All things Books and Reading thread - 2017

[Mamanyt1953]

 
Gosh, I wish we lived closer; I have all the DMD/Goldy books in the series, except for Whole Enchilada, and you'd be more than welcome to borrow them to read. I've tried some of the recipes and they're not bad. I have a lot of the Joanne Fluke series, too; some of the cookie recipes are pretty good. She also has a cookbook out; I borrowed it from the library one time, but didn't buy it. I think it's called The Lake Eden Cookbook and it has "Hannah's" cookie recipes. 

I've read some of the Joe Gray books; I didn't buy any.

>SNIP<

And I would borrow them, too!  Although that wouldn't stop me from buying them later.  If I really love a book, I want it all for my very own to read over and over and over again.

WELL SPIT SPIT SPIT SPIT SPIT!  Now there;s ANOTHER series I want!  The Pennsylvania Dutch Mystery.  Our heroine, Magdalena Yoder, is a Mennonite woman of "a certain age."  She owns a B&B in (brace yourself) Hernia, PA, and is also the mayor of said town.  I am currently reading Grape Expectations.  I have grinned and giggled almost continuously since beginning this book, and have laughed out loud at LEAST 4 times.  Yes, there are recipes.  And, as the title suggest, they are made with grape juice, grape jam, or both.  I'm not a huge fan of grape flavors (although I love red grapes), but at least three of the recipes will be tried!  If the titles of the books are indications of the recipes within, I'm especially looking forward to "Custard's Last Stand," "Hell Hath No Curry," and "Batter Off Dead."

If any of you like mysteries like I do, I HIGHLY recomment the Cozy Mystery Blog and website.  It lists "cozy" mysteries by both author and type.  There is a HUGE selection of series based on cats!

 

[Mia6]

Just finished In a Dark Dark Wood...so suspenseful..read the hard copy. On to The Woman in Cabin 10, also hard copy.

I have about 20 downloaded on my Kindle. Love Kindle Unlimited, so worth it.

 

[Winchester]

 
And I would borrow them, too!  Although that wouldn't stop me from buying them later.  If I really love a book, I want it all for my very own to read over and over and over again.

WELL SPIT SPIT SPIT SPIT SPIT!  Now there;s ANOTHER series I want!  The Pennsylvania Dutch Mystery.  Our heroine, Magdalena Yoder, is a Mennonite woman of "a certain age."  She owns a B&B in (brace yourself) Hernia, PA, and is also the mayor of said town.  I am currently reading Grape Expectations.  I have grinned and giggled almost continuously since beginning this book, and have laughed out loud at LEAST 4 times.  Yes, there are recipes.  And, as the title suggest, they are made with grape juice, grape jam, or both.  I'm not a huge fan of grape flavors (although I love red grapes), but at least three of the recipes will be tried!  If the titles of the books are indications of the recipes within, I'm especially looking forward to "Custard's Last Stand," "Hell Hath No Curry," and "Batter Off Dead."

If any of you like mysteries like I do, I HIGHLY recomment the Cozy Mystery Blog and website.  It lists "cozy" mysteries by both author and type.  There is a HUGE selection of series based on cats!

Those Magdalena books are hilarious; I think I've read them all. But I can only take them maybe one book at a time, then I have to switch over to something else; otherwise they can get on my nerves. I love the Cozy Mystery site.

 

[foxxycat]

I just finished that dog story-the green cover one.The dog who saved me. It was kind of slow in the beginning but once it got into the various conflicts of the son and his brother-then the dog- the dog was the connection to his dad who wasn't the best father but the dog loves him. The dog didn't warm up to the son for awhile but he slept outside in a sleeping back and fed him meat to earn his trust..took a month or more. It was a very interesting story and I highly recommend it. I still didn't finish that cat one I started reading. Got to get back into reading for sure.

 

[Mia6]

Is this fiction or non-fiction?

 

[Mia6]

 
I just finished that dog story-the green cover one.The dog who saved me. It was kind of slow in the beginning but once it got into the various conflicts of the son and his brother-then the dog- the dog was the connection to his dad who wasn't the best father but the dog loves him. The dog didn't warm up to the son for awhile but he slept outside in a sleeping back and fed him meat to earn his trust..took a month or more. It was a very interesting story and I highly recommend it. I still didn't finish that cat one I started reading. Got to get back into reading for sure.

fiction or non-fiction?

