Bookopoly Chance Cards Season 2.

Just over a year ago I made my first Bookopoly TBR board and decided to make Bookopoly reading challenge a buddy reading project with a booklover friend Vivone. You can check out that first Bookopoly post HERE. Since then we had many changes to our boards to make them fit more to our reading habits and preferences.

One of the requirements for the Bookopoly board was a set of 16 Chance Cards with book titles for a random draw each time we end our movement on a Chance Card tile. Eight Chance Cards have titles of eight books I am looking forward to read and other eight Chance Cards have titles of books I am less excited about but still want to read. I decided to use this opportunity and use books that I already own and choose the titles from my own bookshelves. This resulted in first 15 out of 16 titles to be books I already own and is something I am very happy about.

Here are the first 16 book titles I put on Chance Cards:

The Chosen Half-Elf (Elfes #4) by Éric Corbeyran, Jean-Paul Bordier (Illustrator) ★★★★

The Scent of Shadows (Signs of the Zodiac #1) by Vicki Pettersson ★★★★

The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux ★★

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon ★★★★

Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Choderlos de Laclos ★★★

Ninth House (Alex Stern #1) by Leigh Bardugo ★★★★★

Pride (Shifters #3) by Rachel Vincent ★★★★★

The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu ★★★

Naked City by Ellen Datlow (Editor) ★★★★

Elminster: The Making of a Mage (Forgotten Realms: Elminster #1) by Ed Greenwood  ★★★★

Master of Chains (Forgotten Realms: The Fighters #1) by Jess Lebow ★★★

The Hedge Knight: The Tales of Dunk and Egg by George R.R. Martin  ★★★★

Time Weaver (Drakon #5) by Shana Abe ★★★

Antologija suvremene japanske novele by Kazuo Tanaka (Editor) ★★★★

Real World by Natsuo Kirino ★★★

The Vampire Lestat (The Vampire Chronicles #2) by Anne Rice

On this picture The Chosen Half-Elf (Elfes #4) by Éric Corbeyran, Jean-Paul Bordier is missing because it was a digital edition.

Some books I put on Chance Cards I ended up reading for some other reading challenges and the amount of times I landed on the Chance Card tile was surprisingly high. This resulted in me needing a new set of 16 titles for Chance Cards! This time I decided to use all the titles from my own bookshelves and it is a big part of the reason why I have not updated my TBR Jar Draw project. The purpose of my TBR Jar Draw project was to read the books from my own shelves and I have been doing that surprisingly well in the last few years.

At the moment I am reading the last book from the first set – The Vampire Lestat (The Vampire Chronicles #2) by Anne Rice and have already drawn a new Chance Card from the second batch and have added the Bajki robotów by Stanisław Lem to my reading for October ( I am not sure if I’m going to make it by the end of the month since life interrupts a lot of my reading sessions lately).

Here are the 16 new book titles for Chance Cards:

Bajki robotów by Stanisław Lem

Bring Me the Head of Prince Charming (Millennial Contest #1) by Roger Zelazny, Robert Sheckley

Wonder Woman: Warbringer (DC Icons #1) by Leigh Bardugo

A Wind in the Door (Time Quintet #2) by Madeleine L’Engle

Necroscope (Necroscope #1) by Brian Lumley

The Poison Diaries (The Poison Diaries #1) by Maryrose Wood

The Great Book of Amber (The Chronicles of Amber #1-10 ) by Roger Zelazny

Concertina: The Life And Loves Of A Dominatrix by Susan Winemaker

Shattered (The Iron Druid Chronicles #7) by Kevin Hearne

Loki: Where Mischief Lies (Marvel Press Novels) by Mackenzi Lee

Wait Till Your Vampire Gets Home (Broken Heart #4) by Michele Bardsley

Love In Vein: Tales of Vampire Erotica by Poppy Z. Brite

Wolf Brother (Chronicles of Ancient Darkness #1) by Michelle Paver

The Fellowship of the Ring (The Lord of the Rings #1) by J.R.R. Tolkien

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Vol. 2 (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) by Nancy Holder

Neuromancer (Sprawl #1) by William Gibson

On this picture Neuromancer (Sprawl #1) by William Gibson is missing since I loaned the book to a friend.

