Welcome to Litsy!

We are back with a jam packed episode! First off, we discuss the massive 2005 hit, “The Historian“ by Elizabeth Kostova. We gave inklings that one of us didn't like the book and Peter details why. And we go from there. Enjoy!

https://open.spotify.com/episode/4BA5kmuvztPZiDsW5fjOqa

Visited a cookies & coffee place earlier that had a mini-library. (It was the latter that drew me to the place more than the former. But the cookies were really good though.)

Was pleasantly surprised to see my favorite book there. 🩵

My absolute favorite #vampire novel. I need to pick this up again.

#scarathlonphotochallenge Day 21. @clwojick @staycurious

Team #BOOklovers @bookwormjillk

Gearing up for October

#tlt three-list Thursday

1) The Narrator (we never learn her name) in the tagged book
2) Diana in The Discovery of Witches (the books and tv show, which I‘ve been watching)
3) Max from the Chronicles of St Mary‘s

Want to play? @Catsandbooks @Kelly_the_Bookish_Sidekick @TheBookHippie @TheSpineView @Eggs @IndoorDame

A young woman is plunged into a labyrinth where the secrets of her family‘s past connect to an inconceivable evil: the dark 15th century reign of Vlad the Impaler and a time-defying pact that may have kept his awful work alive through the ages. The search for the truth becomes an adventure of monumental proportions, taking us from monasteries and dusty libraries to the capitals of Eastern Europe.

I‘ve seen such mixed reviews for this so I wasn‘t too sure but I loved it! I found it dark and was totally engrossed the whole way through. This is the abridged version which has made me want to listen to the full book now. I do think this story works really well as an audiobook

I‘ve been in a horrible reading slump the last couple of months. It took me forever to get through this book, but it was great. It seems some dislike it for getting too far into the weeds of Eastern European history but that was what made it compelling for me. Great reimagining of the Vlad Tepes/Dracula connection as if followed by academic historians. This book made me want to dig further into Eastern European history.

As I have mentioned, I‘m super fussy with reading material at the moment. This book really took me away. The writing was great, the story brilliant. I think it will be hard to follow.

Going to spend the afternoon with this audiobook and some crochet.

A story about the history and horror of Dracula and a quest to find his tomb. Listened to the audio version. The narrators were very good. Rich with a lot of historical details, suspenseful, and a few scary moments. I read it when it first came out and decided I wanted to re-vist it again. This is not a fast read and you do have to pay attention but I enjoyed the stories within the story and found it to be as eerie as I remembered it.

#spookyreads #halloween #vampires #drakula #history #mystery #adultlit #creepy #folklore

Poor Mittens had an emergency surgery a couple of days ago. He's feeling much better but still getting all the cuddles he can when I sit down to read.

#readKY #catsoflitsy #fall #amreading #mittens #cuddles

This book has nothing to do with a #campfire, but it's absolutely something I could see myself reading around a campfire. Just to freak myself out. This is one of my favorite seasonal reads and I'll probably have to pick it up again this fall. There's something so satisfying about a slow burn, epistolary vampire story.

#OminousOctober #Scarathlon2022 #TeamSlaughter @clwojick @alwaysbeenaloverofbooks @eggs

"Are you trying to intimidate me out of my library book?"

#vampires #history #creepy #halloween #research #readKY #mystery #readingstamina #fall #coffee

"The very worst impulses of humankind can survive generations, centuries, even millennia. And the best of our individual efforts can die with us at the end of a single lifetime."

#creepy #halloween #dracula #folklore

Playing catch-up after being away from Wi-Fi the last week.

#LetterH #TheAlphabetGame

Loved everything about this book, a great read.

@AlwaysBeenaLoverofBooks

Very informative. Long-winded, reads like a Victor Hugo novel--but shares a lot of historical facts and inspires wanderlust. It can get confusing on who's perspective you're reading when there's stories within stories within letters.

Always a sucker for a gothic, Dracula tale. See what I did there? 😁🧛‍♂️🦇

Here we go, another month spinning. This is such a fun and effective way to finally getting round to those long neglected books on the dusty tbr shelf.
Trying to think of ways to condense reading challenges, so this months picks include ones for my nature writing and read harder challenges.

@TheAromaofBooks
#bookspinbingo #bookspin

🧛🏾‍♀️🧛🏼🧛🏼‍♂️

I read this book on the priviso it would be a scary read. Although it was an enjoyable read, it didn't have that fear factor

Nope.
Done.
I reached 47% and finally had to skip to the end to see if it was worth pushing through. I know this gets high praise from some people but I can‘t get around the plodding plot, cardboard characters, unexplainable coincidences, unrealistically detailed letters or the humorlessly non-threatening antagonists.

