Hello everyone!
I am so happy you found my blog and are going on this bookish journey with me!
I thought I would share with you a bit of who I am as a reader and how I rate my books! Please remember that I do love talking and that I love lists, math and spreadsheets!
There is nothing I admire more than someone who can read a book and discuss it so eloquently and beautifully. I am not that person (but maybe I will become one?!?). I wish I could speak of books and use the proper lingo such as “voice”, “narrative”, “first person”, or even understand the full nuances of different genres and subgenres. But as it is, I am an amateur reader who, selfishly, reads for pure enjoyment. If I could compare it to my psyche, I currently am an “ID” reader and hope to at least get to be a “Superego” reader by the end if the year! #goals
I started reading at a very young age, 3, my mom says I pushed myself to learn how to read because I couldn’t wait for her to read me the books I craved. My parents worked full time and we also did a lot of activities and spend time as a family together, so it is very understandable that my mom and dad wouldn’t want to spend all of their down time reading to me!
I would read primary comic books (In Brazil they have a wonderful child comic series about a girl called Monica and her friends) and fairy tales. By 9 I was reading classics (which I still love), and finally at 11 it was, what I consider, to be the main milestone of my whole reading “career”. My grandfather gifted me “Murder on the Orient Express,” a book that had my mom’s name on it. He had tried gifting it to her when she was a teen, but her interests lay elsewhere. This was the beginning of a wonderful journey – my grandfather, my soulmate, and I would from then on visit bookstores everywhere we went until I had the whole collection. They are all mismatched and from different editions and publishers. Once, now in my adulthood, I have settled in Canada. My grandfather and I went on a virtual journey to complete my English collection, now from the same edition from Harper Collins. Due to copyright, I couldn’t find all books in Canada, so we imported from the UK and – believe it or not – Brazil! We completed the collection before he passed away. These are my “special books.”
This marked me so deeply. It gave me fond memories that shaped me. My love for my grandfather bled into my love for Agatha. I can not think of her without thinking of him and this is, to me, a wonderful thing. Agatha Christie has also made me want to read English, and love England and all things British. She is solely responsible for cementing my love of Golden Age Mysteries, female British writers and it has shaped me as a reader.
Because of Agatha Books there are 6 things I rate a book on before I get my overall rating: Enjoyability, Characters, Ambience, Plot and Execution. I have a video explaining which all of those mean and you can check it out here: https://youtu.be/dkwjzkFbeG0
I also have a deduction criterion, that is only used when applicable. But in a nutshell, while I try to consider when the book is written, there are things – basically any “isms” you can think off, that I find unappealing in a book if it clearly doesn’t add to the plot or isn’t a product of its time that can be understood in context (but never endorsed).
I always strive to give a book a fair rating with my personal emotions aside. Just because a book isn’t for me, doesn’t mean that a lot of people won’t enjoy it. Therefore, I might rate a book high but not recommend it to readers like me. Or really enjoy a book with an average rating. There is no shame in enjoying a fast read!
What are some of your favourite books?!? I would love to hear about your rating system and what things you look forward to while reading a book.
Until next time, be the hummingbird!
Frosta Wings It 