New reads:

This week, I'm reading Written in My Own Heart's Blood by Diana Gabaldon. It's the eighth and latest installment in the Outlander series. I've slowly been making my way thru the series (see here, here, and here for a peek into the series) and have finally caught up. Even though I got this book when it came out last summer, I was way too busy and way too sleep-deprived to pick it up. So, it sat patiently waiting on my bookshelf until I felt ready to pick it up. I chose it for the #7 pick on the "26 books to read in 2015" list: a book by an author you love and finally got around to picking it up.

I'm not done with it but so far, I'm loving it. These books are big, each one close to 1,000 pages. They're a commitment and while I love the story, sometimes they can drag on. This one doesn't seem to be that way though. I'm a lot more involved in the story this time and eager to see where it leads. I've been breezing thru it and really enjoying the adventure I'm on. It takes a good storyteller to keep an reader's attention for so long. Gabaldon does an excellent job.

Here's the plot summary, if you're interested:

"In her now classic novel Outlander, Diana Gabaldon told the story of Claire Randall, an English ex-combat nurse who walks through a stone circle in the Scottish Highlands in 1946, and disappears... into 1743. The story unfolded from there in seven bestselling novels, and has been called 'a grand adventure written on a canvas that probes the heart, weighs the soul and measures the human spirit across [centuries].' Now the story continues in Written in My Own Heart's Blood.

1778: France declares war on Great Britain, the British Army leaves Philadelphia, and George Washington's troops leave Valley Forge in pursuit. At this moment, Jamie Fraser returns from a presumed watery grave to discover that his best friend has married his wife, his illegitimate son has discovered (to his horror) who his father really is, and his beloved nephew, Ian, wants to marry a Quaker. Meanwhile, Jamie's wife, Claire, and his sister, Jenny, are busy picking up the pieces. 

The Frasers can only be thankful that their daughter Brianna and her family are safe in twentieth-century Scotland. Or not. In fact, Brianna is searching for her own son, who was kidnapped by a man determined to learn her family's secrets. Her husband, Roger, has ventured into the past in search of the missing boy... never suspecting that the object of his quest has not left the present. Now, with Roger out of the way, the kidnapper can focus on his true target: Brianna herself.

Written in My Own Heart's Blood is the brilliant next chapter in a masterpiece of the imagination unlike any other."

I'm hoping to finish it this weekend. And good thing, too -- I have been neglecting all of my other projects and responsibilities (not of the parental variety, don't worry). I have a lot of other things I should be working on but can't seem to put this book down to get anything done.