Monday 17 August 2015

It's Monday! Remember me?

The best laid plans....

Last weekend I thought life was settling down and returning to normal after 'THE MOVE'. I didn't factor in getting sick though.

I've spent the last week feeling sorry for myself (& sleeping non-stop) as I've battled some kind of lingering winter throaty, chesty lurgy.

Thankfully I had scheduled a few posts to tide me over during the 'moving' weeks so that I didn't drop off the radar completely.
But now it's time to reclaim this blogging life.
What better way to get back into the groove than with Sheila's meme It's Monday! What Are You Reading? (The good news being that Sheila hopes to resume hosting IMWAYR in September.)

What have I been reading these past few weeks?

Last weekend I finally finished Gone With the Wind with much love and admiration in my heart for this classic epic story. My final review post is a 'work in progress'.

Last night I finished my reread of Emma for Austen in August and now feel at a bit of a loss as to what to read next.

I have Remarkably Jane by Jennifer Adams to tempt me...
The wit of Jane Austen has for partner the perfection of her taste.
Virginia Woolf, 1925
It wasn't really me that everyone went crazy about--it was the character [Fitzwilliam Darcy], who'd been around for a couple of centuries.
Colin Firth, 1997 
Every time I read Pride and Prejudice I want to dig her up and hit her over the skull with her own shin-bone.
Mark Twain, 1898 
For those of us who suspect all the mysteries of life are contained in the microcosm of the family, that personal relationships prefigure all else, the work of Jane Austen is the Rosetta stone of literature.
Anna Quindlen, 1995

Or perhaps I will dip into an AARC (yes, an advance, advance reading copy due for release in January next year) that came my way last week, Lady Helen and the Dark Days Club by Aussie #LoveOzYA writer Alison Goodman....

New York Times bestseller Alison Goodman’s eagerly awaited new project: a Regency adventure starring a stylish and intrepid demon-hunter!

London, April 1812. On the eve of eighteen-year-old Lady Helen Wrexhall’s presentation to the queen, one of her family’s housemaids disappears-and Helen is drawn into the shadows of Regency London. There, she meets Lord Carlston, one of the few who can stop the perpetrators: a cabal of demons infiltrating every level of society. Dare she ask for his help, when his reputation is almost as black as his lingering eyes? And will her intelligence and headstrong curiosity wind up leading them into a death trap?
My copy is so advanced, the final cover art has not been decided. Personally, I hope they pick the dark cover; the pink one brings to mind a bodice-ripper story!

I also have several books left-over from previous It's Monday! posts that I've dipped into over the past few months but have not yet finished. The inevitable chaos and distraction that moving house creates explains my ridiculously long goodreads 'currently reading' panel!

The only blogging effort I've managed to complete this past week is my bi-monthly roundup post for the Australian Women Writer's challenge (here).

What have you been up to lately and what will you be reading this week?

Twitter #IMWAYR

8 comments:

  1. Welcome back! Can you believe I'm still working on Gone With the Wind too? I have under 200 pages to go and love it to death. I will be starting Northanger Abbey this week for Austen in August.

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    1. It won't take you long to finish it now :-)

      Northanger is probably my least favourite Austen, but there was a fabulous BBC production back in the 80's with Peter Firth in it. It's worth tracking down.

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  2. Anonymous18/8/15

    I'm happy to see you got over the double-whammy: moving AND getting sick. I'm looking forward to your GWTW wrap-up. As for what to read after Emma? Let's see, Persuasion, Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility. ;) I always fall into a little hole after reading Austen, so I have no other suggestions.

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    1. Ba ha ha!!
      I reread S&S for last years AinA.
      Mansfield Park the year before that, Persuasion the year before that....and you guessed it, P&P the year before that! My little Regency YA fantasy novel (above) seems to be filling the hole right now.

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  3. I love that quote from Quindlen. Rereading Emma was such a delight. It really does make you pause before you can pick out a new book after reading something that good.

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  4. So is your move done? Sounds epic. I just finished a novel called My Sunshine Away which I'm gathering thoughts on to review. Good job with Austen and GWTW.

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    1. Yes! The move is done, but there's still some unpacking and rearranging to do at our leisure :-)
      I'm hoping to have some blogging time this w/e to catch up on what everyone else has been up to.

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  5. Congrats on finishing the move! And glad to know you are getting over that winter illness. Surely the stress of moving had something to do with it. Welcome back!

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