My recent reads have been a little scattered.

I just finished Dan Wells' I am NOT a Serial Killer, a first-person thriller from the perspective of a teenage sociopath who knows that, if he doesn't keep himself guarded, he will become one of the serial killers who fascinate him. It's a compelling, oddly empathetic story that's tightly plotted and extremely well written. I'm ready to dive into the rest of the series. I highly recommend it for fans of Dexter, Criminal Minds, and similar fare.

I'm also nearing the end of Jonathan Stroud's Bartimaeus trilogy. This has been a fun, wild ride and I'm sorry to see it end. I still have about ten or twelve chapters left in the third book.

I recently started Dune at the recommendation of several NWebbers and other friends. I like it so far, and I'm interested in seeing where Paul's journey takes him.

I've also been reading some comics and manga lately. I'm working my way through both Attack on Titan and Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind. I'm very interested in watching the animated adaptations of these series, so I'm trying to read the source material first.

I thought it was extremely well written, but very bloody and I learned some new things I didn't need to. However it was definitely a history lesson for me and it did make my brother very happy that I read it.

Yes, there are quite a few anniversaries this year. Not only the Anzac Day Centenary, on 25th April, but also the Bicentenary of Waterloo, the 700 years' anniversary of Agincourt (and Harfleur) on 25th October. And today's 900 years' anniversary of the 1215 signing of Magna Carta. And yes, war can be very gruesome.

Hi, Melian_Maia! It's good to see you again! I hope you enjoy Fairest when you get to it. It's darker than the rest of the series (which makes sense) but helps explain some things, and Marissa Meyer does a good job telling the story. Plus there's a sneak peak of Winter in the back.

For my reading challenge (which I'm almost finished with, yay!), I need to read a Pulitzer Prize winner, so I've got both The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings and One of Ours by Willa Cather out. I'm not sure which I'll read, since I have the impression that the first is a coming-of-age story about a boy and his...deer? (I'd always thought it was a horse story, but the illustration sure looks like a deer) which probably means the deer will die and it'll be tragic, and the second...I have no description of and just picked up because I recognised the author. Any thoughts?

I also read Firefight by Brandon Sanderson, which was fun; I'm looking forward to the next book in the series and to learning more about the Epics. And I also just read a booklet with two of Dorothy L. Sayer's essays entitled "Are Women Human?" and "The Human-Not-Quite-Human", both of which dealt with feminism/the social position of women, I guess, and were quite good. First time for me reading something by her that wasn't a mystery, though I've been meaning to read her essay on work (aptly named "Why Work?") for a while. I've got several collections of her essays out of the library now, so hopefully I'll get to it before too long.

I read The Yearling once and have never been tempted to read it again. I don't know if it all went over my head or what... I remember it as having some nice descriptions of the Florida woods but nothing about the characters (beyond the main character being named Jaimie) or events.

I raced through Firefight, grinning the entire time, more or less.

For those interested in fairy tale retellings, I picked up Zoe Marriott's Shadows on the Moon which is Cinderella in a culture reminiscent of medieval Japan. It wasn't quite what I was expecting from the blurb, but I might have misread a few words and invented a whole different story. In contrast to the recent movie, Cinderella's goal is not a happily ever after and she sabotages herself along the way so the tension comes from wondering if she'll realize what she had going for her before it's too late... There are a few flourishes I could have lived without but it does some interesting things with parts of the story outside the heroine's control. The supporting characters were unusually vivid, I thought.

I recently read North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell. I had seen the 2006 movie before, and it was beautiful, but the book has so much more depth to it. For one thing, religion is a major thread in the book. The interaction between people of different beliefs creates fascinating character dynamics. The book also gives the impression that the love story between John and Margaret is partly symbolic of the relationship between Northern industrial culture and Southern agrarianism. The thing that struck me most was how applicable all of the stresses and conflicts in the story are to modern day life. We, like the people of the industrial revolution, are living in a society in flux.

I'm so out of the habit of reading books it's embarrassing. My brother got me an Amazon gift card for Mother's Day so I ordered a few books that I've been wanting to read and reread again.

The Phantom Tollbooth - Back in grade school it seems like EVERYBODY read this book... except me. I don't know how i missed it because I thought I read just about everything back then, but not this one. It looks hilarious and I'm looking forward to reading it.

