What is the last book you read, and your rating?

[sunshayn]

Rereading SLAMMED by Colleen Hoover and I'd still give it 4 out of 4 stars! This is romance and poetry in one. Great storyline too!

[Emilyflint]

Toxic side effect by Sandy manger 2 out of 4 stars

[Redlegs]

Winner of the 2013 Stella Prize and listed for several other literary awards, Mateship With Birds by Carrie Tiffany is an absolute zinger of a read.

It races along for its relatively brief 208 pages, and it's finished all too quickly. Presented as a mix of prose, diary entries about the lives of a family of kookaburras that read more like poetry, and letters on sexual education from a farmer to his teenage neighbour, it barely stops for breath.

Set in rural Victoria in the 1950s, its chief characters are dairy farmer Harry, whose wife left him for another man many years ago, his neighbour and single mother Betty, and her two children, Michael and Little Hazel.

The novel is quirky in the extreme, a series of brief sketches and interludes that build to an impressionistic portrait of the relationship between these eccentric players.

Tiffany throws in all manner of random trivia about rural life and dairy farming, especially around the necessary hygienic care of a cow's udders.

Harry's secret letters to Michael, describing the female form and the best approach to satisfactory sexual encounters with women are hilarious.

There was a lot to love about this book, and I would have been happy to give it 5 stars if only it had a little more substance. Tiffany has skated along the surface of her subject, creating a highly talented and enjoyable sketch, but I kept feeling it could have been developed further and had so much more to say. I am happy to call it 4.5 stars.

[leiabutler]

The last book I read was The 11:05 Murders by Brian O'Hare. It was an amazing detective book. 10/10 for sure. Really worth a read and led by a strong female character.

[ChloesFurBabyMama]

I am currently reading "Gods at War" by Pastor Kyle Idleman. AMAZING AND LIFE-CHANGING BOOK! 5/5 stars!

[Thabang Amos]

The last book I read was "Who Told you, You were Naked". A great book and one which i found to be amazingly challenging overall. rating 4/5

[Gravy]

I read Nalini Singh's newest Psy-Changeling Wolf Rain and rated it a 3 out of 4.

[Shrad]

The last book i read was the lux series. An alien series that was interesting and spellbounding. In its own unique it intrigued me had me turning pages without keeping the book down or stopping. It was easy to feel connected with the characters as well as understand the turmoil or excitement they were going through.. I would give this book 3.7 out of 4.

[Giana08]

Hatchet my rating is a 4/5

[Afturnitsa]

The last book I read was "Dear Ally, How Do You Write A Book?". I give this book a 4 out of 4 stars. I gave it four stars because I had an ah-ha moment when she said that writing is a story is difficult because a writer needs to create his/her base material, which is the first draft. Still, revising the draft again and again and again makes it into a beautiful piece of artwork, similar, to a sculptor shaping clay.

[Redlegs]

It's difficult to write a decent review of Karen Joy Fowler's We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves without including significant plot spoilers.

Firstly, the novel is completely delightful, conveying a mix of humour, joy, despair and profound sadness.

The story is narrated by Rosemary Cooke, who is, however, a very unreliable witness to her own story.

Rosemary has a sister Fern and an older brother Lowell, as well as parents who seem dysfunctional on a range of levels. At around age five, Rosemary is sent to spend some time with her parents, and returns to find that Fern is no longer part of the family. Her brother Lowell disappears shortly after that, and Rosemary is left alone to grieve for the two individuals she loved most in her life.

Let's just say that Fern is no ordinary sister.

This novel won the 2014 PEN Faulkner Award and was short-listed for the Man Booker in the same year. It has deservedly won high praise for the skill and quality of its writing and the sensitivity with which it covers its subject matter.

It is a thoroughly engaging, intelligent, surprising and highly recommended book.

4.5 stars out of 5

[Redlegs]

Emile, Jean-Jacques Rousseau's treatise on Education (1762) is ultimately long, rambling and more than a little tedious.

Beginning with Rousseau's ideas on the correct manner in which to educate a male child from infancy to adulthood, it digresses into many areas of philosophical thought.

He later adds his thoughts on the education of girls and women, through the introduction of Emile's female counterpart, Sophy. Modern feminists are likely to be grossly offended by Rousseau's attitudes to the role and worth of women in society.

I found Rousseau's opinions, which are necessarily limited by time and place (18th century Europe) sometimes interesting and well developed, oftentimes strange, and frequently contradictory. His views are more than 250 years old, after all.

But my main beef was that this book was way too long and disorganised to retain my interest or admiration. 3 stars out of 5.

[Wambui-nj]

Gringo: My Life on the Edge as an International Fugitive by Dan Tito Davis with Peter Conti. Rating 4/4

[Manogna Thumukunta]

The last book i read was Nightshade by Nora Roberts. I gave it a pretty low rating because i did not like many things about both the story and the plot progression. I gave it a rating of 2 on 5

[Annika Naramreddy]

The last book I read was Randy Love...at your service by Shay Carter. Great book but could use with a bit of professional editing, I rate it a solid 3 out of 4. The official book review is available on online book club as well.