#032-034

Feb. 24th, 2011 12:16 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Der Augensammler (Sebastian Fitzek) - 448 pages

I really love that you know that those thrillers really are full of twists and surprises you don't see coming.
And the end of this story really puts goosebumps on your skin.

10/10


Jennifer Goverment (Max Barry) - (audio) 9 hours 09 minutes

I loved the concept of this story, but I was dissapointed by the execution. The characters never really grew on me

5/10


Unter deutschen Betten (Justyna Polanska) - 224 pages

If you're a maid and a used condom makes it into the top 10 of weird things to be found under a bed, than you either got the wrong job are are too easy to scandalize.
Also, I would have prefered some more real weird or disgusting or scandalous stories rather then the book be filled with the boring autobiography of the writer

6/10

2011:
Books: 034
Cover to back: 029
Not read to end: 5
Non fiction: 014
Audio Books: 9
Rereads: 0
Pages: 5 374 pages
Audio time: 32 hours 24 minutes

#029-031

Feb. 21st, 2011 09:02 pm
jassanja: Please don't take! (Bookslut - Winter Read)
Gaydar (Kim Dare) - 45 pages

Solid, but nothing that make's it unforgettable

4/10


Ardeur - 14 Writers about Anita Blake:Vampire Hunter(various) - stopped after 74 of 208 pages

I recognized too late that this book was edited by LKH herself. So of course it was all full of praise for ABVH and the critical stuff that came up in the second half of the series wasn't mentioned with one word.

1/10


Jill Kismet - Book 1 - Night Shift (Lilith Saintcrow) - stopped after 62 of 352 Pages

This book is a perfect example how to kill a story by the over-use of flashbacks.
Combined with the lack of explenation of the rules in this paranormal setting it's a sure thing to turn readers away

2/10

2011:
Books: 031
Cover to back: 026
Not read to end: 5
Non fiction: 013
Audio Books: 8
Rereads: 0
Pages: 4 702 pages
Audio time: 23 hours 15 minutes

#026-028

Feb. 6th, 2011 06:17 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Adrien English - Book 5 - The Dark Tide (Josh Lanyon) - 304 pages

I really liked the series, but this is just another prime example how the story is more about the love-story between Adrien and Jake than about the crime. The crime in this book gets from weird to down right unbelievable.
It doesn't help that Adrien's to Ex-lovers Mel and Guy try to get back with him, because it is pretty clear from the beginning that there is going to be no real heat between anyone but Adrien and Jake and the other two guys are just there as padding.

6/10


Liebe geht durch alle Zeiten - Book 3 - Smaragdgrün (Kerstin Gier) - 496 pages

Again, a great series, that just get's a little short-charged because it has to fit into the Young Adult genre. So a few turns are too predictible and the teen angst gets more attention then some of the background stuff. (Never mind that the big show down is anticlimatic due to the heroine being unconciouss for most of it, so we only learn about is secondhand from her loverboy later)

9/10


Serial (Jack Kilborn, Blake Crouch) - 65 pages

A fantastic story about two serial killer meeting by chance and trying to kill each other.
The only problem of this?
It's too short!

10/10

2011:
Books: 028
Cover to back: 025
Not read to end: 3
Non fiction: 012
Audio Books: 8
Rereads: 0
Pages: 4 521 pages
Audio time: 23 hours 15 minutes

#023-025

Feb. 2nd, 2011 01:05 am
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Doctor Who - Tie-In - Beautiful Chaos (Gary Russell) - (audio) 2 hours 35 minutes

A nice tale, but aside from the first half not really thrilling.
But I loved the squabbles between Donna and her mother

5/10


Your Hate Mail will be graded (John Scalzi) - 368 pages

So, where is the hate mail?
This is just more crap from Scalzi's overrated blog

3/10


Lies My Teacher Told Me (James W. Loewen) - (audio) stopped after 56 minutes

This only makes me want to bang my head against hard things about how stupid some people are

1/10


2011:
Books: 025
Cover to back: 022
Not read to end: 3
Non fiction:012
Audio Books: 8
Rereads: 0
Pages: 3 656 pages
Audio time: 23 hours 15 minutes

#020-022

Jan. 29th, 2011 11:12 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Adrien English - Book 3 - The Hell you say (Josh Lanyon) - 272 pages

From native spirits to goth-satanical-kids. Quite a jump, but not really. There were just a few parts that were too easy to foresee, while some other interesting stuff barley got touched on.
Adrien's complicated love life once again is more interesting the murder investigation. (And occasionally Jake needs a good kick in the butt for acting like he does)

7/10


Liebe geht durch alle Zeiten - Book 2 - Saphirblau (Kerstin Gier) - (audio) 4 hours 47 minutes

The same complaints as with the first book. Great idea and great writing somewhat spoiled by making it too much of a teen-romance.
At first I wasn't too thrilled about the main character getting a demon pet, but then said daemon turned out to be a cheeky, sarcastic little monster and became my favorite character in the whole story.

