What is everyone reading?

I am reading Murder at the Piccadilly Playhouse by C.J. Archer.  Set in London 1900. Light HF mystery read. I am enjoying it.

Hi, Alice!  Thanks for getting us started.  Happy March to all! 

Current reads for me - The Covenant of Water (Audible) - Loving this!!  The Village Healer's Book of Cures (Kindle) - not bad, not great.  Should finish it this evening.  I'm not sure what's up next. 

Hello!  Hope everyone had a good weekend.  I finished The Village Healer's Book of Cures, which was okay.  I started and am about halfway through The Witch of Tin Mountain, which again, is okay.  I think I did myself a disservice by starting the year with some super good books - North Woods and Cloud Cuckoo Land.  Those books were so good and more like "literature" (for lack of a better term).  Most of the other books just seem like books.  LOL!  Hopefully you get what I'm trying to say.  So far The Covenant of Water (I'm 9 hours into the 32 total), is shaping up to be another super good read. 

I started Ring Shout by P. Djeli Clark.  It's historical fiction/horror.  Quite an interesting set up!

CR

Reading The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See.  Have been reading classics, mysteries and biographies for the most part. 

Hello!  I finished The Witch of Tin Mountain by Paulette Kennedy. It was okay.  It got a tad tedious with multiple characters in multiple times, especially since there were so many similarities between two of the characters and the events of their lives, but it was readable. Still listening to The Covenant of Water, which I am thoroughly enjoying.  I haven't decided which book I'll start reading this evening. 

I finished an excellent book The First Ladies by Marie Benedict The book featuers Eleanor Roosevelt, Mary Bethune (Early civil rights leader) and FDR. I highly recomment

Finishing The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See, a good, good read.  If you haven't read it I think you would enjoy it.  Lots of information about tea plus life experiencem in China, Chinese culture and romance!

Read Where Daffodils Bloom: Based on a True Story of Courage and Commitment During WWII by  Leya Delray which is based on a true story.  Well done and a most interesting read.  I liked it!

Now reading the hefty Legend of the Celtic Stone by Michael Phillips

I started Riviera Gold by Laurie R. King, the 16th book in her Sherlock Holmes/Mary Russell series.

Put The Celtic Stone aside for a bit.  It's a big read so will take me awhile to get through it.  Finished A Memory of Violets by Hazel Gaynor, about rescuing flower girls who soll flowers on the streets of London.  A wonderful read about a little addressed topic in historical fiction.  I quite enjoyed it.  A book with sad portions that ends on a happy ending.

By the way Shelly:  While there are 103 on the WL for North Woods by Daniel Mason, I am at last able to  obtain it from the library.  Thanks for the recommendation!  

REK - I read that book many years ago and it was quite touching.

Hello!  The big news is that I finished listening to The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese this morning and . . .  just wow.  What a stunning, beautiful book.  I am rarely moved to tears, but the last section of the book had me tearing up a lot., and at the end the tears were falling.  I highly recommend this one, especially an audio version.  The author reads it himself, and he does such a good job.  I just loved listening to his lilting Indian accent.  He really brought the book to life.  Another book (the third this year!) going on my favorite books of all time list.  It's been a really good reading year so far! I'm a little afraid that after North Woods, Cloud Cuckoo Land, and The Covenant of Water, I won't be able to find anything else as good.  I did buy Cutting for Stone, also by Abraham Verghese, on Audible, which, by a lot of reviews I've read (backed up by my own mother-in-law, who claims the same), many people liked better than The Covenant of Water.  It's going to have to be really, really good for me to feel that way.  LOL!  I think I may listen to that next. 

I started reading The Last Crossing last week, but I was struggling to get into it, so I set it aside.  Instead I picked up The Winter Soldier, by Daniel Mason (author of North Woods, which I read previously this year).  This one started out a bit slow, but now I am 75 pages in, and it is improving.  

R E K - I read The Memory of Violets a few years ago, and I remember enjoying it.  

