Annie reading Asian Dumplings cookbook by Andrea Nguyen (from which we made dumpling skins from scratch.)

I’ve been meaning to start a blog on reading for a long time. After all, I’ve been a reader for almost all my life. I know there are many blogs out there that talk about books and reading so I’m not unique in this way. But I wanted to start one anyway because I have so many questions that I want to ask of other readers. I’ve always wondered if we readers are very similar. So everytime I blog, I will ask one of these questions that I’ve always been curious about.

Today’s is really easy. What are you reading today? Has it changed from what you used to read?

For myself, I will confess that for a time, I was really hooked on romance books. I know, those trashy penny novels about dashing “alpha” males and equally beautiful independent women (who somehow still needed the alpha males). Today, I will pick up a romance novel once in a while, but on the whole, I find the genre much too “hot” for me these days and most of the writing is just so generic and sometimes plain terrible.

I guess my teenage years of swooning after dashing pirates, or roguish lords are no longer. I have my real-life lover now, and though he will never quite be as intense or mysterious or sexy as the ones I read about in those books, he is more than the sum total of all those romance heroes (more about that later).

Run the Gamut

These days, I will sometimes indulge in some chick-lit (Jane Austen being my ultimate chick-lit author) when I’m feeling like a light read. Some of these books will include some romance but in general, they deal with women and their relationships with those around them (family and friends). Mostly, they are somewhat humourous, and every so often, deal with some sobering issues that we women face.

Other than these two genres, I am not specific about what I read. They run the gamut. I do prefer fiction to non-fiction even though I will read those sometimes (biographies being one that I find fascinating and books on cooking—of course!). I just finished Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy and enjoyed it quite a bit. Every so often, I will read fantasy or science fiction (Orson Scott Card is one of my favorite authors). So, really, thrillers, mysteries, historical fiction, christian fiction, general fiction, science fiction, fantasy, classics, and even children and young adult fiction, I will happily read.

The only thing I can’t read is horror. I tried reading Stephen King a few times and only managed to finish one of his books (it was not even a real horror one—more fantasy than horror—can you guess which one I’m referring to?). And I tried to read another author (whose name I can’t even remember now) who also wrote in that genre and I just couldn’t get through them. I’m too chicken I guess or my imagination is too vivid (yeah, just too chicken…).

So there you go—in my teens I read romances almost exclusively. Today, I’ve outgrown them and read almost everything else.

Recent Reads

Here is a list of books I’ve recently finished or am in the process of finishing (some on the Kindle):

Tales of the Otori Series by Lian Hearn (I enjoyed the first three and even though the fourth in the series was compelling, the story was very hard to accept—romantic that I was).

The Millenium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson (I enjoyed all three very much)

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruis Zafon (beautiful, descriptive mystery)

Crocodile on the Sandbank by Elizabeth Peters (yes, the first in yet another series. I’m enjoying it so far)

So tell me, what are you reading today? Has it changed from what you used to read? Leave me a comment!

Cheers, Annie