Teaser Tuesday & Top Ten Tuesday Freebie

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of A Daily Rhythm. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Tiara’s Teaser

Page 1: "What the story forgets to tell you is that even the veiled and vile are prone to heartbreak. And sidekicks never get out clean."

Samuel Lenn, Veiled and Vile #1: Villain, Interrupted

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created by The Broke and the Bookish. They created the meme because they love lists. Who doesn’t love lists? They wanted to share these list with fellow booklovers and ask that we share in return to connect with our fellow book lovers. To learn more about participating in the challenge, stop by their page dedicated to it and dive in!

This week’s topic: Top Ten Tuesday Freebie

As you all know, I read a ton of speculative fiction. Maybe more than I have in recent years since I started reviewing for this site. So, my top ten for today is to list ten non-speculative books I want to read before this year closes. This was harder than I was expecting since much of my TBR pile is now speculative. I seem to keep forgetting there’s more to life than dragons and aliens and dragon aliens… also comics… these days.

God Help the Child by Toni Morrison – I love Toni Morrison, and her latest book is probably her first to be set in a contemporary setting, which means I’m doubly excited to see what she’s done with this story. I’ll probably be reading (or listening) to this one sooner rather than later since I’ve been really good about catching up on other books, and I won’t feel so bad if I slip this one in. Not that I was going to feel bad anyway because it’s Toni Morrison.

Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert – I am on a real classics kick, and as soon as I get my ARC tbr pile back under control. I’m going to get back to reading and reviewing classic speculative fiction as well as classic literature in general. I finally found a Jane Austen book I absolutely adore doing this classics read challenge! Not that I hated Austen, but I wasn’t as taken by her as some. I finally found the Austen book for me, though. I’m looking forward to this one because I can never pass over a book that’s about a good scandal, classic or contemporary.

The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester – I love reading (of course). I love words. I love definitions. I also love learning the history of how things came to be. This book is about the history of the Oxford English Dictionary’s creation. What’s so fascinating about that? One of the largest contributors was an American surgeon who wanted to meet the mastermind behind it, but was always turned down by him. He finds out why once he learns the editor is a murderer locked in an insane asylum, purported to be the harshest at the time, during its creation. This focuses more on the people than anything I believe.

Balm by Dolen Perkins-Valdez – I discovered Perkins-Valdez in an airport bookstore during a layover coming home from a trip. I had quite some time to wander around the airport, so of course I go to the overpriced bookstore (and I just recently found two books in an old suitcase that I bought years ago in an airport bookstore and never read). I know I shouldn’t trust airport bookstores, but I was so enticed by the cover of Wench and the historical story it promised. I was prepared for the worst. I read that book during part of my layover and finished it on the plane. I cried like a baby. I haven’t read another book by her since even though I often think about that story and loved it. So, I’m venturing into my second Perkins-Valdez novel, another historical fiction following the lives of women set after the days of the civil war.

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach – For Science! My love of science fiction stems from my love of all things science. I also have a very healthy love of sex. I’ve heard mostly good things about Mary Roach’s science books, and I’ve been wanting to read her for ages. So, why not read a book by her that combines two of my favorite things?

An Untamed State by Roxane Gay – Roxane Gay is probably best known for her essays discussing race, feminism, sexuality, and how they intersect (particularly Bad Feminist), but she’s written short stories for various publications. This is her debut novel. I’ve enjoyed many of her essays and short stories and I’m curious to see how her writing talent translates into a novel. The story revolves around a kidnapping, but from the description, I think there are going to be many issues at play here, and I want to see how she weaves this all together.

Farewell My Concubine by Lilian Lee – A friend recommended this to me years ago, and I still haven’t read it. I can vaguely remember watching the movie, but I don’t think I finished it completely. I think it was one of those things that happened to be on when I went to this friend’s house and she started blubbering about how much she loved it. I promised her I’d read it. I don’t care if that was years ago, she’ll still be happy to hear this. Heralded as a LGBTQ classic by many,  spanning from China to Hong Kong, I’m almost mad at myself that I haven’t gotten around to reading this sooner. (I also plan to watch the movie in its entirety.)

When Rabbit Howls by Truddi Chase – So, I was one of those college kids who had like 15 different majors, right. I wanted to do everything including psychology, and while I eventually settled into something different, psychology is still something I’m very interested in. I just have an interest in trying to figure out why people do the things they do. This has led to countless hours of dissecting pixel people in video games and paper people in books. This book is the true story of a woman who found out she had 92 individual personalities.  92! She begins seeing a doctor after suffering blackouts. I’m intrigued.

The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – A collection of Adichie’s short stories. I was tempted by the description: “Searing and profound, suffused with beauty, sorrow, and longing, these stories map, with Adichie’s signature emotional wisdom, the collision of two cultures and the deeply human struggle to reconcile them. The Thing Around Your Neck is a resounding confirmation of the prodigious literary powers of one of our most essential writers.” I’m so easy.

Before I Go To Sleep by S.J. Watson – I’m just now getting into this mystery/suspense/thriller novel with the unreliable narrator thing. I still have not read Gone Girl (I’m getting there), but I have finally watched the movie, which I liked and I didn’t like. So, I’m curious to see how the book really is. I also read The Girl on the Train and wanted to see how other writers did with the unreliable narrator in this genre thing. I was drawn to this book because the premise reminds me of one of my favorite movies, Memento (easily in my top ten favorite movies), which is a story told backwards about a man who loses his short term memories (anterograde amnesia) every night when he sleeps. This book follows a similar premise but the main character is a woman (also, I’m sure this book is probably not told backwards).