It's Monday! and so forth

I know there are many people who work the long week month after month, year after year.  I'm used to having summers off, so the beginning of the school year Mondays are a little hard for me.  The middle of the school year, Mondays are a bit harder.  By the time the end of the school year rolls around, I'm barely hanging in there, forcing myself to get up - especially on those Mondays... Which is why I usually - absolutely - hate Mondays.  No Exception....except the summer when all days roll into each other.  Soooo fine (except for the being completely broke bit, lol)

Of course, Monday also means time for It's Monday, What Are You Reading? - the always fun book blog meme hosted by Sheila of Book Journey.  Full guidelines at her website - but basically it's a sharing of what we've read the past week, what we're currently reading and for some more organized folk, what is planned reading for the coming week.  My planned reading never works out, so I usually leave that part out on my own blog. :)  

I read a short story - The Moths of Miller Place last week. The Moths of Miller Place is written by J.A. Campbell and features more of Doc, The Vampire Hunting Dog.  I really love this character - if you like dogs (or animals) you'll understand when I say it's fun for me to try to picture my own dog and what he might be thinking while I'm reading about Doc - These Doc stories are from the point of view of the dog - and done very well, you can totally see how a dog might think along these lines.  Especially if you - like me - do NOT believe in the whole short memory thing with dogs.  I think there's way more to a dog's brain and thinking processes than people give them credit for - just like elephants, cats, crows.... hell, any number of animals.  Anyway- this is just one of the shorts about Doc - and there's more coming! :)

Other than the short story - the only novel I was able to finish reading this past week was Endgame by Ann Aguirre.  I have been looking forward to this novel for years!  I know that sounds very dramatic, but seriously - Aguirre has had the names of EACH book of the Sirantha Jax series listed on her site since book two (at least) and I've been waiting for each book to come out, buying them the minute I could and devouring them within two days....until this last book.  And then I fell into my last book of the series slow reading syndrome. I start the book and read some, then put it aside and do something else; then I pick it back up and read some more....repeating this.  I noticed that I do this about a year ago while reading the last Strange Angels novel; realizing more when reading Angel Town - and other final novels.  Seems like I have to drag out the reading experience on that last book, since I usually have mixed feelings about one of my favorite series coming to an end.  You know it's the smart thing for an author to do - go on while at the top type of thing (something a certain coughlkhcough author should have done about 11 books ago), keeping the series fresh and the readers not only wanting more but still enjoying the series. So I drag out the reading of that very last novel of the series.  I thoroughly enjoyed Endgame and happily - while there won't be anymore Sirantha Jax novels, there WILL be more in the universe.  That's good -because while I enjoy Aguirre's other series, I LOVE  her SciFi writing.  I'll be looking for the Dread Queen series - set on a prison ship in the Jax universe setting.  Ooh boy! Hoping it's just as good as Sirantha's stories.

Current Reading

Here is where I'm having a hard time this week - seriously - after reading such great books the past few weeks (most of the novels I've picked in the last few weeks have been so satisfyingly great reading) and finishing up with Endgame it's been hard to concentrate on the next novel.  

I started off trying to read Blades of Winter by G.T. Almasi  - but it's not holding my interest after the first two chapters.  Not a fault of the author - there's a gun fight, augmented main character, some suspense in the past of this chacter - etc....then she goes home and has a MEAL with her mother...I fell out of interest, so I put it aside to try again later.  It SEEMS like it should be interesting - perhaps I need a palate cleanser novel first.  Perhaps it's because the main character is a woman written by a man in the first person pov - which doesn't always seem to work for me. (for ME, could be wonderful for other readers).  Who knows?  I don't.  I'll just have to try again later, which I'm willing to do.

Then I grabbed up In Fury Born - a nice meaty novel by David Weber that seems to be a reworking of two novels into one=I think.  Anyway a combination of extremely small font and a little too much of backstory of a planet's war history  made me lose interest - there are times when I enjoy a bit of history, some information of what's been going on, but most of the time it just frustrates me - AUTHORS - small doses of information judiciously applied here and there - please; don't overwhelm me with too much.  I don't feel like sitting through a class.  Again, this is a main character of a female written by a man, although not in the first person.  So I also put it aside for .....possibly for some summer reading.  *g* - yeah, that's it.  Summer reading. :)

I then picked up a book I've had for over a year - it's a sequel to The Better To Hold You - a book I read a couple years ago.  Moonburn is by Alisa Sheckley aka Alisa Kwitney - (first person pov of a woman, by a woman) and interesting - but my interest wasn't catching....I can tell it's going to be an interesting book though, and I did enjoy previous novel - different from most urban fantasies.  So this proves to me that it really is time for the palate cleanser read.  A book that has nothing to do with magic, urban fantasy, weres, vampires, fey or anything but mundane humans.  The regular fiction novel.

So I searched my shelves for a regular fiction book - of which I have few.  I found a novel I had won from Sheila over a year ago - Hasta La Vista, Lola by Misa Ramirez.  It's time I read it.  I read the first couple of pages tonight and I think this is going to be the one novel I read this week.  The only thing that kept me from reading more tonight was this meme, and a couple of episodes of Leverage. :)  and of course - LOLCatz. *g*  I captioned the lolcat below - not the one above, though. :)  The plan will be reading the palate cleanser novel, Hasta La Vista, Lola! and then going back to MoonBurn by Sheckley - it's calling my name now, even.  But then, so is Lola!

No other reading plans - not committing to anything else, my commitments rarely work out with books anyway. :)

So, what's going on with y'all?

Isn't this kitty kat a creepy looking cat?