First sixteen books for Chance Cards have amounted to 5081 pages and are mostly around 300 pages long each. The longest book from the first batch is 539 pages long and the shortest is only 55. From all the book titles I had on my Chance Cards only one book was rated with two stars and I did not particularly liked it. In contrast 9 out of 16 books I loved and rated four or five stars. I am happy to report that this made me read trough some books that I had on my shelf for years and I even liked them more than I expected to. I had a clear vision of the books I was looking forward to read and this might be why I read some of them even before I pulled their Chance Card out for Bookopoly. This might happen again with the new batch and I refuse to save or hold the titles just because I will pull their Chance Card eventually. When I pull a title I have already read I just draw the next one until I run out of Chance Cards.

Both piles have one title missing from the list.

The second batch of sixteen books I have chosen have a bit more pages total – 6501. The average book is around 350 long and the biggest difference is with the book with the most pages. The longest book in the second batch has 1258 pages and the shortest has 166. I realize that I might have to give myself more time to finish my Bookopoly reading in the future, since my schedule is more busy than it was last few years. Right now I am quite busy with reading for work and some of my books have taken the back seat until I ease into things I have on my plate right now. The amount of books in English language ratio and books in Croatian language remains the same and I still have a lot of variety in genres. Some of the books on my lists are older and not so well known but I always have some popular and bestseller titles I have yet to read.

What do you think about my lists and book choices? Have you read any and what did you think about them?

Leave a comment and let me know!

January Book Wrap Up 2021

Monthly reading review – January 2021

This January I have read:

Elminster: The Making of a Mage (Forgotten Realms: Elminster #1) by Ed Greenwood  ★★★★

Sucker Punch (Anita Blake Vampire Hunter #27) by Laurell K. Hamilton ★★★

Vitez slavonske ravni by Marija Jurić Zagorka ★★★

Serpent & Dove (Serpent & Dove #1) by Shelby Mahurin ★★★★

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

This year started depressingly slow and I had problems with finding the will to read anything. I have read three whole books and finished one I got left from Bookopoly TBR picks from December. This makes it 4 books finished and another 4 I started. I am not happy with the amount or the books I read…

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

The book that made my reading experience more livelier in January was Serpent & Dove (Serpent & Dove #1) by Shelby Mahurin. It was a 500+ pages long book I finished off in about three days as opposed to some other books I’m dragging on for weeks and months now. I connected with the drama and the tragic quality of the characters in Serpent & Dove and would like to continue the series sometime this year.

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

I had really high hopes for Sucker Punch (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter #27) by Laurell K. Hamilton and in most ways it let me down. I built my own high expectations for it and needed it to be that good. After it fell flat I kinda lost most of my drive for reading. Next book I read after it I dragged on for almost two weeks. I missed the excitement of picking up a book to read and diving into it.

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

I had humble plans for January from the start. After reading thirteen books in December I knew I needed a bit of a break to slow down my pace. I went with only five books for Bookopoly TBR game and did not manage to finish even those. I finished one book I got left over from December, read another three for Bookopoly TBR and got stuck on the fourth book. I got one book I did not even start at all. All my reading was planned and I find it telling that I did not even got to read anything interesting beside those books I set out.

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

Elminster and Serpent & Dove were technically first books of two new series. I got up to date with Anita Blake the Vampire Hunter series by reading Sucker Punch – the book 27! The book I started on this month Master of Chains (Forgotten Realms: The Fighters #1) by Jess Lebow is also first book of a series which makes a lot of new book series for a really slow reading month!

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

My recommendation from January is just to keep reading and finish books in general. My score sheet for January left me with four books finished and another four I started and did not finish. This is starting to frustrate me and I need to clear my reading pile soon!

Final thoughts on January 2021 reading

I tried out some new authors for me and the results were warried. At one point I even got to the dazzling revelation that I don’t like books without emotional conflicts, love or sex in them. Without those I just can’t seem to keep my interest for the book. I have been toying around with reading only romance books for the whole month or even a year to see how would that work out! Right now I am left with battling to do just that or to take a whole month off any new book and just finish off all the books I am in the middle of reading.

To give myself some books to indulge into or to work trough the books I have already started and feel like a chore that needs to be finished?

Here are the books I have started at some point and are still going as “in the middle of reading“:

Master of Chains (Forgotten Realms: The Fighters #1) by Jess Lebow

Started it out this month. It has been on my shelf for over a decade. Also have two another from the series. I don’t seem that inspired with the plot but the reading is going better than expected – I am about 1/4 in.

