Bout of Books 15: Tuesday

Today's Reading:

After the doom and gloom that was Disclaimer yesterday, today I'm reading a young adult novel from Annabel Pitcher, author of My Sister Lives on the Mantlepiece, which I listened to as an audiobook and loved, and Ketchup Clouds, which I found disappointingly forgettable. Thankfully, Silence is Goldfish is impressing me so far, with lyrical prose and a bright, imaginative and passionate protagonist in Tess Turner. Tess is an outsider, and at least inside her mind she has a strong yet introverted personality. She knows what she likes, and yet she's under pressure to fit in at school. Being around people makes it harder to be yourself when you're an introvert, harder to be confident when the bullies are taunting you, and when her father keeps on giving her conflicting advice about whether she ought to fit in or stand out from the crowd, it is hard. But she tries, to please him, until the day she reads something he's written about her that brings everything she tried to be, everything she thought she was, crashing down around her.

Challenge: Would You Rather...? by Writing My Own Fairytale

Would you rather...

Lend books to someone who dog-ears pages or lend books to someone who reads with cheesy Cheetos fingers?

Dog-ears, but only paperbacks, and nothing specials.

Be able to meet one character of your choice or meet one author of your choice?

Well, I met Neil Gaiman in 2013, so that's accounted for. So I suppose the obvious answer would be to meet Anne Shirley and be kindred spirits with her in person as well as through the pages of her books.

Never be allowed in a book store again or never be allowed in a library again?

This is an evil question. I could never give up bookstores, so I'll have to say library, but that would also be a big gaping loss. You can take more chances on library books, because you don't lose anything if you don't like or don't read a book you borrowed. And yet... I just couldn't live without bookshops.

Have to choose one of your favourite characters to die in their book or have to pick one of your favourite couples to break up in their book?

Usually I find couples are more interesting when they're not actually together, so as long as they're both decent characters and both get to stick around, I don't really care if they break up (with a couple of exceptions.) Then again, if it's a really good death scene, it can be satisfying even with the loss of a favourite character. But yeah, I'm not that bothered by romance. It's usually a thing to be endured for the sake of the rest of the story.

Be required to read Twilight once a year for the rest of your life or The Scarlet Letter once a year for the rest of your life?

I've never actually read The Scarlet Letter, so I can't really answer that one. I have a lot of problems with Twilight but it is perfectly readable and I did enjoy it on my first reading, until I stopped to think about it critically. So that wouldn't be a major hardship, and I quite enjoy snarking about it.

Tuesday's Stats

Books read: Silence is Goldfish

Pages read: 363 so far

Running total for the week: 2 books finished, 651 pages.

Favourite read of the week so far: Silence is Goldfish

Today in six words: book hermit catching up on reviews

When I wasn't reading I was... sleeping in, scheduling reviews for when I'm at work from tomorrow.