The Friday 56 (135) & Book Beginnings: Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

A satiric look at another planet which gives us a fresh look at our own.

Beginning: "I call our world Flatland, not because we call it so, but to make its nature clearer to you, my happy reader, who are privileged to live in Space."

56: "At this period, square houses were still everywhere permitted, though discouraged by a special tax."

Comments: I borrowed my sister's copy of Thrilling Tales: Science Fiction Short Stories just so I could read Edwin A. Abbott's Flatland. This story is ridiculous. But it's also a great read. My 56 comes from section 2. What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (134) & Book Beginnings: Art Deco by Victoria Charles & Klaus H. Carl

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

Art Deco style was established on the ashes of a disappeared world, the one from before the First World War, and on the foundation stone of a world yet to become, opened to the most undisclosed promises. Forgetting herself in the whirl of Jazz Age and the euphoria of the “Années Folles”, the Garçonne with her linear shape reflects the architectural style of Art Deco: to the rounded curves succeed the simple and plain androgynous straight line… Architecture, painting, furniture and sculpture, dissected by the author, proclaim the druthers for sharp lines and broken angles. Although ephemeral, this movement keeps on influencing contemporary design

Beginning: "Decorative and industrial arts, like all forms of art, are an expression of life itself: they evolve with the times and with moral or material demands to which they must respond."

56: "The monumental staircase and the hall designed by Charles Letrosne were to lend themselves to large and brilliant ceremonies."

Comments: I'm reading about art deco this week. I was thinking about doing a painting inspired by it, but then I also wanted to know more about the it. My beginning is from the introduction, and my 56 is from page 58. What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (133) & Book Beginnings: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

Seconds before the Earth is demolished to make way for a galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is plucked off the planet by his friend Ford Prefect, a researcher for the revised edition of the The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy who, for the last fifteen years, has been posing as an out of work actor. Together this dynamic pair begin their journey through space aided by quotes from The Hitch Hiker's Guide "A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have" and a galaxy-full of fellow travellers: Zaphod Beeblebrox - the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally out to lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian, Zaphod's girlfriend (formally Tricia McMillan), whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant and chronically depressed robot; Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student who is obsessed with the disappearance of all the ball-point pens he has bought over the years...

Beginning: "Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun."

56: "The real Universe arched sickeningly away beneath them. Various pretend ones flitted silently by, like mountain goats."

Comments: I haven't been reading much beside the ARCs I currently have to get through. As such, I'm sharing a quote from one of my all-time favorite science fiction novels: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. The first sentence is one of the most memorable lines from the book. It's one of the few books that has made me really laugh. 

The Friday 56 (132) & Book Beginnings: Heroine Worship by Sarah Kuhn

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

Once upon a time, Aveda Jupiter (aka Annie Chang) was demon-infested San Francisco’s most beloved superheroine, a beacon of hope and strength and really awesome outfits. But all that changed the day she agreed to share the spotlight with her best friend and former assistant Evie Tanaka—who’s now a badass, fire-wielding superheroine in her own right. They were supposed to be a dynamic duo, but more and more, Aveda finds herself shoved into the sidekick role. Where, it must be said, she is not at all comfortable. It doesn’t help that Aveda’s finally being forced to deal with fallout from her diva behavior—and the fact that she’s been a less than stellar friend to Evie. Or that Scott Cameron—the man Aveda’s loved for nearly a decade—is suddenly giving her the cold shoulder after what seemed to be some promising steps toward friendship. Or that the city has been demon-free for three months in the wake of Evie and Aveda’s apocalypse-preventing battle against the evil forces of the Otherworld, leaving Aveda without the one thing she craves most in life: a mission. All of this is causing Aveda’s burning sense of heroic purpose—the thing that’s guided her all these years—to falter.

In short, Aveda Jupiter is having an identity crisis.

