April's Affections and Intrigues: Love and Mystery Bloom

Merri Crawford

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9 comments posted.

Re: Blown Away (3:54pm May 30, 2010):

Great topic, Sandi!

Unless it is an author I really love, I hate the trilogy publishing & marketing gimmick. It puts me off of trying new authors. I resent the heavy handed marketing and sometimes it actually has a reverse effect on me to turn me off from books and authors.

But if it is an author I really love, I suppose I read them...but if I love the author, I would read their next book trilogy or not so I still find it annoying. If it is even only very good as compared to great, I tend to shun the next book because everyone does trilogies.

I guess I read them when they come out if I have time. Not sure what trilogy I will do this summer. I have to wait til summer 2011 for this medieval historical fiction trilogy I am reading. :-( I could learn Swedish and not wait for the translation in that time, lol! I think maybe I like trilogies better in category romance than others but I haven't decided yet.

Re: Live To Tell (3:30pm May 9, 2010):

Yes! We were going out to photograph and the day just more and more overcast and then we got involved in this computer game we love and played it til 4am! Yikes! Well, hopefully today we will not be so derailed. Great blog, Sandi. I read Wendy Corsi Staub's book and it was great! Nice you got to go to her signing. Will love to hear what you think.

Re: The You I Never Knew (1:02pm March 14, 2010):

I like both kinds of books. It seems to be a lot harder for me to find a great tear jerker than the happy books.

Re: Down By The River (1:03pm January 31, 2010):

I read a lot of really good books this past month, namely Lauren Willig (The Betrayal of the Blood Lily), My Soul To Take (Yrsa Sigurdardottir), The Queen's Dollmaker by Christine Trent, The Murderer's Daughters by Randy Susan Meyers, My Unfair Lady by Kathryne Kennedy and this fantastic Medieval history book called A Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England which was so alive and not the dry history one expects. Kathryne Kennedy is a favorite author. The Yrsa Sigurdardottir was my second by her and I would now call her one of my favorite suspense writers.

My biggest find this past month was a ONE CRAZY SUMMER by Rita Williams-Garcia, a id's book for 9-12 year olds. It is set in 1968 during the civil rights movement. I was then almost the age of the main character in 1968. The author caught so well the eye of that age --- both the innocence and that special way of seeing through junk. One of the nest books I have read in some time. For me, it was such a find, as book that reached a special place. I have to read more by her. Such a good story teller.

Re: Dark Lover (1:38pm November 29, 2009):

I like lots of genres. I am a happier reader when I mix it up because then I don't get bored and each one makes me appreciate the other genre more. Suspense, mysteries and sci-fi/fantasy have been genres I have loved since a young kid. Later I added historical fiction, literary fiction and romance. In romance I like romantic suspense, medieval, paranormal and some of the blends with other genres.

I try to keep all of my books but I have moved several times in my life. I miss the books that could not move with me.

Re: The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society (11:55am July 5, 2009):

I loved The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, but then again, I was fortunate to read it before the hype. I think you make a very intriguing point about books, however. Once a book gets too much hype, it just does not interest me. I loved Harry Potter but after a certain point, well, the hype is just so much that I no longer have much interesting reading it and probably won't, at least not until all the hype has worn off. I guess when a book gets so much hype it feels like there is little left to discover. In one sense, reading is a quiet, personal experience for me so maybe that is why. Too much hype and book talk can detract from that unique experience I find between the book and me as reader. Great topic, Sandi!

Re: A Thread Of Truth (12:21pm June 21, 2009):

Ideally, I would hope that publishers would take the time to be excellent in their job and editing is part of that. But personally, typos do not bother me. I am more concerned about the story itself than a typo or two. I read a lot of medieval texts and standarized spelling did not exist then so maybe that is part of why it doesn't bother me. Awkward grammar botherw me more -- not the kind of incomplete sentences an author uses when the character is using indirect dialogue for what is going on in his/her head but rather sentences that do not flow. If this happens a lot, then it bothers me because then it is more characteristic of the author's writing than just a missed correction/editing error.

Re: Pretty in Plaid (1:49pm May 17, 2009):

I am like you. I had to stop wearing a watch years ago because it made me way too early for everything. I am usually early except for thing a like a doctor or dentist appointment where I try to be as close to on time a possible to avoid waiting in the waiting room.

Re: The Promise (1:13pm April 19, 2009):

Why do I read? It just seems like a fact like my eye color or other immutable things. My first grade teacher really was the one who turned me on to reading. I did not like reading aloud but reading to myself was just like magic from the first moment. If I don't get a change to read something before I go to sleep, I just can't sleep or don't sleep as well. It's like chill out time to stop focusing on all the things that I need to do but instead soak in and slow my brain to a kind of more meditative relaxed space. My first novels were Walter Farley's Black Stallion and Marguerite Henry's novels which were way beyond my reading level when I picked them up but they were about horses so I just read them anyhow.