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIHM - I think I've read this book, but the only memory I really have is from watching the movie years ago and thinking during parts of it "oh, that's not in the book." But I don't actually remember reading the book. So I'm curious about this one too.

Beauty: A Retelling of the Story of Beauty and the Beast and The Outlaws of Sherwood - Read 'em both, love 'em both, and I've been wanting to reread them for a long time now. Here's my chance.

I also still need to read The Warden and the Wolf King which is sitting on my bookshelf, and I've been getting this burning desire to reread the Artemis Fowl series as well. Really I want to reread all of the books I love to get a refresher on them, but those are the ones that are near the top.

ETA: Oh yeah, I also got The Complete Works of Curious George to read with my kids. If I'm being honest with myself, this is the one that will likely be finished first.

FK: I've read Phantom Tollbooth twice, once as a child and again as an adult. I loved it both times! Favorite part: subtraction soup. The more they ate, the hungrier they became.

Mel, based on your review of The Yearling and my own misgivings, I ended up reading One of Ours. If I'd known that it would be so sad and depressing and then turn into a WWI story, I probably would've rethought my decision. But it was pretty easy to read and fairly engaging, so there's that!
Welllll, I wasn't nervous about

Anhun, I read North and South a number of years back and really enjoyed it. I saw the adaptation after I read it and thought it was a good one overall, though the book definitely goes more in depth on religion and such.

Ooooh, fk! Beauty has been a favourite for a while; I think I may've been introduced to it on my early days on NW? Or maybe before... At any rate, I still enjoy it though I noticed a certain...oh, I'm not sure, perhaps a bit of roughness/stitledness in the writing on the last reread a couple years ago? But I should probably reread soon anyhow. Have never read The Outlaws of Sherwood though I picked up a nice hardcover copy with dustjacket a few years back at a library booksale.
I read The Phantom Tollbooth maybe five-seven years ago? I remember liking it but not much else.
(And I'd like to do an AF reread too at some point...)

I've only got four books left on my list. Two of the slots (book with a bad review and book your mother loves) are wide open, one slot is set (book 100 years old or more; only problem is it's digital which means I can't take it with me to work for over lunch break, which is when most of my reading has been happening lately), and one that I'm trying to decide on (a book with antonyms in the title; the only one I can think of is N.D. Wilson's Death by Living but I feel like there are some others).

...I still have a huge stack of books out from the library, though, and I also am taking some books I own back to the apartment with me that I haven't read before, so we'll see what gets read next.

Firefight -- Calamity is pretty settled as the final book in the Reckoners series. There might be more set in that universe later on, especially if the whole

Personally, i'm not especially worried about

Speaking of Sanderson, my dad was telling me his boss is a fan of Sanderson, and recommended Steven Erikson. Looking him up, it seems Erikson is best-known for his Malazan Book of the Fallen series, which i've seen mentioned in other places but don't know anything about. Anyone here read that or anything else by him? Opinions?

I need more books to read.

Valia, I was looking at your choices for the Pulitzer prize winner and of the other ones I'd read I wasn't really seeing one I'd recommend. They all looked to be more on the depressing side of the spectrum for one reason or another. (Like, I might have recommended Gone with the Wind but it's rather long and I doubt you'd like it anyway... Although if something from the poetry category would work you might like Carl Sandburg? /thinks of things too late to be useful)

In Firefight I got the idea

Beauty and Outlaws of Sherwood are two of my top three favorites by Robin McKinley. Third is Blue Sword and the two short story collections Door in the Hedge and A Knot in the Grain round out a top five.
I also really like Phantom Tollbooth. I believe the 'average child' and the Soundmaster are the parts that get referenced most often around here, though my personal favorites are Officer Shrift and the Which.

Arwenel, have you read Shannon Hale's Dangerous? (Looking up that title, it seems I may have to check out her Princess in Black as well...) Or Red Rising by Pierce Brown? Or, if you like graphic novels, maybe Digger by Ursula Vernon?

I went and got a whole bunch of books from the library, in hopes that my reading thirst would pike during summer. That... has been spottily effective. I have a couple books I need to read, but I realized how few books I reread but I took the pains to buy, and I felt guilty.

