"I'd love to read but I just don't have the time!"

Really? Really? I mean come on! How can you not have time? Do you really, honestly, find yourself busy 24/7? You honestly don't have any time to yourself where you could find 10 or 20 minutes to just chill out with a book and do nothing but think about your fiction world? I mean I am a primary school teacher, if anyone can understand about the time their day job takes up it is me! I work during the day, I work from 8 till 6 quite often and come home and continue to work some nights and continue nearly all day Sunday. I still read. I read and have a blog.

Do audiobooks count as reading?

This is a question I have been asked many times. Do audiobooks count as reading? My simple answer is yes. How can they not? You spend as much time selecting and choosing an audiobook as you do a physical book.

I personally have read a small selection of audiobooks. I have always wanted to listen to them but have found that they can be extortionately expensive! No one wants to pay £15+ for a CD/MP3. So how did I overcome this? I realised my local library loans out audiobooks! What a brilliant idea! 

Poor Phoebe...poor Molly

Title: The Wrong Girl
Author: Laura Wilson
ISBN: 978-1-4450-5108-6
Rating: 6/10
Genre: Thriller, Murder, Mystery, Adult Fiction

Following my first audiobook which I took out from the local library, I wanted another. I selected this audiobook because I was interested in the thriller aspect. I wanted to know if 10-year-old Molly was, in fact, the missing Phoebe Piper who had disappeared 7 years previously at the age of 3.

What are you currently reading?

In the last post I wrote, I specifically said I would be reading The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I am reading this book and I am happy to announce I am currently at page...27! Woo, I've got far. book before your kids.

However, I have had to, yet again, read a book for work. As you are aware I work in a school as a primary school teacher. I am an NQT (Newly Qualified Teacher) and as anyone will understand you need to read the book before you start teaching from it.

Stephen King, Jill Mansell, Agatha Christie, Harper Lee and half term!

I have very nearly completed my first half term as a full time employed teacher of my very own class of delights. 25 children who I am responsible for and who I enjoy working with every day. I spent my first half term catching up on appointments and meeting up with old friends.

It was great! We talked about past memories, we went out together and created new memories and I even met up with a friend I haven't seen in nearly 2 years as he's been spending his time jet setting around the world! I also bought a range of books! Of course I did! I am still reading Spellbound by Laurie Elisabeth Ashcroft, which I am still really enjoying, but I did buy a range of new and exciting books.

Dark Sun, Bright Moon...Can't do it!

Title: Dark Sun, Bright Moon
Author: Oliver Sparrow
ISBN: 978-1500432010


Sorry about my lack of posting recently. I have just recently started a new job so it has been very busy here! I have started working in a primary school and I really do hope I will be able to post on here more often and regular. Especially as I have a fortnight off over Christmas! I have been reading Dark Sun, Bright Moon for about a month. However, no matter how much I have tried to read it over and over and I just can not get into it. 

Grey...Mr Grey will see you now! Oh my...

Title: Grey
Author: E. L. James
ISBN: 978-1784753252
Rating: 7/10
Genre: Romance, Fiction, Erotic


"Ana's reproachful eyes are on me, and for a moment I don't know if it's because of Elliot and Kate's lascivious display or -
Hell! This is what she wants. To be courted and wooed.
I don't do romance, sweetheart.
A lock of her hair has broken free, and without thinking, I tuck it behind her ear. She leans her face into my fingers, the tender gesture surprising me. My thumb strays to her soft bottom lip, which I'd like to kiss again. But I can't. Not until I have her consent.
'Laters, baby,' I whisper, and her face softens with a smile. 'I'll pick you up at eight.' Reluctantly, I turn away and open the front door, Elliot behind me."


I have read the original Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James and although everyone who I know was not impressed with them, I really enjoyed them. A lot of my friends just believed it was full of sex and no story. Yes, there is a lot of sex in the books, sometimes a little too much, but I thoroughly enjoyed the background story to the first three books.

My Fictional Bucket List

Hello, everyone. 

I have watched and read a number of other people talking about who they would like to meet in their fictional bucket list so I thought I would weigh in on the discussion. For those who do not know, a fictional bucket list is characters you would like to meet from any fictional text and where you would go and what you would do with them.

So I have tried to think about which books I would like to include and which characters I would meet. If only, all this was possible!!

So here we go...

Sapient...Wow!! Where can I get Kaczmarowski's other book from?

Title: Sapient
Author: Jerry Kaczmarowski
ISBN: 978-0990410928
Rating: 9/10
Genre: Fiction, Sci-Fi

"'Tell them we're dead.'
The man nodded, now rushing to comply. He pulled a mobile phone out of a shirt pocket.
'No tricks. English only.' The man glanced at his torn ankle and knee and nodded in submission.
He pushed a speed-dial button, and Bear heard it ringing through the speaker. After a perfunctory greeting the man said, 'I got the dog.' The man listened for a moment. 'Yes, and the rat. We're good. I'm returning now.' The man hung up the phone and looked with a pleading expression at Einstein before turning to face Bear again. His eyes settled on Bear's still-bloody fangs.
Einstein tapped on the keys, but no sound came from the phone. He paused to stare at the man before hitting the Enter key. 'Now kill him.'"

