Category: Gen Lit

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Review: The Beekeeper’s Apprentice (The Mary Russell #1) by Laurie R. King

by The Lit Bitch10 Comments on Review: The Beekeeper’s Apprentice (The Mary Russell #1) by Laurie R. King

I desperately needed something fun and easy to read….and this time of year I just love a good mystery….something about the turning leaves and the cool, slightly foggy mornings….geese flying south for the winter, the pumpkins ripening….I just love fall and always associate mysteries as the season’s preferred genre….maybe it’s the spirit Halloween (incidentally that is my fav holiday as well)!

I just finished reading The September Society by Charles Finch and was hungry for another mystery but was waiting for my mom to give me back my copy of the next book in the series (The Fleet Street Murders) that I plan on reading next. So I was stuck wondering what to read.

My sister and I went to this great used bookstore in my hometown a few weeks ago and she suggested that I read this series called the Mary Russell series, the first book being The Beekeeper’s Apprentice by Laurie R King. The bookstore had it in stock so I bought it, took it home, put it on my shelf, and kind of forgot about it.

As I was browsing through for something to read the bright yellow honeycomb cover totally stood out so I grabbed it and started reading….my only regrets were that I didn’t pick this book up MONTHS ago and didn’t buy the next book in the series (because of course they don’t have the book in stock anymore! I was so upset that I had to ‘bookmark it’ every night so I could actually get up for work the next day….I was DYING to get home and start reading it again. Continue reading “Review: The Beekeeper’s Apprentice (The Mary Russell #1) by Laurie R. King” →

Book Challenges, Book Critic, Book Review, Books, Gen Lit, Literary Criticism, Reading, Reading Challenges

Review: The September Society (Charles Lenox Mysteries #2) by Charles Finch

by The Lit Bitch3 Comments on Review: The September Society (Charles Lenox Mysteries #2) by Charles Finch

How perfect and fitting that I am finishing this book today on the first day of September!

I’ve just come off a string of long and content heavy books. So I just mentally needed a break from reading things that were hard/complicated, wordy, and had long, extensive family trees (which is so typical of English literary classics and British based books like Outlander or Through a Glass Darkly!).

So, I was eager to read something else historically based but yet something I also knew to be a little less complicated and easy to read/understand….I immediately turned to the next book in the Charles Lenox Series, The September Society by Charles Finch!

When I started the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge this year, my objective was to complete at least two books in the genre. I selected two books from the Charles Lenox mysteries series by Charles Finch, A Beautiful Blue Death and The September Society.

If you are a fan of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes Mysteries….or enjoy Sherlock Holmes-type mysteries….you will devour these books. Finch gives readers a similar approach to the amateur gumshoe/doctor duo with Lenox and his sidekick Dr McConnell who are a bit more down to earth an approachable than Holmes and Dr Watson.

The Sherlock Holmes series has gained a lot of popularity in the last couple of years with the modern Guy Ritchie rendition in 2009 and another upcoming installment (Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows) due out in Dec 2011. I know lots of people are picking up the classic series hoping to find the same type of Holmes character that they see portrayed by Hollywood. Lenox is a breath of fresh air for the typical Sherlock Holmes style mysteries. As I said before, we have a more approachable combo of detective/doctor in the Lenox series…..Lenox is rich, eccentric, witty, charming, and smart. Continue reading “Review: The September Society (Charles Lenox Mysteries #2) by Charles Finch” →

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Review: Through a Glass Darkly by Karleen Koen

by The Lit Bitch3 Comments on Review: Through a Glass Darkly by Karleen Koen

For my birthday a few months ago, my sister got me this book. Both her and I have very similar literary tastes so when she got me this book I was very excited to start reading it–I totally trust her literary judgement, since she is a librarian she knows all the good books/authors :).

She had heard lots of good things about it and said she thought it was part of a series but wasn’t sure. She knew the author had written other historic works such as Before Versailles: A Novel of Louis XIV which I saw featured on Goodreads around the same time.

Karleen Koen has written four books, Dark Angles, Through a Glass Darkly, Now Face to Face, and Before Versailles….for more info check out her website. All of the books are set in 17th-18th century England and France  and all feature colorful blue blood aristocrats so if you love historic fiction of this period, these books are for you!

I was ready for something new and different. As I was browsing my bookshelf I decided to pick up Through a Glass Darkly by Karleen Koen. Since the book falls under the historic fiction category I decided to use it as part of the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge.  Continue reading “Review: Through a Glass Darkly by Karleen Koen” →

Book Challenges, Book Critic, Book Review, Books, Gen Lit, Literary Criticism, Reading, Reading Challenges

Review: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

by The Lit Bitch5 Comments on Review: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

Well it’s taken me a few months but I have finally finished Great Expectations! Yes I know I started it like months ago and have been slowly trying to finish it up between the move and other books I’ve been reading.

I started reading Great Expectations by Charles Dickens for the Gothic Literature Reading Challenge, I had it down to read for the Victorian Literature Reading Challenge also but I decided to use it for the Gothic one since it had a lot of classic Gothic themes which I love.

I have struggled with reading Dickens over the years only because I think he is wordy and often his stories seem a little slow to start.

However, last year I read the book Drood which is a fiction work based on two English literary greats…Wilkie Collins and Charles Dickens. After reading that book I was curious about Dickens’s life and works. After signing up for both the Victorian and Gothic literature challenges having some Dickens novels on my ‘to read’ lists was a no brainer.  Continue reading “Review: Great Expectations by Charles Dickens” →

Book Critic, Book Review, Books, Gen Lit, Literary Criticism, Reading

Review: The Wedding by Nicholas Sparks

by The Lit Bitch10 Comments on Review: The Wedding by Nicholas Sparks

I think I must be the only girl on earth who hasn’t seen The Notebook. I am just not into Nicholas Sparks, and I had no interest in watching The Notebook let alone reading a Nicholas Sparks novel. However, at the behest of one of my friends, I decided to cave and read ONE Sparks novel.

I picked The Wedding.

Now, in general I too fancy myself a jaded cynic so Nicholas Sparks has never really had any appeal to me what-so-ever….he seems a little too over the top sappy.

Romance as a genre in general has never been one that I am particularly into though I do like Para-Romance books (I’ll swoon for Eric Northman any day!)….I just don’t understand the draw for romance novels like those by Sparks, and I REALLY don’t understand the draw for books like Danielle Steele, or some of the harlequin romance novels….though I am willing to give Sparks a shot.

Half way through the book, I felt a little lost, like I was missing a huge piece which made me kind of drag my feet reading it. There were references to various characters and past stories that I just felt like I wasn’t getting.  I confessed I had no idea what was going on! Continue reading “Review: The Wedding by Nicholas Sparks” →