What Are You Reading in May 2010

Starting off the new month, I finished Kingdom of the Golden Dragon, which was a charmer. I'll look for the other two in the trilogy.

I'm just a ways into I Am the Messenger, in what is quite a different story by the author of The Book Thief.

Over the weekend I read two books:

Before I Fall By Lauren Oliver
It has the same concept of the movie Groundhog Day - living the same day over and over. Quite good.

Going Bovine by Libba Bray
Excellent book but reminded me strongly of American Gods by Neil Gaiman which I liked better. Made me want to read Don Quixote though!

I'm now starting Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

I'm finally reading The Knife of Never Letting Go.

And I'm finally reading Life As We Knew It. It's been on my TBR pile for well over a year!

#1 I really enjoyed I Am the Messenger and also liked Fighting Ruben Wolfe. Both were well written and very different.

This isn't quite YA, but I'm reading The Curse of the Pharoahs by Elizabeth Peters. I'm loving me some Amelia Peabody -- the way she acts and describes her antics are hilariously entertaining.

>5 whymaggiemay: whymaggiemay I also really enjoyed I Am the Messenger - boy, does Markus Zusak look young in the photo in the back of my book! I was also struck by how different this one was from The Book Thief. I'll have to look for Fighting Ruben Wolfe.

I've now started First Light by Rebecca Stead.

Edited for touchstones.

I just finished Voices of Dragons and now I'm reading Frostbite

Right now I'm reading Guardian of the dead by Karen Healey

Really good so far!

I started Dragonfly by Julia Golding yesterday and it's going pretty fast. So far I'm enjoying it. It reminds me a lot of Tamora Pierce.

I'm contemplating just simply tossing the books I'm reading The Princess and the Hound by Meete Ivie Harrison and Witch and Wizard by James Patterson, I'm not sure if there are any redeeming factors to either of them.

I agree with you on the Patterson book! It has put me off of any of his books.

I have been lent the House of Night series by a neighbor girl. Interesting take on the vampire thing, so far.

I also brought home Ruined from my HS library book fair.

Waiting for my copy of Radiant Shadows by Melissa Marr to come from Amazon. Didn't like the third one, hope this one is better. I evidently like the dark court better than the summer or winter ones.

I started the Uglies series and I really love it so far. I just finished Pretties and waiting for Specials at the library. I flew through both of them and cant wait to see what happens next.

I am reading The Awakening by Kelley Armstrong - the second in a series, with the third one in my TBR pile.

Before I get to that though I have The dead-tossed waves by Carrie Ryan to read - have had it on pre-order and it has finally arrived!!!!

@ selkie_girl - I actually kind of like Princess and the Hound although it was a bit slow in spots. It reminded me of some of Robin McKinley's books a bit.

I have Going Bovine sitting next in my stack.

#7 jnwelch - I agree Zusak looks very young in that picture, which is the same one I saw when I first read The Book Thief in 2006. Luckily, apparently his age hasn't hindered his talent.

Yes, maggie, holy smokes! It's remarkable he can write this well if he's as young as he looks.

First Light by Rebecca Stead was pretty good, although for me the premise was odd. It reminded me in some ways of M. Night Shyalaman's The Village.

Zusak's Fighting Ruben Wolfe is waiting for me at the library.

I just got Hex Hall last night on an impulse and I think I'll get started on it right away. It looks like a fairly quick read, and I'm a sucker for those boarding school stories.

Finished The Awakening by Kelley Armstrong last night - was good.

Then I picked up The DeadTossed Waves by Carrie Ryan - wow! wow! wow! Sat up and read to more than half way - will finish the rest today.

I read Dark Life by Kat Falls and I'd recommend it. Interesting premise: colonies begun on the ocean floor after the oceans rise and flood all the coastland due to global warming. Liked the characters, plot twist at the end I didn't see coming. Kept me in suspense.

On Friday I read Crank by Ellen Hopkins. A novel in verse. Very talented but it's heartbreaking to know she is describing her own daughter.

Saturday I read Dairy Queen then The Off Season a great coming of age story by Catherine Murdock... I'm going to hunt down the third in the series.

