March RandomKIT - Water, water everywhere

Water is the world’s most precious resource. It’s all around us, and our entire planet relies on water for the basic functions of life.

The challenge is to read a book that has some connection to water: it might be set on an island, or feature a voyage, a seaside or lakeside vacation, a river, rain, floods, or water sports. Or, a book with any water-related word in the title.

Rain:

Summerwater by Sarah Moss

Rain dogs by Adrian McKinty
Islands:

And then there were none by Agatha Christie

Devil-devil by Graeme Kent

The glass hotel by Emily St.John Mandel

Don’t stop the carnival by Herman Wouk

Al Capone does my homework by Gennifer Choldenko
Seaside, Beach:

Eustace and Hilda by L.P. Hartley

Now is the hour by Hilary Green

The shape of water by Andrea Camilleri
Voyages:

The Kon-Tiki expedition by Thor Heyerdahl

The voyage out by Virginia Woolf

Murder on the Lusitania by Conrad Allen

Full circle by Michael Palin

Sailing the wine-dark sea: why the Greeks matter by Thomas Cahill
Lakes:

Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner

Don’t cry, Tai Lake by Qiu Xiaolong

The wolf border by Sarah Hall
Rivers:

Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie

Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald

Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch

River of smoke by Amitov Ghosh

Whiplash river by Lou Berney

“Thousands have lived without love. Not one without water.” — H. Auden

“Once, during Prohibition, I was forced to live for days on nothing but food and water.” — W.C. Fields

“It’s a strange world of language in which skating on thin ice can get you into hot water.” — Franklin P. Jones

Have fun! And don’t forget to add your reading to the wiki

Oh, this is a wonderful topic! I'll make up my mind at the last minute, I'm afraid. So much to choose from!

My book club choice for March is Sea People: In Search of the Ancient Navigators of the Pacific by Christina Thompson.

Two other possibilities are: Islander by Patrick Barkham and The Roman Empire and the Indian Ocean by Raoul McLaughlin

I don't know how watery Amongst Our Weapons by Ben Aaronovitch is, but it is part of the Rivers of London series.

I think my choice for this will be Where the River Ends by Charles Martin.

If I can find it (we are currently in the middle of a big kitchen refurb, so we have items from the kitchen all over the house, including in front of many bookshelves, making them hard to reach) my first choice for this month would be Isle of Rust by Alex Boyd (about Lewis and Harris in the Outer Hebrides). If it stays hidden, then my next choice is also Outer Hebridean, Derek Cooper's The Road to Mingulay.

I'm determined to read The Lighthouse Stevensons by Bella Bathurst. I've had it out from the library for a while. And you can't have a lighthouse without water, right?

Among fiction the two oldest in the TBR shelves are: The Scent of Water by Elizabeth Goudge (2014) and The Season of Water by Dawn Tripp (2016), so I'll read at least one of those. Both are 4* reads on LT.

>6 kac522: Oh, I have that on my Kindle too!

>7 clue: - I remember finding The Scent of Water on one of the bookshelves when I was pretty young (maybe young teenager?). I loved it so much, I would make a point of reading it every year. I still have it. Maybe I'll read it again.

From a cursory glance through my TBR, I come up with Salt to the Sea, which is tagged "ships" and "shipwrecks", so one can assume. I also have Along the Broken Bay which is a WWII work of historical fiction set in the Philippines.

Great theme - and the perfect opportunity for me to read Life on the Mississippi: An Epic American Adventure by Rinker Buck.

>10 DeltaQueen50: I'll be interested to see what you think, I have it on my list but don't own it. If I decide I want adventure travel on the Mississippi after I've read it, I can be there in an afternooon.

>11 clue: I previously read Buck's book about traveling the Oregon Trail and found it really good with lots of humor. I am hoping for the same from this one.

You must be a mind reader! Just yesterday I was browsing my bookshelves and picked up Too Much of Water. I also downloaded a copy of Death at the Frost Fair so either of them would work.

It's good to hear of the variety of books being read for this category.

I'm planning to read Stone Rain by Linwood Barclay and Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. If there is time I might try one of the Shetland series by Ann Cleeves.

>6 kac522: I've read that. It was pretty good.

I'll throw Rain : four walks in English weather into the possibles list. There is something about walking in rain.

I've pulled out Gideon's River, by J.J. Marric, for this challenge.

I'm going to plan on reading The Same Dark Water As You by Chad Lutzke.