9/10


Adrien English - Book 4 - Death of a pirate (Josh Lanyon) - 248 pages

Two years without running into a corpse and being in a healthy relationship come to an end when Adrien's book gets optioned for a movie and one of the financiers ends up dead in the soup.
And again the mystery part of the book has to take a backseat to the romance part - never mind that it is pretty obvious as to were that was leading

6/10


2011:
Books: 022
Cover to back: 020
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction:010
Audio Books: 62
Rereads: 0
Pages: 3 288 pages
Audio time: 20 hours 44 minutes

#017-019

Jan. 23rd, 2011 08:23 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Adrien English - Book 2 - A Dangerous Thing (Josh Lanyon) - 248 pages

In this second book the mysery seems to take a back seat to the love story between Adrien and Jake. So sometimes it is getting a bit annoying that there is just another dead body showing up.
Also, native American spirit stories don't really rank high on my personal enjoyment list

8/10


Einführung zu Analsex (Alexa Ador) - (audio) 1 hour 07 minutes

The bad porn-y background music
The fake bedroom voice of the reader that just didn't mix with the rather clinical tone of the text...
I sure as hell laughed my ass off

2/10


Liebe geht durch alle Zeiten - Book 1 - Rubinrot (Kerstin Gier) - (audio) 4 hours 52 minutes

From what I gathered this is the new YA hype in Germany.
Basically a 16 year old girl from a family who has a time traveler in every other generation or so finds out that it is her who has that gene rather than her cousin who has been trained for time travel mission for years.
And while the book it is pretty good, the YA part is the story's biggest problem.
Too much teenage angst where I would have preferred some more background to the secret society and the Time Travelers history

9/10


2011:
Books: 019
Cover to back: 017
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction:010
Audio Books: 5
Rereads: 0
Pages: 2 768 pages
Audio time: 15 hours 57 minutes

#014-016

Jan. 22nd, 2011 12:58 am
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Ü-30-Krankheiten (Nina Puri) - 224 pages

Na bitte, es gibt doch ein Buch zum Thema mit Humor

7/10


Adrien English - Book 1 - Fatal Shadows (Josh Lanyon) - 232 pages

A very interesting start for the series. And a good twist.
Just the secondary characters aren't really that great, and with one of them I was actually quite happy that the character got killed

8/10


Dear American Airlines (Jonathan Miles) - (audio) stopped after 46 minutes

I don't see the point...

1/10


2011:
Books: 016
Cover to back: 014
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction:009
Audio Books: 3
Rereads: 0
Pages: 2 520 pages
Audio time: 9 hours 58 minutes

#010-013

Jan. 20th, 2011 07:45 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Are You Positive? (Stephen Davis) - stopped after 16 of 384 pages

So HIV doesn't exist and is just diagnosed to give AZT/HAART meds to gays to kill them.
Sorry, but there just isn't enough time to waste it on stupid conspiracies

1/10


Wenn ich mal groß bin (Martin Reichert) - 224 pages

Soll das Ironie sein? Comedy? Ernsthaft?
Keine Ahnung. Scheitert jedenfalls an allem.
Und hätten sie das Kapitel über Depression (nicht erlaub, und wer noch Bücher lesen kann, ist eh nicht depressiv) nicht ganz zum Schluss sondern schon am Anfang gebracht hätte ich das Buch wohl viel früher in eine Ecke gepfeffert

2/10


Donald Strachey - Book 8 - Tongue Tied (Richard Stevenson) - 212 pages

So after two rather disappointing books, the series picks up again.
And there is the added bonus of bringing up people and stuff from past books again.

10/10


Dear Me (many) - 128 pages

A wonderful collection of letters.

7/10


2011:
Books: 013
Cover to back: 012
Not read to end: 1
Non fiction:008
Audio Books: 2
Rereads: 0
Pages: 2 064 pages
Audio time: 9 hours 12 minutes

#006-009

Jan. 15th, 2011 11:37 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Masterful (David Shade) - 111 pages

I guess this book was written by a man to be read by men. The problem is that it concerns women and that the men in question will aply it to to their femal lovers.
Generally the book is full of bull shit ideas.

