Women who run with the wolves – Book Review

Finished reading:

Women Who Run with the Wolves

Myths & Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype

by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Expectation

This book was a book club assignment. I don’t think I would have ever took it on my own. For starters it is psychoanalytical non fiction. As an added bonus it is 500+ pages long. I honestly did not know what to expect and I have heard many good reviews from the people who read it.

Summary

The author is an American poet, psychoanalyst and post-trauma specialist. She is also a storyteller. This book is filled with archetype stories on lives of women. There is something in it that will make any woman respond to the stories. Some of the things the author brings to light here come to every woman naturally and some other things make you work hard to control.

This book caught me by surprise. Most of the women in my book club group agreed that we all overestimated ourselves in the time we thought would take to read this book. As it turned out this book is quite intense and requires the reader to take time and think about life. This book is not to be taken lightly. At times, reading this book is like a slap in the face. I cried…I cried a lot…

“Sometimes the one who is running from the Life/Death/Life nature insists on thinking of love as a boon only. Yet love in its fullest form is a series of deaths and rebirths. We let go of one phase, one aspect of love, and enter another. Passion dies and is brought back. Pain is chased away and surfaces another time. To love means to embrace and at the same time to withstand many endings, and many many beginnings- all in the same relationship.”

I liked this book a lot. Things I liked the most were archetype stories from different cultures. Most of them began as legends and folk tales. And I love those kind of stories!

Conclusion

I am glad to have read and learned from this book!

I totally understand why most women who read this book tend to pass it on to other women as a recommendation or even as a book gift. While reading I thought of several women in my life who would benefit from reading this book.  With all that in mind I must conclude that this book was hard for me. I see this book as a Rorschach test – the things you are ready to face about yourself will stare back at you from the pages. This book stared at me a lot…

A God to Wed Her – Book Review

Finished reading:

A God to Wed Her by Yamila Abraham

★★★

Expectation

Lately I’ve hoarding lots of Kindle freebies and I want to start reading them a bit more just to clear my Kindle Library. This one looked promising and short. I’ve seen few free books by this author and frankly I wanted to see what lies beyond these illustrative covers.

This is what the full picture looks like apparently.

Summary

Storywise this book is cool. We meet a small island village slightly primitive in their ways. Ashla, local healer finds herself dealing with an epidemic that even her magical abilities can’t handle. Village elders and senators conclude that she needs to climb the mountain that loom over the village and the god Exinious for help. There are few background characters and plots that made me really interested in this story.

First of all this little story is under 100 pages long. I like the ideas presented in the story and the idea of a god in exile creating people and watching them evolve and learn. The story is totally PG13 and in Kindle store is recommended with erotic fiction. This is probably due to some other works by the same author.

The author writes erotic fiction and some of it are yaoi oriented. Funny I stumbled upon probably the only story by this author that is not erotic fiction.

Other works I found by this author are giving me the impression that the whole process of creating them was rather “done manually” but with great enthusiasm. By the pictures like this one above you can see a person who is doing what she loves and gives it her best to keep at it. It takes a lot of energy to keep up and stay engaged in ventures like this one. I have much respect for less known authors who dare to explore in less traditional parts of erotic fiction. Yaoi being one of them.

Conclusion

I am not really sure what to make of this story. It finished way to soon and left me wondering about the cliffhanger ending. So far I haven’t found any evidence that this story is continued. I will seek out some other work by Yamila Abraham.

 

Sass & Sorcery – Book Review

Finished reading:

Sass & Sorcery (Rat Queens vol 1) by Kurtis J. Wiebe and illustrator Roc Upchurch ★★★★★

Expectation:

This graphic novel has been on my reading list since Easter. A friend read it in chapters as it came out and she was very positive about it. It has been a while since I read a good graphic novel and I was really looking forward to this one. I haven’t played DnD for a while now and I’m really interested in this story of all female DnD butt kicking party!

Summary

Here we’ve got four quirky women who have banded together and make a living by supporting local city and get things done accepting quests from locals. They call themselves The Rat Queens. The story is set in a classic DnD manner. Local city captain passes out quests to questing groups willing to work as mercenaries. They are almost like police units only a lot more colorful and wild.

One of the authors has explained the story as: Lord of the Rings meets Bridesmaids. The heroines of the story each have a intriguing background: Betty is a halfling rogue who considers packing drugs and candy as food on a quest nutrient sufficient; Dee is a human cleric of a giant floating squid deity in search for her own self; Hannah is an elf wizard with an attitude and a black arts dabbling family; Violet is a dwarf fighter that stopped shaving her beard long before it was a thing with the young today.

