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Post by sophie on Oct 22, 2023 19:51:18 GMT -5
Liisa, octopus research is finally catching up with what divers and coastal residents knew about octupi.. they are smart! Too bad their life span is relatively short.
Small things like this by Claire Keegan. A gem. It’s short, more of a novela, but so well written. It hits all the emotional points of a good read as well. It describes a few days in the life of the main character, Bill Furlong, around Christmas time. He has much to be grateful for, but he also has many unanswered questions about his own life and the goings on in the convent where he encounters a couple of girls who are obviously in difficulty. Recommended.
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Oct 23, 2023 3:42:13 GMT -5
75. Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus. I loved it. It tapped into various parts of my own history, although Elizabeth’s life was very different.
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Post by Q-pee on Oct 23, 2023 13:50:49 GMT -5
78) Sy Montgomery, The Soul of an Octopus In the course of researching this book, the author befriends a number of Boston aquarists and a couple of octopuses. It's amazing how the octopuses can recognize different people, and respond intelligently to them. She describes interesting octopus research and shows just how much personality and intelligence these slippery beasts have. Do you have Netflix? Watch my Octopus Teacher
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Post by Liiisa on Oct 23, 2023 14:38:58 GMT -5
I don’t, but will keep that in mind for if I ever do, thank you!
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Post by scrubb on Oct 23, 2023 23:17:53 GMT -5
A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True, by Brigid Pasulka.
Set in Poland with a dual timeline, one from the eve of WW2 until shortly after, when the Communists were in control; one in the '90s, following descendents of the first characters as they emerge from Communism.
I really liked it - would definitely recommend.
ETA: to correct the title which I'd gotten slightly wrong
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Post by Liiisa on Oct 24, 2023 5:05:39 GMT -5
79) Benjamin Percy, The Sky Vault
This is the third installation of these books that I was reading last year about a comet, where in the first book a new kind of metal with strange properties is discovered, and then second that's all about fungus. In this one you learn what the comet really was. Great characters; set in Fairbanks, Alaska.
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Post by sprite on Oct 24, 2023 7:44:25 GMT -5
Small things like this by Claire Keegan. A gem. It’s short, more of a novela, but so well written. It hits all the emotional points of a good read as well. It describes a few days in the life of the main character, Bill Furlong, around Christmas time. He has much to be grateful for, but he also has many unanswered questions about his own life and the goings on in the convent where he encounters a couple of girls who are obviously in difficulty. Recommended. I also enjoyed this story, especially having read some social history from that era just a while before. The idea that one person can't solve all the problems themselves, but they can solve one or two. He's a likeable character, admirable without being annoyingly pure.
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Post by sophie on Oct 24, 2023 9:34:55 GMT -5
Dead Mountain by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. A decent thriller/murder mystery set in the mountains of New Mexico with a disturbing disappearance and death of a group of mountaineers 15 years back and new clues currently being uncovered. Also a fast read. Good entertainment.
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Post by tzarine on Oct 24, 2023 16:50:57 GMT -5
the perfect nanny - leila slimani a nanny, a murder perfectly encapsulates the world of a working mother & the woman she entrusts her children to dark but incisive
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Post by lillielangtry on Oct 25, 2023 0:51:35 GMT -5
Eva Karnofsky and Barbara Potthast, Mächtig, mutig und genial: vierzig außergewöhnliche Frauen aus Lateinamerika
I'm clearing the decks a bit and finished this book, which I've been dipping into all year. It's 40 short biographies of women from Latin America. Even though I have a great interest in the region, I hadn't heard of them all - although the big names like Evita and Frida Kahlo are also there. Really good, but because I picked the book up second hand and it was published in 2012, the chapters about the still living women were obviously out of date.
Georgi Gospodinov, Time Shelter (translated by Angela Rodel) I was slow to get into this novel about recreating the past but I enjoyed the second half. I'm going to guess that some of my fellow book club members are not going to have patience with the nonlinear, meandering structure, but we'll see. Even though the author is Bulgarian, I felt the influence of Brexit on this novel - it's specifically mentioned a few times but more the general feeling of the danger of nostalgia and trying to recreate the past. Interesting.
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Post by scrubb on Oct 27, 2023 2:37:59 GMT -5
Normal Rules Don't Apply, Kate Atkinson. Collection of short stories that are connected in some ways. Playing with time and a bit of meta fiction. Really good.
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Post by lillielangtry on Oct 27, 2023 4:23:08 GMT -5
Normal Rules Don't Apply, Kate Atkinson. Collection of short stories that are connected in some ways. Playing with time and a bit of meta fiction. Really good. I plan to buy this for my mum for Christmas. She loves short stories.
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Post by Liiisa on Oct 27, 2023 17:31:51 GMT -5
80) Chuck Wendig, Black River Orchard
Demonic apples give people incredible power but also make them into huge assholes; and THEN things get creepy. This book was just as addictive as those demon apples. Absolutely loved the characters and the setting.
I also particularly loved the acknowledgments, where the author gives us great writing advice: there are no new stories; it's YOUR particular weirdness that you bring to a story that makes it new. Maybe I'll write a novel after all.
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Oct 27, 2023 19:17:25 GMT -5
I’d definitely read a novel based on your particular weirdness, Liiisa.
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Post by Liiisa on Oct 27, 2023 19:31:17 GMT -5
Aww thank you. Maybe I'll start one when I retire in 227 days
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Oct 31, 2023 5:35:53 GMT -5
76. Arrivals and Arrests, Diana Xarissa. Another cozy mystery series set on the Isle of Man, this time contemporary, and with a resident ghost. Not as good so far as her Aunt Bessie series, but I like the setting.
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Post by sophie on Oct 31, 2023 8:58:55 GMT -5
The huntress by Kate Quinn. A novel based on some vaguely similar people from the WW2 era. A woman born on the shores of Lake Baikal ends up being in the Soviet Air Force. Another woman is a cold blooded nazi, trying to get a new identity. A young woman in the US is dealing with figuring out how to convince her father to let her take courses to further her passion for photography. The novel throws all three of them on an eventual collision course. I enjoyed it.
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Post by Liiisa on Nov 1, 2023 6:08:20 GMT -5
81) N. K. Jemisin, The Stone Sky
The third and final book in the series (that I can't believe I took this long to get around to reading) about people who work geology magic. The conclusion, but more importantly, the story of how it all came about. "[F]or a society built on exploitation, there is no greater threat than having no one left to oppress."
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Post by scrubb on Nov 2, 2023 0:55:56 GMT -5
The Night Ship, by Jess Kidd.
Two timelines: one with 9 year old Maykin, a Dutch girl aboard the Batavia - yes, that Batavia, the famous ship wreck with the horrific actions among the survivors who washed up on remote islands off west Australia in the 1600s - to join her never-met father in Jakarta, after her mother died in Holland. She is a great character.
Other timeline with 9 year old Gil, a boy sent to live with his surly grandfather on the same remote isislandsniw used for crayfishing, in the 1980s, after his mother dies. He's odd and easily bullied.
I'm officially a Jess Kidd fan. I really liked the book.
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Post by snowwhite on Nov 2, 2023 15:27:27 GMT -5
I was looking for a November edition...
Not that I've finished anything, but the latest Richard Osman has been fetched from the library.
I also need to return A Falklands Family at War, which I've not entirely finished, but have enjoyed dipping in and out of. It's also really nice that I asked for the library to get a copy when I heard about it on FB from the woman who compiled / edited it (from her parents' diaries) and now there are two reserves on it - so other people can enjoy it too.
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