2/10


Don't look back (Josh Lanyon) - 128 pages

I couldn't really get a connection to the characters. It doesn't help that just a short time ago I also read some amnesia stories that were just a lot better

3/10


3096 Tage (Ghostwriters as Natascha Kampusch) - 288 pages

I can't help it, but Kampusch always gave me the impression to be a bit too calculated for someone who went truth what she did.
And this book just underlines that impression. Especially in the end when she complains that the police didn't act like she wanted them too in the first few hours after she managed to flee.

6/10


Donald Strachey - Book 7 - Strachey's Folly (Richard Stevenson) - 253 pages

This book is a bit different from the rest of the series, and it makes it seem a bit longer and a bit slower than the other stories. But I love some things that happened in this story.

6/10

2011:
Books: 009
Cover to back: 009
Not read to end: 0
Non fiction:005
Audio Books: 2
Rereads: 0
Pages: 1 484 pages
Audio time: 9 hours 12 minutes

Dear Self

Jan. 10th, 2011 09:52 pm
jassanja: (Cats - *pawned*)
How about we stop buying books until we have read all the unread ones we already have, and after that perhaps read all those we want to re-read for years?

#001-005

Jan. 8th, 2011 04:27 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
The Man who loved Books too much (Allison Hoover Bartlett) - (audio) 6 hours 04 minutes

This is the story of a book thief. Not just your regular books but high value collectibles.
While his story was interesting I liked the insight into the world of other book collectors even more. Why they collect books that are too valuable to read for risk of damage. How they find such books and how their prices are set.

9/10


Faceboom (Juan Faerman) - 160 pages

This book does not really give any new insight as to why we use Facebook or how it changes us.
There are also parts where it is overly obvious that the book originally written for a South American audience, as it mentions other social portals as important, that I have never heard of before, while only mentioning Twitter once in passing, calling it unimportant and without influence.

3/10


Why Popcorn Costs So Much at the Movies: And Other Pricing Puzzles (Richard B. McKenzie ) - 328 pages

Basically everything in this book falls down to one conclusion, things have the prices they have because there are enough people willing to pay it.

4/10


Animal Farm (George Orwell) - (audio) 3 hours 08 minutes

I'm not one for lengthy analyzing of books, and prefer to take them at face value, but even to me it was obvious as to what conclusion this was going, when the pigs decided to take charge of the revolution.

5/10


Donald Strachey - Book 6 - Chain of Fools (Richard Stevenson) - 216 pages

Not really one of the better books in the series, but a good way back into the series after a short break.
And as for a way to accidentally lose 16 million dollars - I hardly heard of a better method than in this story.

5/10


2011:
Books: 005
Cover to back: 005
Not read to end: 0
Non fiction: 3
Audio Books: 2
Rereads: 0
Pages: 704 pages
Audio time: 9 hours 12 minutes
jassanja: (Bookslut)
This was my second worst year since I started my booklist back in 2005 with only 124 books.
I guess it had a lot to do with me not having easy access to a mobile reader, reading more fanfic and writing more myself.

I won't set a goal for 2011

Chronological )


Rating )


Meme:
How many books did you read this year?
124

What was the first one in 2010?
Blindness by Jose Saramago

What was the last one in 2010?
Shaken by J.A. Konrath

Which one had the biggest impact on you in 2010?
Bottelmania by Elizabeth Royte
I always believed that people who by mineral water in bottles are a bit stupid. This book showed that there is a lot more behind it, and it isn't just stupid but also dangerous.

Which one did you like best?
Shock to the System by Richard Stevenson
It's also very impressive how different it was to the movie version

Which one did you like least?
Abort by Xavier Leret
It was a short, free offer coming with my Sony Reader)

Which will be the first book in 2011?
I have no clue. 'm still in the middle of a few I started in 10, but I also already started two new ones.
Stay around and you will find out with my next book update, which I finished first

Is there a book release in 2011 you hardly can await?
No. Right now, I have no clue what is coming out when.

#123/124

Jan. 2nd, 2011 12:51 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Temeraire - Book 1 - His His Majesty's Dragon (Naomi Novik) - (audio) 9 hours 57 minutes - 5/10
Jack Daniels - Book 7 - Shaken (J.A. Konrath) - (audio) 6 hours 26 minutes - 10/10

2010:
Books: 124
Cover to back: 119
Not read to end: 5
Non fiction: 29
Audio Books: 43
Video Blogs: 1
Rereads: 2
Pages: 12 970 pages
Audio time: 417 hours 40 minutes
Video Time: 8 hours 27 minutes