What I love about these characters is their energy. They are living in an imagined world but their lives, their troubles and hurts are unbelievably real and urban. They are no damsels that need rescuing – they do their own battles and will not shy from a good bar fight. They will probably be the ones starting it…

The first volume has been nominated for a prestigious Eisner award – which is like an Oscar for graphic novels and comics. It has been nominated for a Hugo this year as well.

This graphic novel has recieved GLAAD Media Award and many praises by the LGBT community for a positive portrayal of characters.

Before it was going to be launched as a Kickstarter project editor for Image Comics picked it up and decided to start with publishing a chapter per month which makes two volumes a year.

Last year Heavy Metal Magazine and Pukeko Pictures have announced an animated series to be made based on the story.

Conclusion

I loved the story and the characters. They make for some good cosplay material already. I recommend you to read this graphic novel and get on the fan bandwagon before this stuff gets more popular!

I’m looking forward to read the next volume and I’m very eager to see how the animated series turn out!

 

 

The Wallbanger – Book Review

Finished reading

Wallbanger (Cocktal series book 1) by Alice Clayton ★★★★

Expectation

I’ve heard a lot about this book and since I work in a bookstore I noticed that many people were quite specific looking to buy it. I like to know what I’m selling to people and this also seemed a good book for a quick reading.

Summary

Let’s start with the cover. It is a good cover. Intriguing and not to revealing. It makes a person smile just looking at it. I love this cover….well except for the shoes…I don’t like those shoes…

The whole book is under 300 pages long and for the first two thirds I had a smile plastered to my face. I did not expect for book to be that funny. It is nicely written and the witty banter makes up the most of this book.

A single successful woman in her twenties just moved into a new fabulous apartment. Her O is lost (O as an Orgasm)  and when she hears her new neighbor banging his dates into her bedroom wall so hard that the pictures fall from the wall in the middle of the night and hit her in the head, she is forced into perspective on her life.

“Thump
“Oh, God”
Thump Thump

Unbelievable…

I woke up faster this time, because I knew what I was hearing I sat up in bed, glaring behind me. The bed was still pulled safely away from the wall, so I felt no movement. But there sure as hell something moving over there.

Then I heard ……hissing?
I looked down at Clive, whose tail was at full puff. He arched his back and paced back and forth at the foot of the bed.

“Hey, mister. It’s cool. We just got a noisy neighbor, that’s all,” I soothed, stretching my hand out to him. That’s when I heard it. “Meow”
I cocked my head sideways, listening more intently. I studied Clive, who looked back at me as if to say “T’weren’t me”.
“Meow! Oh, God. Me -Yow!”
The girl next door was meowing. What in the world was my neighbor packing to make that happen?
Clive, at this point, went utterly bonkers and launched himself at the wall. He was literally climbing it, trying to get where the noise was coming from, and adding his own meows to the chorus.

“Oooh yes, just like that, Simon…Mmmm….Meow, meow, Meow!”

Sweet Lord, there were out-of-control pussies on both sides of this wall tonight.”

I love the fact that she owns a cat and that the sexual innuendos did not skip wordplay on that part!

“Of course the girl who meows when she has an orgasm is afraid of cats.”
― Alice Clayton, Wallbanger

Even with all the sexy funny talk this book is in its core a romance and some might even find it shocking how main characters amidst all the jokes and the laughs take their budding relationship seriously.

Conclusion

I will continue reading this book series and I will take my time with it. This is the kind of book series to make me smile on a bad day and I will treat it as such. I tend to rate all the books by read on personal experience and based on how much emotion they managed to make me feel. I treat all art this way.

When I find something that can make me smile the way this book has I intend to enjoy reading it more times.

Buffy corner

Finally I’ve made my own little Buffy corner. I’ve managed to put together all my Buffy and Angel themed books, graphic novels and few other things that are Buffy related into one single shelf. It’s a bit crowded on the shelf…

It is not a shrine to all things Buffy I own but it might be close. Beside the bookish things I have, there’s also an original soundtrack, an original game for Play Station 2 (I’ve never owned a Play station 2) and a first season of Buffy on VHS :p

Soundtrack is really good and I replayed it a few times. It’s basically teen angst compilation that went really well with the show. My favorites are Bif Naked and K’s Choice.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Chaos Bleeds for Play Station 2 I’ve tried playing a few times on a borrowed console. I liked the voice actors and all the little extra stuff in the game. Witty dialogue and Buffy talk are up to the standards of the show and I loved hearing them in the game.