Glad to hear that others enjoyed Violets, too.  I'm currently reading a couple of lengthy books:  Legend of the Celtic Stone by Michael Phillips, the edition of which I have is not listed in PBS, 538 pages, which I have returned to reading, and Shadows and Strongholds by Elizabeth Chadwick, 568 pages, a WL book with 10 people hoping to get it.  Switching back and forth between the two!  Is anyone interested in either of these books when I finish?

REK I have read Shadows and Strongholds. Elizabeth Chadwick is one of my favorite historical fiction writer. Her facebook page is excellent.

I finished City of Betrayal (Counterfeit Lady, Bk 7) by  Victoria Thompson. Setin 1920. The series shifts to Tennessee and Washington DC and focuses on the vote for the amendment allow women to vote.  It was okay I liked previous books in the series better.

Wow!  Just when I start two big books several I want from the library arrive.  Guess i'll work on what I can!  Have managed to get through some of the library books.  Back to one of my big ones:  Legend of the Celtic Stone and beginning a library book, North Woods by Daniel Mason.

I started Blackout by Simon Scarrow.  Its a murder mystery set in Berlin in 1939.  Very good, so far.  It's the first in a series, though there is only one other book so far in that series.  Very good so far!  I've never read anything by this author.

Hello!  I did start listening to Cutting for Stone, and yes, it is very promising. I'm over halfway through The Winter Soldier.  

R E K - Thanks for the offer, but I have several Chadwicks on my bookshelf, probably including that one.  I nope you enjoy North Woods as much as I did.  It's kind of hard when one listens to a book to know if one would've enjoyed it as much if they had read it.  Audio books have such a way of bringing a story to life, and the various narrators of North Woods were all excellent.  Hope you are surviving the wonderful spring storm Minnesota is currently getting hit with! 

Hello!  I finished The Winter Soldier by Daniel Mason last night.  A good read, although, of course, quite depressing, and I am not sure how I felt about the ending.  I haven't yet decided what I will read this evening, but I am loving the anticipation of knowing I get to start a new book later!  

Finished  Legend of the Celtic Stone and North Woods.  Legend was a lengthy but most interesting read about historical Scotland linked with a tale about a member of Parliment who is searching documents and his past to determine who he is based on who his ancestors and that history.  As for North Woods, it was a good but not outstanding read for me.  It was like reading a series of short stories linked by interactions of those who lived in this house.  Since I enjoy short stories it was a fun read.  Rather than embark on my second long book, I am now reading The Last Checkmate by Gabriella Saab, a newby author who wrote a tale about a 14-year-old Polish girl who is caught by the Nazis with prohibited documents.  Imagine finding yourself at that age in a concentration camp and  discovering the rest of her family has been shot.

R E K - I'm glad you enjoyed North Woods.  As you know, for me it WAS an outstanding read, and I generally don't like short stories.  LOL!  However, since this author employs the technique that Edward Rutherfurd is so keen on (telling stories from different perspectives, times, etc. that eventually reveal a connectedness), I think that's what made it extra appealing for me.  I love finding those connections, and Rutherfurd is my favorite author.   

I can't imagine even half of the stuff that happens in HF books. I always remind myself when I find myself complaining about this or that in my modern, convenient life that at least I'm not a peasant in the 12th (or any other) century, or one of a persecuted group of people in WW1 or WW2 era Europe, or a resident of London during the Black Plague of the 1300s or . . . I could go on and on.  It is truly mind-blowing what people of the past had to endure.  

I decided to start reading Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver.  I have no idea when the story takes place, but from what I can gather from this and that in the book so far, my best guess is the 1970s.  In my opinion, since I was a child in the 70s and remember the decade well, anything set in the 70s should most definitely not be considered HF, but .  . . one of the defining characteristics of the genre is, as I understand it, that the book be written at least 50 years after the events occurred, so I guess I am just old.  Anyway, after the first chapter, I wasn't sure if I would continue, but I did, and now I am more interested.  

I hope everyone has a great weekend and a Happy Easter if they celebrate.