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Ireland & Irish Literature – Lioness at Large

Ireland & Irish Literature

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An Alphabet of My Likes and Dislikes: “V”

This is a post belonging to a new blogging project — the title is pretty much self-explanatory, I think; the project’s introductory post can be found HERE.  Credit for the idea: BeetleyPete. As always, the only thing linking the two items mentioned in this post in my mind is that they both start with the […]

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Literature Reviews

Val McDermid: Still Life

After Ann Cleeves’s Red Bones, another May 2021 armchair visit to Scotland; though this time to Edinburgh — with brief but significant excursions to the English Midlands, Ireland and Paris, that is.  (France yet again, too — after I had already read Agatha Christie’s Mystery of the Blue Train, Georges Simenon’s Maigret’s Holiday, and Arthur […]

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Lifestyle Literature Movies Music Reviews

February and March 2021: Reading Recap

Well, go figure.  The first quarter of 2021 is already behind us, never mind that I’m still having to remind myself on occasion to write “2021” instead of “2020” … (and we’re even a week into April already, but let that go). Anyway, since I never got around to doing a “February in review” post, […]

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Literature Reviews

Patrick Radden Keefe: Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland

This was a buddy read with some of my BookLikes exile friends — the inside story of the Northern Ireland conflict, the “Troubles”, from (chiefly) the 1960s up to the Good Friday Agreement and (partways) beyond, inspired and based in part on taped interviews with some of the conflict’s key players recorded in the context […]

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Fun and Games Literature Reviews

Oscar Wilde: The Importance of Being Earnest

24 Festive Tasks: Door 20 – Festivus, Book: Read anything comedic; a parody, satire, etc., books with hilariously dysfunctional families (must be funny dysfunctional, not tragic dysfunctional), or anything else that makes you laugh (or hope it does).   I spontaneously decided to revisit Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest — in the 1977 […]

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Fun and Games Literature

A Short Book List for Jonathan Harker

24 Festive Tasks: Door 6 – St. Nicholas’ Day / Sinterklaas, Task 1: Create a book wish list for one of your favorite book characters, or pick 3 books for that character to receive from St. Nick. Here’s a list of books that Jonathan Harker might have found useful before embarking on his trip to […]

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Fun and Games Linked Items Literature Reviews

Book Characters Turning Over a New Leaf

24 Festive Tasks: Door 4 – Japanese Culture Day, Task 2: Japanese Culture Day was first held in 1948, to commemorate the announcement of the country’s post-war constitution on November 3, 1946, which was to make a new start for Japan.  Which book did you read this year where someone was searching for or starting […]

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Fun and Games Literature Reviews

The Medieval Murderers: The Lost Prophecies

This was a reread, which this time around I liked quite a bit better than when I first read it a few years ago.  The Medieval Murderers series of round robins are the perfect books for the “Relics and Curiosities” Halloween Bingo category, as their very concept consists in following one (supposedly cursed or unlucky) […]

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Cats Fun and Games Literature Reviews

Halloween Bingo 2020: The Rest of the Game and Wrap-Up

Sooo, that’s another bingo game behind us already!  Many thanks to our game hosts for successfully moving the game from BookLikes to a new venue and organizing one heck of a game despite that venue’s built-in limitations.  I had a great time and would only have wished I could have participated more throughout the game […]

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Fun and Games Literature

The Halloween Creatures Book Tag

Rules: Answer all prompts. Answer honestly. Tag 1-13 people. Link back to this post. ( For me it was SnoopyDoo!) Remember to credit the creator. (Anthony @ Keep Reading Forward)< Have fun!   Witch A Magical Character or Book Terry Pratchett’s witches, particularly Granny Weatherwax. And DEATH (preferably in his Hogfather incarnation). No contest.   […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature

An “Out of My Reach” Book Wishlist to St. Nick

24 Festive Tasks: Door 14 – St. Nicholas’ Day / Sinterklaas, Task 1: Write a book wish list to St. Nick / Santa Claus for books that you’ve been eyeing but can’t justify the expense of purchasing.  (E.g., art books? Collector’s editions? Boxed sets?)   Dear Saint Nick, it would be really nice if one […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature Music

My Favorite Books with Music as a Plot Element

24 Festive Tasks: Door 21 – Kwanzaa, Task 2: Music is an important part of a Kwanzaa celebration.  Which is / are your favorite book(s) where music plays an important role in the plot?   In no particular order, books (of all genres, except for artist biographies)* that I love where music plays an important […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature Reviews

Nicholas Blake: Thou Shell of Death

24 Festive Tasks: Door 18 – Hanukkah, Book: Read a book about light, miracles, featuring Jewish characters, set in Israel, that is the second book in a series, with the word “two” in the title, or with a light on the cover.   This is a Christmas book, but I’ll be reading plenty more of […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature Reviews

E.C.R. Lorac: Murder by Matchlight

24 Festive Tasks: Door 6 – Veterans’ / Armistice Day, Book: Read a book involving a war, battle, or where characters are active military or veterans, or with poppies on the cover, or honor the ‘unknown soldier’ of your TBR and read the book that’s been there the longest. This is set in 1945 London, […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature

Halloween Bingo 2019 PreParty — Question for 08/03 (Day 3): Favorite Ghostly Tales?

      As I said in my first pre-party post, I’m not much of a horror reader, and the ghost stories I like almost all either feature a ghost who is the author’s messenger for some larger point, or they’re chiefly characters who have had such an impact on another character’s life, or on […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature

Halloween Bingo 2019 PreParty — Question for 08/02 (Day 2): Vampires, Werewolves, Zombies or Other?

  Witches. One of my very first literary heroine was a little witch who manages to get the better of all the bigger, older witches after having been put down by them — the heroine of Otfried Preußler’s Little Witch.  (In fact, I loved that book enough to write my very first fan letter to […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature

Halloween Bingo 2019 PreParty — Question for 08/01 (Day 1): Mystery or Horror?

  Mystery, definitely. For one thing, I’m a total chicken — I can’t look at blood (not even, or rather, especially not my own, e.g. in medical procedures); and anything shocking, spooky, or otherwise unnaturally unsettling just has me running for the rafters.  That’s particularly true at night — which is when I’m doing a […]

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BookLikes Imports Linked Items Literature Reviews

More Favorite / Essential Historical Fiction: Towards the 200!

OK, so I did get to another full list after all.  Here goes, without any further ado: Virginia Woolf: Orlando I’m happy I’m getting another shot for this book alone — could have kicked myself for leaving it off my first list.  I’m not a big fan of either time travel or main character sex […]

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BookLikes Imports Cats Linked Items Literature Reviews

Crowdsourced: More Books with a Difference – Fiction

You asked, Moonlight Reader?  To quote from one of my additional entries below:  “As you wish …” Without any further ado: Hilary Mantel: Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies When Lillelara added A Place of Greater Safety to her list, I could have kicked myself —  because Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell books were definitely among […]

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BookLikes Imports Fun and Games Linked Items Literature Reviews

My Personal Literary Canon, Part 2: “Veteran” Readership

24 Festive Tasks, Door 5, Task 3: Tell us: What author’s books would you consider yourself a veteran of (i.e., by author have you read particularly many books – or maybe even all of them)? The authors by whom I’ve read the most books don’t coincide exactly, but substantially with those that I’d also consider […]

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