirely within the Black community, I think the only non-Black character who showed up "on screen" was a ghost.

74) Index, A History of the by Dennis Duncan
Non-fiction. An astonishingly lively history of book indexes.

75) The Ghost Who Was Says I Do by Bobbi Holmes
76) The Ghost and the Baby by Bobbi Holmes
77) The Ghost and the Christmas Spirit by Bobbi Holmes
Books 20-22 of the Haunting Danielle mystery series.

13pamelad
joulukuu 31, 2023, 3:21 pm

Hi Shel, here's the 2024 group: Here is the 2024 group: https://www.librarything.com/ngroups/24197/100-Books-in-2024-Challenge

Happy New Year!