 

[Mia6]

 
I didn't realize we could borrow ebooks from the library!! I just emailed the library asking them to send me my number as I lost my card.

I am still working on that doggie book. I am also gonna read that link you gals gave yesterday. I gave up on 1984-I don't like the typeset=going to see if I can get it from the library=it was annoying reading on the desk top. but I will try again later.

Now if we could get Tallyp to get her Magic Egg book published on Amazon! I bet lots of people will want to read it!!! 

just started a cat called alfie on amazon cloud--I LOVE IT! already 2 chapters into it!

I use Overdrive and it's great. There are long waits for the newer more popular books. I am allowed to borrow 10 at a time.

 

[foxxycat]

 

 
I just finished that dog story-the green cover one.The dog who saved me. It was kind of slow in the beginning but once it got into the various conflicts of the son and his brother-then the dog- the dog was the connection to his dad who wasn't the best father but the dog loves him. The dog didn't warm up to the son for awhile but he slept outside in a sleeping back and fed him meat to earn his trust..took a month or more. It was a very interesting story and I highly recommend it. I still didn't finish that cat one I started reading. Got to get back into reading for sure.

fiction or non-fiction?

I think fiction.

 

[jcat]

I've just finished five Bookmobile Cat mysteries by Laura Cass, the first two Magical Bookshop mysteries by Amanda Flower,
Telling Tails (Second Chance Cat Mystery) by Sofie Ryan, books #4 and #5 of the Cold River series by Enes Smith, the latest Longmire book by Craig Johnson (An Obvious Fact), and a couple of true crime accounts: Wages of Sin by Suzy Spencer, Psycho USA: Famous American Killers You Never Heard Of by Harold Schechter, Cold Kill: The True Story of a Murderous Love by Jack Olsen, Sharon Tate and the Manson Murders by Greg King, A Very Private Woman: The Life and Unsolved Murder of Presidential Mistress Mary Meyer by Nina Burleigh, and
Devil in The Darkness: True Story of Serial Killer ISRAEL KEYES by J.T. Hunter

 

[Mamanyt1953]

I've just finished five Bookmobile Cat mysteries by Laura Cass, the first two Magical Bookshop mysteries by Amanda Flower,
Telling Tails (Second Chance Cat Mystery) by Sofie Ryan, books #4 and #5 of the Cold River series by Enes Smith, the latest Longmire book by Craig Johnson (An Obvious Fact), and a couple of true crime accounts: Wages of Sin by Suzy Spencer, Psycho USA: Famous American Killers You Never Heard Of by Harold Schechter, Cold Kill: The True Story of a Murderous Love by Jack Olsen, Sharon Tate and the Manson Murders by Greg King, A Very Private Woman: The Life and Unsolved Murder of Presidential Mistress Mary Meyer by Nina Burleigh, and
Devil in The Darkness: True Story of Serial Killer ISRAEL KEYES by J.T. Hunter

~grumbles softly to self and adds the Magical Bookshop series to the ever-growing list~

I just ordered Bookmobile Cat #s 2, 4, and 5.  I have 1 & 3.  Not sure where I'm going next, but I might wander back to Alice Hofman or Charles DeLint.  Just for a change.

 

[Winchester]

 
I use Overdrive and it's great. There are long waits for the newer more popular books. I am allowed to borrow 10 at a time.

Ten? Ten? Ten books at a time? That's not funny. Around here, we are only allowed five at a time. Think what I could do with ten books! 

 

[Mia6]

Yes it is really nice. I can jump from one to another. if i like.

 

[rubysmama]

 
I use Overdrive and it's great. There are long waits for the newer more popular books. I am allowed to borrow 10 at a time.

 
Ten? Ten? Ten books at a time? That's not funny. Around here, we are only allowed five at a time. Think what I could do with ten books! 

