Katherine Brown

Argh still don’t know what to recommend

I’m still wondering what happened to August - I work for a university so the start of the new academic year is always a bit crazy but this year…my husband could have knocked me over with a feather when he told me it was time for the clock change

Oh good I have a month to try and work out what I want to recommend this year

I pre-ordered this for my husband who is a huge fan of the series - he was dead excited when it turned up this morning. I hope you enjoy it

Thank you for writing such a brilliant book. I have a couple of others by you already on my shelves and I’m really looking forward to reading them.

Yes it might be - I was thinking that it was too early, but no it is nearly November and I’ve already had a mince pie so I can get away with a Christmas book 😀

Well I had been planning on telling you guys I was reading ‘The Appeal’ by Janice Hallett which I started last night…except I couldn’t put it down and stayed up until half two finishing it. God it was good.
Haven’t worked out the next book to read yet 😀

I think I’ve ordered books quicker from seeing the post to pressing ‘pay now’, but these are definitely up there on my list of speedy orders

Spotting these lovely green birds in the centre of Newcastle Upon Tyne about year ago is what got me interested in birds in the first place. The Chatter then taking flight about ten seconds after I photographed them made me smile properly: great feeling to have on my way to the office. #birding

A tree in silhouette against a grey sky, with a chatter of green parakeets in the branches - taken in Newcastle Upon Tyne about 8:40 am on Thursday 23rd October

I have had a rubbish couple of days, but I was reminded this morning that the smallest of things can bring you just a little bit of joy. This morning it was the Chatter of Parakeets in a tree on my way to work. #birding

76 hexagonal zinc plated nuts tessellated - 8 columns alternating between 9 and 10 per column

Who needs jigsaws when you can just sit and tessellate 76 hexagonal nuts?

Oh so do I now

Death Knocks Twice by Robert Thorogood - orange and blue cover. A man in a wool suit with an umbrella stood on top of a volcano with a hut at the foot of the volcano and the ocean with dolphins at the bottom. The tagline is a Death in Paradise Mystery

The third Death in Paradise book by Robert Thorogood ‘Death Knocks Twice’ - two chapters in and I have a lovely locked room murder mystery to be solved by DI Poole

"Oh, it's like heaven in here"

#OverheardatBerts

She’s homeless and moves between capsule hotels and other options for the first two and a half pages only…why was that even mentioned in the blurb when it isn’t a significant part of the 1st half of the #book? It is mainly a cosy-ish real life story about meeting strangers and rebuilding a life 2/2

I’ve finished it now and I would still recommend the #book but I’m still deep irritated the blurb and the book do not match. I thought it was going to be a slightly gritty story about a woman who deals with being homeless in a city like Tokyo and meets up with people to recommend books to them. 1/2

It’s The Bookshop Woman by Nanako Hanako. Had the blurb been more accurate I still would have been intrigued but I’m disappointed I’m not reading the #book I bought for the very plot point that sold it to me 3/3 p.s I’m only halfway though but I totally recommend it despite the gripe about the blurb

What is more annoying was the fact I picked it up from the fiction section and it turns out to be a true story (which admittedly it says in the blurb but at the bottom and the previous two paragraphs had sold it to me) 2/3 #book

There is nothing more annoying as a reader than a blurb which is misleading - literally a key description used to describe the main character and hinted at an intriguing plot idea is resolved between pages two and three and does not in fact factor as an integral aspect of the book.
1/3 #book

They say you know the characters you write…what do you do when they take over?
One of my MCs is a songwriter. I am literally writing song lyrics: it won’t stop
#writing

I am really quite jealous Michael - (and intrigued by The Wall) - mainly jealous

Even ones going through some quite horrifying trauma and grief. I struggled to connect with them. I will read Dust as I know the third one returns to characters from Wool, I just don’t know when

I really wanted to read this series though, however I think the fact I didn’t enjoy Shift as much as Wool is the reason I have let writing takeover this month. I loved Wool, but Shift I struggled with: the story and world building was fantastic, but I didn’t like a single one of the characters.

I stopped reading series a few years ago because in my head if you read a series that is what you’re reading for now (i.e. don’t read other books in between) and that had been making reading tougher than usual so I focused on stand-alones to help.

July has very much been a writing month for me instead which is fine (apart from the fact I have loads and I mean loads of fantastic books in my TBR). Shift by Hugh Howey is the second in the Silo trilogy (I read Wool in June).

One book, blue cover - Shift by Hugh Howey

My July 2025 reads (technically read): bit late I know but I was away on vacation over the beginning of the month and didn’t take a photo of the one book on the July pile before I left. Mainly because I had hoped I would maybe read another while I was away. I didn’t.

Er…number unknown… a lot: this will likely not surprise you given the piles of your stock I picked up when I visited a few weeks ago

But nearly always a big basket in my experience (or piles of books tumbling out my arms)

Set up me to read Wool by Hugh Howey which I’ve been curious about reading ever since I saw series 1 of Silo, and it was also really good. I’m nearly finished the second in that trilogy with the third lined up as the next read.

And then a hit on my dystopian mood when we’d been watching the Hunger Games movies I finally got the urge to read Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins, and I loved it.