When Evie gets engaged and drafts Aveda as her maid-of-honor, Aveda finally sees a chance to reclaim her sense of self and sets out on a single-minded mission to make sure Evie has the most epic wedding ever. But when a mysterious, unseen supernatural evil rises up and starts attacking brides-to-be, Aveda must summon both her superheroine and best friend mojo to take down the enemy and make sure Evie’s wedding goes off without a hitch—or see both her city and her most important friendship destroyed forever...

Beginning: "I love being a superhero."

56: "It flashed red."

Comments: Sarah Kuhn is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. Heroine Complex was already an amazing read, and I was more than excited to read the followup, Heroine Worship. This book didn't disappoint. Now I'm just waiting for book three. What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (131) & Book Beginnings: Heroine Complex by Sarah Kuhn

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

Being a superheroine is hard. Working for one is even harder...

Evie Tanaka is the put-upon personal assistant to Aveda Jupiter, her childhood best friend and San Francisco's most beloved superheroine. She's great at her job—blending into the background, handling her boss's epic diva tantrums, and getting demon blood out of leather pants. Unfortunately, she's not nearly as together when it comes to running her own life, standing up for herself, or raising her tempestuous teenage sister, Bea. But everything changes when Evie's forced to pose as her glamorous boss for one night, and her darkest comes out: she has powers, too. Now it's up to her to contend with murderous cupcakes, nosy gossip bloggers, and supernatural karaoke battles—all while juggling unexpected romance and Aveda's increasingly outrageous demands. And when a larger threat emerges, Evie must finally take charge and become a superheroine in her own right... or see her city fall to a full-on demonic invasion...

Beginning: "I am not a superhero."

56: "Her gaze swept over me and I could practically see the gears whirring in her brain, cataloging every bit of my body that was rejecting the corset. We could wear the same clothes, but they hung a little differently on me."

Comments: This book was so much fun to read! It's one of the best super hero books I've read, and I'm really looking forward to the next book in the series. What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (130) & Book Beginnings: How To Break Up With Your Phone by Catherine Price

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

Packed with tested strategies and practical tips, this book is the essential, life-changing guide for everyone who owns a smartphone...

Is your phone the first thing you reach for in the morning and the last thing you touch before bed? Do you frequently pick it up "just to check," only to look up forty-five minutes later wondering where the time has gone? Do you say you want to spend less time on your phone--but have no idea how to do so without giving it up completely? If so, this book is your solution. Award-winning journalist Catherine Price presents a practical, hands-on plan to break up--and then make up--with your phone. The goal? A long-term relationship that actually feels good. You'll discover how phones and apps are designed to be addictive, and learn how the time we spend on them damages our abilities to focus, think deeply, and form new memories. You'll then make customized changes to your settings, apps, environment, and mindset that will ultimately enable you to take back control of your life...

Beginning: "It's tempting to think of smartphones as just one more technology in a long list of technologies that have freaked people out. Telegraphs, telephones, radios, movies, television, video games, even books--all caused panic when they were first introduced, and all have turned out to be less harmful than people feared."

56: "Unsurprisingly, ignoring distractions is tiring work, and the less we practice it, the worse at it we become."

Comments: I received How To Break Up With Your Phone by Catherine Price for review, and I have to say that I absolutely loved this book. It was a surprisingly engrossing read that I highly recommend to anyone looking for a book covering the topic of phone use. My beginning comes from chapter 1 instead of the introduction. What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (129) & Book Beginnings: The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

A rollicking space adventure with a lot of heart...

When Rosemary Harper joins the crew of the Wayfarer, she isn't expecting much. The patched-up ship has seen better days, but it offers her everything she could possibly want: a spot to call home, a chance to explore the far-off corners of the galaxy, and some distance from her past. And nothing could be further from what she's known than the crew of the Wayfarer. From Sissix, the exotic reptilian pilot, to Kizzy and Jenks, the chatty engineers who keep the ship running, to the noble captain Ashby, life aboard is chaotic and crazy—exactly what Rosemary wants. That is until the crew is offered the job of a lifetime tunneling wormholes through space to a distant planet. Sure, they'll earn enough money to live comfortably for years, but risking her life wasn't part of the job description. The journey through the galaxy is full of excitement, adventure, and mishaps for the Wayfarer team. And along the way, Rosemary comes to realize that a crew is a family, and that family isn't necessarily the worst thing in the universe… as long as you actually like them...