I just checked and my library lets us borrow 20, yes twenty, e-books at a time. But you can only borrow them for a maximum of 21 days, and if there are other people waiting for them, you can't renew after 21 days, but have to put it back on hold if you're not finished reading, so 20 is way too many for me to borrow at one time. Right now I have 3 borrowed and am only reading the first one, so I'll never finish all 3 before they expire.

We can also put 30 e-books on hold at a time. I try to manage the wait time by suspending the holds once they get to close to being available, but sometimes they come up quicker than expected, and if I'm not ready to start reading them, I end up having to go back to the end of the line again.

 

[Winchester]

Oh wow. I am so jealous. 20 books. Like I said, I can only borrow five at a time and I can only put 5 books on hold at a time, too. And I can keep them for a maximum of 14 days. That's never been a problem as I can read pretty fast. I really wish I could borrow more than 5 and I really wish I could put more than 5 books on hold, too.

If I actually go into the library, I can take out as many books as I want. But ebooks are different. 

 

[catspaw66]

The last time I checked, my local library had no ebooks.

 

[Kat0121]

The last time I checked, my local library had no ebooks.

Bookbub.com has a lot of free ebooks in many different genres

 

[catspaw66]

Oh, I have no lack of sources. Just wanted to show how far behind this town is.

 

[Mamanyt1953]

STILL haven't made the jump to ebooks.  I can get a reader free, but...I keep forgetting, to tell the truth.  I need to have one, just 'cause, but there is just something about the heft of a real book, the turning of the page, that is emotionally satisfying to me.  It's a bit like the difference between actually visiting a friend as opposed to skyping with them.  Maybe if I had a tablet that would fit in my bag it would be more immediately useful to me.

Reading a couple of the Death on Demand mystery series.  They are interesting and clever, and I quite like Annie, who own Death on Demand Mystery Bookstore, AND I like her cats, but they aren't captivating me to the point of adding them to the "I gotta collect those" list.  I shall enjoy them, and pass them on!

 

[catspaw66]

I have 3 different models of nook e-readers/tablets, but my Kindle Fire is my go-to device. For just reading a Paperwhite would be perfect but I like to stream Classical music while I read.

 

[Winchester]

 
STILL haven't made the jump to ebooks.  I can get a reader free, but...I keep forgetting, to tell the truth.  I need to have one, just 'cause, but there is just something about the heft of a real book, the turning of the page, that is emotionally satisfying to me.  It's a bit like the difference between actually visiting a friend as opposed to skyping with them.  Maybe if I had a tablet that would fit in my bag it would be more immediately useful to me.

I like actual books, too. But I'm at the age where it's getting harder for me to see really fine print, especially at night if I'm sacked-out in bed with a light on. Some fonts are easier to read than others and some books have better line-spacing than others, and that has started to bother me, too. What's nice about tablets is that you can adjust the brightness, so that, if it's dark in the bedroom, you can decrease the brightness of the reader accordingly. If you can't read a certain font, it's not a problem because you can adjust the font, the line-spacing and even font size. It just makes it nicer for older folks (like me!), who are starting to have some problems reading regular print.

Tablets aren't really all that big and, in most cases, they're probably about as big as a regular hard-backed book. If you can fit a hard-cover book in your bag (even if you have it in a protective cover), you could likely fit a tablet in there, too, I'm thinking. The large Ipad Pro might be the largest at 12+ inches, but I'm not sure. I bring both my iPad Air 2 and my Nook with me to work in my bag, but my work bag is pretty big. But I can carry either the iPad or the Nook in my regular purses, so one or the other goes with me to doctor and dentist appointments, the hair salon, and the like.

I don't have any kind of Kindle, but the people who do have them really seem to like them. I started out with a Nook and have stuck with it. I like having the Kindle app on my Nook; it's the best of both worlds for me. I can download free Barnes and Noble books as well as Kindle books on the Nook. I use the Overdrive App to download library ebooks on my iPad. I'm sure that, if you have a Kindle, you could download a B & N App and do the same thing with B & N ebooks.

The not-so-great part of an ereader? It seems that whenever I'm down to the last chapter or so of the book I'm reading, I'm really engrossed in the book. And I get a "12% battery charge left. Plug in your Ipad!" Oh crap, crap, crap. 

 So I switch between different books on different devices sometimes. And they both get charged every night, along with my phone.