It’s Tuesday and time for Top Ten Tuesday! The most popular meme on the blogosphere. Or so I’m told. This is my first time and I am super excited (all curled up in a warm blanket at my mommy’s feet). The last time she visited, it was still hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, but there is a new pretty lady over at That Artsy Reader Girl who is playing host now. I think I’m going to like her. She seems like a cat person. Today’s prompt is Top Ten Books on my Summer TBR list. Luckily that pretty Artsy Lady considered us here in the Southern Hemisphere as well where we definitely do not experiencing any summery vibes. This is my fist winter and I’m not all that sure how I feel about it. There’s lots of cuddle time and some comfy warm blankets to snuggle into. But nature still calls and I need to go play outside as well where it’s dreadfully cold and wet. Mommy says I should just embrace it and think of all the lovely books we are going to read in front of the fire.  So let’s have a look at what she’s dusting of […]

The year is just about at an end and not to sound like Scrooge, but bah humbug to that. Not that I am ungrateful, in fact I am extremely grateful to join The Broke and the Bookish once again for Top Ten Tuesday and that I managed to read more than 10 books this year so that I can at least make a selection of my Ten Favorite Books for 2017. As with most books, my selection is strictly based on personal experiences. None of my favorites for 2017 are actually published in 2017. In fact I have two books on my list that were published in the previous century! But that is the wonder of books and the magic of reading. It is always in the present tense the moment you open the book. I don’t really have an ascending order from most favorite to least favorite list for this year. Each of the books listed meant something to me through a really tough year. Let’s have a quick look at the books that made my list: Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult Okay, this one is actually my favorite for the year. It’s my blanky book. A book that brought comfort and peace and […]

It’s Tuesday and time to get serious about reading series’ with Top Ten Tuesday. Seriously, you need to start reading that series you’ve been putting off ever since Eskom first introduced load shedding.  Personally, I don’t read that many series. The problem with a series is you need to read them ALL, for if you take one out, none of the other bulbs will light up and you will be sitting in the dark.  But I still have the following series’ on my TBR list and I haven’t started with any of these. Not one book or even book one from anyone.     Maisie Dobbs Flavia de Luce Phryne Fisher    Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy The Dark Tower The Mediator    The Raven Cycle Department Q Temperance Brennan I am planning to start an Afrikaans series in July that might just give me the jeebie creeps, but I am sooooo looking forward to it! Promise to sleep with the lights on. Unfortunately, no English translation yet. Promise to tell you everything. But when do I plan to start the rest of the series’? Your guess is as good as mine. It will have to be light bulb moment. What […]

Ever since The Evil Queen uttered those damning words, we have all been terrified of Stepmoms. I for one, was much more afraid of The Evil Queen than I was of the Devil in the Children’s Bible. No jokes. I didn’t get to celebrate Mother’s Day on Sunday. But I do have a number of wonderful friends who all got to spend the day with their children. Some of those friends are stepmoms or a stepmom-to-be real soon. When I saw today’s theme for Top Ten Tuesday (Mother’s Day Related), I immediately thought of my dearest stepmom friends. Are they all evil? I honestly don’t think so.  But yes, I do believe their only request is: “Bring me her/his heart!”. Maybe just not literally all the time. Sometimes they really just want to capture their stepchildren’s hearts.Thankfully Literature, the wisest of all, agrees with me. Let’s have a look at a few notable Stepmoms in literature:   1. Jess Thomas in the The One Plus One. Jess is one of my favorite characters in literature and if if wasn’t for Louisa Clark, she might have been my favorite Jojo Moyes character. Imagine you marry a guy with a kid and after a few years that bastard […]

Welcome to another edition of Top Ten Tuesday! Today’s topic is Top Ten most unique books we’ve read. Browsing through my reading lists, I’ve realized that apparently  I have quite a fondness for unique books. (Most probably because I am such a unique creature myself) And then it hit me! Instead of making a list of the most unique books I’ve read, what about a list of the most unique characters I’ve encountered in literature? You know, those characters without an equal, the one of a kind. Those characters who just can’t be copied. Yes, there are 100’s of them floating out there, but these were my Top Ten Favorites: 1. Hercule Poirot With his patent leather shoes, his pince-nez reading glasses and his turnip pocket watch – Hercule Poirot knows how to put the little grey cells to good use. He has solved over 50 murders and rather than painstakingly examining crime scenes, he enquires into the nature of the victim or the psychology of the murderer. He predicates his actions in his underlying assumption that particular crimes are committed by particular types of people. 2. Luna Lovegood “The girl gave off an aura of distinct dottiness. Perhaps it was the […]

Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly link-up/meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish  where they provide a prompt and other lovers of list-making (me! me! me!) join in with their own top ten list. Feel free to have less than 10 or more if you need to at times and put a spin on the topic if you need to. Just please link back to The Broke and the Bookish  if you are participating. Link up with your BLOG POST (not your blog) in the linky provided and remember to pay it forward! Today’s theme for Top Ten Tuesday is A TV themed topic. I had a gazillion ideas for this one: My Top Ten Favorite TV shows (for real) What to read if you like this or that TV show The book was a better show The show was better than the book Bad type casting Good type casting WTF is going on in….? Why don’t they make stories like …. anymore? All those topics just made me feel confused and LOST. Light Bulb! Lets just talk about: (the fact that this was my favorite TV series in forever is completely besides the point)   We all know the story: Plane crashed down on deserted island. Strewn between […]

Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly link-up/meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish  where they provide a prompt and other lovers of list-making (me! me! me!) join in with their own top ten list. Feel free to have less than 10 or more if you need to at times and put a spin on the topic if you need to. Just please link back to The Broke and the Bookish  if you are participating. Link up with your BLOG POST (not your blog) in the linky provided and remember to pay it forward! Today’s theme for Top Ten Tuesday is Ten Books that have been on your shelf (or TBR – let’s not kid ourselves here) from before you started blogging.Seeing that I’ve only been blogging for four months, the state of my actual bookshelf looks like this:  See, lots and lots of space for more books. But believe it or not, hiding in between all those vast open spaces are a number of books I haven’t actually read. Yet. And yes, they have been on that shelf for more than four months. Some for more than four years. Others closer to fourty years. My bad. I know. At least these I still want to read. There […]

I know, I know. this is not what you are suppose to do. You actually need to list ten books set in or on X, Y or Z. But when I saw this week’s theme, the above graphic immediately came to mind. Books with an X setting = Find X. In a previous Top Ten Tuesday, I’ve mentioned my utter lack of Mathematical knowledge. Just for today, I’ve decided to put that prejudice aside and assist Algebra with his/her/it’s age-old dilemma by listing 10 Books with a Mathematical setting. I do hope that my efforts will help him/her/it for once and for all to find his/her/it’s X.   Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly link-up/meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish  where they provide a prompt and other lovers of list-making (me! me! me!) join in with their own top ten list. Feel free to have less than 10 or more if you need to at times and put a spin on the topic if you need to. Just please link back to The Broke and the Bookish  if you are participating. Link up with your BLOG POST (not your blog) in the linky provided and remember to pay it forward! 1. One Plus One by Jojo Moyes This is […]

Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly link-up/meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish  where they provide a prompt and other lovers of list-making (me! me! me!) join in with their own top ten list. Feel free to have less than 10 or more if you need to at times and put a spin on the topic if you need to. Just please link back to The Broke and the Bookish  if you are participating. Link up with your BLOG POST (not your blog) in the linky provided and remember to pay it forward! Today’s Top Ten Tuesday’s theme is: Ten books you’d buy right this second if someone handed you a fully loaded Gift Card. Need to take a deep breath here. That sentence is way to long to utter in one breath. Especially when talking about books – which as you know, tends to leave us breathless to start with. So I just shortened it to my own preference: Ten books I’ve just bought!  (for real, I can show the receipts) I’m not a big spender, but once a year I go on a book-shopping-spree. This is due to my membership to the world’s most amazing Book Club, My Book Club can read between the wines (we are […]

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday – Ten books that inspired me to do/not do or learn something new Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly link-up/meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish  where they provide a prompt and other lovers of list-making (me! me! me!) join in with their own top ten list. Feel free to have less than 10 or more if you need to at times and put a spin on the topic if you need to. Just please link back to The Broke and the Bookish  if you are participating. Link up with your BLOG POST (not your blog) in the linky provided and remember to pay it forward!To do1. Do learn to use some of the spell words in Harry Potter as very effective swear words. Do also ensure that your facial expression and tone of voice are in correlation.     2. Do clap your hands as often and as quickly as you can.  Of course you are allowed to stamp your feet as well, but maybe rather try the happy dance. Go on, clap your hands. Tinkerbell will stay alive if you do. Oh, and of course you have to say the words: “I do believe in fairies”. And believe it. Just say it! (Should anyone disobey […]