Saturday/Sunday I read Boy Toy by Barry Lyga. It was an interesting issue to portray (molestation of a male student by a female teacher) but really ick and I couldn't really get past that to like the book - that ended my reading binge on a downer.

I'm about a third of the way through Millions by Frank Cottrell Boyce. So far I'm really enjoying it. I hope to find a few hours to finish it off tonight.

This month I've read or am reading two outstanding books from Australia:

Thursday's Child by Sonya Hartnett. I found this book when I was standing in the bookstore reading the first line of every novel, to get ideas on how to start my own novel. Hartnett's was the best opening I found and the book continues at this amazing level right to the finish. Dark-ish, beautiful, pure poetry.

The Red Shoe by Ursula Dubosarsky. It was in 1001 Children's books to Read Before You Grow Up; I had never heard of it but thought it sounded good, and it is. Coincidentally, Sonya Hartnett gives it a jacket puff. Truly skilled writing, again rather poetic, distinctive voice.

Makes me think I've missed out on Australian literature. There is more beyond Jaclyn Moriarty and Melina Marchetta -- who are also excellent and more traditional YA.

I am reading Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman.

After exams end (tomorrow!) I'm going to finish all the books I've started over the past few months: Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, Andromeda Klein by Frank Portman, The Witches of Willowmere by Alison Baird, and Old Magic by Marianne Curley.

I also can't wait to get to the comic book store tomorrow, because the new Zatanna series is starting!

This month I've read the really excellent I Am Not A Serial Killer, which is absolutely as interesting as its intriguing title, and the delightfully fun fairytale-esque Toads and Diamonds.

Up next is Never Let Me Go, then I have to choose between A Conspiracy of Kings and The Dead and the Gone.

Life is so hard.

I'm reading Dune for the fifth time. Love this book.

This month I've read A Portrait of Pia, which was quick and okay, as well as The Riddle of the Wren and Silver on the Tree, both of which were excellent! Now I'm in the middle of Diana Wynne Jones' newest, Enchanted Glass, which is wonderful so far.

I just got Wereling from the library

Fighting Ruben Wolfe was good, and each one of the three I've read by Markus Zusak has been quite different from the others.

Just read, last night on my Kindle, The Nicest Girl in School by Angela Brazil. I didn't think it very well written, but it was one of her earliest and maybe some of her later books are better. In any event, Brazil seems to have some importance in the "boarding school" genre.

I am going to read Spirit Bound by Richelle Mead.

I just finished Robert Cormier's The Chocolate War (never again!) and The Outsiders for a Young Adult Literature course I am taking. I'm moving on to Bog Child and Marcelo in the Real World next, both of which I have read before and quite enjoyed.

Wow! Somebody reading Angela Brazil--on a Kindle!
IMHO, not many boarding school books are masterpieces (you have to read them as genre lit) except Antonia Forest and possibly some Josephine Elder.

@35>> Antonia Forest and Josephine Elder? I'll have to give them both a look-see. I've never heard of either. Thanks!

Initially I thought you'd made a mistake with "Antonia Forest" and meant to write Antonia White, whose Frost in May is one of my all-time favorite books. I thought maybe you'd conflated "Antonia" and "Frost" to come up with "Antonia Forest." ;-)

And it also depends on what you mean by "boarding school books." If just a few chapters in the book qualify, then there's my all-time favorite book of all (note my LT handle), Jane Eyre. Lowood, after all, was based on Cowan Bridge School, which really wasn't an orphanage, but I admit I'm stretching things in citing Jane Eyre.

But again with Bronte, don't forget Pensionnat Beck of Villette (though here the focus is on the teachers, not the students, although Lucy might be seen as somewhere in-between a student and a teacher).

Anyway, among other boarding-school books, there's Penelope Farmer's Charlotte Sometimes, which definitely bears mention. And also Jane Trahey's Life with Mother Superior, though I wouldn't call that a "masterpiece" and mention it primarily because it was the source for one of my favorite movies, The Trouble with Angels with Hayley Mills, June Harding, and Roz Russell.