Draconomicon: The Book of Dragons by Andy Collins, Skip Williams, James Wyatt

Started it in August last year for the N.E.W.T.s Magical Readathon. I did not expect to take so much time to read it trough. It is not a novel but a guide supplement for Dungeon and Dragons players I have had for over fifteen years. It is large in format and has many details that players of the game might want to read trough. The illustrations are very nice and detailed. I have been reading it on and off since August and I am not even halfway trough!

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

I started this book courageously for my birthday last year – July 2020. Since then I picked it up a few times out of guilt since it was one of the books I was planning to read last year for my personal reading challenge. I decided to postpone reading it in favor of some other books and challenges since it is a probably the longest book I have read in years if ever! From 1055 pages I am on 295 currently! The weird thing is I find the book interesting and easy to read considering the style and the adventure theme. The sheer number of pages and the weight of it in my hands while I am reading it and holding it feels oppressive.

MOR – Plodovi osvete by Josip Kralik

I barely started this book in December since it was another book from my personal challenge list for 2020. I read the first chapter and left it at that. I am not sure what to expect from it still. It is a new author that works in a local history museum. The thing that drew me in was a dark fantasy story set in my hometown.

There is also one more book I was supposed to read this January that I did not even get to:

The Vampire Lestat (The Vampire Chronicles #2) by Anne Rice

There are some ideas and fantasies I have about myself as a reader. One of them includes reading the classics of the urban fantasy genre and Anne Rice is on top of that list for sure. I remember having problems with reading the first book of The Vampire Chronicles series – I dragged it on for months and months unable to finish it and unable to separate the book from the movie which I have watched a lot of times. I am worried that this will happen again with the second book. I have a big collection of books by Anne Rice and from the seventeen books I own from Anne Rice I have read only one! The book series are all over the place and I should probably write a guide on the order of reading them…

Bookopoly TBR game – December 2020 Experience

Last Bookopoly rolls for December 2020 left me with seven books I got to read along with a whole bunch of books I had left for the last month of the year! Usually I get five rolls and five books but since for December I was especially lucky I got two double rolls and had to add two more books to the pile! As it turned out I managed to read six out of seven books from this pile and barely started the seventh by the last day of the month. On the picture above there are five books I own from my bookshelves and the two missing I have read in digital format. I will not count the book I only started reading as a fail since I am in the middle of reading it and plan to finish it soon. Here is how I did with my December Bookopoly TBR picks!

Prompt: Becca and the Books Recommendation

Book: Howl’s Moving Castle (Howl’s Moving Castle #1) by Diana Wynne Jones ★★★

I got lucky with this one since it was the book I had to read for my book club in December as well! I was very happy to find it as one of the books that Becca recommended in one of her videos. This might be a good time to remind you all how our first Bookopoly TBR game started in September 2020 when Becca and the Books had her Bookopoly TBR game presented as a reading challenge. If you would like to learn more you can check the announcement video HERE and show her channel some love!

Prompt: Fire on the Cover

Book: The Color of Magic (Discworld #1) by Terry Pratchett ★★★

This was the prompt that gave me the most headache since I could not fit any of the books I had on my other lists. I remembered to check with the books I was thinking about suggesting for my book club to read and finally stumbled on this one. I must admit I kinda ran trough the book and the speed might have something to do with my rating of this book. I could not find many thing to keep me emotionally connected with this book and the sharp pace and change of scenery made my reading a blur sometimes. There were moments of the book I really liked but they were few and far between. I will probably stop trying to promote this book for my book club since I could not find enough material for the book club discussion my friends from my reading group are used to. Still I’m glad to have finally read this book.

Prompt: Sad Book

Book: Saga (Collected Editions) #7-9 by Brian K. Vaughan, Fiona Staples ★★★★★

This is the prompt that gives me the most grief from all the spaces on the Bookopoly board. This time I managed to pair it with the hardcover collected edition of Saga graphic novel. This ended up being the best reading experience for December 2020! I love the epic and tragic moments of this graphic novel and it’s head spinning story. I will probably have to reread all nine volumes until I get to read next edition since it will be probably around two years at least until it comes out! Awesome story and it made a frustrating prompt a lot easier to endure!

Prompt: Most recent purchase

Book: The Tower of Nero (The Trials of Apollo #5) by Rick Riordan ★★★★★

This book gave me a chance to finish a book series that was a part of one of the favorite book universes in the last couple of years. I got to read two more books for this book series in December and this was a sugar on top of it all. I thought the ending a bit sappy but mostly rewarding and it gave me such nice feel good moments while I was reading. While I was a bit sceptic from the first book I am glad to have read the whole book series because for me it was the well rounded godly but not too godly point of view to the world of Percy Jackson that started a whole fifteen years earlier with The Lightning Thief. Did I mention that I can’t wait to see the new Disney+ TV series?

