This week’s book talks 5/14-17

A short week for me! I am at a union retreat in Hood River today, working hard, but also enjoying the local attractions. Consequently, I only booktalked 4 books this week. They are all books in a series…trying to get the kids thinking about summer reading plans. Summer is a great time to read a whole series.

Monday

Endling: The Last by Katherine Applegate…..This is the first in the series and the only book published so far.

Tuesday

Mark of the Thief by Jennifer A. Nielsen…There are two other books in this series.

Wednesday

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare…Six books in this series!

Thursday

Etiquette and Espionage by Gail Carriger…This series has four books.

 

#alamw16 It’s A Wonderful Life

After getting up early yesterday, I made it to the airport in a timely manner. After clearing security, I made my way to my gate, where they were announcing that, due to a lack of tailwinds, we’d be leaving 10 minutes early, if we could get everyone aboard. Apparently everyone heard the message because we left about 10 minutes early and the pilot announced he’d fly a little faster than planned to help the people on board who had tight connections. I love flying Alaska Airlines!

I had an aisle seat, which gave me the opportunity to get up, stretch or take a walk. I managed to finish the last reread before we landed, on time, in Boston. My research turned out to be true: free transportation on the Silver Line from the airport. I caught the bus and was in my hotel room by 4:30. I unpacked and had a shower to refresh myself before venturing out.

It is a 5 minute walk from my hotel to the convention center. I walked over there to get my badge before heading over to my first event. The weather in Boston is uncharacteristically warm, and is forecast to be so until Monday, when it will dip closer to freezing again.

My first event was cocktails with Holiday House Publishing. It was a nice event where they were featuring some of their new books, but that also had picture book art on display. They had delicious creamy tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches to eat. After flying all day, I was feeling a little dehydrated and hungry, so I really enjoyed this meal! I also ran into a couple of my committee members.

I swung back to my hotel, the Boston Seaport, which is quite nice. I have a king size bed in my room and the bathrobes are really fluffy. I dropped off my conference bag and the arcs I’d collected and regrouped for a while before heading off to downtown Boston to a restaurant called The Top of the Hub for dessert reception with Cassandra Clare to promote her newest Shadowhunter book, Lady Midnight, which kicks off a new Shadowhunter series.

The Top of the Hub, 50 floors up, has amazing views of Boston. As we got off the elevator, we were greeted by a waiter bearing blue drinks. They were pretty, but a little strong for my taste. As I wandered through the room, I stopped first at the cheese table. But everyone in line wondered where the desserts were. As we rounded the corner in the L-shaped room, looking for a table we realized there were lots of dessert tables. I sat and chatted for a bit while I ate my cheese, then decided to peruse the other options. There was a sundae table, donut & cookie tables, a cotton candy table. I thought I’d reached the end, but then, the crowd at the end of the room parted and I saw the crepe table. Delightful!

I got my crepe, then sat and chatted with a committee member and a few other people we knew joined us. Shortly afterwards, a Simon & Schuster rep let us know Cassandra was going to speak shortly, so we finished up and moved closer to where that would occur.

I left shortly after that, tired but content, and with a full stomach. Here’s what I collected over the course of a few hours yesterday.

My committee meets at 1:00 this afternoon. We have to narrow our 5 books down to one winner. Wish us luck!

Home from Holidays, part 2: The French Connection

One of the things I really noticed while visiting Ottawa was the amount of French I heard spoken. We popped into the Chapters near the Byward market and they had a ton of books in French too. It was the first bilingual book store I’ve ever seen.

The sign reads : Escape – Not only for adolescents.  You probably recognize some covers.

From Left to right: The Clockwork Prince by Cassandra Clare,  Scarlet by Marissa Meyer, Stay Where You are and Then Leave  by John Boyne

Some titles change very little, some change a little more.

It was great to hear and see so much. I enjoyed eavesdropping on conversations and seeing what I could pick up. I even had a brief conversation in French with a woman in the elevator of our hotel. It was an aspect of my trip to Ottawa I hadn’t anticipated, but I was thrilled by it. Ottawa is truly a bilingual city.

Wrapping up a series

Yesterday, I finished listening to The City of Heavenly Fire, the sixth and final book in the final book in  The Mortal Instruments  series by Cassandra Clare, which was generously provided by Audiobook Jukebox.

I read about half of the previous 5 books and listened to the other half. As series  go, they  work really well as audiobooks, although I wish there had been more consistency of narrators over the series.

The City of Heavenly Fire was the first book to be narrated by two readers. I am not sure why this decision was made because I found it a distraction. Rather than simply listening to the story and reflecting on it, I was trying to figure out why each narrator got each section. Sophie Taylor, who portrays Sana Stark, was by far the better of the two narrators. That said, I wish she had just read in re regular English accent, rather than switching between English and American accents. She did the accents well, but it was unnecessary. Jason Dohring, and actor known for Veronica Mars, was a terrible narrator. I suspect they were both chosen for their “star factor”, but I’d rather have had one good narrator. Dohring’s delivery was flat and he should never do English accents.

The book itself was enjoyable, full of action and a high body count. It was a much better book that  a couple of the idle books which irritated me because Clary spent an awful lot of time mooning over Jace. She has her mojo back in this book, thank goodness. The arc of the story itself ended on disc 15 and the last 2 discs are devoted to wrapping up all the loose ends of the series, which I found satisfying. One criticism I have of the book is that Clare spent time introducing characters who will form the core of her next series, The Dark Artifices. 

If you’ve made it through the first five books, however, you will enjoy reading this conclusion.