Flight into Fantasy

It looks as if the Desert Isle Keeper madness that Lisabea has started will be continuing. And since I guess this is the last day for stowaways, I’ve finally gotten a chance to participate.

Now, I know that all three of you who read this blog are dying to know what books I’d take with me on a desert island. Well, wonder no further, for here they be.

• A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin – it’s a four-book series, but we’ll pretend that someone will have compiled them into a ginormous omnibus edition that I can use to either way things down on the island or drop on the heads of my enemies.

• The Little Country – Charles de Lint
• A Wrinkle in Time – Madeleine L’Engle
• Brothers in Arms by Lois McMaster Bujold
• The Viscount Who Loved Me by Julia Quinn
• Demon Night by Meljean Brook

There you have it. Yeah, I cheated, like, a lot, by counting ASOIAF as one book, but if I were really marooned on a desert island, I couldn’t just pick my favorite out of those four, not without refreshing my memory about stuff that came before. Plus, there are some great potential island inhabitants in those books… or at least there are a bunch of cynics in that book who hide their soft hearts beneath hard, callous exteriors, which, uh, I find hella sexy.

I went on kind of a tear on a yahoo group recently and bitched about how I sometimes feel that authors expect all reviewers to look for things to say to trash their books. Obviously, I disagree with this assessment, as evidenced by tonight.

Tonight I was vassilating between two books that I will start tomorrow. Both are paranormals. One is by an author I love. The other is by a new to me author who sent me an E-ARC of her September release. Being a series whore, I need to read the first book before I tackle the second. I was already leaning toward the new to me author, so I went looking for reviews of her first book, which I intend to read in preparation for this one.

The book incidentally, is Dark Thirst by Sarah Reinke. I knew nothing about it, except the fact that Ms. Reinke writes books that all sound very good. So I checked out reviews.

Sadly, the most recent was by Debra Ann MacGilivray, so I ignored that, and went on. And now I am excited to read this book because of the following things that I gleaned from the Amazon reviews:

• Beta hero. Mmm, I lurve me a good beta hero/alpha heroine dynamic. I know, that makes me a freak in the romance world, but anyone here reading this won’t be shocked by that revelation.

• The hero is deaf/mute. After my crush on Nick Andros from The Stand by Stephen King, I am all about the deaf-mute characters, because I think the struggles for communication are fascinating. And I am not deaf or mute, so my disability baggage won’t kick in every time the author does something of which I do not approve.
• Vampire mafia. How awesome is that?
• Did I mention virgin hero? Oh, sign me up.

I also think it’s awesome that this is an interracial romance, but quite honestly that’s just a side benefit. I am looking forward to a darkish paranormal, hoping for a strong heroine, and totally stoked about the virgin hero thing.

Now I just pray that this lives up to my expectations!

Holly over at Book Binge, who I like to think of as my good blogger twin, posted a meme. Given how opposed we are to original content over here I thought I’d do it.

Contemporary, Historical, or Paranormal?
Paranormal, followed by historical and contemp. It really depends on my mood.
Hardback or Trade Paperback or Mass Market Paperback?
Erm… ebook.
Heyer or Austen?
Heyer. She’s witty and funny and I loved both of the books I’ve read by her, whereas–and here I will no doubt get smote–I’ve never really had any desire to read Austen.
Amazon or Brick and Mortar?
Amazon. Or, actually, Fictionwise.
Barnes & Noble or Borders?
Borders. There isn’t a B&N anywhere near where I live, but there is a Borders, and the Borders people are very nice.
Woodiwiss or Lindsay?
Lindsey is the one I’ve read. I haven’t felt any need to try Woodiwiss, either.
First romance novel you ever remember reading?
Hmmm, aside from Thunder Heights by Phylllis Whitney? Probably A Knight in Shining Armor by Deveraux. Unlike Holly, I really kind of liked the ending, but I don’t know if I could read it again and feel similarly years later.
Alphabetize by author Alphabetize by title or random?
By author. Like Holly, I also alphabetize by title and put series together. My ebook collection is the most organized thing in my life.
Keep, Throw Away or Sell?
Since I mostly read ebooks, I make sure I can get them again if I want to and then throw away, unless they’re books I absolutely must reread.
Read with dustjacket or remove it?
N/A.
Sookie Stackhouse or Anita Blake?
Sookie. Not that I intend to read any other books in that series, but yeah, she was less annoying than the one Anita Blake I tried to read.
Stop reading when tired or at chapter breaks?
Chapter breaks, unless I’m using my Book Port, which is my glorified ebook reader for the blind, in which case I stop reading when I’m tired and it will pick up right where I left off.
“It was a dark and stormy night” or “Once upon a time”?
“Once upon a time.”
Crusie or SEP?
SEP I love. I haven’t read Crusie. (I know, le shock! Quel horror!)
Buy or Borrow?
Borrow, mostly. Except I do spend way more than I should on ebooks.
Buying choice: Book Reviews, Recommendation or Browse?
Recommendations from people I trust. Occasionally if a blurb catches me I’ll try something.
Tidy ending or Cliffhanger?
Tidy endings. Even in series. I don’t need every subplot resolved, but I don’t like when a book just… stops.
Morning reading, Afternoon reading or Nighttime reading?
Whenever. I’ll read anytime, anyplace. Books help me wake up, and I have been reading more nonfiction to relax.
Series or standalone?
I am a huge series whore. I keep telling myself I won’t get caught up in any more, then I make a liar of myself and end up reading a series book anyway.
Favorite book of which nobody else has heard?
I think my Kate Elliott discovery qualifies. I loved King’s Dragon but even when I first picked it up nobody else had ever heard of it.