Some options for me:

- Not a Drop to Drink / Mindy McGinnis
- The Lake of Dreams / Kim Edwards
- The Johnstown Flood / David McCullough

>18 LibraryCin: Loved The Johnstown Flood; but them McCullough can do no wrong in my book. The photos in that book were pretty amazing, too.

I am trying to read books that have been on my shelves for at least a year, and I discovered Jerry of the Islands, a gift last year from a fellow LTer!

Onto my list it goes.

I am in the middle of Water Weed which is a graphic novel in the Rivers of London series. I hope I finish it before March! The RoL audiobooks, mostly read by Kobna Holdbrook-Smith are so good! I am not a fan of books that are set on boats or totally underwater, but if they are part of a series, I will make an exception, like with The Atlantis Complex. I am stuck in the Outlander series because I know the #3 has Claire and Jamie trapped on different boats most of the time. I should just skip it and get on to #4.

Other options for me:
Fathomless - Jackson Pearce
The Cursed Sea - Lauren DeStefano

Great topic! Rain Dogs is next up for me.

Well, isn't this just perfect for me! My RL book club selection for March is Properties of Thirst.

I will be reading Tana French's Broken Harbor. It's been on my shelves for a long time, and I have loved all her books so far. Hoping the streak holds :)

>24 beach85: Oh! I have that one on my Kindle TBR...perhaps I can fit in two for this month.

>25 beebeereads: By all means try to squeeze it in. I am more than halfway through, and it is SO good. She never disappoints!

I've already finished my book Where the River Ends by Charles Martin. Started it yesterday and couldn't stop reading.

I finished Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson.
A fabulous, exciting story. My favourite characters were Ben Gunn and Long John Silver but the parrot repeatedly squawking "pieces of eight" was memorable. Said to be a boy's adventure book but I enjoyed it as much as any adventure-seeking boy. I listened to the audiobook narrated by Albert Molina who did an outstanding job.

I have completed Life on the Mississippi: An Epic American Adventure by Rinker Buck. While I enjoyed his previous book about traveling west in a covered wagon a little more than this one, it was still an great way to learn about the history of both the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers as I joined him and his crew in navigating these rivers today.

I have finished Properties of Thirst...an outstanding read! Highly recommend.

https://www.librarything.com/topic/347793#8086415

I've finished And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie, 4*.

I just read "The Voyage," a short story by Katherine Mansfield, in which a young girl and her grandmother ride on a picton boat in New Zealand, going between the girl's home and her grandmother's.

I've finished The Scent of Water by Elizabeth Goudge. Written in 1963, it follows Mary Lindsay, a lifelong city dweller and successful businesswoman when she moves to a manor she has inherited in a small village. Characters range from small children to the very elderly and a spiritual thread runs through it. By what I see on Amazon, fifty years after publication it's still popular.

I finished Summerlong by Peter S. Beagle, a quiet sort of fantasy set mostly on an island in Puget Sound near Seattle. I like the way Beagle writes, and it was an oddly and accidentally perfect choice for the unusually early warm weather we've been having where I live.

Finished The Same Deep Water as You by Chad Lutzke. Full review written, though I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about it.

Finished child of a hidden sea. Portal fantasy mostly taking place on an earth-analogous planet of mainly seas where government and jurisdiction is managed by a huge fleet policing the open seas connecting far flung small island nations with very different rules and cultures.

The Last Dreamwalker is partially set on and entirely centered around a family's legacy on an island off the South Carolina coast.

I had my book, Death on the Nile, when I did a Nile cruise last year. Maybe I will re-read.
Thanks for the laugh from W. C. Fields.

I'm claiming Five on a Treasure Island for this. The island is, obviously, surrounded by water and they spend quite a lot of time in it, on it, getting soaked by it etc.

I read The Cat Who Went Up a Creek by Lilian Jackson Braun

Two for me so far.

The Girl from the Sea by Molly Knox Ostertag


A River Enchanted by Rebecca Ross

Stone Rain by Linwood Barclay
One of Barclay's typical page-turner mysteries that sparkles with humour. Yes, it was far-fetched but highly entertaining. Newspaper reporter, Zack Walker tries to help a friend who happens to be a dominatrix, but he runs into trouble and then just keeps getting in deeper, and deeper. I loved the episode where he was demoted to the Home! section of the paper. Barclay is one of my favourite authors but he got points off for a couple of executions that did nothing for the plot otherwise this could have been a five-star read.

