book settings Archives - Brooke's Reviews and Sweeps

Books with Settings That are New to Me (Top Ten Tuesday)

By Brookelorren on July 23, 2019July 19, 201920 Comments

Welcome to Top Ten Tuesday, where we make a list about our favorite book topics! Today’s topic is “Settings I’d Like to See More Of” but I’m not too picky about the settings, so this week I’m going to twist the topic a bit and write about books on my TBR that have settings that are new to me. Last month, I challenged myself to read more books from different countries and states. There are so many places in this world and I still have to read about a lot of them. So today I’ll go through my TBR and find books from places I’ve never been and have yet to read about.

As always, Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl!

Piedmont Valley, Italy, Medieval era ~ Rora

My “Read Around the World” challenge doesn’t include historical novels, but I think maybe I’ll make an extra column for historical novels. I’ve never read about this particular part of the world or about this particular group of people (except for a couple of lines in Foxe’s book of Martyrs). This is on my summer TBR, so I hope to read it soon.

Ukraine ~ Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine

Fun fact: while Ukraine is officially known as Ukraine today, during the Holodomor (what this book is about) people usually called it The Ukraine. But don’t do that today because it’s considered insulting. At the time of this book, Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, and now it’s not. The farmers at the time didn’t want to go for collectivization, and Stalin tried to starve them. I’ve never read a book set in the Ukraine, so it made today’s list.

North Korea ~ Dear Reader: The Unauthorized Autobiography of Kim Jong Il

Evidently, Kim Jong Il of North Korea could fart rainbows. Or something like that. There aren’t too many books set in North Korea. I don’t think I’ve ever read one, in fact (maybe some world history books that might talk about it for a chapter).

The Azores ~ The Tenth Island: Finding Joy, Beauty, and Unexpected Love in the Azores

I’ve been to the Azores before. It was in the middle of the night at the airport, and I was only there for an hour, but I can technically say I’ve been there. Didn’t really see much because it was dark though. It would probably be more interesting to read this book set in the Azores.

Israel ~ Lone Wolf in Jerusalem

I’ve read several books where the characters visit Israel, but I don’t think I’ve read a book where the main setting was Israel.

Russia on the Eve of Revolution ~ Blood Red, Snow White

I did read The Bear and the Nightingale, so I don’t know if this should count, but these are completely different time periods. This is an interesting period of history though.

Ottoman Empire ~ And I Darken

This is another book that’s on my seasonal TBR for this summer. While we can travel to the location that And I Darken was set today, we can’t exactly travel to the old Ottoman Empire.

Afghanistan ~ The Broken Circle: A Memoir of Escaping Afghanistan

I don’t think I’ve read any books set in Afghanistan. This one is set in the 1980s. I’m sure the country has changed since this book took place, but the great things about books is that you can visit different locations at different time periods.

Hong Kong ~ Somewhere Only We Know

Hong Kong is another location that I’ve never been to in real life, and probably not in a book either. If I did, it was only a small part of the book. This book looks a lot more fun than most of the other books on this list too.

Thirteenth Century Wales ~ Here Be Dragons

The Infernal Devices took me to Wales in the 19th century for a bit, but I’ve never been to Wales in person, and I’ve certainly never been to thirteenth century Wales. It looks like it might be an interesting place to visit.

So that’s ten places that I’ve never taken a book to. Have you been to these places, either virtually or in real life? What bookish settings did you write about today? Next week is a freebie, and I took some inspiration from Whimsy Pages and will be writing about ten books from the last ten years that are still on my TBR!

Book Places I Don’t Want to Visit

By Brookelorren on February 26, 2019February 25, 201930 Comments

Today is Top Ten Tuesday, and the topic is supposed to be “Places Mentioned in Books That I’d Like to Visit” but I actually did that topic in October, and I’m not sure too much has changed since then. So I’m going to go the opposite direction and do places I DON’T want to visit. Some of the places I wouldn’t want to visit are dependent on the time frame too. If that’s the case, I’ll mention that.

