Hi dear friends,

This is already the end of my first week of holiday! The time is really flying by when you have fun 😀

Let’s give some news about my private life first

Well as I’ve said I am on holiday but I did went to our capital city for one day to have a meeting with international experts in my field.

I love these meetings as I get to meet people from all over Europe and chat boutique with them, exchanging our favorite “recipe” also known in our jargon “best practices”. Our common language is English but I get to speak other languages as well as it’s a real Babel Tower. All that I love!

Interrupting my holiday for such event was not a chore.

That said my present days are just fantastic as I get to read as much as I want, go for long walks with the dog, blog hop when I can basically I am free to do as I please till the kids come back home from college or school.

Pure bliss!

I also followed a “Body Balance” class at my fitness club. This is a mix of yoga, tai-chi and pilates. I may be slowly nearing fifty (more than two years) I am still really flexible so I went with gusto. Stretching that limb, holding the “Warrior” pose for long minutes then going to the “Groundhog” and then the Snake, the Crocodile to end with the Raven or Crow pose (basically you are in a crouching position then you put your knees on your elbows and lift your feet, being balanced on your arms and hands. Your hands are the only “point of contact” with the ground).

 

All went well until the morning after where I woke up to new muscles that I had no idea existed but where painfully determined to be acknowledged!

Let me tell you folks your body past fourty five does not react the same as when you were twenty! 😀 

 

I am also thinking about taking online art course as I would love to improve my character drawing and painting skills with digital and classic tools. I just don’t know if I should pay for them or follow free courses as I probably will follow these “when I can” meaning: sometimes dayly when on holiday but most of the time weekly on the weekend.

If you have tips and advices to share here, they are most welcome!

Having books with drawings on the cover is really inspiring me in my bookstagrams (see below Girl Made of Stars).

You can see that this week has been pretty easy, just what I wanted and needed!

 

On the blog this week (click on the graphic to read the post)

I managed to read four books! I reviewed three of them already and just have to fine tune the last review.

Sadly I also had a spectacular DNF of one of my “much wanted” books on my TBR.

Books read and reviewed

Heartbreak Warfare by Heather M Orgeron and Kate Stewart: 5 stars! I never expected to love this book so much as it contains two of my biggest pet peeves: love triangle and cheating (you are warned).

The Darkest Star by Jennifer L Armentrout. The Luxens are back! This story is about Luc, an Origin whom we met in the last installment. 4,5 stars.

Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens. Stunning, heartwrenching,unique. It’s a resounding 5 stars and it is a Goodreads Awards semi-finalist! For those not reading romance this is one of the few “non romance” books that I’ve reviewed.

Read but not reviewed yet: Girl Made of Stars by Ashley Herring Blake. You only get my bookstagram here below and the reason why, after Sadie and Kingdom of Ash I am thinking about following art classes online.

Now the DNF…. I really, really, really wanted to love Captive Prince by CS Pacat yet I stopped 120 pages in the book just plain disgusted. I thougth really hard about not publishing anything because if you don’t have positive things to say then better say silent right? But then I remembered my oath. The oath I pledged to myself of always being honest in my reviews. So even if it is not a review per se as I did not finish the book I still wanted to explain in details what did not work for me with this very hyped book!

And as I said, if you loved it and are a fan, I respect your opinion and still think you hang the moon 😀  Reading is just a personal experience and we are all shaped by our upbringing, experiences etc as readers.

As it is that time of the month I also posted about my November TBR

This week was Calendar Girls week! The theme was a book in the middle of a series that is the best! It was a tie for me as I could not choose between two series of Sarah J Maas!

In Top 5 Tuesday I had to think hard once again as Shanah asked us of books we nearly DNF yet ended just fantastic! This is my “I expected a frog but got a prince in its stead” post 😀

Last weekly meme on Thursday: If you were running because it’s end of day zombie/apocalypse who would you want to have your back? Well rather that’s my interpretation of Dani’s topic: a character to have your back LOL Once again I wanted to put the spotlight on other less “obvious” badass characters because, where would be the fun if I spoke all the time of the same fantastic characters right? Let’s broaden our horizon!

That’s it for this week!

Next week I plan on writing something about how blogging toughened me up when faced with rejection.

Do tell me all about your week now!

As usual I am linking back to The Sunday Post from Kimberly @caffeinatedreviews

Thanks for reading!

