Hour 22

Hour # (actual time): #22 (3:21 a.m.)

Finished Reading: Mary Modern by Camille DeAngelis (350 pages), Clandestine in Chile: The Adventures of Miguel Littin by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (116 pages), (186 pages of) The Shadows by Jacqueline West

Up Next:   Continuing with The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King -- page 278 of 354  

Cover via Amazon

Feeling: ready to be prone!

Eating/Drinking/Where:  on the living room couch with a full glass of water and a little Snickers

Looking forward to finishing The God of the Hive, brushing my teeth, and heading back to bed with my final book of the evening!

Hour 21

Hour # (actual time): #21 (2:35 a.m.)

Finished Reading: Mary Modern by Camille DeAngelis (350 pages), Clandestine in Chile: The Adventures of Miguel Littin by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (116 pages), (186 pages of) The Shadows by Jacqueline West

Up Next:   Continuing with The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King -- page 246 of 354
 

Cover via Amazon

Feeling: fairly confident that I can finish The God of the Hive (the plot of which is not at all calming down) and start another before the read-a-thon is over.

Eating/Drinking/Where:  on the living room couch with an almost empty glass of water.

Hour 19

Hour # (actual time): #19 (12:35 a.m.)

Finished Reading: Mary Modern by Camille DeAngelis (350 pages), Clandestine in Chile: The Adventures of Miguel Littin by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (116 pages)

Up Next:   Continuing with The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King -- on chapter 40.  Really like this series.
 Almost finished The Shadows by Jacqueline West-- the first book in the new Books of Elsewhere -- before my six-year-old fell asleep.  :) She and I will have to finish that sometime tomorrow afternoon.

Cover via Amazon

Feeling:  Sore but fairly content, warmer with my fleece pants on.

Eating/Drinking/Where: I'm in my basement bedroom with my daughter asleep beside me.  Thirsty and hoping to head back upstairs at some point for more Earl Gray as well as some water and maybe a mini-Snickers I happen to know is lurking in the pantry. 


I'm extremely interested in the plot in my King book.  Can't quite imagine how it is all going to pan out and looking forward to finding out!

Book Beginnings & Friday 56 -- Friday, August 20, 2010 -- The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King

Hosted by Storytime with Tonya and Friends
Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of this blog.
*Post a link along with your post back to this blog.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

HAPPY FRIDAY!

I'm reading The God of the Hive by Laurie R. King.  Page 56 is actually largely empty (it's the end of a chapter) so I'm just going to share the last sentence on the page:

Then the world exploded in a racket of tearing metal and crackling trees, the screams of three human voices, and an unbelievable confusion of sound and pain and turmoil as we tumbled end over end and fell crying into the dark.

Cover via Amazon

Book Beginnings on Friday is a meme hosted by Becky at Page Turners. Anyone can participate; just share the opening sentence of your current read, making sure that you include the title and author so others know what you're reading. If you like, share with everyone why you do, or do not, like the sentence.



And again from The God of the Hive:

Two clever London gentlemen. 

This is a great beginning for this book because this part of the plot continues in small and somewhat obscure vignettes throughout the story, surrounded by longer chapters involving the main characters.  I haven't finished it yet so I haven't seen how it will all play out but every time I  encountered one of these two "clever London gentlemen"  I was surprised -- I had almost forgotten about them.  Then I had to ponder how their actions were affecting/influencing the rest of the story.   Good stuff. 

The Language of Bees by Laurie R. KIng

Image via Wikipedia

Another fun mystery in Laurie R. King's Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series.  In The Language of Bees, Russell and Holmes have returned to England after 7 months of traveling far and wide.  When they arrive at their country home in Sussex, Damien, Holmes' son, is waiting for them.  Holmes' had learned of his son's existence five years earlier upon the occasion of Damien's being accused of murder and he and Russell have not seen Damien since he was exonerated.

Damien's wife and child have disappeared and he has come to ask Holmes for help.  Meanwhile, Russell figures out why one of Holmes' hives has been abandoned and then heads to London herself to see what she can learn about Yolanda and Estelle's disappearance.

Stonehenge, Druids, details about beekeeping, London Bohemians, Aleister Crowley, the Wilmington Giant, aeroplanes, A Passage to India in the new fiction section at a bookstore -- what's not to love? Oh, and the ending makes me very glad that The God of the Hive is already out!

Locked Rooms by Laurie R. King

Laurie King is a clever, clever woman.  I love her Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series, of which Locked Rooms is the eighth.  It was a re-read for me before reading the ninth, The Language of Bees.


Russell and Holmes, after their escapades in India (The Game), head for San Francisco.  Mary hasn't returned to California since the accident that killed her parents and younger brother ten years earlier -- and left her alone in the world.  She is ready (she thinks) to take care of the legal matters related to her parents' estate and then put it all behind her.

As she and Holmes begin exploring San Francisco, however, her memories of her childhood become clearer while only creating even more questions.  Why doesn't she remember living in San Francisco during the earthquake?  What do her dreams -- of flying objects, a faceless man, and locked rooms only she is aware of -- signify and are they related to her return to the city where she lost her family? 

I love that King includes a meeting and eventual partnership between Holmes and Dashiell Hammett at the same time that she captures the spirit of San Francisco just 18 years after the 1906 earthquake.  I'm so glad I re-read this one before picking up The Language of Bees and I'm also glad that the next one, The God of the Hive is already out so I can pick it up soon!