Reading Challenge/Goals for 2024

[luvmarypoppins]

What is "hea" short for? I'm sure it will make sense once you've told me.

#61, 62 and 63 - The Amish Brides of Birch Creek Trilogy by Kathleen Fuller.
Book 1 - The Teacher's Bride
Book 2 - The Farmer's Bride
Book 3 - The Inkeeper's Bride
Genre - Book 1 and 2 are Inspirational Amish Rom-Com's. Book 3 is an Inspirational Amish Romance.
I think I picked these up as a set on Bookbub for 99 cents. I really enjoyed reading them and have already picked out another of her books to read.

HEA - Happily Ever After
I have a few of Kathleen’s books in my tbr pile.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

My kindle battery is giving up the ghost. It’s really one my son got me and it’s linked to his accounts so I guess I am going to have to get another one. It has so many books on it and it was a special blue color, sigh.

 

[OKW8297]

26. .A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah Maas I stuck with this as I was told it would get better. It did. I will probably read the next one as it is total escapism.

 

[bobbiwoz]

25. A Month of Summer by Lisa Wingate this is a nice read about complicated family relationships and growing up. This fulfilled my challenge goal so I guess we shall see how much I end up reading this year!

I just re-read this….i really enjoy her books!
42/80

 

[Nora03]

I really appreciate everyone sharing their books and reviews. I’ve read many of your suggestions. I read everything on my iPad through the library app Libby. Every time I see a book I think I’d like I put it in the wait list. Right now I have ten books in my wait list. I have to keep turning down books - delaying delivery. I might be reading two books at a time. I was wondering if it’s a problem to keep turning down or delaying delivery. Anyone have any information on that? Today I was offered three books and had to delay all of them.

 

[melk]

I really appreciate everyone sharing their books and reviews. I’ve read many of your suggestions. I read everything on my iPad through the library app Libby. Every time I see a book I think I’d like I put it in the wait list. Right now I have ten books in my wait list. I have to keep turning down books - delaying delivery. I might be reading two books at a time. I was wondering if it’s a problem to keep turning down or delaying delivery. Anyone have any information on that? Today I was offered three books and had to delay all of them.

I do the same thing and have never encountered a problem. I also do it with physical books on my holds list at the library. I suspend the hold and as the date approaches if I’m not ready to get it I just push it out another couple of months or so. Never an issue!

 

[melk]

26/30 The Bucket List by Rachel Hanna

Thank you to the person who recommended this. It’s a nice story about a woman who finds out that her late best friend has left everything to her in her will, if she successfully completes her bucket list. It was kind of a light read, a little predictable, but I really enjoyed it.

 

[bobbiwoz]

21/30 Last Bus to Wisdom by Ivan Doig

Coming of age story about a young Montana boy being raised by his grandmother. In the summer of 1951 he gets sent to stay with relatives he has never met while his grandmother has surgery. His journey on a greyhound bus and the cast of characters he meets gives him an education that will last a lifetime.

Loved this book, excellent story, great characters and very amusing.

Thanks so much for the recommendation! It was my 43/80 and a 4.5/5 in my book!

 

[Kirby]

HEA - Happily Ever After

Thank you!

#64 - The Last Mile: Second book in the Memory Man/Amos Decker series by David Baldacci.
Genre - Mystery

When a convicted killer is saved by another man's confession, Amos Decker, now an FBI special task force detective, must find the truth in this "utterly absorbing" #1 New York Times bestseller (Associated Press).

Convicted murderer Melvin Mars is counting down the last hours before his execution--for the violent killing of his parents twenty years earlier--when he's granted an unexpected reprieve. Another man has confessed to the crime.

Amos Decker, newly hired on an FBI special task force, takes an interest in Mars's case after discovering the striking similarities to his own life: Both men were talented football players with promising careers cut short by tragedy. Both men's families were brutally murdered. And in both cases, another suspect came forward, years after the killing, to confess to the crime. A suspect who may or may not have been telling the truth.

The confession has the potential to make Melvin Mars--guilty or not--a free man. Who wants Mars out of prison? And why now?

But when a member of Decker's team disappears, it becomes clear that something much larger--and more sinister--than just one convicted criminal's life hangs in the balance. Decker will need all of his extraordinary brainpower to stop an innocent man from being executed.
I enjoyed this book as much as the first one.

 

[MGMmjl]

26/32 - Lost Hills by Lee Goldberg

Description:
"A video of Deputy Eve Ronin’s off-duty arrest of an abusive movie star goes viral, turning her into a popular hero at a time when the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is plagued by scandal. The sheriff, desperate for more positive press, makes Eve the youngest female homicide detective in the department’s history.

