Goodreads Monday: 25/3/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Hello!

I hope everyone has had a good start to the week. Sadly, the weather has kept me out of the garden today but I have been busy doing some teaching and chores.

My chosen book to feature this week is one I have recently purchased but one that I want to read as soon as possible because it looks really interesting.

Medea longs for a different life. Since childhood, she has been separated from her sister, shunned by her mother, and persecuted and tormented by her brother and father. All because of a unique and dangerous witchcraft.

But when a dashing young hero, Jason, arrives to claim the famed Golden Fleece that her father fiercely protects, Medea sees her opportunity for escape. Her offer to help Jason overcome the trials set by her father sets in motion a journey that will test every ounce of her strength, magic and loyalty; a journey that will see her battle monsters, dethrone kings and fall in love.

But when faced with the ultimate betrayal, Medea is driven to an act of desperation so brutal it rips apart the lives of everyone involved…

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 18/03/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Happy Monday!

I have had a glorious day working in the garden in the sunshine. It is so nice to finally have some sun and no rain! I am really hoping to actually use my garden this year so I am working hard to tame it so I can happily sit in the sunshine reading a good book during the summer. There is a lot of work to do before I get to this stage.

My chosen book to feature off my TBR this week is one that I bought relatively recently and hope to read soon.

334 BC. Alexander the Great is just twenty-one years old when he sets out with a small army to challenge Persia, the largest and most powerful empire in the world.

Together, his Macedonian army marches East into the unknown – winning battles against overwhelming odds, storming impregnable fortresses from the Aegean through to India.

But there is another Alexander. Prince of the Macedonian royal house of Lyncestis, he becomes Alexander the Great’s general and most trusted friend.

Alexander of Lyncestis is between this friendship and the duty to avenge his murdered brothers. And he is under threat, too. Others – Persians, Greeks, Macedonians – see him him as a rival for the throne. For six years of conspiracy and battle, his life hangs by a thread.

For Alexander of Lyncestis is the Shadow King.

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 4/3/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Hello my fellow Book Dragons!

I hope everyone has had a good start to the week so far. I have had a good day teaching and making up Etsy orders. I have also managed some reading but sadly not much.

My chosen book today is a recent addition to my TBR but one I hope to read soon.

Change your fate—or kneel to it. The Companions are scattered and hopeless, torn from each other. After Corayne barely escapes with her life, she must forge on alone, leaving her blade broken and her allies behind her. Her only consolation—Corayne now has Taristan’s sword, the only Spindleblade left in existence. Without it, he can’t rip open any more Spindles. Without it, he can’t end the world. But Taristan and Queen Erida will not be defeated so easily. Both will burn the world to bring down Corayne—and bring forth their demon god, What Waits, ready to claim the realm of Allward for his own.  In a final clash between kingdoms and gods, all must rise to fight—or be destroyed.  Everything has come to this. Prepare for a larger-than-life, unforgettable finale to the instant New York Times bestselling Realm Breaker series, where a shattered alliance must rise from the ashes to make their final stand against a ruthless enemy…and the demon god who looks to shroud the entire world in darkness.

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 26/2/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Happy Monday!

I hope everyone has had a good start to the week. My day has been rather long with lots of teaching but I did manage to do some reading today.

My chosen book to feature this week is another that has been sat on my TBR for way too long.

At first glance, the world has not changed: the trams on the boulevards, the grand hotels, the cafes abuzz with conversation. The street kids still play on the two great bridges that divide the city, and the smart set still venture down to the Morgue Ship for an evening’s entertainment.

Yet it only takes a spark to ignite a revolution.

For young Dora, a maid at the university, the moment brings liberation. She finds herself walking out with one of the student radicals, Robert, free to investigate what her brother Ambrose may have seen at the Institute for Psykical Research before he died.

But it is another establishment that Dora is given to look after, The Museum of the Worker. This strange, forgotten edifice is occupied by waxwork tableaux of miners, nurses, shopkeepers and other disturbingly lifelike figures.

As the revolution and counter-revolution outside unleash forces of love, betrayal, magic and terrifying darkness, Dora’s search for the truth behind a mystery that she has long concealed will unravel a monstrous conspiracy and bring her to the very edge of worlds.

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 19/2/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Hello!

I hope everyone has had a good start to the week. I must admit I found my first day back at school rather a shock to the system.

I am determined to start my Agatha Christie challenge back up, so for today I have chosen the next book on the list for me to read.

A practical joke goes chillingly, murderously wrong in Queen of Mystery Agatha Christie’s classic detective story, The Seven Dials Mystery.

Gerry Wade had proved himself to be a champion sleeper, so the other houseguests decided to play a practical joke on him. Eight alarm clocks were set to go off, one after the other, starting at 6:30 a.m. But when morning arrived, one clock was missing and the prank then backfired, with tragic consequences.

For Jimmy Thesiger in particular, the words “Seven Dials” were to take on a new and chilling significance…

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 12/2/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Happy Monday Everyone!

I have had a lovely day enjoying the sunshine on a nice walk and National Trust visit and I have also done some teaching.

My chosen book to feature today is a book from a series I started a couple of years ago and I have sadly not finished yet. This is the next book in the series I need to read and has been sat on my TBR for way too long!

A revolution brewing for generations has begun in fire. It will end in blood.

The Free Navy – a violent group of Belters in black-market military ships – has crippled the Earth and begun a campaign of piracy and violence among the outer planets. The colony ships heading for the thousand new worlds on the far side of the alien ring gates are easy prey, and no single navy remains strong enough to protect them.