Sophie

 

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50 Comments

  1. Ah what a great week and it looks like 3 of your books were 4.5 or 5 stars! I also had the week off and was reading for HoHoHoRAT, lots of holiday romances, which was too many in a row.

    Yoga has many styles. I have enjoyed it For my daughter’s therapy, we need to find the gentle, stretching, meditative classes because she is in a wheelchair not standing at this point. I did see the YMCA had a chair yoga which might work.

    Here’s to the next week and more great reads and holiday food. Anne – Books of My Heart

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  3. No the body is not as cooperative after 40 I think! Everything seems to be a challenge with that for me these days, and I’m sore from doing anything. Glad you are enjoying your vacation, and I loved Heartbreak Warfare too! I’m posting my review tomorrow, so I’ll wait to read yours. (I’m sorry I missed your takeover yesterday…. )

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  7. After roughly eight years, my regular yoga class was canceled at my gym and moved to times that didn’t work with my schedule. I did some YouTube videos, but not regularly. This month a new class was added at a time that worked – yay! The next morning, muscles that hadn’t been used in a while were protesting, but I’ll be back in class again this week – the benefits of yoga are endless.

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  8. I feel like I’m starting to fall apart at 42! The thought of doing yoga for me is just laughable, so kudos to you!

    I’m sorry to hear you didn’t enjoy Captive Prince. It’s one of my favorite series, but I do think that it’s not for everyone.

    Thanks for sharing! Love your art work. 🙂

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  9. I got the special book box for the Darkest Star. I wanted to read it and like in there was a t-shirt and well I love those. So hey why not. I haven’t read it yet of course. But I did love Sadie and the audiobook of The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein are by far amazing. I can see why you gushed over Sadie. Heartbreaking but an amazing read.

    Have a great week Sophie! I will be stalking the blog this week. =)

    Mary

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  13. I heard really good things about Girl Made of Stars. That’s one I’d like to get to soon as well. I did not know that you had a dog. Tell me more. What is your dog’s name? How old? What breed? When will I see pictures on your dog? Can you tell that I really like dogs?

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    1. Hahahah yes Alicia I can tell you love dogs! Mine is a Cotton of Tulear and her name is Bella. Nine years old and a real cuttie 😉

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  15. Oh Sophie, I wish you had loved Captive Prince, but I totally understand why you had to DNF. The topics are pretty heavy and there’s a lot of graphic scenes in it. I still think you hang the moon too

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    1. Ha Meeghan I know this is one of your favorite series…I so wanted to love it. I guess Laurent has his reason and there is much more to it but yes it was too much for me to be able to go on sadly.

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  16. I hate it when I realise I have muscles I didn’t know were there……I always remember a step class and the next day trying to sit in the loo was the most painful ever because of my legs!!!!

    Some great books there and I’m sorry about your dnf. I always feel so guilty about a dnf but honesty is best…..and one person can’t love everything….❤

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  17. Firstly, let me just say this: i find it awesome that you found a career / job you enjoy so much that you are willing spend time on it during your holiday. If anyone from my job so much as suggested I do anything work related after 5.30 pm, let alone my holiday, they would meet my eyes shooting death rays. 😀

    Body Balance sounds amazing. I’m not really into classes, but i’d actually try this. Being flexible is so important. I’m back at my physio for about a month now and she keeps telling me i’ll recover faster because i’m quite well stretched out. So i want to keep it that way 😀

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    1. Hahahaha Norrie not everything in my job is thrilling all the time but I love meeting other people, preferably from other countries as I am so curious as to how things are done . And I hope you will stretch enough LOL

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  18. I am only in my thirties but even my body doesn’t react the same as it did when I was in my twenties which is making me want to be more healthy and work out on a more consistent basis for sure. That way as I get older I can handle things better.

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  20. You had a great week, Sophie! I’m sorry Captive Prince was a DNF for you! That series can be pretty much disturbing and uncomfortable to some readers. So I can totally understand why you DNF’ed it..
    Hope you have a wonderful week! 🙂

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  21. There is too much awesome in this post, but let’s start with that awesome Girl Made of Stars picture. It’s stunning! I am sorry one of your anticipated reads didn’t work for you. That’s always so disappointing, but other than that, you had a pretty spectacular reading week. And that cat gif – still laughing!

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  24. Looks like another great week in blogging and books! I’ve been enjoying your posts and excellent reviews. I’m on the other side of fifty now and yoga has been good for me. I learned quickly to not take many days off or those muscles stand up and let you know you used them. LOL Enjoy your time off:)

    My Sunday Post

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