#105-122

Dec. 30th, 2010 05:38 am
jassanja: Please don't take! (Bookslut - Winter Read)
Dresden Files - Interlude - Side Jobs (Jim Butcher) - (audio) 11 hours 45 minutes - 9/10
Sleeping with the Devil (Robert Baer) - (audio) 7 hours 48 minutes - 5/10
Kashimashi - Part 1 (Satoru Akahori/Yukimaru Katsura) - 496 pages - 4/10
Kashimashi - Part 2 (Satoru Akahori/Yukimaru Katsura) - 496 pages - 4/10
Until the Full Moon - Part 1 (Sanami Matoh) - 224 pages - 7/10
Until the Full Moon - Part 2 (Sanami Matoh) - 192 pages - 7/10
No Plot? No Problem (Chris Baty) - 79 pages - 5/10
On Writing (Stephan King) - 333 pages - reread - 6/10
Risky Maneuvers (Sheridan/Voinov) - 89 pages - 7/10
Unbearable Lightness (Portia de Rossi) - 104 pages - 7/10
Abort (Xavier Leret) - 9 pages - 1/10
Turn on the Porn (Xavier Leret) - 9 pages - 2/10
You're in the Matrix Charlie Brown (Stupidpic) - stopped afte 5 of 8 pages - 1/10
If they give you Lined Paper write Sideways (Daniel Quinn) - stopped after 16 of 108 pages - 1/10
Handcuffs and Glory Holes (Kim Dare) - 59 pages - 6/10
Love Match (Keira Andrews) - 187 pages - 9/10
Stiff (Mary Roach) - (audi) 8 hours 02 minutes - 7/10
Millennium - Book 1 - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Stieg Larsson) - (audio) stopped after 10 hours 13 minutes - 5/10

2010:
Books: 122
Cover to back: 117
Not read to end: 5
Non fiction: 29
Audio Books: 41
Video Blogs: 1
Rereads: 2
Pages: 12 970 pages
Audio time: 401 hours 17 minuts
Video Time: 8 hours 27 minutes
jassanja: (ATWT - Reid - Idiots)
I don't care for Christmas, so why do I have to submit to Christmas stress?

Since syncing my PDA with Windows 7 was a regular pain in the butt for the last year, I was quite happy when someone offered to buy me a real Ebook Reader.
Unfortunatly I still life in a part of the world where dead tree books are seen as the only way too go. (of course it isn't helping that our politicans want to go back to fixed book prices, so you would have to pay the same amount for a book no matter if you get it as Hardcover, paperback of ebook. And even if you would order it by, for example, Amazon, in Germany, the UK or the US, you would have to pay the diffrence to the regular Swiss price on top of taxes - This just isn't a country for bookworms)

But back to the tale of getting an ebook reader

Store 1 (Media Markt) only had the model I wanted in pink, and when I asked if they will get others (no hurry, next year is fine!) they said it was unlikely. After all Ebooks are out, and who needs an Ebook Reader in a world where an iPad exists! He could show me one of those, and it's only double the price but tripple as stylish and trendy

Store 2 (Interdiscount) has stopped selling Ebook Readers as well, but they offered to show me the iPad, because" it is all the rage now, and can do a lot more than just show some boring books"

I decided to give up on Tech-Stores and go to the book stores to see if they still sell them.
Thalia does, but only their new own brand. Oyo may be cheap, but looking at those they had set up in the store as well as reading some customer opinions, that pretty much is a no go.
(Needs to get bank account information to even get it running, 10 seconds for a page flip, battery only lasting for about 200 pages rather than the advised 8 000)

In the end, (after 4 hours of running around) I got one from a small local store. Not the brand that I wanted (Bookeen) but a Sony 350 for about the same price I would have paid for the pink monster at Media Markt.
jassanja: Please don't take! (Bookslut - Winter Read)
Y - The last man - Volume 21 (Vaughn, Guerra, Marzan) - 23 pages - 8/10
Y - The last man - Volume 22 (Vaughn, Guerra, Marzan) - 23 pages - 8/10
Y - The last man - Volume 23 (Vaughn, Guerra, Marzan) - 23 pages - 8/10
Y - The last man - Volume 24 (Vaughn, Guerra, Marzan) - 23 pages - 7/10

101 other uses for a condom (Various) - 48 pages - 4/10
Grimm Fairy Tales Swimsuit Special 2010 (various) - 46 pages - 7/10


2010:
Books: 104
Cover to back: 102
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction: 23
Audio Books: 37
Video Blogs: 1
Rereads: 1
Pages: 10 672 pages
Audio time: 363 hours 29 minuts
Video Time: 8 hours 27 minutes

#96-98

Dec. 14th, 2010 10:01 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
The Purity Myth (Jessica Valenti) - 265 pages

