No book has grabbed my attention lately, although I’ve started several. “Visitation Street,” “The Edge of the Earth,” “Falling to Earth” – all have my bookmarks. Even in sunny Italy, “Beautiful Ruins” held no fascination. Â Soon, two of my favorite authors – JoJo Moyes and Deborah Harkness – have promising publications that will save me.
In the meantime, I confess – I’ve been wallowing in Diana Gabaldon’s “Outlander” series. With over 1000 pages in each book, I’m halfway through the second and enjoying my guilty pleasure.
Have you read them?
The No Charge Book Bunch 
One of my all-time faves. I read the first 4 back to back 🙂
You will be all set for the TV version this Fall. I’ve slowed down a bit, but finished the first two.
I’ve worked my way through the first five books in the series over the past two months, in fact half an hour ago just finished book 5! Book six is in transit from the library, book 7 I took out in anticipation of getting book 6. And I may have to break down and by book 8, although the library waiting list is moving quickly I am still 200th on the list!
Love the series, it’s a total guilty pleasure. Don’t know how I missed it 20 years ago, although I guess I wasn’t doing a lot of novel reading as I would have been in the third year of my degree….
While Jamie is most definitely all that and a bag of chips, ;-), I particularly like the actual love story between him and Claire and all of the thought that went into creating it. It’s a great adventure story as well, every book has another twist. I won’t give away any more than that.
The series is only going to be book 1 this season, I believe. I’m not always keen on watching shows that I know the story really well – we’ll see. We don’t get it in Canada until the end of August, so I’ll hear what the US audience is thinking of it first!
You are a fan! Glad to hear the series is only the first book this year – gives me time to catch up. I have a smoldering picture of Jamie in my head – hope it doesn’t get spoiled with an actor who doesn’t fit the picture. I will be in Canada in September.
Oh, he’s pretty cute. Not quite what I had in my mind, but the voice is very good. I checked out the trailer on line. Claire is good, too.
Thanks for the tip – I just checked out the trailer. Oh yes, he’ll do 🙂
I remember when Outlander first came out. Bookstores were really freaked out over where to shelve it, because it was romance, it was historical, and it was sci-fi with time travel. I first read it in high school (and wow, this summer, my high school class is celebrating its 20th reunion!), and I was in love with the characters and the fact that the book managed to pack a lot of history into it.
Red-headed Jamie has the great qualities of a true romance hero and has me drooling; the time travel has me spinning, and the historical facts warrant checks on google. You are so right – romance, sci-fi, history. Today’s NYT “inside the List” notes that the books are written “by a science Ph.D. with a background in scripting Scrooge McDuck comics.” I am hooked – just hope I get them all read before the series starts on TV.
Yes, she has degrees in zoology, marine biology, and behavioral ecology, which I find fascinating. Gabaldon is a Renaissance woman! Good luck getting through thousands of pages before the series starts.
Probably not – but worth a try – I have some long flights coming up 🙂
I listened to 4 or 5 of them and remember many in my work group reading them at the same time. Jamie was q particular favorite! I agree that sometimes it seems they aren’t writing good books anymore. Too many contrived plots or gimmicks for me. I couldn’t get interested in The Ruins either. I did like You Should Have Known, Orphan Train and The Storied Life of A J Firkey.
Thanks for the book suggestions! I did like The Storied Life… but have not read the others – will check them out.
I’ve (read) listened to them all. Starting my second time through while waiting for her newest book which has just come out. My Outlander friends and I are counting the days till the Outlander tv series debuts on Starz in August. I don’t know how you feel about audio books but this series is excellent. The narrator brings each character to life. After seven 1000 page books you know each character by his voice.
Great idea! I’ll download one for one of my many trips across the ocean. I’d heard about the upcoming series – a motivator for reading the books first.