Prompt: Chance card

Book: The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu ★★★

I have tried reading this book once before and did not manage to get farther than the introduction. To be fair, introduction is rather long and not easy to read trough but still… I did not know what to expect from this book. I even used it for one other reading challenge in December as a “book that intimidates me”. Not surprising the narrative was a bit harder to get used to due to the whole millennium has past since the book was written. What surprised me was the similarities I did not expect to find in everyday life of Japanese nobles from one thousand years ago and lives of the rich and popular which we get to read about in news feeds and watch on modern media outlets. Some of the more intricate details were left to the imagination and of the reader and were they not this would have been to explicit to read. I am still at odds about what to think about this book.

Prompt: E-book or Audio book

Book: Taken by The Hunger (Blood Thirst Affair #1) by Harnet Spade ★

Since I got to read the most enjoyable book for Bookopoly in December it is only fair to get to read the least enjoyable book as well! This book was a mess. The plot was chaotic and it mostly described sex crazed female heroine running from one male character to the next without actually having any real sex. This was the first book in a long time I wanted to DNF. Since it was a rather short Kindle freebie I felt ridiculous to do so. I am not sorry for reading it since it gave me something to think about on the things I can value in the books and I believe that reading bad books is necessary for any reader’s reading experience and growth.

Prompt: Chance card

Book: Elminster: The Making of a Mage (Forgotten Realms: Elminster #1) by Ed Greenwood

Last but not least book I got to read and another Chance card prompt – I am running out of these a lot faster than I anticipated! This is the book I have only started on and I am still reading it. So far it is not what I expected it to be. I am enjoying Forgotten Realms related bits and I am interested in how this great mage comes into being because so far his path is much more different than thought it would be. I like not getting what I expected in this case! I hope to finish it soon so I can start on one of the books I got for January 2021.

Bookopoly TBR game – November and December 2020

After much thought on trying to accommodate my personal reading goals for this year and squeeze those books in as much as possible reading challenges by the end of the year I decided to give Bookopoly TBR game a chance for December as well. The reason I made this decision is that I was very happy and pleased with how my Bookopoly TBR game went smoothly in November. I managed to finish all of my assigned books in the first half of the month!

Naturally this left me with more time on my hands than I anticipated and I started getting these crazy ideas instead of reading the books I picked for my personal reading challenge…

Here are the books that made the first half of November a smooth reading experience:

Prompt: Nature on the Cover

Book: The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux ★★

This was one of the books for my personal reading challenge for the year. It’s a Croatian translation of a not so popular classic. This book turned out one of the less enjoyable books for me in November. I could clearly read the mistakes in translation and editing and it made me sad since the story and the idea had so much more to offer. I can’t help but think that if it were written today with the help of a good editor it would have been so much better. I liked the idea and the mystery of the story but it was hard to keep up with everything and I did not like authors writing style at all…

Prompt: Chance card

Book: The Scent of Shadows (Signs of the Zodiac #1) by Vicki Pettersson ★★★★

This is the only book that was not a part of my personal reading challenge for this year that got included into Bookopoly TBR game in November since it gave me no choice to pick something else. I’ve had this book and a few other in the series for years now and I love urban fantasy. It was different in a way that included character types that are original instead of the usual vampires, shifters and such. What impressed me the most is that the main character is a survivor and I like to read about survivors. The Zodiac theme was at first a bit cringey and then I got used to it. Sadly the zodiac signs that the story is centered at don’t make me invested, otherwise I would have rated it with five stars probably!

Prompt: TBR Veteran

Book: The Borders of Infinity (Vorkosigan Saga #5.3) by Lois McMaster Bujold ★★★★★

This book is one of the rare favorites I own in Croatian translation that I am happy about. It was a part of my personal reading challenge and I would like to read more of the series anyway. It is also rare for me to enjoy science fiction this much but the characters are great to read about and the writing style keeps the reader on its toes. It is the kind of book series I enjoy and have surprisingly little problems getting into even after longer periods of time.