I have class tonight, and am still in the stage where this is exciting. I even enjoyed the chapter I read in my textbook. And I’m one of the non-elementary ed majors. I even prepared for the class by finding some classic children’s books from my youth that I want to reread. Most are in the middle grade to YA category, which I suspect is going to be my favorite part of the class.

In my adult reading, though, poor Sookie’s getting so shafted. I have a bunch of stuff I want to be reading, none of which involves her. I’ll give Ms. Harris points for the fact that I am thinking in terms of Sookie as a character I don’t like, and not just that Dead Until Dark isn’t a book that’s working for me. I guess it’s just hard for me to suspend my disbelief about characters who sit there and fail to notice that every man with a working penis wants to put it inside their personal vajayjay. Although, that being said, I do love me some Sam. I might continue reading the series just for him. (Incidentally, Holly said once that Nick was her favorite hero name. Sam is mine. So make of that what you will.)

Er… Anyway. Next on my list is the new Loretta Chase, and then at some point very soon I really want to read me some Josh Lanyon and Ally Blue. I’ve also got a few Harlequin Historicals that look good that I have to review and I want to go back to my epic fantasy series that I started last month.

Some people wish they had my TBR anxiety, I’m sure, and I feel like a snot every time I muse about what I want to read next and then proceed to waffle about it.

So my summer class started today. I like my children’s lit teacher. Or, at least, the woman who is teaching the first two sections of the class. She seems to really like kids, and the class is going to be fun, I think. But of course she was an English major and an academic, so she sniped about the romance genre, saying that it wasn’t real literature because naturally you only need two brain cells to read it. She made up for it by reading aloud from one of my favorite children’s books ever, (“Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Day, if you’re counting.) but still… I wanted to sic some of y’all on her, or give her a book recommendation. (I defy anyone to read a Janice Kay johnson superromance and tell me that isn’t some damn fine writing and serious lit-ra-ture.) Or, you know, there are always Georgette Heyer and Jane Austen, who are nowhere near “trashy Harlequin” status. Then she said something like, “Children’s books usually have hope at the end. Too many adult books have depressing endings.” I know I smirked meanly and thought, ‘Not the ones I read.’

Oh, and there was an interesting side conversation in my class in which I probably upset a few of the elementary ed majors in attendance. A bunch of them were saying that they used to be readers but, and someone actually did say, “Who has time to read?” Someone else pointed out that she had friends who made time, but she stated that she didn’t know how they could. So naturally I piped up and said I was one of those, because university student or not, I really need something to read at some point in the day. It makes me feel like I’ve done something productive, even if I haven’t, and even if what I’m reading isn’t 700 pages of weighty prose with a depressing ending, I figure I’m still learning something, even if it’s just what not to do if I ever get off my ass and write a book.

Speaking of books, I managed to walk out the door without my primary book-reading gadget. I was so upset! I couldn’t read my current book, because it wasn’t on my emergency backup reading gadget, so I settled for reading the first Charlaine Harris book. I don’t know if Sookie Stackhouse and I are all that compatible. It started when she told the readers she had a disability. Uh, snookems, yes, not being the world’s smartest individual is certainly nothing to be proud of, but reading minds? Not a real disability, darlin’.

I feel compelled to finish the book, and at the moment it’s cruising somewhere in the C range, and I also know that Charlaine Harris fangirls are probably going to be shocked–shocked I say!–that I don’t understand the brilliance that is Sookie Stackhouse. I’m sure that Charlaine and I will get over it with no hard feelings.