Beginning: "As she woke up in the pod, she remembered three things. First, she was traveling through open space. Second, she was about to start a new job, one she could not screw up. Third, she had bribed a government official into giving her a new identity file."

56: "Jenks quirked an eyebrow. "Do you have any idea what this song is?"

Kizzy blinked. "Socks Match My Hat," she said. She went back up into the ceiling, tightening something with her gloved hands.

"Soskh Matsh Mae'ha. It's banned in the Harmagian Protectorate."

Comments: The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers is a slightly different kind of science fiction book. Less action and more about the characters. And, I loved it! What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (128) & Book Beginnings: The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

The first novel of a new space-opera sequence set in an all-new universe by the Hugo Award-winning, New York Times-bestselling author of Redshirts and Old Man's War...

Our universe is ruled by physics and faster than light travel is not possible -- until the discovery of The Flow, an extra-dimensional field we can access at certain points in space-time that transport us to other worlds, around other stars. Humanity flows away from Earth, into space, and in time forgets our home world and creates a new empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that no one human outpost can survive without the others. It’s a hedge against interstellar war -- and a system of control for the rulers of the empire. The Flow is eternal -- but it is not static. Just as a river changes course, The Flow changes as well, cutting off worlds from the rest of humanity. When it’s discovered that The Flow is moving, possibly cutting off all human worlds from faster than light travel forever, three individuals -- a scientist, a starship captain and the Empress of the Interdependency -- are in a race against time to discover what, if anything, can be salvaged from an interstellar empire on the brink of collapse.

Beginning: "The mutineers would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for the collapse of the Flow."

56: "The duke squinted at Kiva. "How do you mean?""

Comments: The Collapsing Empire is a John Scalzi book, and it's good. I enjoyed it a lot and am looking forward to the next book in the series. Also, does anyone else think the opening line is a little familiar, or is it just me? 

What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (127) & Book Beginnings: Envy of Angels by Matt Wallace

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

In New York, eating out can be hell. Everyone loves a well-catered event, and the supernatural community is no different, but where do demons go to satisfy their culinary cravings? Welcome to Sin du Jour - where devils on horseback are the clients, not the dish...

Beginning: "A hotel room in São Paulo is the third worst place in the world in which to go into cardiac arrest."

56: "Bronko grins. "All evidence to the contrary, kid."

Comments: I've been getting into more novellas lately with Aliette de Bodard's The Tea Master and the Detective (March 31, 2018 from Subterranean Press), and now Envy of Angel's by Matt Wallace. This book was good. I wish it was longer, but that doesn't change how much I enjoyed the story.

What are you reading this week?

The Friday 56 (126) & Book Beginnings: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda's Voice where every Friday you pick a book and turn to page 56 or 56%, and select a sentence or a few, as long as it's not a spoiler. For the full rules, visit the the page HERE

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading.

Synopsis from Goodreads...

In the year 2044, reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts really feels alive is when he's jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade's devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world's digital confines--puzzles that are based on their creator's obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever can unlock them. But when Wade stumbles upon the first clue, he finds himself beset by players willing to kill to take this ultimate prize. The race is on, and if Wade's going to survive, he'll have to win--and confront the real world he's always been so desperate to escape...

Beginning: "Everyone my age remember where they were and what they were doing when they first heard about the contest."

56: "Ogden Morrow was a brilliant programmer in his own right, but his true talent was his knack for business."

Comments: Earlier in the week, I received Ready Player One by Ernest Cline for review and liked the story more than I originally thought I would. There were as many 80s references as I expected, and overall I found the story to be interesting. What are you reading this week?