Prompt: Disability representation

Book: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon ★★★★

This was the first book I read in November and it was another from my personal challenge for the year pile. The main character is a teenage boy with autism. I loved how easily some things I did not know about autism were explained and put to paper. I plan to vote for this book to be read in by book club group and I wish to discuss it with others for more insight into things I have probably missed. The mystery part of the story was interesting and the human part of it was very relatable and realistic.

Prompt: Young Adult

Book: Wayward Son (Simon Snow #2) by Rainbow Rowell ★★★★★

Out of the books from this list this one made me most apprehensive to start reading. I wanted to like it and was scared I would be let down. I am so glad I loved it. The change of POVs in the book was done in such a way that it let the reader get the most from each scene. I learned to appreciate each character more in this way. The start of the book was angsty and it matched with my mood about the book. I am torn about waiting for the next book of the series and can’t wait for it!

My friend talked me into playing the game for December a little earlier than usual and I had some time thinking trough and choosing the books for my new prompts. This is the first time I rolled a double and I got not one but two double rolls and the were both snake eyes! Our positions on the board are now mostly on the totally opposite sides since my rolls tend to be a bit lower than hers and she got more doubles in total. This December instead of five books from five rolls I got seven rolls and seven books!

My first roll was my first double ever since I started this TBR game. It was double ones. Also my first time I landed on a Becca and the Books recommendation tile. I could not find any list that included all her recommendations so far so I started going trough some of her video recommendations trough the months and different topics. I decided on Howl’s Moving Castle (Howl’s Moving Castle #1) by Diana Wynne Jones from her Best Books of 2019 video which you can check out HERE. I choose this book in particular because it is my book club reading choice for December as well! I hope to watch the anime after I read the book and before our book club meeting.

My next roll got me to the most problematic prompt for this month – Fire on the Cover. I am trying to include books I have on my personal reading challenge for the year but no matter how hard I tried I could not find anything resembling fire enough to pass as a valid prompt choice. I turned to some lists of books I was talking about reading in my book club and this book stood out: The Color of Magic (Discworld #1) by Terry Pratchett. It is a book that I consider a classic of the genre and one I would very much like to read so I can fill in the popular culture blanks I feel I get when I’m confronted with references to Discworld and Terry Pratchett in general. I’m reading the digital version and put the cover of the same edition in color so that the torch in the center is not missed as fire for my prompt!

This is the second time I landed on the “Sad Book” prompt and I am starting to really consider removing this prompt from the game board. I am not too keen on reading sad books in particular I cry at those not labelled as sad books enough as it is. After consulting my other reading challenge list I settled on the graphic novel: Saga (Collected Editions) #7-9 by Brian K. Vaughan, Fiona Staples. I short perusing the book got me some almost spoiler information that left me distraught and made me remember how dramatic the story really gets in these graphic novels.

Next roll was the highest I got in a while and got me on the “Most recent purchase” tile. I had few options from my most recent Book haul post which you can check out HERE. In the end I choose The Tower of Nero (The Trials of Apollo #5) by Rick Riordan. As the last book of the longtime favorite series and a book that goes well with my other reading challenge I decided it would fit nicely and make me feel very good about finishing a book series by the end of the year as well.

My next roll got me to one of those non-flexible prompts – Chance cards again. I pulled out another book that is not on my other reading list for this year: The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu. It is one of the oldest books on my TBR by date of publication since it was made over one thousand years ago and it is frankly rather intimidating book for me. I tried reading it once before but had to let it go for some other time. I hope I will have better luck with it this time around.

First extra roll ever landed me on another Audio or E-Book prompt. I reserve these prompts for Kindle freebies to ensure that at least some of the many new authors and books I browse on Kindle lists of freebies get read by me. This time I shamelessly decided on a urban fantasy book for mature audiences – Taken by The Hunger (Blood Thirst Affair #1) by Harnet Spade. It is a slightly older Kindle freebie and I am going to let myself be surprised by it.

My last extra roll landed me on another Chance card tile. At this rate I will be out of my Chance card since I’ve pulled almost one third of them already ( 5 out of 16). Another non-flexible pick I can’t combine with my personal reading challenge for this year. This time I got Elminster: The Making of a Mage (Forgotten Realms: Elminster #1) by Ed Greenwood. It is one of the few book series from my bookshelves that I am collecting and haven’t even started reading yet.

This makes a total of seven books added for my December reading enjoyment. Five of the books are the books I own and from my own physical bookshelves and two are in the digital form. Only three of them are part of some other reading challenge or assignment. This leaves me with much more reading material for December than I anticipated. What will I do?