After readint this book I have the sudden urge to go out, sleep with 100 men and have 10 abortions, just because

9/10


A less travelled Road (Amy Dumas) - (audio) 1 hour 58 minutes

Holly hell, how old is this? It's out of date for at least 5 years if not more

3/10


The Darkest Powers - Book 3 - The Reckoning (Kelley Armstrong) - (audio) 9 hours 26 minutes

The books in this series went downhill after the first. The best part in this book was the brief mention of Elena and her children

3/10

2010:
Books: 098
Cover to back: 096
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction: 23
Audio Books: 37
Video Blogs: 1
Rereads: 1
Pages: 10 486 pages
Audio time: 363 hours 29 minuts
Video Time: 8 hours 27 minutes

#93-95

Oct. 30th, 2010 09:38 pm
jassanja: Please don't take! (Bookslut - Winter Read)
The Dresden Files - Book 10 - Small Favor (Jim Butcher) - (audio) 14 hours 11 minutes - 10/10

Of course as soon as Harry is clear of Lash, her pals come to visit again. And every time they show up, things get good


The Dresden Files - Book 11 -Turn Coat (Jim Butcher) - (audio) 14 hours 56 minutes - 9/10
The Dresden Files - Book 12 - Changes (Jim Butcher - (audio) 15 hours 27 minutes - 6/10

Is it me, or does it look like the series is going into it's endgame?
The tieing up of loose ends, the death of some semi-important characters, the connection between events

And I am not sure if all that changed in the 12th book will not make some stuff in the next novel less enjoyable

2010:
Books: 095
Cover to back: 093
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction: 21
Audio Books: 35
Video Blogs: 1
Rereads: 1
Pages: 10 221 pages
Audio time: 352 hours 05 minuts
Video Time: 8 hours 27 minutes

#086-092

Oct. 20th, 2010 07:36 pm
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Arschgeweih: Das wahre Lexikon der Gegenwart (Oliver Kuhn, Alexandra Reinwarth,, Axel Fröhlich) - 237 pages - 5/10
Very nice Ways to say very bad Things (Linda Berdoll) -156 pages - 7/10

Baustelle Body (Sonya Kraus) - 320 pages - 3/10
Baustelle Mann (Sonya Kraus) - 224 pages - 1/10

Can I claim temporary insanity at having gotten this books in a bundle for a buck at the used book store?
The Highligh of the stupidity was most likely the step by step guide how to spy around your boyfirends cell phone for messages of other women ...


The Dresden Files - Book 08 - Proven Guilty (Jim Butcher) - (audio) 16 hours 15 minutes - 9/10
The Dresden Files - Book 09 - White Knight (Jim Butcher) - (audio) 14 hours 13 minutes - 6/10

I really like some ideas behind those books.
Still it is funny how one book can be close to brilliant, another just well written
(of course it also has a lot to do that things get mushy when you have like 6 diffrent groups of villans in one story)


Boneshaker (Cherie Priest) - (audio) 13 hours 45 minutes - 6/10

I expected a lot more from this.
And I would have prefered to hear more about Minnenricht or the original Boneshaker incident

2010:
Books: 092
Cover to back: 090
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction: 21
Audio Books: 32
Video Blogs: 1
Rereads: 1
Pages: 10 221 pages
Audio time: 307 hours 31 minutes
Video Time: 8 hours 27 minutes

#80-85

Sep. 12th, 2010 02:52 am
jassanja: (Bookslut)
Unmasked - The final Years of Michael Jackson (Richard Allen) - (audio) 9 hours 04 minutes - 5/10
Was tattoon? (Anne Kretschmar) - 96 pages - 5/10
1984 (George Orwell) - (audio) 11 hours 24 minutes
Sorry, wir haben die Landebahn verfehlt (Stephan Orth, Antje Blinda) - 192 pages - 9/10

The Hippopotamus (Stephen Fry) - 350 pages

Good read, even if in the beginning a bit hard to get into
And there aren't that many books that have not one but three scenes in it that can make my jaw drop
(let's just say the part with the horse was as fascinating as it was disturbing)

8/10

Kushiel's Dart (Jaqueline Carey) - (audio) stopped after 25 hours 08 minutes

There are a few good parts, but most of it turned out as filler - so yeah, I don't quite see the hype about those books
(And let's not even go into the whole part where there is a land that turns prostitution and slavery into a religous cult)

6/10



2010:
Books: 085
Cover to back: 083
Not read to end: 2
Non fiction: 17
Audio Books: 29
Video Blogs: 1
Rereads: 1
Pages: 9284 pages
Audio time: 263 hours 18 minutes
Video Time: 8 hours 27 minutes

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