(In case The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie is coming to anyone's mind as another example, the Marcia Blaine School for Girls was a day school, though it does for me have a little bit of the feel of the "boarding school book.")

And I almost forgot, though this is a love-it-or-hate-it example (but I love it), there's Libba Bray's Gemma Doyle trilogy. And another "boarding school book" (or at least I think it is, but I'll have to see) that I've got in my near-future TBR pile is Gail Godwin's recent Unfinished Desires.

I guess, though, considering this is the "Read YA Lit" thread, a lot of my references are to adult lit. But as for YA lit, Charlotte Sometimes and Life with Mother Superior definitely fit in, as Gemma Doyle certainly likewise does, and Frost in May is an adult book but one which is very much readable by an advanced reader in her early teens.

Anyway, I've definitely marked Message 35 on this thread as a "favorite" to remind me to check out Forest and Elder. Thanks again, annamorphic! Sorry if I've included too many adult lit examples, but you've gotten me off on one of my favorite literary settings.

I just started Hex Hall because I felt in the need of a little light reading interspersed with My Husband Betty: Love, Sex, and Life with a Crossdresser by Helen Boyd which isn't light and isn't ya even a little.

I loved Going Bovine, and it never made me want to read Don Quixote. I've started that book twice, one on paper, once audio and just can't do it. I know it's a great novel and a reflection of the times, but I can't take the view of women.

I was depressed about not having any YA around, but I've ordered several of these from my library :). Thanks! -

I just finished Candor -- pretty good, especially for fans of dystopian lit.

The Last Summer of the Death Warriors by Francisco X. Stork just arrived from the library and I'm looking forward to starting it.

I'm reading Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. I don't know why it's taking me so long to read.
Along with that, I'm reading Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk. The book is just as good at the movie.

I just finished Bones of Faerie, which was kind of short but a good story. I'm about to start Rogelia's House of Magic, which I picked up on a whim.

I'm currently reading Rick Riodan's latest, The Red Pyramid and loving it so far. I see a lot of Percy Jacksonish type plot lines but it has to do with Egyptian gods which I have to admit I'm a sucker for

We have many tastes in common!
If you read one Josephine Elder. be sure it's Evelyn Finds Herself, much more ambitious and subtle than her other work. If you read one Antonia Forest I recommend End of Term although most of her work is outstanding.
And if you love Antonia White (as do I!) try The Chinese Garden by Rosemary Manning for another semi-autobiographical twisted early 20th-centufy boarding-school novel.

Just finished reading Wish by Alexandra Bullen and am now working my way through Incarceron by Catherine Fisher...which is creepily excellent.

The Last Summer of the Death Warriors, by the author of Marcelo in the Real World, was good. It also was timely, as I have a family member in that situation.

@44 I just finished The Chinese Garden and I really liked it. My one problem was with the way Manning kept switching back and forth in narrative voice, between Rachel's first person and an omniscient third person. I was a little bit surprised the first time this happened, from one chapter to another, but then she actually started switching from one paragraph to another within chapters, and I'm not sure the significance of why Manning was doing this.

In addition to her children's books, Manning seems to have written one other adult book, The Shape of Innocence (written, I think, before The Chinese Garden), but The Shape of Innocence doesn't show up here anywhere on LibraryThing. Do you know anything about it?

Also, I've got Evelyn Finds Herself and End of Term on order through inter-library loan, but I don't know how successful I'm going to be. I'll have to wait and see. My local library (in the suburbs of Philadelphia PA) told me that the nearest Evelyn Finds Herself is in Toronto and the nearest End of Term is somewhere in Ohio.

Try Manning's autobiography Corridor of Mirrors which is a kind of commentary on The Chinese Garden. I don't know the book you mention, Shape of Innocence.
You can often find the Puffin versions of Antonia Forest's school stories pretty cheaply on ebay or Amazon. The non-school stories, republished by Girls Gone By press, are generally more expensive; same for Evelyn Finds Herself.

CurrerBell, wow, I'm jealous. Our inter library loan system just allows us to choose from the other non-university libraries in our city. I had no idea there were some that let you delve into the libraries of other states. It seems you could get anything, eventually.