'I Dare You' Book Tag

Good morning bookworms!
The beautiful and bubbly Cassie @ Let’s Get Galactic tagged me in this… a while ago! But, I’m keeping Fridays for catching up on these things!! If you don’t know Cassie’s blog, PLEASE go check it out. She’s a bright and sparkly rainbow of a person, even while ranting, and I adore her (and her hair).

What book has been on your shelf the longest?

The Winnie-the-Pooh hardcover set from my childhood by A. A. Milne. Winnie is blue, and The House at Pooh Corner is red. I hated the dust jackets when I was young so I threw them away… I was such an evil child!! Apart from the missing dust jackets, they’re in very good condition considering they were printed in 1987.

What is your current read, your last read, and the book you’ll read next?

Last read was Godsgrave by Jay Kristoff, current read is Darkdawn by Jay Kristoff, next read is my buddy read with Marina, which is Vicious by V. E. Schwab.

What book did everyone like, but you hated?

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, the script. By… (let me think about this because I actually threw my copy away it was making me so angry…) Jack Thorne, John Tiffany and J. K. Rowling.

What book do you keep telling yourself that you’ll read, but you probably won’t?

The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss… I bought it as part of the Barnes and Noble leatherbound classics… and I just probably will never get there.

What book are you saving for retirement?

Uhhh… none of them? I want to read them all now!

Last page: read it first, or wait until the end?

Wait until the end!! What kind of monster do you think I am?! Although, I will admit that I got bored reading the final book in Robin Hobb’s Farseer trilogy when I was like… fifteen…? (Look, YA didn’t really exist back then so I just read a lot of fantasy, ok?) So, I read the first half, and then I … read the last two pages. I then threw the trilogy out. But since speaking with people who have read the entire book, it looks like I mistook the ending as what I remember it as didn’t happen… so… who knows?! Maybe I’ll read it again? Maybe I’ll save this trilogy for retirement.

Acknowledgement: Waste of paper and ink, or interesting aside?

*GASPS IN HORROR*

The Acknowledgement is one of my favourite things when I read books. I read more acknowledgements than I do blurbs. I must say, Jay Kristoff’s for The Nevernight Chronicle are quite good.

Nevernight: for my sisters, light and dark and all that is beautiful between
Godsgrave: for my enemies, I couldn’t have done it without you
Darkdawn: for my readers, I couldn’t have done it without you, either

Which book character would you switch places with?

Uhhh… Penny from Emergency Contact by Mary H. K. Choi. Because I could probably deal with her challenges… about as well as she does!

Do you have a book that reminds you of something specific in your life? (Place, time, person?)

I absolutely do. I can’t really give details or I’ll start blubbering at my desk, but there is a very specific edition of a book on my shelves that I was one chapter away from finishing, when my dad called me, about two years ago. Instead of telling him I would finish the book and call him back (which wouldn’t have happened because the ending BLEW. MY. MIND. and I absolutely would have forgotten), I took the call and we chatted for about 20 minutes. That was the last time I spoke to him before he passed away. (And now I’m blubbering anyway…)

Name a book that you acquired in an interesting way.

I can’t remember what it was called (as I gifted it to my niece), but when we were on our honeymoon, we went to King’s Cross Station so I could do the Harry Potter thing at Platform 9 3/4. When we were walking out there was a guy with a trolley of books (they were middle grade adventure type books) and he dropped one off the trolley. I picked it up and went to give it back to him, and he told me to keep it. Maybe not interesting, but definitely the strangest way I have acquired a book.

Have you ever given a book away for a special reason to a special person?

One of my books? Nope. But I have bought MANY books for other people. Some of my favourite people to gift books to are Maria and Chiara. They are two beautiful souls who live in Italy, and I have bought (and had signed for them) the Captive Prince trilogy, and many Jay Kristoff books. (I’m waiting for their Darkdawn package to arrive any day now!!)

Which book has been with you most places?

Ooof. I bought a lot of books when I was living in the UK and had them posted back to Australia before I left (my luggage couldn’t hold them all). So, probably one of them? I don’t tend to take a lot of physical books traveling with me, unless I’m going for less than a week. Our trip to Fiji might have been the only exception. But I don’t remember what I took!

Any “required reading” you hated in high school, that wasn’t so bad two years later?

Anything I hated in high school I haven’t read since. The only exception to that is The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald… and I didn’t think that much of it later, either.

Used or brand new?

My shelves are a mixture of both. But also a lot of books that were bought new that now look decidedly worse for wear. I do prefer new books though, but some you just can’t buy that way any more.

Have you ever read a Dan Brown book?

Yes. The Da Vinci Code. But that’s it.

Have you ever seen a movie you liked more than the book?

The Great Gatsby! The Baz Luhrmann version! (This is also the reason that I reread the book…)

Have you ever read a book that’s made you hungry, cookbooks included?

You cannot read The Boy Who Steals Houses by C. G. Drews without wanting several kilos of caramel and waffles. I declare it IMPOSSIBLE.

Who is the person whose book advice you’ll always take?

SO MANY, it would be impossible to list. But, basically everyone who likes similar books to me.

Is there a book out of your comfort zone (e.g., outside your usual reading genre) that you ended up loving?

Once upon a time, I read a book called Playing With Monsters by Amelia Hutchins. It’s a paranormal erotica book (which is so far out of my comfort zone I had to get a passport to read it), and I quite enjoyed it (not sure about ‘loved’, but it was great). Then I read book 2 (Sleeping With Monsters) and thought ‘huh… maybe I do like these books?’ and I was confused. Then I read book 3 (Becoming His Monster), and hated it. So yes, I think this qualifies.