I suppose if they do the topic of “Bookish Places I Don’t Want to Visit” as an official topic in a few months, maybe I’ll have more places I do want to visit by then. Anyway, as always, TTT is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl.

The setting of Red Queen – Nope. It might be an okay place ten years after the conclusion of War Storm, but during the series, I don’t think so. There’s a war going on, and it doesn’t really matter if you’re a red or a silver, it’s not really an appealing place. I think I’ll skip a vacation here.

Pre-Revolutionary War France (Enchantée) – There are a lot of historical places I’d like to visit, but if I were to visit the time period of Enchantée, I’d want to do it as an observer only. This would have been a nightmare of a place. First, if you’re poor, you’re probably starving. The crops had been terrible and there really wasn’t enough food for everybody. If you were rich, you were expected to be the king’s lapdog. No thanks. I wouldn’t mind seeing this place in a holodeck as a ghost where nobody could see me, but I don’t really want to live here.

Ukraine during the Holodomor (Red Famine). Another real place and real time period I wouldn’t want to visit, except as one of those ghosts that couldn’t interact or be seen by anybody else. The Holodomor was a time period in the last century where Stalin tried to starve the Ukrainians because they wouldn’t go along with his farm collectivization program. I haven’t read this book yet, but I know enough about this ugly little period of history that I don’t want to go there.

Several locations in The Last Year of the War. I would not have wanted to be set to one of the Japanese/German internment camps that the United States set up during World War II, despite the propaganda videos that show how happy the people were in them (I’m sure they weren’t). Then, I wouldn’t want to be in Germany or Japan during the end of World War II or right afterwards. I have a German textbook that was printed in the 1970s and even then, local calls were still expensive to make and most people didn’t have phones. That was 30 years after the war ended! So no, I think I’ll avoid taking a trip to this location.

Australia of A Thousand Perfect Notes. I absolutely adore Australia. I spent five weeks there many years ago, and it was wonderful. I spent time in Sydney, Cairns, Brisbane, even went to Canberra… and I loved it. But the people in A Thousand Perfect Notes have really rough lives. I’d love to visit Australia again someday, bu I’ll skip this particular neighborhood, if at all possible.

Weep of Strange the Dreamer. I’d love to visit Lazlo’s library, but Weep would have been a terribly depressing place. There’s this big monstrous metal structure hanging over the city, casting a shadow over the whole place, the whole town has recent memories of how the gods used to steal the people away, no thanks. I might want to visit the setting of this series after the conclusion of Muse of Nightmares, but not before.

Thule, Queen of Air and Darkness. I love the Los Angeles setting of The Dark Artifices, but I wouldn’t want to live in Thule, which is an alternate world that split off when… well, I wont give spoilers, but something bad happened during The Dark War in Thule. We’ll see more of Thule in The Wicked Powers, which I’m glad about, but I don’t want to visit Thule, even if I want to read about it.

The world of An Ember in the Ashes. I doubt it matters whether you are in a powerful position or not in this world, it seems like a terrible place to live. You’d always live in fear, and war comes to the land. Maybe this place won’t be so bad after Ember 4 (I don’t know), but as it stands now, I’ll stay away.

Brazil of Never Stop Walking. There are probably a lot of wonderful places to visit in Brazil. I wouldn’t pass up a trip there if offered. However, the particular locations that Christina Rickardsson talks about in her memoir… I’ll stay very far away from. Places where corrupt police shoot children, where kids live on the street and are vulnerable to exploitation or might have to kill to live… I’ll stay away from there.

Germany before World War II (Defying Hitler). Maybe Germany would be a good place to avoid entirely between say… 1900 and 1960? But I would’t want to spend too much time there in the days leading up to World War II, when people were trying to live with runaway inflation. After inflation was under control, they had to live with Adolph Hitler’s rise to power. No thanks.

