Category: summer fun

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The Summer Library Read

  By books, musings, reading, summer fun

Library_Pataskala_025I’m working my way through my 52-book Goodreads Reading Challenge–a little bit behind, mainly because of writing projects. I haven’t done an actual survey of what I’ve read this year, but I’m going to guess that they’d shake out like this by format: Audio, then Ebook, then Print.

(Well, now that I’ve wondered about it, I DO have to go and check.) Yup, confirmed. Print is at the bottom of the list.

It’s not that I don’t like print books anymore. It’s a matter of convenience–I can multitask and do stuff around the house and garden while I listen to audiobooks. I can easily have an ebook with me wherever I go, on one of my ereaders or even my phone. So while I still love the print format, it’s harder to find space for it in my life.

But not in the summer.

Perhaps because reading print books has become more of an indulgence, they seem to go best with summer reading. I usually devour books in the summertime, and one of the things I love best is the Summer Library Read.

This is the book that you had never heard of before you stopped into the library today. It’s probably the book you wouldn’t be quick to buy, because you know nothing about it, and little about the author. But as you ran your eyes and fingers along the shelf, it spoke to you. The spine caught your eye. The title intrigued. The blurb piqued your interest.

And there was nothing to stop you from giving it a try. Zero committment. Nothing down, nothing to pay (unless you don’t return it on time). You just picked it up, took it to the desk, and then walked out with it. And you’ll settle in to read it at the most indulgent times. When you’re up late because it’s vacation and you don’t have to set the alarm. When you’re at the beach. At the cottage. Sitting out on your step with a cold drink and a bit of shade. Indulging your love of print books, and library books, and the absolute joy of discovering something wonderful and new.

The summer library read. If you haven’t tried it lately, I recommend you give it a whirl. You never know what you might find.

Photo credit: click at Morguefile.com

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Book Juggling and Summer Reading

  By audiobooks, books, ebooks, reading, summer fun, writing life

I’ve always been a voracious reader. When I was younger (say, in my teens and university) reading was really my first experience with multitasking (see my previous post!). I read while I was getting dressed. I read while I dried my hair. I read while I ate (whenever I could get away with it). I read before going to sleep. I’d have a book on the go in my bedroom, one in the bathroom, one downstairs, and one in my bag. People often commented on this, wondering how I could keep all the stories straight. I wondered how one couldn’t keep all the stories straight. I mean, they were all different stories, right?

If you pop over to my Goodreads “currently reading” page, you’ll see that I’m still the same book juggler. It’s a bit misleading, really–there are more books on that list than I’m actively reading at any given moment. That’s because when I start a book and then don’t really get into it or get distracted from it, I still leave it on the list until I’m quite certain I’m not going to finish it. I have less tolerance now for books that don’t keep me interested–but I don’t like moving them into the “shelved” category until I’m sure. That means my list can get pretty long at times.

My habits have changed in one regard; I still might have four books actively on the go, but it’s likely that no more than two are physical, print books. Another will be on my Kobo, and another will be an audiobook I’m listening to. I like this; it’s tidier, for one thing, and these days, tidy is like a lovely, usually-unattainable dream. I’ve come to love audiobooks–they appeal to the corner of my soul that loves multi-tasking because I can listen to them while I do so many other things. Cleaning. Sewing. Making jewelry. Driving. Gardening. When I got serious about writing, the time I could devote to reading suffered somewhat. Audiobooks have changed that. I might even attain my long-wished-for goal of reading more than 52 books in a year. Well, I know I have done that when I was younger, but not since I became a “grown-up.” I’d like to get there again.

All this is on my mind of late because summer is still my reading season. I read all year, of course, but there’s something about summertime reading that sets it apart for me. It’s easier to allow myself to take a whole afternoon off and just read. Or stay up late into the wee hours with a book I just can’t put down, knowing I don’t have to wake up early and get kids off to school. Summer is my time to read freely, in some sense. There are some books I save for summer reading, because I know the experience will have an extra fillip of enjoyment.

My Goodreads page and my reviews on this site will tell you what I’ve read lately…what else is still on my summer reading list? Stay tuned and I’ll tell you…

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Third Person Press E-Sampler

  By ebooks, publishing, reading, summer fun, Third Person Press

Third Person Press has a little summer reading treat–or teaser–for you. We’ve put together three stories, one each from Undercurrents, Airborne, and the newly-released Unearthed, in a free sampler ebook.

