Thing a Day #4 | Books

I love to read! Reading for me is a total escape from reality. I've noticed that a lot of people don't like to read, I think this is simply because they haven't found the right book, or style of writing.

An example: My best friend always hated reading, and had recently told me she's always hated that I take her to book stores. I had always thought this was an activity we both liked, cause when we were in our teens we'd pick out a book at a used book store and go to the park and read it together. These weren't novels, more like books on horoscopes, dreams, or even magazines. Apparently she didn't enjoy the book stores, but because I dragged her along she more or less agreed to get one with me so we could get out of there. 

 A few months ago she saw the 4th Twilight movie Breaking Dawn, she really wanted to know what happened in the second half. If you aren't familiar with the Twilight series, the 4th book (Breaking Dawn) was made into a 2 part movie, they haven't released the second movie from book 4 yet. So, knowing I had read the series she asked me, I told her I wasn't going to tell her . If she wanted to find out what happens she'd have to go get the book. She did, just the 4th book (Breaking Dawn). Three days later she was at the book store buying book 1 (Twilight), and so on. This was in December since she's read 15 books.

If you don't like vampires or fantasy there are all sorts of YA fiction books that can get your brain in shape again so you can move onto books with more complex story lines.

I'll get off my soapbox now...

I really like to stick with an author once I've enjoyed on of their books, which is why I gravitate towards series. If you are (or are not) a reader try not to get overwhelmed by the size of a book. If it's a good read that just means there is more to read, and you're not sitting there after the book ends wishing there was more, well, not as quickly anyway.

I was planning on doing a top ten books or authors, but I feel like I'd truncate things too much so right now I'm going to focus on one.

OUTLANDER by Diana Gabaldon

This is my NUMBER ONE BEST LOVED MORE THAN ANYTHING IN THE ENTIRE WORLD book (series).

Why I was skeptical.

Time Travel... Really?, 18th Century Scottish Wars... Ugh?, How many pages... No way!

All these had me against this series, but Diana Gabaldon somehow it's pulled off in this series, maybe because in 7 books there is exactly 5 occurences of time travel, back and forth between 18th and 20th century. So, even though it is a character defining aspect, it isn't book defining. Make sense? Claire the main character and narrator, she is super strong willed, opinionated, not at all traditional woman... and by a force of natural phenomenon finds her self in a time where women were property. She meets someone, and falls in love, hard, but misses her home and her husband in the 20th century. There are all sorts of tricky situations she gets into because she it isn't in her to be a submissive woman.  The writing constantly has me laughing, Claire will think something and it will make me laugh out loud because it's a thought I would have but never admit to anyone.


Outlander takes place in Scotland, and is filled with a rich appreciation for the country and it's people. While reading I would often research things as I came upon them, such as where exactly IS Scotland. Yes, I know... but I really did look. As I got more into the first book I was looking up clan histories, Gaelic, music and all sorts of things... Thank God for Wikipedia and YouTube. I started to fall in love with the dynamic of the country, the scenery, and their history

So far there are 7 published books in this order:

1. Outlander
2. Dragonfly in Amber
3. Voyager
4. Drums of Autumn
5. Fiery Cross
6. A Breath of Snow and Ashes
7. Echo in the Bone
8. (2013)Written In My Own Hearts Blood

I went through Goodreads.com and here are some lines from people's reviews to show how passionate they are about these books. Their names link to their review if you want to read more.

HeatherJay: As I am currently without any books to read and nothing catching my interest, I decide to finally give it a try.......... All I can say is " I cannot believe I wasted almost 20 years of my life without reading this book!" I won't go into the plot as it's already been covered, but, Holy Shit, this is one fantastic book! 

Claire: Don't let the romance label put you off, this series is difficult to define. The historical content is accurate and amazing, the characters are amazingly real and complicated, the storylines interesting and unexpected - really, I just can't say enough great things about this series.

Shell S: It took me a crazy long time, to convince myself to pick up these books. Convinced it just wasn't my thing, I ignored the numerous pleas from fellow book lover friends, to take on this series. Eventually of course, their tenacious badgering, and my over all curiousity won out in the end... And... Amazing. Beautiful, Magical, Heart wrenching, fantastic, awe inspiring, mind blowing, epic in its originality. My all time favorite books, ones I will forever keep, and read over, and over again.

"I Promised Ye Honesty"

To be fair, these books aren't for everyone. My mom didn't care for them. There are some intense sex scenes, language and violence that some people may find offensive.  The thing I really like is how the historical scenes are so accurate. I learned so much about English/Scottish history that it became a new favorite genre of reading.

To be fair here are some additional reviews from readers who weren't as impressed as I am.

Methodtomadness: The book needs some sort of warning on the cover for those like myself, who aimlessly pick it up secondhand thinking, "time travel, Scotland, men in kilts, okay, I'm on board," and then grow progressively more irritated and unamused at Gabaldon's love of whips and general abuse for women, kids, adult men -- oh, right, basically everyone.  

Emily G: After that many pages take your time to wrap it up, don't squeeze it into a couple of paragraphs. My other pet peeve was with the number of times the main characters were suddenly thrust into a life/death situation and barely survived.

Mark B: The narrative moves in fits and starts. I guess that's fitting since the novel was broken into seven sections, but there's a lot of time where there's not so much movement and then a lot of things happen at once. Some of the sections are better than others. Some are harder to follow. It's tough to keep track of who's been kidnapped and what jail they're in and who is trying to break them out, at times.

I have many more suggestions in various genres, if you want suggestions based on what you like I'd be more than happy to share.

Check out Goodreads.com too, it's a great resource!