#WWW and #WIPpet Wednesday – 23 November, 2016

Hi all! I’ve finally finished the three week run of The Merry Widow, which really knocked me out. Even on nights I wasn’t performing, I was just exhausted and not doing anything useful. Now that the run is completed, though, I should be able to get back to reading and blogging regularly. I’ve missed you guys!

It’s time for WWW Wednesday! This is a blog hop hosted by Sam over at A World Of Words. Link up with us by commenting on Sam’s post for today, and just answer the three questions.

What have you recently finished reading?

I finished reading Doctor Who: Big Bang Generation by Gary Russell. It was, to be honest, pretty awful, but I ticked off another challenge item with it. My review will go up on Friday.

I have also finished the audio book of Girl 4 by Will Carver, which was a thriller with a serial killed on the loose. It was an interesting format, and definitely gripping. I enjoyed it. I’ll have a review up next Monday.

I review Artie and the Grime Wave by Richard Roxburgh last Friday. You can read that here.

What are you currently reading?

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo came in from me at the library, so I’m finally getting to see what all the fuss is about! I had thought it was a trilogy so I was holding off reading it, but when I learned that it was only a duology and that Crooked Kingdom is the conclusion, I decided to get onto it sooner.

I’m also listening to the audio of The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen. I’m enjoying it, but the narrator has a sort of whiny voice which is a bit annoying. It’s fairly short, though (a bit over 8 hours) so I’m putting up with it.

What do you think you’ll read next?

I picked up Heat and Light by Ellen van Neerven fro m the library today, so I’ll probably pick up that next. It will be one of my books for the Australian Women Writers Challenge. I also have a feeling this is going to be one of those weeks where I end up with a whole heap of my library holds coming in at once, so I will have a few more in the next few days. Oh, and I picked up a couple of graphic novels today as well, beacuse they had a display of them  when I walked into the library and I couldn’t resist. They won’t take long to get through.

On audio, I think I’ll pick up the sequel to Girl 4, which is called The Two, once I finish The False Prince. I think it’s a trilogy in the vein of I Hunt Killers, rather than a long series of unrelated stories with the same investigator, if that makes sense. Though if I really love The False Prince I might want to immediately continue with that one. We’ll see.

What are you reading this week? 🙂

The other blog hop for this week is WIPpet Wednesday. If you’re a writer, you are very welcome to join us in this one by posting an excerpt from your WIP that somehow relates to the date. You can click the blue guy on the right of this blog to be taken to the link up. Today I added the digits of 23/11 together, then also threw in the 2 from 2016, for nine paragraphs.

The last sections I shared from Operation: Sugarplum were from Clara’s POV. Now it’s time for something from Max’s. He’s just walked in on a conversation between the people intent on taking over the palace and the Kingdom.  He’s a member of an Order called the Aligarian Mages, and the room is half-filled with them.

“And you are?” asked the man who had been speaking.

“Maxwell Drosselmeier, Aligarian Mage, second level. Who are you?”

“My name is Josef Bauer, and as of this morning, I am in charge of your order, as well as your country.”

“You led the attack?”

“Yes.”

Max looked around the room. “And the rest of you are just letting this happen because…” The unfinished statement hung in the air.

“Max, perhaps you should wait until General Bauer is ready to address all of the Mages,” said a woman, Sofia, finally.

Max bristled. He was often talked down to by virtue of being significantly younger than the rest of the  Mages, and the newest addition to the Order, but in this case, it seemed more condescending than usual.

“Fine,” he said finally. “I’m sure this is all just some grave misunderstanding and everything will become clear soon enough.”

 

#WWW and #WIPpet Wednesday – 09 November, 2016

It’s time for WWW Wednesday! This is a blog hop hosted by Sam over at A World Of Words. Link up with us by commenting on Sam’s post for today, and just answer the three questions.

I was so busy last week that blogging completely slipped my mind, so my answers today reflect my last two weeks’ reading.

What have you recently finished reading?

Yikes. Two DNFs this week! At least it means I’m no longer behind on ARCs (#silverlining).

Neither The Ill-Kept Oath by C. C. Aune nor Immortal Writers by Jill Bower managed to hold my interest. The Ill-Kept Oath had far less fantasy than the blurb promised, and the 25% that I read was just the two girls fussing over a few strange occurrences and the men they fancied. Immortal Writers spawned my first ever DNF review, as I felt I had enough to say about the first half of the book to warrant it. Basically, there were a few narrative choices that I didn’t like, and so the book just didn’t work for me.

Fortunately, The Infinity of You and Me by J. Q. Coyle proved far more enjoyable. It was one of those books where I read the first couple of paragraphs and was already thinking “Yesssssssss!” My review for that is here. If you like stories about them multiverse, I definitely recommend this one.

Today I finished Artie and the Grime Wave by Richard Roxburgh, which was cute, though nothing spectacular. Even within the realms of MG, it’s not really something I would read and I really only bought it because I like Richard Roxburgh’s acting work and it was an excuse to get his autograph at a signing. Having said that, it was a quick enough read and the characters were quite vibrant. And I probably would have been pretty into it when I was 12.

Oh, and I listened to the audio book of Neil Gaiman’s The Sleeper and the Spindle, which was interesting, though I think I probably lost out with not having the illustrations, even if I did have an atmospheric soundtrack to replace it.

I also reviewed Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (the original book that came out in 2001, not the movie script) since my last WWW post.

What are you currently reading?

