Finally Getting Around To
The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith (aka JKR)
Listening to the audiobook (narration by Robert Glenister) and it’s good! If you like your private investigators slightly scruffy, surly, very smart, secretly sad, and preferably English, you will like Cormoran Strike, PI. He’s struggling financially, romantically, and healthwise, when a sharp, new assistant from the temp agency and a case concerning a questionable suicide come into his shabby office (where he sleeps on a camp bed in the back) and start to turn things around.
Published in 2013, there are already three more Cormoran Strike books since this first one. #alwaysbehind
White Teeth by Zadie Smith (2000)
I really am going to finish this novel this week. It’s so good that I’ve only been reading it when I have a big block of time to read, so I’ve been “currently reading” it for ages. Set in London, it’s got everything I like in a sprawling, big novel: over 400 pages; generations of families; ambitious scope; lots of witty/weighty conversation; and plenty of dry/dark humor.
Finished Last Week
Read Bel Canto by Ann Patchett for a book & movie discussion with my library book club. Had listened to the audiobook a few years ago, so read it in print (mostly) this time. Dipped into the audiobook again to get the pronunciations of the names and because I remembered how good the audiobook narration by Anna Fields was.
The book was much better than the movie, but that’s always the way. The movie, taken on it’s own, is probably good, too, but simplifies the book’s themes and storylines so much that watching it right after reading the book made it a disappointment. There was also hardly any opera singing in the movie (Whaattt????) although it the whole book is saturated in opera.
Listened to 
The Cracked Spine by Paige Shelton last week, while I was still using cozy mysteries to recover from my overdose of dark foreboding from too many psychological suspense audiobooks in a row!
The Cracked Spine is the first in a bookish mystery series set in Edinburgh, where the Midwestern archivist heroine has gotten a fresh start with a new job in a bookstore headed by a mysterious millionaire. Didn’t love it like I do the Max Tudor books by G.M. Malliet, but it was a good audiobook (narrated by Carrington McDuffie) and an interesting take on the bookstore cozy. Recommended for anyone who has a fondness for Scottish accents and bookstores!
The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay Terrifying and tragic. WARNING: Do not read this if you can’t stomach a Stephen King novel. (There’s a reason a blurb from the master of horror is on the front cover of this book!) The Cabin at the End of the World is about a third of the size and twice as scary as your average Stephen King novel, with none of the extraneous wordplay that SK likes to throw in. If you like realistic horror about ordinary people like yourself finding themselves placed through no fault of their own into situations of extraordinary peril, you’ll find yourself unable to put this book down.
Up Next
Truly, Madly, Guilty by Liane Moriarty (2016)
Home for Erring and Outcast Girls by Julie Kibler
(forthcoming July 2019)
I’m not doing well at posting what I’m reading every Monday, but I would love to hear what you’re reading this week (and every week), so please let me know in the comments!
It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? (#IMWAYR) is hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It’s a place to meet up and share what you have been, are, and about to be reading over the week. It’s a great post to organize yourself. It’s an opportunity to visit and comment, and er… add to that ever-growing TBR pile! This meme started with J Kaye’s Blog and then was taken up by Sheila from Book Journey. Sheila then passed it on to Kathryn at Book Date.
Nice assortment of books. The Cuckoo’s Calling has been on my TBR list since it was published. I’ll have to try it someday. Come see my week here. Happy reading!
I am interested in some of those books, so this post was very useful for me. I did read Cuckoo’s Calling and liked it much more than I expected. Now I need to move on to the next one.
This last week I finished up DEAD WAKE: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania by Erik Larson. I did not know much about the sinking of the Lusitania so I learned a lot and it was a good read.
I also read EVIL UNDER THE SUN by Agatha Christie, a very fast read.
And my latest read was THE TIN FLUTE by Gabrielle Roy, published in 1945. Set in Canada in a very poor neighborhood, during World War II. I loved it, got very involved in the story, but not a happy book.
Yay on starting the Cormoran Strike books … and on audio!
I don’t read much nonfiction, especially history, although I should, but am currently reading a biography of Joni Mitchell that I don’t think I mentioned in my post. (It’s my lunch hour book at work, where I get a lot of interruptions!) I recently listened to the Anthony Horowitz books Magpie Murders and The Word Is Murder, and they got me wanting to read more Agatha Christie!
I’ve already placed a hold on the next book, The Silkworm!
I am curious about the Cormoran Strike books, but they are pretty long…I don’t think I would have the patience. Thanks for visiting my blog.
The Cabin at the End of the World is on my wishlist. My weekly updates
The Cabin at the End of the World sounds fantastic! I’ll have to track down a copy!
What a good reading week for you! I also enjoyed The Cuckoo’s Calling (just read it last year) and Bel Canto (I agree it’s best if a lot of time passes before you see a movie adaptation!). And I really want/need to read Zadie Smith and Liane Moriarty – I’ve heard so many good things about both their novels but have never read either author!
Enjoy your books this week –
Sue
Book By Book
I saw the film listed in the movie selection on a recent flight and thought I’d watch it on my return journey. Thanks for the warning that it doesn’t live up to the book which I loved…..
The Cracked Spine looks like one I’d like. A nice set of books this week 🙂
[…] Last week’s reading plan turned out to be too ambitious. Here’s this week’s plan: […]