Bad thing is it seems to have a glitch and the whole game freezes when I battle evil druid/magican Giles. It was a bit frustrating since he’s like a big boss or something and I never got to see how the ending of the game looks like 😦

The VHS box set for the first season is with Croatian regional settings and subtitles! It is the ONLY season that was available for buying in Croatia. The actual store I bought it in got burned down a decade ago and was never rebuilt.

The first season is only 12 episodes long and watching it on VHS is a completely different experience. The tapes themselves need to be re-winded from time to time because of the magnetic tape. I have DVD/VHS player that can do that and I need to watch them soon.

It is actually a piece of history as a media type and a cultural quirk.

I would like to get at least one action figure Buffy themed for the shelf and that goes on the wishlist for the future. It will not happen any time soon though since I’m poor and they are not exactly easy to find around here.

Monthly reading review – August 2015

This August I have read

The Duchess War (Brothers Sinister book 1) by Courtney Milan ★★★★
The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katarina Bivald ★★★★
20 pasos hacia adelante by Jorge Bucay ★★★
Fifty Shades Darker (Fifty Shades book 2) by E. L. James ★★
The Rosie Effect (Don Tillman book 2 ) by Greame Simsion ★★★★
Animal Farm by George Orwell ★★★
Red and her Wolf (Kingdom series book 3) by Marie Hall ★★
The Blood of Olympus (Heroes of Olympus book 5) by Rick Riordan ★★★★ ❤
Dnevnik Gradske Cure by Andrea Andrassy ★★★
Seven Nights in a Rogue’s Bed (Sons of Sin book 1) by Anna Campbell ★★★★
Training Their Mate (Pack Wars Book 1) by Vella Day ★★

1. How many books you’ve read last month? Are you happy with the amount you read?

This August I’ve read 11 books which is two times more than in July. I’m happy with this amount. Hopefully I will balance out and stay in the double digits next month as well.

2. What was the best of all the books you’ve read in August? Any scenes or characters that made a lasting impression?

With reading more books comes the reading of more good books in general. This August there were 5 very good books for me. The best was finally finishing Heroes of Olympus series with The Blood of Olympus. I loved those characters and travelling trough not one but two book series with them has been a great experience.

3. Were there any not so good books for you last month? What made it hard or not enjoyable to read?

At first I thought that trudging trough Fifty Shades Darker was the worst book experience for August. I’ve been going at it for more than two months trying to finish it. Then came two more books whose reading I will consider test in patience and a learning experience for spotting not so good books. First was Red and her Wolf – third book in a box set of Kingdom series. I honestly don’t know what went wrong with this one since I usually love the fairy retelling books. Second one was Training Their Mate which I reviewed and was really easy on it since going about all the things that were wrong about that book would have put my blog in the RATED R and PROCEED WITH CAUTION area. You can read the review HERE. 

4. How did the books you were reading last month fit in your reading plans if you had any?

Well the general plan was to up my reading which was a success. Also finishing a series or getting a series up to date is always a good opportunity to do a happy dance since I finished one series and got two other up to date. I added a few new books to my TBR and read them in August which made the reading more fun. 

I’m pleased as punch with my reading in August

5. Any updates on the series you are reading or are you starting any new series?

When it comes to book series in general I’ve had a busy month.

One finished – Heroes of Olympus series

Two up to date – Kingdom series (third bad book is as far as I want to take this series); Don Tillman book series ( I do hope there will be more books in this series)

Two continuing – Fifty Shades (I will make myself read the third book … eventually); Brothers Sinister series ( I count this as continuation since I started the series with a prequel)

And two more started on – Sons of Sin book series (I’m planing to continue); Pack Wars book series ( probably not going to keep reading this one)

6. Would you like to recommend any books or authors you’ve been reading this last month?

I would like to recommend The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katarina Bivald. I’ve seen that the US edition is finally announced so for those of you who rely on English edition go for it!

Courtney Milan stays as one of the best authors I met by reading the freebies. Her characters are interesting and I love her writing style. 

The Rosie Effect (Don Tillman book 2 ) by Greame Simsion I have already praised and you can read my review HERE. 

Once more I must add a recommendation for all readers who have not lost the ability to feel young and can join on the learning experience with some of the most amazing characters I have been reading about in Heroes of Olympus series.

READING IN PROGRESS

Women who run with the wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estes – Book club assignment

Neuromancer (Sprawl Trilogy book 1) by William Gibson – personal challenge as a book from the year I was born

Wallbanger (Cocktal series book 1) by Alice Clayton – Laughing out loud reading!

Les Contes de Grimm by Marc Girard – still at it!