The Much-Loved and Favoured

I occasionally find myself in a mood that has me turning to the steady greatness of some of my much-loved and favoured authors. For these authors I have many, many, many titles from their book lists gracing my shelves and digital libraries. Some titles I even have in multiple copies – the new release hardcovers, the well-read trades and paperbacks, and, of course, the easily transportable digital e-books. These books are housed – always – on shelves that prominently display the spines in my living room, my office space, in my kitchen and my bedroom. Despite the multitude of their books already owned, when I see a title by one of these authors which I don’t already have, I finagle some way to get it.

Always.

Well, 95% of the time.

Sometimes I have to briefly add it to my “purchase wish-list” until the next time I have the money to make the buy.

When I get in to certain moods I’ll storm through books by a specific author the way other women will dig their way through every flavour of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. And no matter how many times I’ve read or re-read a story, during these binge periods of reading I am reminded with every single book why I love the author’s work.

I’m not really sure of exactly what spurred my current headfirst dive into all things Nora Roberts. I suppose it was a combination of things that had my focus narrowing and my vision tunnelling to the exclusion of nearly all else for the past month. Primarily I guess the prod came from the whole #CopyPasteCris plagiarism debacle that is currently a BIG deal in the writing, publishing, and book worlds. I’m not going to go in to the details – if you want to learn more about it all, I recommend you check out Nora’s official blog Fall Into The Story where she has posted a series of really good and informative updates over the past month regarding the situation. Until word of the whole thing broke publicly, I’d never even heard of Cristiane Serruyo. But I’d heard of, read, and loved a good number of the titles and authors that she's purported to have plagiarised. (From my personal p.o.v., I think there is more than enough evidence to prove to even the most skeptical that the accusations are fact.)

So maybe it was anger, of a certain form, that plunged me into my current backlist re-read.

I actually managed to do some of that finagling I mentioned earlier to get myself digital copies of all The Stanislaskis: Those Wild Ukrainians series books as well as the books in The Stars of Mithra trilogy, and the books Three Fates and Public Secrets. All of which were personal previously unread Nora creations and all of which I absolutely loved. In the reading mix as well have been some of the newer NR releases, The Liar and The Obsession to name a couple.

One thing that I find so interesting is seeing the way Nora’s writing has adapted to the changing cultural, societal, and technological norms of the times. It’s intriguing to read a story that was published decades ago, for example Secret Star: Stars of Mithra #3 published in 1997, complete with it’s main characters’ reliance on his pager and fax machine, and imagine the story within today’s framework of technology. Would those technological advancements change the course the story would take in it’s telling? Or how about the reverse? Take the story in The Liar back 20 or 30 years and it’s possible that the whole truth within the dastardly tale never would have been revealed. 

I just finished (re)reading Genuine Lies and I continue to be fascinated by the glitz and glamour of Eve Benedict’s life through the decades, enchanted by the understated, but budding and building romance between Julia and Paul, and I am, as always, intrigued by the mystery and the twists as-yet-unrevealed. I’ve read the story several times before and still, every time is like the first and I’m never disappointed; and each time I re-read a story I find something new, something wonderful. 

In the past month I’ve read just about 20 Nora Roberts books – a fair number of them are even ones that I’ve never read before – and I’m still not ready to veer away from this course quite yet. Yesterday I scrolled through the list of Roberts’ titles I could get my hands on through my local library’s digital access license… Happily I now have 7 more of those personal previously unread NR stories waiting on my digital shelf to entrance me, with a couple more on hold and headed my way shortly. If I love them as much as I have all her other works, I imagine my purchase wish-list is about to grow even longer!

Nora Roberts is just one of my ‘much-loved and favoured authors.’ There are others and if you’ve followed this blog in the past, or follow my Facebook Page, chances are you’ll know who some of the others are. But what of yours?

Who are the authors who’s books you are inspired you to read, re-read, and read again? Which authors do you have extensive library space devoted to?

If you had to pick an absolute favourite, who would it be? 

*book covers were curated from Nora's official website, or from Goodreads. 

**If you'd like to discover the full list of books published by Nora Roberts, I recommend her website as an excellent place to start!

Tuesday's Tunes: Nostalgia & Good Times

There are some songs that come on the radio or pop up in my playlists that simply take me back in time. Some take me back to old friends or important experiences. Some remind me of my sisters, cousins or long-lost relatives.

And some take me back to happy times of driving around the country-side with my dad in his old truck listening to the radio. This truck was as old as he was (well it is – he still has it) and only had a radio and an 8-track player, so we couldn’t pick or choose the songs we’d hear while together in that truck. Yet, it seemed like every time we went somewhere today's Tuesday's Tune came on.

Now every time I hear this tune I think of my dad and those blissful afternoons when we would simply drive.

THOSE EYES – The Guess Who

Tuesday's Tunes: An Old Favorite

I have such wide variety of music that when I'm not writing (because I always listen to specific music lists when I'm writing) I can listen to my music library and not repeat a song all day. But like any music lover I have favorites - favorite bands, favorite albums, favorite songs. And like many music lovers I may choose to listen to songs to make me happy, to remind me of another time or a specific person. I may pick an album because a particular sound or style of the music appeals to me that day. Or I may choose to listen to a song or series of songs because of the story I imagine they tell me.

Today's Tuesday's Tunes is one of the "story telling" songs that I particularly appreciate. In fact there are a series of songs from the artists album that this song appears on that (Marianas Trench - Ever After) tell a pretty fascinating story and I enjoy listening to them (and watching the videos) every once in a while. Lately I've been listening to the newest album from Marianas Trench - Astoria and it has a number of songs that I really enjoy too. (I'll talk more about that album next week as I'll actually be attending a live concert with Marianas Trench and Walk Off the Earth next Tuesday.)

But for now, here is the song currently playing on my iPhone... Enjoy :-)

Marianas Trench - STUTTER

And hey... now that I'm thinking about why I listen to particular songs, tell me some of the reasons that you might listen to a song?

This Reader Recommends...

I don't know about anyone else but I am always looking for the next book to read. Whether it's something new, new-to-me, or an old favorite, I am constantly scrolling through reading lists, recommended new releases and looking through my own digital and hard-copy libraries…  So this week, to get myself back into a book blogging mindset after a couple months of hard times (wondering WTF? See here.) I’m sharing with you some of my reading recommendations. Some will be books that I’ve read and loved for years – my all-time favorites. Others will be ones that I’ve read, loved, and/or reviewed in more recent times. And finally some will be new and (possibly) up-coming releases that I’ve heard wonderful things about.

Here we go…