My March reading experience has been rather interesting. I kicked it off with a read-through of the messy first draft of mine own work in progress. I ploughed through a good chunk of it during a retreat weekend at the start of the month, then finished it off over the ensuing week. I've already discussed … Continue reading March reading: psychics, farmers and superhumans
The main book I read during February was A companion to wolves by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear -- a fantasy novel published in around 2008 (first of a trilogy). I found it a fascinating book, certainly memorable, in some ways familiar and in other ways not. It's about a youth (Isolfr) who is tithed … Continue reading Book review: A companion to wolves
I haven't come up with many 'I' words to do with fantasy, but IMAGINATION must be one of the big ones. Imagination -- the faculty or action of forming new ideas, or images or concepts of external objects not present to the senses. Fantasy comes in many guises -- but no matter whether you're talking … Continue reading A-Z of fantasy: I is for Imagination
I've finished reading three fantasy novels this month -- that's much more like it! The slight drawback to this has been the wrecking of my sleep patterns. In my determination to find books to immerse myself in, I forgot the part where this means I keep reading to 3 or 4 or 5am... which in … Continue reading Three fantasy books by Aussie women for January
It’s been good to finally get my teeth into some contemporary epic fantasy in the form of Australian author Jo Spurrier's Winter be my shield (Children of the Black Sun - Book 1). From the very start this novel gripped me in its icy vices and – even if perhaps it faded a little in the … Continue reading Book Review: Winter be my shield
Here's a quick tip for reading big fat fantasy novels on e-readers. Particularly fantasy books with a MAP (or maps) at the front. Take a digital photo of the map with your phone. This makes it so much easier to refer to the map while you're reading the novel. The lack of navigability of e-readers is their biggest … Continue reading Quick tip for reading fantasy on e-readers
It's becoming a habit of mine at the end of each year to reflect back on the books I've read in the past 12 months -- and invariably I decide the list is not long enough, or diverse enough, or recent enough and I resolve to do better. (Here's what I read in 2012.) This … Continue reading What I read in 2013
My 10 year-old niece rang me this morning, all excited, to tell me she had won a top reading award at her school. Basically, they get points for the books they read, the harder books accruing more points and so forth. She's accumulated more points than anyone else in her school, and so was the … Continue reading Oh, to be a bookworm again
Today I'm launching the Friday with Friends series, which is (as the name suggests) a series of guest posts from fellow bloggers. Today we have the fabulous S.M. Nonnemacher, who's working on her first Young Adult (YA) novel (see full bio below). I asked her to share with us some of her top reading tips: … Continue reading Fridays with Friends: S.M. Nonnemacher