Now Eve, with a lot to learn and resented by her colleagues, has to justify her new badge. Her chance comes when she and her burned-out, soon-to-retire partner are called to the blood-splattered home of a missing single mother and her two kids. The horrific carnage screams multiple murder—but there are no corpses.

Eve has to rely on her instincts and tenacity to find the bodies and capture the vicious killer, all while battling her own insecurities and mounting pressure from the media, her bosses, and the bereaved family. It’s a deadly ordeal that will either prove her skills…or totally destroy her."

This is the first book in the Eve Ronin series. I enjoyed it, and plan to read more books in the series.

 

[bobbiwoz]

Looks like I'm overdue for an update again.

7-9/18 Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay - all re-reads for me

10-11/18 Normal (2 versions) by Magdalena Newman and the "Young Reader's" version of the same book (same title) with Magdalena and her son, Nathanial. These are memoirs about Nathaniel, who was born with the same facial deformity as the main character in the "Wonder" book. I read both, thinking the kids version would be mostly from Nathaniel's POV, but it's still mostly from his mom's POV, just with more insight from Nathaniel himself. I'd recommend only reading one of the two, because the second felt extremely repetitive. Almost exactly the same, really. If anything, the "young reader's" version is more difficult to read, because it's not as linear as the first.

12/18 - Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney-Boylan - A teenager finds his girlfriend dead at the bottom of the stairs of her home, and is quickly questioned by police. But the girlfriend was hiding a secret. Did he know, and was that motivation to kill? I actually got this book for free for finishing the summer reading program at my library. and it's hard cover too!

13/18 - Harry Potter the the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling - A 4th time (I think?) re-read. Love this series, and re-read it every couple of years. I think you a predict my next few books.

I read and thought “Mad Honey” was a good book! 4/5
44/80

 

[melk]

27/30 Crow Mary by Kathleen Grissom

Historical fiction about a sixteen year old who marries a white fur trader in 1872, covering their life as husband and wife as she is caught between two cultures.

This is probably my favorite book I’ve read this year.

 

[cayennews]

#29 Pretty Girls by Karin Slaughter. This book was very dark, so dark that I couldn't read it at night.

 

[cayennews]

#30 Faithless by Karin Slaughter. Book 5 of the Grant County series. Another great read. I just started to 6th and final book to this series. This also finishes my 30 book challenge!

 

[mgarbowski]

Book 19 of 24 - Lords of Uncreation (The Final Architecture #3) - Adrian Tchaikovsky
Book 20 of 24 - The Big Sleep - Raymond Chandler

Good end to the Final Architecture series, though I it didn't meet the super high expectations I had midway through the first book. But it's like an 8.5 down from 9.5 so still solid.

I haven't read any Chandler in more than 20 years and I first read the Big Sleep almost 40 years ago. It's a bit of a jumbled mess, which is no secret, but nonetheless satisfying. I think I prefer Hammet though.

 

[Simba's Mom]

I just wanted to let people who like historical fiction, as I do, that I began "The Sound of Light" by Sarah Sundin and did something I never did before with historical fiction-stopped after I'd read about 30% of the book. I've read a couple of her books, but in this one, it was just too confusing to keep everything straight. Maybe someone else will like it, but it wasn't for me.

 

[Kirby]

#65 - Before You Found Me by Brooke Beyfuss
Genre - General Fiction
Is it ever alright to kidnap a child? With breath-taking suspense, Before You Found Me emotionally explores the fine line between right and wrong in an enduring story of found family and tender love amidst harsh circumstances.
Rowan McNamara doesn't open the door to her new life—she's thrown through it. Following an explosive argument with her abusive fiancé, Rowan runs. With no family except for her estranged sister, Celia, Rowan takes refuge in an idyllic New England town.
There, she meets Gabriel, the eleven-year-old son of her neighbor, Lee. Lee is welcoming, friendly, and a little too helpful. But Gabriel is a mystery: withdrawn, often bruised, and only willing to speak to Rowan through his basement window. When she discovers that Lee has kept Gabriel imprisoned for the past three years, Rowan is desperate to save him. Fueled by outrage and empathy, she abducts Gabriel and flees to her childhood home in rural Oklahoma, determined to raise him as her own.
Together they battle nightmares, curious stares, and Celia's constant disapproval. But when Lee begins haunting more than their dreams, Rowan and Gabriel realize they stopped pretending to be a family a long time ago. Their bond is just as strong as blood, and they're willing to do anything to protect one another.
I wanted to really like this book. It started out good but then I made myself finish it just so that I would know how it turned out. No surprises and no justice which is what I wanted to see. Someone else may really like it and feel differently than me. This is her second book, I'm not going to look into the first one.