James Holden and his crew know the strengths and weaknesses of this new force better than anyone. Outnumbered and outgunned, the embattled remnants of the old political powers call on the Rocinante for a desperate mission to reach Medina Station at the heart of the gate network. 

But the new alliances are as flawed as the old, and the struggle for power has only just begun. As the chaos grows, an alien mystery deepens. Pirate fleets, mutiny and betrayal may be the least of the Rocinante’s problems. And in the uncanny spaces past the ring gates, the choices of a few damaged and desperate people may determine the fate of more than just humanity.

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 4/2/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Happy Monday!

I hope everyone has had a good start to the week. I only had a little bit of teaching today as school has been moved to Thursday for this week so we went to Hanbury Hall for a day out.

My chosen book to feature off my Goodreads TBR this week is a book I bought last year and I am quite excited about. I think this book will be a fascinating read and a different take on the history we know so well.

Here’s how the history of the Roman Empire usually goes…

We start with Romulus, go on to Brutus overthrowing Tarquin, bounce through an appallingly tedious list of battles and generals and consuls, before emerging into the political stab-fest of the late Republic. From there, it runs through all the emperors, occasionally mentioning a wife or mother to show how bad things get when women get out of control, until Constantine invents Christianity and then Attila the Hun comes and ruins everything. But the history of Rome and empire is so much more than these Important Things.

In this alternative history, Emma Southon traces the story of the Roman Empire through women: Vestal Virgins and sex workers, business owners and poets, martyrs and saints. Each gives a different perspective on women’s lives and how they changed, across time and across class lines.

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 29/1/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Hello and Happy Monday!

I must admit I am not very happy with my lack of reading in January, I can’t remember such a bad month reading wise and I’m not even in a reading slump. I just can’t find the time like I usually do.

I am really hoping my reading increases in February. One of the books I think I would like to read in February is this one.

From beloved, award-winning poet Aimee Nezhukumatathil comes a debut work of nonfiction–a collection of essays about the natural world, and the way its inhabitants can teach, support, and inspire us.

As a child, Nezhukumatathil called many places home: the grounds of a Kansas mental institution, where her Filipina mother was a doctor; the open skies and tall mountains of Arizona, where she hiked with her Indian father; and the chillier climes of western New York and Ohio. But no matter where she was transplanted–no matter how awkward the fit or forbidding the landscape–she was able to turn to our world’s fierce and funny creatures for guidance.

“What the peacock can do,” she tells us, “is remind you of a home you will run away from and run back to all your life.” The axolotl teaches us to smile, even in the face of unkindness; the touch-me-not plant shows us how to shake off unwanted advances; the narwhal demonstrates how to survive in hostile environments. Even in the strange and the unlovely, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship. For it is this way with wonder: it requires that we are curious enough to look past the distractions in order to fully appreciate the world’s gifts.

Warm, lyrical, and gorgeously illustrated by Fumi Nakamura, World of Wonders is a book of sustenance and joy.

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 22/1/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Hello!

I hope everyone has had a good start to the week. I had an unexpected day where quite a few of my students were off sick so it meant a shorter day for me. My chosen book today is one I got this month but I’m really hoping I get around to reading in February.

Their names still echo down the ages: The Great Pyramid at Giza. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon. The Temple of Artemis. The statue of Zeus at Olympia. The mausoleum of Halikarnassos. The Colossus at Rhodes. The Lighthouse of Alexandria. The Seven Wonders of the World were staggeringly audacious impositions on our planet. They were also brilliant adventures of the mind, test cases of the reaches of human imagination. Now only the pyramid remains, yet the scale and majesty of these seven wonders still enthral us today.

In a thrilling, colourful narrative enriched with the latest archaeological discoveries, bestselling historian Bettany Hughes walks through the landscapes of both ancient and modern time; on a journey whose purpose is to ask why we wonder, why we create, why we choose to remember the wonder of others. She explores traces of the Wonders themselves, and the traces they have left in history. A majestic work of historical storytelling, The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World reinforces the exciting, and nourishing, notion that humans can make the impossible happen.

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you

Goodreads Monday: 15/1/2024

Goodreads Monday is now hosted by Budget Tales Book Club.  All you have to do is show off a book from your TBR that you’re looking forward to reading.

Hello!

Welcome to my first Goodreads Monday of 2024. My chosen book this week is one off my 24 Books of 2024 list. It is also one I bought just before Christmas and have been very excited to read as it is by one of my favourite historians.

Medieval queens were seen as mere dynastic trophies, yet many of the Plantagenet queens of the High Middle Ages dramatically broke away from the restrictions imposed on their sex, as Alison Weir shows in this gripping group biography of England’s fourteenth-century consorts.

Using personal letters and wonderfully vivid sources, Alison Weir evokes the lives of five remarkable Marguerite of France, Isabella of France, Philippa of Hainault, Anne of Bohemia and Isabella of Valois.

The turbulent, brutal Age of Chivalry witnessed the Black Death, the Peasants’ Revolt, the Hundred Years War against France and savage baronial wars against the monarchy in which these queens were passionately involved. Queens of the Age of Chivalry brilliantly recreates this truly dramatic period of history through the lives of five extraordinary women.

Please drop me a link with your Goodreads Monday and I will head over for a visit. 

Happy Reading

Etsy

If you enjoy reading my blog and would like to make a donation I would be very grateful. Thank you