Author Archives: Thistle

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About Thistle

Queer, neurospicy, chronically longwinded oversharer. 40s; they/them. ✍️📷🐈📚🥾🇩🇪🏳️‍🌈😇💖🐍

Afterworlds, by Scott Westerfeld

Posted on October 21, 2014 by Thistle

Eighteen-year-old Darcy Patel can’t believe the dream is really happening to her. Her novel has been picked up by an agent, and a publisher. She’s received a huge two-book-deal advance. She’s moving to NYC. She’s going to be a real … Continue reading →

Posted in 2014, Prose, Young Adult | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Sunday Coffee – Utter Readathon Fail

Posted on October 19, 2014 by Thistle

Um…I was supposed to participate in Readathon yesterday. I haven’t participated in quite some time, and I was looking forward to it this fall. I knew it was going to be hectic, and busy, because yesterday was my oldest son’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged , | 2 Comments

The Secret Place, by Tana French (audio)

Posted on October 16, 2014 by Thistle

Stephen Moran has been working cold cases since his appearance in Faithful Place. Holly Mackey, who has aged seven years since Faithful Place, comes to him with a postcard from a wall at her private girls’ school. The wall is … Continue reading →

Posted in 2014, Adult, Prose | Tagged , , , , | 8 Comments

Sunday Coffee – Busy busy busy

Posted on October 12, 2014 by Thistle

I haven’t had time for much these days. Been under a lot of stress. Just wanted to take a moment to pop my head back in and say hello. Hopefully soon I’ll get back to my feed reader and responding … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged , | 4 Comments

An Age of License, by Lucy Knisley

Posted on October 9, 2014 by Thistle

An Age of License is Lucy Knisley’s latest memoir/travelogue-thingy. It depicts an uncertain time in her mid-twenties, on a trip through Europe, and the discoveries she made about herself there. Let me just say first off: I adore Knisley’s work. … Continue reading →

Posted in 2014, Adult, Visual | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Top Ten Character-Driven Novels

Posted on October 7, 2014 by Thistle

I adore character-driven novels, so it was really hard to limit this post to ten titles! Here’s what I came up with, in no particular order: The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker – I adore seeing character-driven fantasy novels. … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged | 10 Comments

Sunday Coffee – Reflections on 2010: Guilt-reading

Posted on October 5, 2014 by Thistle

My years of book blogging look like a bell curve: starting with a lower number of books read per year, rising steadily for several years, and then slowly dropping back down. The peak of that curve was in 2010, a … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged | 5 Comments

The Whispering Skull, by Jonathan Stroud

Posted on October 1, 2014 by Thistle

The adventures continue for Lockwood & Co, related to the teaser at the end of The Screaming Staircase. It involves murder, theft, old uncontained relics, a black market ring, and leaping off buildings. I don’t want to say anything more … Continue reading →

Posted in 2014, 2016, Children's, Prose | Tagged , , , , , | 4 Comments

Top Ten Difficult Reads

Posted on September 30, 2014 by Thistle

This is an interesting topic. I wasn’t quite sure how I should define “difficult.” There are a lot of reasons a book might be difficult to read. After some debate, I decided to include several different kinds of difficulty here. Readability: There are … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged | 6 Comments

Sunday Coffee – A Rating History

Posted on September 28, 2014 by Thistle

Last week in my Sunday Coffee post, I talked about how my impressions of books tend to change over time. I wanted to sort of continue that talk, specifically with regards to ratings. Ratings are a really easy way to … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Talk | Tagged | 2 Comments