deinonychus_1 | Entries tagged with book bingo

Much belated book reviews (considering I read the first one on January 1st!).

( three reviews behind the cut )

Possibly I was having a moment of madness, but I have decided to sign up for

ljbookbingo this year. I have no illusions that I will get a blackout, but I think I'm mostly hoping it will encourage me to read more, and to read more widely than just crime novels and popular science non-fiction, which was apparently the theme for last year.

The aim is to read books where the title starts with each letter (not counting 'A' or 'The', although if you want to use something starting with those to fill the A or T square you can). There are three free squares that can be substituted in for letters that you really can't find a book to fill.

A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
H. The Heron's Cry, by Ann Cleeves. Started 1/1/22 - finished 1/1/22
I.
J.
K.
L.
M.
N.
O.
P.
Q.
R.
S. Six Degrees - Our Future on a Hotter Planet, by Mark Lynas. Started 15/1/22 - finished 19/1/22
T.
U, The Unihabitable Earth - A Story of the Future, by David Wallace-Wells. Started 19/1/22 - finished 27/1/22
V.
W.
X.
Y.
Z.

So, my plan to post to lj more regularly doesn't seem to have happened recently. I ought to get round to doing a general update post before too long, but for now this is mainly aimed at the book bingo gang, because I'm looking for book recs. Specifically crime novels with more of a focus on the forensics side of things, and/or cold case crime fiction.

( more specific stuff behind the cut )

So, I'm massively behind on book reviews for lj book bingo this year, but here are three more in an attempt to get vaguely up to date before the end of the year. Still no bingo, although I can see at least two lines which are only one square away from a bingo if I can just fill it in the next month and half!

( reviews behind the cut )

I'm back, hopefully a bit more regularly now I'm getting used to the no-longer-very-new tablet! (Still stuggling a bit with copying and pasting, which is making a lot of html very difficult, because to be honest my usual method of posting lj posts is to copy and paste the relevant html from a previous post. Actually having to manually type it out is getting a bit faffy!). Anyway, I'm having a couple of days off after a lovely weekend away with

fififolle and

clea2011, although I'm back to work tomorrow, so thought I should take the opportunity to update my reading list and post another couple of reviews. The sad thing is I've had these two reviews written for a couple of months I just haven't been online enough to actually post them.

( review behind the cut )

Hello! I'm alive, I do still exist!

Sorry I've been pretty much absent lately. I've been watching lots of TV, and reading lots of books (I have about five book bingo reviews handwritten and good to post!) but mostly it's because my laptop is so old and cranky that I've reached the stage of not wanting to turn it on unless I know I'm going to be online for a couple of hours, because it takes so long to start up it's no longer worth it for short periods. However, I'm now on a mission to buy myself a tablet, so hopefully should be around a bit more in a week or so, once I've got that sorted. (I've been asking round my friends for recommendations, I'm hoping I can get some advice from you at the weekend, please, Fifi and Clea?).

Anyway, I won't post all the book reviews at once, but here's the first two. I'll stagger posting the others over the next week or so.

( review behind the cut )

I've finished my first book of 2019, so here's the first book review of the year.

( review behind the cut )

I'm doing

ljbookbingo again in 2019. \o/

I just about scraped a blackout in on the very last day of 2018, so it would be nice to manage it with a bit more room to spare this time round. But mostly I'm just looking forward to reading lots of interesting and entertaining books in 2019.

In 2017 I read 28 books, in 2018 I read 33, so for 2019 I'm setting a vague 'target' of 40, but I'm not putting myself under any pressure - it's supposed to be fun, after all!

( 2019 card behind the cut )

Woohoo! I did it! I read an entire book last night and have now got a blackout on my book bingo card! *does little happy dance*.

On Friday evening I have to admit I didn't think I would manage a blackout, I still had two and a half squares to fill at that point. But, largely thanks to managing to get my hands on two *very* short books for the final two squares, and two *very* late nights reading in bed, I've done it. And with a day to spare as well!

So, one last book review.

( review behind the cut )

I hope everyone had a very merry Christmas, and didn't eat too much food (I did! I was at my parents' for Christmas, and sometimes I think my mum still thinks I live like a student and need feeding up every time I go to visit!). I'll try to have a catch-up on everyone's recent posts in the next day or two, I've not been online since the Thursday before Christmas, so I'm way behind!

Anyway, another thing I'm way behind on is book bingo reviews. As of today, I have filled 24 squares, and am *one* squares away from a blackout. The deadline is midnight on the 31st, right? I've still got time... maybe.

( reviews behind the cut )

I have another bingo! Four corners and the centre square, to be exact.

I'm now up to 28 books read in total this year (2018 reading list), and only need to fill another 6 squares on the bingo to get a blackout. But with only two months left I might be cutting it fine! Meep!

But anyway, on with the latest book reviews.

( reviews behind the cut )

I have a bingo! Actually, I had a bingo about two weekends ago, but I've only just got round to doing a post. I'm now up to 16 squares filled, and only 9 to go. I'd like a blackout, and I've got a pile of books planned for filling most of the remaining 9, but whether I'll manage it before the end of the year is another matter.

The actual number of books that I've read in total this year is actually 25 (according to my 2018 reading list), but of course not all of these have fitted bingo squares. If they *had* I would have had a blackout already :-)

Anyway, on with the book reviews.

( reviews behind the cut )

I'm up to 14 completed books this year now, although only 10 of them are filling bingo squares. However, I've just filled the 'number or colour in the title' square, which means I am one square away from a straight line bingo, so if I'm being at all competitive, my next book ought to be for the biography/autobiography square.

But for now, I have two more book reviews, which I appreciate are probably a niche market because they're about homosexuality in ancient Greece, and bronze age archaeology. You know how I said in my last review that a book about early medieval English history was out of my comfort zone? These two subject are very definitely right in my area of interest.

( reviews behind the cut )

Time for a book bingo update! I've now filled 9 squares on my book bingo card, although still no sign of a bingo. However, I now have something of a backlog of book reviews pending, so here are a few for the non-fiction books I've been reading over the last few months.

( reviews behind the cut )

And here's the second of my book review posts for this year. I'm still reading the great big academic thing (for anyone who's interested, it's about homosexuality in ancient Greece, so admittedly a bit of a niche interest, but I'm enjoying it, it's just heavy going in places), but in between I've polished off the other two Strike novels from Robert Galbraith, with quite good timing since I'm now seeing adverts for the next TV adaptation coming soon.

So, reviews!

( reviews behind the cut )

Not even the end of January and I've already finished two books, and am reading another two (one is a bloody huge weighty academic tome, so I'm multi-tasking and reading a quick-read fiction at the same time).

But since I'm claiming two bingo squares for my first two books of the year, I felt I ought to do a quick review.

( reviews behind the cut )