#66 - Cross Down by James Patterson and Brendan DuBois, a book in the Alex Cross series, Book 1 in the John Sampson series.
Genre - Thriller
With the country in chaos and corruption on all sides, there's only one person to turn to.
When a series of military-style attacks erupt across the United States, Detective John Sampson is called in to investigate. The attacks are untraceable, with patterns too random to decipher, leaving Sampson struggling to find a link amongst the carnage.
As Sampson discovers a lead through an ex-military contact, his partner Alex Cross is brutally side-lined, leaving him certain about one thing: he can trust no one.
With soldiers called on secret assignments and others mysteriously disappearing, Sampson must revisit his military past if he's to save his country's future.
This definitely was a thriller. I'm not real fond of reading Patterson when he writes with someone else, especially in an ongoing series. But I'll give him some leeway considering that this is the beginning of a John Sampson series. Alex Cross does not play a major role in this book. I hated to put it down, it deals with a national crisis that could happen today but it wrapped up way to quick for me.

 

[willowsnn3]

#30 Faithless by Karin Slaughter. Book 5 of the Grant County series. Another great read. I just started to 6th and final book to this series. This also finishes my 30 book challenge!

Let me know how you feel about book 6.

 

[willowsnn3]

38/50 The Gifted School by Bruce Holsinger
When a new school for gifted children is planned for their community, four families who've been a part of one another's lives since their kids were born over a decade ago, the story reveals not only the lengths that some adults are willing to go to get ahead, but the effect on the group's children, sibling relationships, marriages, and careers, as simmering resentments come to a boil and long-buried, explosive secrets surface and detonate.
Was just ok, no likable characters at all.
39/50 The Baker's Wife by Erin Healey
Before Audrey was the baker's wife, she was the pastor's wife.
Then a scandalous lie cost her husband a pastoral career. Now the two work side-by-side running a bakery, serving coffee, and baking fresh bread. But the hurt still pulls at Audrey.
Driving early one morning to the bakery, Audrey's car strikes something—or someone—at a fog-shrouded intersection. She finds a motor scooter belonging to a local teacher. Blood is everywhere, but there's no trace of a body.
Both the scooter and the blood belong to detective Jack Mansfield's wife, and he's certain that Audrey is behind Julie's disappearance.
But the case dead-ends and the detective spirals into madness. When he takes her family and some patrons hostage at the bakery, Audrey is left with a soul-damaged ex-con and a cynical teen to solve the mystery. And she'll never manage that unless she taps into something she would rather leave behind—her excruciating ability to feel other's pain.
Good, but not great.
40/50 Little Lovely Things by Maureen Joyce Connelly
Claire Rawlings, mother of two and medical resident, will not let the troubling signs of an allergic reaction prevent her from making it in for rounds. But when Claire's symptoms overpower her while she's driving into work, her two children in tow, she must pull over. Moments later she wakes up on the floor of a gas station bathroom-her car, and her precious girls have vanished.
The police have no leads and the weight of guilt presses down on Claire as each hour passes with no trace of her girls. All she has to hold on to are her strained marriage, a potentially unreliable witness who emerges days later, and the desperate but unquenchable belief that her daughters are out there somewhere.
I enjoyed this one. Well, as much as you can enjoy a book about child abduction.

 

[jlud57]

A tad behind on updating books read-

1/20 Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder- Joanne Fluke
2/20 Strawberry Shortcake Murder- Joanne Fluke
3/20 Blueberry Muffin Murder- Joanne Fluke
4/20 Lemon Meringue Pie Murder- Joanne Fluke
5/20 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire- JK Rowling
6/20 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix- JK Rowling
7/20 Fudge Cupcake Murder- Joanne Fluke
8/20 Sugar Cookie Murder- Joanne Fluke
9/20 Peach Cobbler Murder- Joanne Fluke
10/20 Cherry Cheesecake Murder- Joanne Fluke
11/20 Key Lime Pie Murder- Joanne Fluke
12/20 Candy Cane Murder- Joanne Fluke
13/20 Harry Potter and the Half Blooded Prince- JK Rowling

All the Joanne Fluke books are from the Hannah Swensen series, just a fun easy mystery read. Just trying to finish the Harry Potter books, I've really enjoyed reading these (I had never read them)