I finished Rain Dogs. I'm going to control myself and not dive into the next book.

COMPLETED Sea People by Christina Thompson about Europeans' evolving ideas of how the indigenous people explored and travelled in Polynesia.

Starting Taken At The Flood by Agatha Christie. I suspect the only watery element is the title, but that still counts, doesn't it?

I finished Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch. To my surprise, the rivers really do play a role in the novel, as does the folklore surrounding them.

>45 MissBrangwen: I love that series!

April's thread is up: https://www.librarything.com/topic/349417

I finished Isle of Rust, a photographic portrait of the islands of Lewis and Harris in the Outer Hebrides, focusing on the mechanical and industrial detritus which is gradually being absorbed and reclaimed into the landscape. I loved the photos, but was really disappointed with the essay by Jonathan Meades, which was angry and cynical and arch. 3.5/5.

I finished Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy, about a woman who boards a fishing vessel to follow the migration of terns in a near-future world where most animal species are going extinct.

I'm currently reading North Water by Ian McGuire, a historical thriller set on board a whaling ship in 1859.

I finished The Lighthouse Stevensons by Bella Bathurst (1999), a history of 4 generations and 150 years of the family of builders and maintainers of nearly 100 lighthouses along the coasts of Scotland. (Robert Louis Stevenson was part of this family, but he decided against the career of his ancestors.) The book was well-written and a great character study of the Stevenson men, but it had no footnotes, no attributions for the many quotes and illustrations, and many typos. A good read, but would be a frustrating resource for a serious researcher.

I have finished Der Tote am Hindenburgdamm, a historical mystery set on the island of Sylt in the year 1923 when hyperinflation was rampant. The building of the railway dam to connect the island with the coast plays a very small part in this, alas.

I read The High House by Jessie Greengrass, which takes place by the sea, including many scenes on the beach, and also features the topic of flooding due to climate change.

I just read The Setup by Lizzy Dent, which is set in a British seaside town. Most of the main characters are trying to save a historic beachside pool/resort/community center.

Edited: I originally (incorrectly) said the author was Angie Hockman.

Well, I think I am not going to read my choice after all, Jerry of the Islands. It's about a terrier who is given to a ship captain who ferries "workers/slaves" from island to island, circa 1900. My problem is that the local headhunters (and cannibals) might be horrible people, but everyone in the story calls them N****s (rhymes with chiggers) and after a couple chapters I am done.

>54 fuzzi: Bummer! I can see how that would grate on a person soon. I hope you can find something else you like better.

I read Raven Black by Ann Cleeves. Like >54 fuzzi:'s choice, this was not to my taste: a teenage girl murdered, mentally slow recluse suspected (and mistreated).

There is less than a week left in the month! I'm not sure I'll get to this one before then, but if not, it will be early in April instead.

I have finished Das verschwundene Fräulein, a historical mystery set on the Frisian island of Norderney on the eve of WWI. The showdown takes place on a wrecked ship in bad weather.

>45 MissBrangwen: For March, I read one of the graphic novels in the Rivers of London series: Deadly Ever After and realized I have skipped Monday, Monday. Luckily the graphic novels aren't always in strict chronological order.

I completed Island Beneath the Sea by Isabel Allende which took place on two islands: Haiti and Cuba. The title refers to the place where the voodooists go after death.

Just started mine today, but I will not likely finish tomorrow!

I am reading The Stranger in the Lifeboat by Mitch Albom. It is about people stranded on a lifeboat in the ocean after a shipwreck. Nothing but water, water everwhere.

The Johnstown Flood / David McCullough
2.5 stars

In 1889, Johnstown, Pennsylvania’s dam broke and the town was flooded. The town had flooded many times before, but it was nothing like this. Over 2000 people lost their lives. Turns out the dam wasn’t maintained nor repaired properly.

Sounds like an interesting story, but it just couldn’t keep my attention. Much of the book was just not that interesting to me, especially before the flood hit and after. The flood itself and people’s stories of what happened during was a bit better, but not great. I have read one other book by this author and it seems I was underwhelmed reading it, too; that one, I listened to and wasn’t sure if it was the writing or the topic, but I’m thinking it’s the author’s writing style that just isn’t for me. There were photos included, and I have to say those were pretty impressive, pretty scary. The photo that might stick with me is one of all the debris smashed up against a bridge.

Thanks to everyone who participated in March. It was fun to follow everyone's reading choices.