read 100 books in 2007

Thank god, finally something that flowed and was fun to read. Good supernatural chick-lit. Kitty has a sense of humour, is nicely sarcastic and doesn’t take herself to seriously. I liked that in this first book of the series vampires and werewolves are coming out of the closet. In all the other books with this plot line that I’ve read, the books always start after the fact. It is quite refreshing to see how the critters of the night actually deal with it. Book two is on order and book three is already on my shelf…
http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/5407151

Snore, don’t bother! Imagine Tom Clancy having one of those reaaaally long explanations of something in another one of those military conspiracy things, add a little Armageddon to it and a small helping of Angels and Demons. And you get a fairly boring read with a very improbable and silly plot twist at the end, that makes you go “Huh?”. Sorry, put me to sleep several times this week…
http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/4722239

Very good and boring at the same time. I enjoyed the first half of the book a lot, but then started running out of steam. Or it just got too talkative and too heavy on philosophy from the mid of the book. I had hoped for something more action driven. And I could have done without the fantasy take on the bardo / reincarnation. Great idea, very well written. Too long.
http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/5407146

,,,,,
Lots of vampires! All reviews here:
http://cathepsut.livejournal.com/tag/books_in_2007

http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/4341146
Amazon.co.uk Review:
“Matt Browning has left the SAS, and life is not treating him well. For a start, he’s up to his ears in debt, and if he doesn’t pay the £500,000 he owes, he’ll be dead. Then, out of the blue, he is given a lifeline: a carefully targeted hit on al-Qa’eda, with the full cooperation of MI5. Matt’s job is to bring together a close-knit team of ex-SAS men to lift $10 million in gold and diamonds from the world’s most lethal terrorist organisation. Along with MI5’s clandestine assistance, there’s another bonus—there will be no charges made. Needless to say, this isn’t the perfect crime. The money is stolen, then the killing begins. A panther-like assassin is tracking down the team one by one, bloodily slaughtering both them and their families. Matt realises that he has to take the fight to the enemy if he himself isn’t to join the dead.”

I read the German translation. The German title literally translates to Lust for Power, which makes no sense in the context of the book. I should have seen it as a bad omen. Very, very lame book. Or perhaps not only the title was badly translated, but the whole book. It might be ok in English. In German it was definitely not worth my time. Don’t bother.

http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/5075738
Excellent! Good fun, I am finally hooked for good! Books 5 to 7 are already on my shelf… His writing gets better with every book. And Rowan Gant’s fetish with his wife’s hair gets less and less pronounced with every outing. If the writing was a little less flowery and Sellars would drop about 10 or 20 adverbs and adjectivs each page, it would be downright spectacular. So far he wins the price for scary first sentences in a book every time… But the books are still very good.

“The Dragon Reborn – the leader long prophesied who will save the world, but in the saving destroy it – is on the run from his destiny. Able to touch the One Power, but unable to control it, Rand al’Thor knows only that he must face the Dark One. But how?”

I read #1 and #2 a while ago, but characters and story are very memorable, so I got back into it without any problems. I still like it, although it took my a while to make my way through those 700 pages. The books would work as stand-alones, although I recommend to start with the first one for maximised fun. Just ignore that it reads like a rip-off of LOTR at first glance.
My favourite characters in #3 are Perrin and Egwene. I don’t mind that there was very little about Rand, as I don’t actually like him that much.

If you want to read what I thought, follow the link. SPOILER ALERT! Don’t go there, unless you have read the book, I give it all away:

http://cathepsut.livejournal.com/364494.html#cutid1

An account of the women sharing their lives with Lord Byron, Shelley and Keats. A very good description of the middle/upper class of that time with emphasis on the women, their social surroundings, morals and ethics of that time, politics and major events of the period. You get a look at the literary and social scene, the Prince Regent, Beau Brummel, Napoleon, Waterloo and so on and so forth.
Although its central theme is romantic relationships, I would not class this as a romantic novel, but rather a historic one. There is not a strong narrative thread. Which is probably the reason, why I started loosing interest about half way through. So, I enjoyed the first 300 pages very much, but thought that the book got a bit scattered after that. I did not like the chapters that were told by Caro Lamb much – mostly because I did not like her talking directly at me. I did not think that worked very well.
The storyline of Keats and Fanny Brawne felt like an afterthought and the book could have done without it. I liked Augusta and Mary Shelley best. They were the most vivid and interesting characters in the book. And Byron – I wouldn’t mind having dinner with him, to see what all the fuss is about and if he was really this fascinating!
I expected their stay at lake Geneva – where Frankenstein was “born” – to be the pivotal point of the book and was a bit disappointed, how briefly it appeared.
It is a good story though and was worth reading.

http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/4187373

After 50 pages I was thoroughly bored – chapter after chapter of introducing characters. Frank Newton keeps popping up, but otherwise no plotline of any kind emerges. Half of the other characters are violently killed. Chapters average at 5 pages length – supposedly to give a feel of fast-paced suspense. I realised that it was just the setting of something bigger to come. It just wasn’t very interesting. After 70 pages all the small-time crooks finally met up with Frank Newton, to discuss the coming job. “Aha,” I thought, “finally something is going to happen!”. 50 pages after that still nothing much. Nope, pointless violence, no plot, not for me!