COCO's Updates en-US Mon, 13 Jan 2025 11:56:29 -0800 60 COCO's Updates 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Review7211384423 Mon, 13 Jan 2025 11:56:29 -0800 <![CDATA[COCO added 'Blackbringer']]> /review/show/7211384423 Blackbringer by Laini Taylor COCO gave 5 stars to Blackbringer (Faeries of Dreamdark, #1) by Laini Taylor
It is such a brilliant and wonderful book. The world magic creatures created is so attempting. The audio book is done by Davina Porter who is the best narrator of all.

I don't understand why the second book of this serie is not well published. The ebook is not available anywhere. I suspect if the second book continues the story about Magpie and the crows it would have been more popular. ]]> Review6880025674 Thu, 26 Sep 2024 14:44:48 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO added 'Isabel Dalhousie Series, 4 books']]> /review/show/6880025674 Isabel Dalhousie Series, 4 books by Alexander McCall Smith COCO gave 2 stars to Isabel Dalhousie Series, 4 books (Hardcover) by Alexander McCall Smith
]]> Review6880044283 Thu, 26 Sep 2024 14:40:55 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO added 'The Sunday Philosophy Club']]> /review/show/6880044283 The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith COCO gave 2 stars to The Sunday Philosophy Club (Isabel Dalhousie, #1) by Alexander McCall Smith
There are so many random thoughts and is no clear thread in the books. It seems to me the author only wrote those books to record his own random thoughts.

The character, Isabel, so often felt so guilty about her wealth which in her mind was a source of sin regardless, so she found ways to punish herself, at least in her mind she was tortured by it. Another thing strikes me as odd was that she so often said one thing but thought another, never ever spoke her mind, which in my mind is close to lying. Plus, her mind wandered all the time. The books probably closely reflect the author’s philosophy for life.

Overall, there are no real plots or story lines for this series of books. The audio books by Davina Porter made the books more bearable.
]]> Review6880025674 Thu, 26 Sep 2024 14:32:47 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO added 'Isabel Dalhousie Series, 4 books']]> /review/show/6880025674 Isabel Dalhousie Series, 4 books by Alexander McCall Smith COCO gave 2 stars to Isabel Dalhousie Series, 4 books (Hardcover) by Alexander McCall Smith
]]> Review6879923966 Thu, 26 Sep 2024 13:51:47 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO added 'The Comforts of a Muddy Saturday']]> /review/show/6879923966 The Comforts of a Muddy Saturday by Alexander McCall Smith COCO gave 2 stars to The Comforts of a Muddy Saturday (Isabel Dalhousie, #5) by Alexander McCall Smith
]]> Rating774602884 Thu, 26 Sep 2024 13:49:13 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO liked a review]]> /
COCO liked Chanuki Ranasinghe's review of The Comforts of a Muddy Saturday (Isabel Dalhousie, #5):
The Comforts of a Muddy Saturday by Alexander McCall Smith
"Not sure why it is being rated 4 or 5 stars. I didnot like it. The writing was meh. And the story was all over the place. The story goes on and on about everything but the mystery case. "
]]> ReadStatus8408311793 Sat, 14 Sep 2024 18:21:53 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO wants to read 'Untitled']]> /review/show/6847152863 Untitled by Laini Taylor COCO wants to read Untitled by Laini Taylor
]]> Review6826479151 Sat, 07 Sep 2024 02:51:35 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO added 'The Fate of the Tearling']]> /review/show/6826479151 The Fate of the Tearling by Erika Johansen COCO gave 1 star to The Fate of the Tearling (The Queen of the Tearling, #3) by Erika Johansen
The wost book of the trilogy. The plots didn't flow. There were too many clues here and there, plus the clues from the last two books. The author just rambled on yet provided no answers. It felt like the author didn't know what to write in book 3 and got lost in her own story.

What happened to the sisters right after the crossing? The author totally forgot about it.

Instead of writing 3 long books the author should have attempted the same story line with 1 or 2 shorter books. ]]> Review6612892635 Mon, 24 Jun 2024 09:52:24 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO added 'The Thorn Birds']]> /review/show/6612892635 The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough COCO gave 2 stars to The Thorn Birds (Mass Market Paperback) by Colleen McCullough
It is not a long book. I read it in Chinese years ago and was very touched maybe because it is so tragic.

The book is mainly about forbidden love which is the nature of most love stories written. I cannot say which characters are likable to me. Too many secrets were kept by people from people.

The family is good natured, hard working and gullible especially Meggie. Somehow, all that reading didn't help at all.

I read the English version recently. It is still tragic but with too much rambling and too little plotting. I believe fictions are all about plots. The plots in this book were disrupted by all that rambling.

It is a rather simple story. ]]> Review5917054940 Wed, 18 Oct 2023 08:30:58 -0700 <![CDATA[COCO added 'Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone']]> /review/show/5917054940 Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone by Diana Gabaldon COCO gave 4 stars to Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone (Outlander, #9) by Diana Gabaldon
There are still so many loose threads from all the books, a book 10 will not be able to tie them up. The books and stories are long and slow. I have to say there are a lot of rambling that distracted readers from the main plot, we will need more books to complete the story.

The books contain significant historical and scientific details, and a great sense of humor. The plots however are not very believable. For instance, the Jamie Fraser character is a perfect and good at everything character: good at reading people and hiding his own feelings and thoughts yet failed at most things in his life; and was always running from something and suffered great physical harm. Some of his injuries didn't meet common sense, he was described as a big guy with great agility and stealth, and a sharp shooter. The Rogers Mc character, is no good at anything and not very bright hence suffered a great deal as well, poor guy.

Plus, the family of 3, all had been raped even though over the course of 20 more years and 200 years time travelling. You would think that a dark fate follows Jamie Fraser and whomever related to him. ]]>