So there you have it. Ten places mentioned in books that I wouldn’t want to visit. I look forward to seeing the places that you would like to visit, or maybe you went another direction like I did.

Book Settings I’d Like To Visit

By Brookelorren on October 16, 2018October 16, 201834 Comments

It’s Tuesday again, and today’s Top Ten Tuesday Topic is “Bookstores/Libraries I’ve Always Wanted to Visit”. I’ve chosen to do “Book Settings I’d Like to Visit” instead. In case you’re wondering, the bookstores/libraries I’d like to visit include Powell’s Books in Portland (been there but it’s awesome), the National Archives, Library of Congress, and the Vatican library. But back to ten bookish settings:

There are a lot of bookish settings that would absolutely be terrible to visit because they’re always at war or something. But not all of them would be that bad.

The Shire: Who wouldn’t want to visit the Shire? I wouldn’t want to go at some periods of it’s history, but overall, it seems like a nice place. If it looks anything like the movies, it would be gorgeous. I guess the next best thing would be to go to New Zealand. But I’ve never been there either.

Narnia: Narnia would be a lovely place to visit. As long as you went at the right time. I mean, who would want to visit while the White Witch was still reigning and there was an eternal winter (with no Christmas)? It would be cool to see the talking animals and the mythical creatures.

Heaven: The Bible has a lot of places that would be pretty cool to visit. The Garden of Eden would be interesting to see (before that whole fruit thing happened, of course). I probably wouldn’t want to stay very long in any one place, because I probably wouldn’t really like their idea of sanitation, but Heaven would be a pretty cool place to stay for a very long time. We’re supposed to be happy there forever, right?

Tokyo of Warcross: I think it would be pretty cool to visit the Tokyo of Warcross. It would probably be a pretty fun game to play. The virtual overlays over everything would be cool to see as well. I’m not sure that the whole social scoring would be too good in real life (they’re already doing that in China) but other aspects of the game and its leakage into reality would be fun.

The Prairie of Little House: I guess there’s something of a theme in a lot of places I’d like to visit. Imagine the peace and quiet where you could read all of those books! But it would be lovely to visit some of those old-timey places where there weren’t a lot of people around and it was just you and nature.

Prince Edward Island of Anne of Green Gables time: here’s another one of those old-timey places that would be quiet and fun to visit for a bit. I bet it would get pretty cold in the winter though, since it’s so far up north. Maybe I’d only want to visit in the summer. Or I’d want to have extra warm clothes to wear. I get cold pretty easily.

Feudal Japan of Flame in the Mist: We’re going to assume that if I go to visit this place, I’m not going to be a peasant, because that would be no fun at all. But the magical forests and the like would probably be quite beautiful.

Krynn of Dragonlance: While I wouldn’t want to visit Krynn during one of their numerous wars, there were periods of peace in the land’s history (I think). It would be pretty fun to study to be a mage. I imagine they’d have to be Erudite like me, since they always have to read books.

Ireland, of The Wren Hunt: This was a last-minute edition to this post, because I just read it last week. The Wren Hunt is set in modern-day Ireland. Not in a big city or anything, but in a small village. Although the book doesn’t do a lot to describe the surroundings, I’ve seen pictures of Ireland before and I know it’s a beautiful place. So, I’d probably love to visit the setting of this book.

Pacific Crest Trail of Wild: At this point, I’ve gone through my entire read list on Goodreads (there’s a lot of books that I’ve read that aren’t on Goodreads that I don’t remember though) and I still have to come up with one other place. I’d love to visit the Pacific Crest Trail though, which is in the book Wild. I love hiking, and think that this would be a fun thing to do. I’d need new shoes though. Since I walk all day at work, I go through shoes fairly quickly, and am in need of a new pair. Especially if I plan on going on a massive hike like this.

So that’s today’s list. Come back next week when I talk about villains!