I finally finished the entire Harry Potter series. I really, really liked them. In retrospect, I'm glad I read them now, because I feel like I appreciated them more fully than I would have when I was younger. On the other hand, they have a lot of heart that I would have enjoyed reading as a kid. I like them a lot.
Such incredible books. I'm going to reread them definitely.

I've been reading a historical science book (nonfiction) called The Clockwork Universe by Edward Dolnick. It's about the development of science from Newton's time to the Royal Society and further on. It's beautifully written. On the surface, even if you're into this stuff, it seems like it could be dry, but the author weaves in culture, philosophy, art, and literature so beautifully that the book is the type of book that ends up being a really nice read rather than a heavy one. I really liked it.

I'm going to read The Two Towers and RotK this summer if it kills me. I have got to stop giving up on them.

Ahh I keep on forgetting to check out The Phantom Tollbooth! I have got to do that, since you all said you liked it, fantasia, Valia, and Mel.

Although if something from the poetry category would work you might like Carl Sandburg?

!!!! He's my favorite! You're one of the few people who actually know who he is. I ask people here (and I'm in his home state.....) and they act like they have no idea who he is. I love his poems on Autumn/October/corn fields. I forget which book those are from.

Arwenel, have you read Shannon Hale's Dangerous? (Looking up that title, it seems I may have to check out her Princess in Black as well...) Or Red Rising by Pierce Brown? Or, if you like graphic novels, maybe Digger by Ursula Vernon?

I am 95% sure i have read stuff by Shannon Hale in the past. *checks amazon* Ah, yes i have. Not Dangerous or Princess in Black. I didn't like her take on fairy tales as much as Gail Carson Levine, but i did like them, especially her version of Rapunzel.

Never heard of Pierce Brown.

Actually, i've already read Digger -- whole thing is available on-line for free. Someday i'll probably buy a copy, because it was pretty good.

(The only unfortunate thing about the omnibus is the fact that you don't get the comment section on each page because the comment section for Digger is like really fascinating footnotes. )

Red Rising is the author's debut novel. I don't remember exactly what was said about it to make me want to read it, but it's in the Hunger Games/space fantasy genre.

!!!! He's my favorite! You're one of the few people who actually know who he is. I ask people here (and I'm in his home state.....) and they act like they have no idea who he is. I love his poems on Autumn/October/corn fields. I forget which book those are from.

Really? Because it feels like his poem about the fog coming in on cat's feet is in every single poetry anthology I own and it's been done as an illustrated kids book at least once... I need to read more of his work myself. Poetry is one genre I feel like I under-read.
*notes down The Clockwork Universe*

EDIT: For fans of the fantasy/court intrigue genre I just read (and recommend) The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison. It's an 'unexpected heir to the throne must navigate conspiracies' story, where manners are punctiliously adhered to and the names are a little complex. Very fun.

I just finished reading Paris in Love: A Memoir by Eloisa James (pen name). It was humorous. Here's one good tidbit from the first chapter.

"Since I was seven, I had compulsively collected novels, cataloging them and keeping my favorites close to the door in case of fire. My boxed set of The Chronicles of Narnia bore a large sign instructing my parents not to forget it as they carried my (presumably unconscious) body through the door, just before the ceiling fell in."

http://www.amazon.com/Paris-Love-Memoir ... 812981901/

I have one more book to read before I'm done with my library's adult summer reading program. Last year I won a Kindle. I hope to win a $25 Amazon gift card this year.

I have one more book to read before I'm done with my library's adult summer reading program. Last year I won a Kindle. I hope to win a $25 Amazon gift card this year.

A brief aside here. My wife got me my Kindle a few years ago for my birthday and I have not owned anything that has immersed me deeper in reading than it has. If I like a book I can find things that are much like it already listed for me once I finish. You're going to pay full price with a lot of major titles but they stay on your Kindle forever if you do buy them, and glorious Amazon Prime oftentimes takes a nice chunk out of prices you'd ordinarily pay. I started out reading Independently published books because they're usually pretty cheap but discovered there on par or better than many of the more mainstream books I'd normally be paying much more for. And to top it all off I can read at night while the lights are out. Don't feel like reading? Load up a game of Angry Birds (or its umpteen different flavors). Plus it keeps my kid quiet on long road trips.