So, what are you reading this month?

Read The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, my choice for Brave New World.  It's an outstanding read - probably the best of the month and I highly recommend it to anyone who likes science fiction.   Finished A Misty Mourning by Rett MacPherson, a poorly written cozy mystery.  Don't know why I finished it but I tend to wade through almost any book I pick up and I had chosen this one for the mystery challenge.  No recommendations from me, however.

Out of the mouths of babes: a work told from a non-adult point of view:  Kissing the Rain by Kevin Brooks.  Although I had trouble getting into the mind of a 15-year-old boy and I wasn't sure that I liked the ending, this is a good read.   The author does an outstanding job of staying in character from beginning to end.  I gave it 4 stars.

After finishing Eugene Onegin by Pushkin I needed something light so I turned to Sweet Misfortune by Kevin Alan Milne while I was reading 1984 by George Orwell for the fantasy challenge and began Grail by Stephen Lawhead for the HF challenge.  

Finished my first challenge of the year, Helen Humphreys' The Frozen Thames. I thought it would be a fitting read for January, however, my neck of the woods is unseasonably mild. This is a quirky, yet oddly attractive historical fiction in which the author commemorates the 40 times that the river Thames has frozen over, beginning in the 12th century and going up to 1927. Intriguing.

I'm reading & enjoying  Game of Thrones for the "brave new world" category of the contemporary lit. challenge.

I put Game of Thrones on my want list based on the recommendations here.  Hope it comes through for me, but I am pretty far down on the list.

I started a mystery on January 1st, and it fits the "translated" category so I'm counting it for this challenge.  It is The Keeper of Lost Causes, by Jussi Adler-Olsen.  Very typical Scandinavian mystery, with the troubled police inspector and the dark atmosphere--during the first half of the book I thought the premise was a little far-fetched but the author tied everything up nicely, so I enjoyed it.

Diane

I'm nearly finished with Crash by J.G. Ballard...a truly weird book.  Pornographic and disturbing.  I guess it's supposed to be disturbing, but it also seems pretty pointless.  The shock value makes it into a sort of cult classic, I guess, but once you get past the fact of it's utter weirdness, it's not even interesting. 

Anyway, I'm counting it for the "one word title" category of the challenge.

I finished my one-word title,  Faith by Jennifer Haigh.  A woman tries to find out the truth about her brother, a priest accused of molesting a young boy.  This book is a quick read with a variety of interesting characters.

I finished The Cellist of Sarajevo by Galloway and highly recommend it. It's my first 5-star book so far this year.

I also recently finished a surprisingly good historical mystery (I read for it for the HF challenge) that would fit a couple of our contemporary challenge categories: The Tenderness of Wolves by Penney.

I agree with Kristin that The Tenderness of Wolves is an exceptional book. It is unlike any other book I've ever read. LOVE IT.

                                                                          Rose