The stories included are: “Winter Bewitched” by Sherry D. Ramsey, “Mind Drifter” by Julie A. Serroul, and “Mud Pies” by Nancy S.M. Waldman. The e-sampler is available in .epub and .mobi formats directly from the Third Person Press website, and in many formats from Smashwords.

If you haven’t read our anthologies and would like a taste of the stories to see if you’d like them, now is the time to take some for a test-drive!

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Summer Reading, I Love You

  By personal, reading, summer fun

Of course I read all the time, but I’ve always tended to read more during the summer months. There’s something about summer that just says “recharge your batteries” to me, and that means spending as much time as I can immersed in someone else’s imaginary worlds instead of my own. The advent of audiobooks means that I can expand that reading time even further. Oh. Yeah.

So I thought I’d share my summer reading list, so far, and planned.

Although June is really still “spring” around here, and it was super busy this year, it was a good month for audiobooks. I listened to The Last Good Man, by A.J. Kazinski; Cinder, by Marissa Meyer; U is for Undertow, by Sue Grafton, and The Weed That Strings the Hangman’s Bag, by Alan Bradley. Good reads, all (which reminds me, you can generally find out all of this stuff and more by following me over on Goodreads). These days I find that I’m particularly interested by books that offer me something new–a different take on an idea, or something I haven’t come across before–especially in the speculative genres.

I kicked off July with another audiobook, The Knife Of Never Letting Go, by Patrick Ness. Wow, I found this book stressful, but also gripping. I have the next two in the series queued up on my iPhone ready to go, but I had to take a little break for the sake of my nerves. Currently, I’m almost finished listening to The Third Gate, by Lincoln Child.

On the print side, I’m reading Zero History, by William Gibson, and on my Kobo I have The Art of War for Writers, by James Scott Bell. Although you’ll see other books on my Currently Reading shelf over at Goodreads, these are the ones I’m really actively reading right now.

My big vacation read this summer will be Stephen King’s 11/22/63. I have been saving it for when I can really get into it, but I know I won’t wait much longer. It’s sitting on my reading pile just daring me to put it off another day. I’m getting a bit worried, though…what if I don’t like it? I’ve been anticipating it for so long, it’s going to be a big let-down if it doesn’t live up to my expectations.

The pile in the picture is only the tip of the TBR pile. No doubt I’ll be back with another summer reading post anon.

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Summer Reading Wrap-Up

  By personal, reading, summer fun

I suppose, since the first day of fall is imminent, it’s a good time to revisit my summer reading list and see how it fared. No need to actually click back to the link, I’ll reproduce the updated version here:

Murderous Magick by Michael A. Stackpole
Remake by Connie Willis
Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland… by Catherynne M. Valente
Suspense and Sensibility by Carrie Bebris
Darwin’s Radio by Greg Bear (a book club book, if we get our book club active again–it’s next on our list, IIRC)
Steam and Sorcery by Cindy Spencer Pape
Wit’s End by Karen Joy Fowler
The Jennifer Morgue by Charles Stross
The Strange Case of Finley Jayne by Kady Cross
Industrial Magic by Kelley Armstrong
Barrington Street Blues by Anne Emory
The Native Star by M.K. Hobson
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin
Spiral Hunt by Margaret Ronald
The Map of Time by Felix J. Palma
The Thackeray T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer (eds.)

Wow, so the planned list did not take much of a beating. I did start several more from this list, but they fell to the allure of other titles.

However, this doesn’t mean it was not a good summer for reading. Far from it. I believe I mentioned in the initial post that I am very much swayed by things that come to my attention, and I have no trouble shooting something straight to the top of by TBR pile if I’m in the mood for it. So in addition to the two titles crossed off above, I also read (or in some cases listed to the audio book of):

V and A Shipping by J.R. Murdock
The Secret World Chronicle: World Divided by Mercedes Lackey et als.
The Best Laid Plans by Terry Fallis
The President’s Vampire by Christopher Farnsworth
Hull Zero Three by Greg Bear
Sh*t My Dad Says by Justin Halpern
The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud
The Night Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko
The Ring of Solomon by Jonathan Stroud
Tithe by Holly Black
Blackout by Connie Willis
All Clear by Connie Willis

I enjoyed all of these books to varying degrees, but the standouts for me were the two Connie Willis titles. However, they were all worth the read/listen, and definitely come recommended by me.