I started Doctor Who: Big Bang Generation by Gary Russel (Doctor Who in Australia! 😀 ). This is for the challenge item “a book you intended to read last year and didn’t”. It’s set on Christmas Day 2015, and my plan had been to read it on that day, but then I entirely forgot to buy it in time .

No movement on The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu by Joshua Hammer, but it’s due back to the library next week, so really should get a wriggle-on. I was going to go back to it today, but I can’t deal with war and terroism after the election result, even if the book is about people doing awesome things in the face of it.

What do you think you’ll read next?

I am aiming to read Mother of Dreams and Other Short Stories: Portrayals of Women in Modern Japanese Fiction, edited by Makota Ueda. This is another challenge itme, this time for “A book about a culture you are unfamiliar with”. I picked this up by chance recently, so I have no idea what it will be like.

What are you reading this week? 🙂

The other blog hop for this week is WIPpet Wednesday. If you’re a writer, you are very welcome to join us in this one by posting an excerpt from your WIP that somehow relates to the date. You can click the blue guy on the right of this blog to be taken to the link up.

When I last shared from the new version of Operation Sugarplum that I’m currently working on, Clara was assuring herself that the runes stopping the lock on her bedroom door from being broken were still there, despite the threats from a stranger on the other side. She’s received rather a shock when the runes glow and then disappear, leaving her vulnerable to physical attack. I’ve got 9 sentences for the 9th of November. (btw, Hanna is Clara’s ladies’ maid/companion).

She spun around and grabbed Hanna’s hand, jumping as she heard the sound of something being smashed against the lock to break it. They both ran into Hanna’s room, and Clara signalled for Hanna to hide herself under the bed. She blew out the candle and ran to Hanna’s wardrobe, flinging the doors open and stepping inside. She pulled the doors closed behind her and held her breath.

She knew she was only delaying the inevitable. She had made the mistake of speaking to General Bauer, whoever he was, so even if he hadn’t been certain at first that he had the right room, he knew now. It was impossible to escape; the windows all opened onto a fifty-foot drop. In a few months’ time, and with the proper training, Clara might have been able to buffet herself and Hanna safely to the ground, but her powers weren’t developed enough for that yet. All she was capable of at this point was startling someone with a blast of heat or light at inopportune moments.

Oh yeah… that just reminded me I need to have some sort of training montage further along where she actually does learn how to use her powers… Should probably remember that… 😉

All right, that’s all from me! See you on your blogs.

#WWW and #WIPpet Wednesday – 10 August, 2016

It’s time for WWW Wednesday! This is a blog hop hosted by Sam over at A World Of Words. Link up with us by commenting on Sam’s post for today, and just answer the three questions.

• What are you currently reading?

I have just started The Rook by local author Daniel O’Malley. The tag line is “On her majesty’s supernatural secret service” and it sounds quite fun, and comes highly recommended. IIt’s been described as “supernatural public service” among my public service colleagues and even in the first 30 pages, there have already been a couple of moments where I’ve laughed out loud because the bureaucracy element is too real.

On audio, I’m listening to Tallow by Karen Brooks. This is a fantasy inspired by Italian culture – the main city is basically a fictional, magical version of Renaissance-era Venice. Enjoying it so far!

• What did you recently finish reading?

I finished Am I Black Enough for You? by Anita Heiss. I really appreciated the renewed understanding of racial identity that this book gave me.

Reviews of The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf by Ambelin Kwaymullina and Paper Daisies by Kim Kelly went up this week.

• What do you think you’ll read next?

Probably Doctor Who: Big Bang Generation by Gary Russell. This is a challenge item – “A book you intended to read last year but didn’t”. It is set on Christmas Day 2015 and I had grand intentions of reading it that day, except then I didn’t manage to get a copy in time. I’m actually pretty excited that there’s a DW novel set in Australia. 😀

So I made a list of all the books I own in various forms that I have to read before I’m allowed to buy any more or go to the library again… there are ten on it, and that’s not counting the books that have been on my Kindle for years, for example, just my most recent purchases. Sigh. What’s that quote about dying next to a pile of books I intended to read?

And now for WIPpet Wednesday. This is another blog hop in which writers share excerpts from their current WIP that somehow relate to the date. Clicking the blue guy on the right will take you to the linkup for this one. I’m going a bit backwards from last week’s excerpt, this is when Grace first returns home after leaving her job in Frederick Merrow’s household (which was a maid in this draft, but will be governess in subsequent versions). Claire is one of her younger sisters, aged about elevent. Ten paragraphs for the 10th day of the month.

“I’ve come home, Claire.”

“You lose your job or something?”

“Well, yes. Is mother home?”

“Yeah, she’s here. Mum! Grace’s home! She’s been fired!”

Grace cringed. She would have preferred to deliver a gentler blow to her mother. She heard her mother’s footsteps approaching the door a few moments later, and found herself looking down at the ground under her mother’s hard stare.

“Hello, mother,” she said quietly.

“Is that true? Fired?”

“Yes.” Grace’s voice was nearly a whisper.

“What the bloody hell did you do?”

Grace cringed again, this time at her mother’s language. It shouldn’t have been a surprise, she grew up with it, but after six months living among people who spoke properly, it grated on her ears.

Even though I’m still sharing from Lessons Learned, I’ve actually been revising Operation: Sugarplum over the last couple of weeks. Most of the stuff I’ve bene working on is really similar to stuff I’ve shared before, though, so for the moment, I think I’ll continue with Lessons Learned. I might switch it up when you least expect it, though! Who knows! 😛

All right, better finish this up! See you all later!

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