Go Set a Watchman...All the waiting, what for?

Title: Go Set A Watchman
Author: Harper Lee
ISBN: 978-1785150289
Ratings: 5/10
Genre: Fiction, Adult Fiction

"'Jean Louise, have you ever thought about coming home?'
'Home?'
'If you will refrain from echoing either the last clause or the last word of everything I say to you, I will be much obliged. Home. Yes, home.'
Jean Louise grinned. He was becoming Uncle Jack again. 'No sir,' she said.
'Well, at the risk of overloading you, could you possibly give an undertaking to think about it? You may not know it, but there's room for you down here.'
'You mean Atticus needs me?'
'Not altogether. I was thinking of Maycomb.'
'That'd be great, with me on one side and everybody else on the other. If life's an endless flow of the kind of talk I heard this morning, I don't think I'd exactly fit in."

One Day...Couldn't Put it Down

Title: One Day
Author: David Nicholls
ISBN: 978-1444724585
Rating: 8/10
Genre: Romance, comedy, drama

"You are smart and funny and kind (too kind if you ask me) and by far the cleverest person I know. And...you are also a Very Attractive Woman. And...yes I do mean 'sexy' as well, though I do feel a bit sick writing it down. Well I am not going to scribble it out because it's politically incorrect to call someone 'sexy' because it is also TRUE. You're gorgeous you old hag, and if I could get you just one gift ever for the rest of your life it would be this. Confidence. It would be the gift of Confidence. Either that or a scented candle."

Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold...the beginning

Title: Kitty Hawk and the Curse of the Yukon Gold
Author: Iain Reading
ISBN: 978-1502300874
Rating: 6/10
Genre: Young adult, action, adventure, mystery

"Stopping for what felt like the hundredth time, I leaned over, face down on all fours, to inhale and exhale raggedly. Stretching my neck forward, I looked up toward the summit. The line of orange poles seemed to stretch on forever, winding back and forth across the waterfall of rocks and stones and boulders that cascaded down between the two small peaks up above me.
That is exactly what it looked like - a waterfall of rock. There could not possibly be better words to describe it than that. It was as though some immense pair of hands had poured a giant bucket or rocks and boulders down the slope towards where I was catching my breathe."

Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces...What comes next?

Title: Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces
Author: Iain Reading
ISBN: 978-1508488866
Rating: 8/10
Genre: Young adult, action, adventure, mystery

"'True,' Marieke said, nodding absently. 'But to be honest, I'm far more curious to find out how these other two paintings ended up here.'
Marieke reached out and pointed toward a pair of paintings that were hanging off in the corner on the opposite of the fireplace.
'What do you mean?' Vega asked, turning her head to look at what she was gesturing to.
'Well, in light of the fact that this Van Gogh over here is almost surely authentic,' Marieke replied, 'then I can only assume that the Monet and Pissaro hanging right over there are authentic as well.'"

The Lovely Bones...Maybe not for me

Title: The Lovely Bones

Author: Alice Sebold

ISBN: 978-0-330-45772-9

Rating: 7/10

Genre: Fantasy, Drama

"These were the lovely bones that had grown around my absence: the connections - sometimes tenuous, sometimes made at great cost, but often magnificent - that happened after I was gone. And I began to see things in a way that let me hold the world without me in it. The events that my death wrought were merely the bones of a body that would become whole at some unpredictable time in the future. The price of what I came to see as this miraculous body had been my life." 

I started to read this book in April. I had been looking forward to reading this book for a long time as I had heard great things about both the book and the film. I had not seen the film and a number of my friends have read the book. I have had this book on my shelf for a number of years and I had high hopes for it.

Mr Stink...Get this book for your kids, I'm getting them all!

Title: Mr Stink
Author: David Walliams
ISBN: 978-0-00-727906-7
Rating: 7/10
Genre: Children's book, comedy

"'My work here is done. And I'm a wanderer,' said Mr Stink. 'It's time for me to wander on.' 
'But we want you to be safe and warm here with us,' said Chloe. Tears were rolling down her cheeks now. Annabelle wiped away her sister's tears with her sleeve. 

'I am sorry, Miss Chloe. I have to go. No tears please. No fuss. Farewell to you all and thank you for your kindness.' Mr Stink put down his cup and saucer, and headed for the door. 'Come on, Duchess,' he said. 'It's time to go.'"

Mr Stink was a book I was reading because of work. Due to being off work I have been able to read it quickly and really did enjoy it. It's a few years since I've read a children's book, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was the last children's book I read in 2011. 

To Kill a Mockingbird...Once a classic always a classic!

Title: To Kill a Mockingbird
Author: Harper Lee
ISBN: 978-0-09-954948-2
Rating: 9/10
Genre: Drama

"I could not possibly hope possibly hope to be a lady if I wore breeches: when I said I could do nothing in a dress, she said I wasn't supposed to be doing things that required pants. Aunt Alexandra's vision of my deportment involved playing with small stoves, tea sets, and wearing the Add-A-Pearl necklace she gave me when I was born; furthermore, I should be a ray of sunshine in my father's lonely life."

"I'd rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you'll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird,"