I also met my reading goal for the year, set back in January on Goodreads, so everything I read for the rest of the year is gravy. :)

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The Butterbeer Project

  By just for fun, personal & miscellaneous, Recipes, summer fun

I know I have a lot of catch-up blogging to do, so things are going to be out of chronological order for a while, but hey–that’s summer for you.

One of the items on our Big Summer Fun List was “make Butterbeer.” We enjoyed this very tasty treat at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando this past spring, and of course at the time tried to figure out what ingredients went into it. We determined to try to recreate it at home.

A quick Googling of “Harry Potter Butterbeer” turns up many, many recipes purporting to duplicate it. Glancing over them, I quickly concluded that many of these recipes were NOT going to come close to what we’d sampled. I also discarded the alcoholic versions. There were still quite a few to choose from, but for our first attempt I thought this one looked like it might come close. I set out to collect up the necessary ingredients, and promptly ran into a couple of snags.

I couldn’t find any toffee-flavoured dessert topping, however I did find this caramel one, which seemed like it might be a decent substitute since it proclaimed itself to be “rich, creamy, buttery.” Next problem: you can’t just buy butterscotch-flavoured Dream Whip, nor could I find butterscotch flavouring, even at the Bulk Barn, which carries all manner of such things. So we were on to experimentation from the outset.

I did buy Coca-Cola, as called for in the recipe, but I also picked up a bottle of root beer, since we’d all thought in Florida that root beer must be on the ingredient list. Ginger beer was no problem to find at the grocery store.

So first we whipped up the Dream Whip. I followed the package directions, but reduced the vanilla to 1/4 tsp. and added a teaspoon of the caramel sauce. It whipped up nicely, but the topping that forms the “head” of the butterbeer was quite runny when we had it in Florida, and this was still fluffy. I added another teaspoon of the sauce and whipped that in, which helped some, but I think you would have to add a LOT of sauce to really get it to the right consistency. This turned out to be the most difficult part of the project, and one which we haven’t really solved yet. The taste was very close, but the consistency was not right. Anyway, we were ready to experiment. I still wasn’t feeling very certain about the Coke, so we did a small test glass and decided that no, it wasn’t right. So we switched to the root beer.

I did roughly follow the directions in the recipe. We added a tablespoon of the caramel sauce to the bottom of each tankard, then filled the glass about halfway with root beer. I used a small whisk to stir in the sauce, which caused quite a head of foam to appear! We added about half as much ginger beer as we’d had root beer, then a dollop of Dream Whip. Which of course, since it was fluffy instead of runny, just sort of plopped into the foam and floated. More research is needed in this department! I suppose one could skim off the root beer foam and then try to spread the Dream Whip on more smoothly, but the kids thought that the foam was delicious and would strongly oppose removing it. Hmmm…I wonder if we could skim the foam and mix it into the Dream Whip? (scribbles a note for next time)

Anyway, the finished Butterbeers, reposing in the mugs brought from Florida:

They were downed with great gusto and proclaimed a huge success. Indeed, they did taste remarkably as we remembered them. My husband opined that they were “fizzier” than the originals, so perhaps letting the root beer go partially flat might improve them. And the topping consistency still needs work. However, if you’d like an idea of what Butterbeer tastes like (without the expense of going to Florida), give it a try! Great on a hot day (although those are harder to find in Cape Breton this summer than the Room of Requirement).

Our modified recipe:

2 L. root beer
2 small bottles Ginger Beer
1 Pkg. Dream Whip
1 bottle Sensations Creamy Caramel dessert topping (although I expect any caramel or butterscotch-type sauce would yield much the same result)

Mix Dream Whip according to package directions, BUT reduce vanilla to 1/4 tsp. and add 2 tsp. of the caramel sauce (or more, if you’d like to try and make it runnier and increase the butterscotch flavour).

Add 1 tbsp. caramel sauce to the bottom of tankard. Fill about halfway with root beer. Whisk or stir gently to mix in the sauce. Add about half as much ginger beer as you had root beer. Add a dollop of Dream Whip. Enjoy!