Reading Diary 2012

Oh yes. I've been meaning to read this book series for a while and I finally bought the first book. I think these books might be the perfect substitute of Dexter for me. They are quite similar, but John Wayne Cleaver is, I think a bit more easier to relate to. It's a nice perspective of a teenager on the subject. I'll definitely buy the second and third book, and I'm excited to read them.

It took me a hell of a time to get done with this, since it's been kind of hectic, these few months and I was also reading a Finnish book about a coroners work. But anyway, this was a great book. I love the way Chuck Palahniuk always shakes things up when you least expect it. He's brilliant.

This book is brilliant. I love the story and the way there are such subtle hints everywhere in the story. The book is really great and so is the film. I really like Clarice.

This book is so fucked up, it's brilliant. I never thought Lindsay could top that first book but he did it with Dexter Is Delicious. This book has everything from vampires to cannibals, babies to demented kids and of course, brother Brian. There really are no words to describe this book, just read it and be amazed. This book was so great I finished it in two days and that's a record time for me. I just kept reading it, and every time I stopped, it just called me back and I had to just read it right to the end.

I indeed bought myself two books of the Dexter book series. I've now read Darkly Dreaming Dexter, Dearly Devoted Dexter, Dexter in the Dark and Dexter by Design. I was a bit disappointed with Dexter in the dark, as it was way too strange and it got lost in all the odd supernatural things. So the first good thing about Dexter By Design is that it went back to what I like about the whole books series. Even though this book didn't feature too many kills (which are always the parts of the books) it was definitely heading to the right direction. This book was very much about Dexter trying to cope with his new life, and now that he's married, it's hard for Dexter to not be hunting in the Miami nights.

I've always really liked the way Jeff Lindsay writes. He gives Dexter's thoughts such depth, even though some things are repeated but in different choice of words. All in all the language is quite colorful and the way he describes things around Dexter, it's nothing but a pleasure to read. I like how the Deb/Dex story line got a bit of a twist in this book. And also the book introduced some interesting characters.

So I'd say this book was a quite the improvement to the last one, and I'm really excited to finally get to Dexter is Delicious which I have heard to be really brilliant.

I didn't even know about Kafka until a school course which was about literary history. I've never been into books and so, but this course inspired me to make this new years resolution and I also found some great writers, like Kafka. First of all, I'm very fascinated by Kafka, he's really an interesting character and his stories are incredible.

Kafka's stories are definitely weird, there's just no way around it, some are just a little less weird than others. I'd say about 8/10 of his stories are great. Some are just a bit too weird or just not my cup of tea. But among the greater ones, are also stories that will blow your mind. The Metamorphosis, A Country Doctor & In the Penal Colony are truly spectacular and I think they are from the more popular than some other great stories. The stories I liked the most were: In the Penal Colony, The Metamorphosis, The Judgment, Jackals and Arabs & The Bucket Rider. There are many more, but these are really the ones that stuck in my mind. In the Penal Colony is one fucked up story... I was left speechless because of it. I strongly recommend reading these, even though some are at times boring, and don't make any sense. This guy was such a great writer, and it's interesting to find some clues about his own mind and life in his stories.

I've never really been interested in Jane Austen books, but after hearing about this book, I had to read it. And I was pleasantly surprised when I actually found this from my local library. As always the reading started really slowly like it always does when I'm reading. I'm really lazy and it takes time to get interested in the book. Even after a slow start it got interesting enough and I really got into the book and read it fast (by my standards).

Without the zombies I doubt that I would've ever read this book, but now that I've read it, I realized that I would've probably liked the original book too. I don't usually like love stories etc. like this but still I found myself being really fascinated by the relationship between Elizabeth & Mr. Darcy. And the characters were interesting but the fact that the Bennett girls were accomplished zombie slayers made them even more interesting. Overall the book was just great, I can't really think of too many negative things, except for some boring/irrelevant chapters but otherwise I loved it.

So we had to read a finnish novel for this project thingy and I didn't get my first choice so I had to settle for this. Äideistä parhain (Mother of Mine in English) tells the story of Eero, who was sent to Sweden because of the on going war in Finland. It sets in the present and Eero is already somewhat 60, but as he learns about his Swedish mother's death, it brings up some old memories. Mainly because his Swedish mother Signe had left him all the letters his real mother send to Signe. As Eero starts reading the letters, Eero learns a lot of new things about his mothers. They seem to bring up some bad memories and traumas.

The novel started out very slowly and it was even boring at times. But as the story progressed it got a lot more interesting. So as I got to the end, I was pleased I had read it, even though it wasn't spectacular. I've never really read too much of Finnish literature but I thought this was surprisingly good.

I've read the two previous Dexter books, and especially Darkly Dreaming Dexter was incredible. This is a unique topic and each book I've read is great in it's own way. Compared to the first novel Dexter in the Dark was leaning much more towards even fantasy-like telling. But it was really fascinating. Sometimes a bit weird, and I found myself often comparing the plot with the TV show. And now I get it why the show doesn't follow the book series.

The biggest part that bugged me, was that in the books Astor and Cody have the same urge as Dexter (Cody recognizes 'a shadow' in himself and Dexter). I just didn't like the scenario with Dexter trying to do the same thing to the kids as what Harry did to him. Another annoying fact was that Deb's character feels more distant and Deb and Dexter's relationship doesn't seem to be as warm as in the show. But of course it's different since in the books, Deb has already learned about Dexter's dark passenger. But it worries me what will happen on the show since Deb caught Dexter killing someone.

I wish I could get my hands on the next three Dexter books.