#unpopularopinion This was such a big disappointment for me. For about 500 pages, I was enjoying it immensely, I loved the rich details, and the mystery kept me guessing. Between pages 500-600 I began to lose my patience, I felt like the author was artificially holding back information, tossing me bits and pieces, then making me read lots of unimportant stuff. During the final 100 pages, when the big reveal came, I couldn't believe my eyes 🤦‍♀️

Probably only going to get to this chunkster this weekend despite my high hopes of squeezing in two more reads before the end of the month. We‘re visiting family today and running multiple errands all day tomorrow, so my reading time will be much shorter than I originally hoped/planned.

Book 4 of 2022

“My dear and unfortunate successor”

I love a good Dracula story

#weekendreads @rachelsbrittain
(1) I'm reading The Historian. It's long and slow, but I'm enjoying it a lot 😊
(2) Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, by Philip K. Dick
(3) Bluescreen, by Dan Wells

Thanks for the tag @DannyDan ☺️
Would you like to play @Ast_Arslan @JessBookNerd ?

#BookCoverChallenge
Day 140.
Here I will note 365 books (or as many as I will have before I get tired) that have shaped my taste in literature. No explanations, no reviews. Just the cover of the book.
I do not challenge anyone. You are all welcome to take part.

Day 15 of #21DaysofHorror
In my review of this I said that it was more of a historical fiction tinged with horror rather than a horror novel. I stand by this assessment. This was one of the most immersive reads that I have experienced. Recently someone on social media asked for a recommendation for a horror movie where the majority of the movie was the research scenes. I feel like The Historian is the perfect book recommendation for this question.

This was a great reread/first-time listen. I really loved this book when I read it 4-5 years ago. I saw the abridged audiobook with full cast recording was available on Hoopla and thought it would be a great option for spooky season. I didn‘t mind it being abridged, since I‘d read the book before, and I was still surprised a few times since I didn‘t remember all the details of the plot.

#Scarathlon2021 #Screamathon #LittenListen #TeamHendrix

#FallTreasures - Slow Burn: I feel that this is considered a slow moving story by many. Readers seems to have a polarized opinion of its merit. It‘s love or hate with no middle ground. I thought that it was captivating not in a thriller sense which is maybe what most folks are seeking being that it is supposedly a vampire story. Its hypnotic trance is in the writing. It is lush and brooding.👇🏽

Mini #bookhaul!
I‘m generally not a re-reader but for the tagged I‘ll make an exception. Also pictured A Wrinkle in Time, which keeps coming up lately. It was one of my favourites growing up. I don‘t know how many times I must have read it but I don‘t remember a thing about it ☹️.

#SeptemberSundays - books and football 🏈📚

It‘s the first Sunday so I‘m excited. Ask me again in December 🤣

My #SuperSeptember goals are pretty simple. I‘m about 225 pages into the tagged book. I‘m hoping to finish it this weekend but we‘ll see.

I‘m listening to the first Agatha Raisin on audio. It‘s pretty good so far.

If I finish the Historian, I‘m hoping to start my 2 library books, but we‘ll see.

Work has been crazy busy and I haven‘t had a ton of reading time lately.

Hope you start feeling better soon Andrew.

My Dark Academia bookmark arrived today! 💀📚 Thought this would pair nicely with these books, especially the tagged one, which is my favorite book in the world. 🖤

Just not a book I could get into. I guess I needed more rom coms at the time…#doublespin from Feb is now off my list!!

I am posting one book per day from my to-be-read collection. No description and providing no reason for wanting to read it. Some will be old, some will be new - don't judge me, I have a lot of books.

Day 77th

Join the fun if you want!

#tbrpile

#thoughtfulthursday

1. Three or more reads each (probably at least 5+ reads each): tagged, Dracula, Rebecca
2. Absolutely. A great cover pulls me in to see if the book might be good. I generally ignore awful covers
3. The Hobbit, especially Mirkwood

This novel was suggested to me when I was looking for books similar to Anne Rice VC
After reading the description I‘m pretty excited to start it🖤

I tried, I really did but this book is so boring! Halfway through and I stopped caring about any of it. Also, telling the story through someone's letters but not formatting it as a letter is really annoying. Does she find Dracula in the end? I don't know and I don't care. DNF.

If I was going to do one bad thing, I was going to do twenty.

Sometimes I read my books out loud and pretend I'm the narrator of it's Audiobook.

Has anyone read this? Opinions please!

I am posting a book every day from my TBR.

Day 15

#tbrpile #bookstoread

1) The Historian
2) Let the Right One In
3) Either of the above. I also really liked 30 Days of Night.
#SpookySaturday

It‘s my “Vlad the Impaler” night. I happened upon this fascinating tv show about Vlad. See my previous post about the “Vlad the Inhaler.” I have the weirdest coincidences around this, one of my favorite books.

Couldn‘t resist this one!!

#wintergames #merryreaders @Clwojick