Recommendations from Peggy for June 2014.

In order to bring some more variety to my blog, I have asked some of my bookish friends to tell about the books they have in the past month, and to give us a recommendation. Today’s post is made by Peggy from Belgium.

Peggy:

I have read 2 books in the past month, and those 2 books are:

1. Fifth grave past the light – Darynda Jones



2. One summer – Karen Robards




First, I would like to thank Aurian for the lovely bag (with little presents in) that I got from her in Berlin. A ‘thank you’ for writing these reviews for her blog. I found it really sweet of her and I loved it very much. It’s the first time that I write reviews (so I’m still a newbie of writing them) and I was very touched by her sweet ‘thank you’.

As you can see, I have only read 2 books this month. I have done a lot of travelling this past month and if there is one situation where I don’t read much, it’s when I travel. Strange but true. Sometimes, I don’t read one book! So as you can imagine I’m really happy I’m back home, so I can read again.

I have decided to do no book review this month. I really love the two books that I read but I want to talk about something else … I want to talk about anthologies.
I know that some people don’t like to read them (because they’re too short or something like that) but I love to read them from time to time. They’re a good way to get to know a new writer, I think. And I especially like it that even when you don’t have much time to read, you still can read a ‘full’ story (although a short one).

Sometimes I just want to read a story that I can finish in one day and an anthology story is perfect for that.

Most anthologies have a theme. And there are times that I want to read about a special theme, like with Valentine or Christmas or Summer stories. Sometimes I want to read about bad boys (one of my favorites!) or about vampires, alpha’s, Scottish highlanders or I just want to read some historical stories.

After talking with a few writers at the Love Letter Convention I know that some of them find it very difficult to write a ‘short’ story and some writers love to write them. And that’s also my experience when I read anthologies. Some stories in anthologies are very good and some are very bad. Because although the story is short, you still want a story where they meet, they fall in love, then ‘something’ happens and at the end they live happily together. With other words, we want a good story but in a ‘light’ version.

Some of my favorite writers of anthology stories are Julia Quinn, Lori Forster, Nalini Singh, Shannon McKenna, Lora Leigh, Mary Balogh, Jo Beverley, Sherrilyn Kenyon, Erin McCarthy, Stephanie Laurens and Lisa Kleypas.

So I wonder, do you love reading anthologies and who are your favorite writers or which anthology is your favorite? Please let me know, I’m always looking for ‘new’ anthologies to discover and read.

Aurian: Thanks for this post Peggy! I absolutely agree on some of your favorite authors, and I do love to read anthologies on occasion, but writing a review of one is not so easy. I do like anthologies that contain stories in series I love, and that really add a little gem of knowledge to the characters I care for. I am going to read Kicking It soon.

© 2014 Reviews by Aurian