WWW Wednesday is a meme hosted by Sam at Taking on a World of Words. It’s open for anyone to join in and is a great way to share what you’ve been reading! All you have to do is answer three questions and share a link to your blog in the comments section of Sam’s blog.

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?

What did you recently finish reading?

What do you think you’ll read next?

What I’m reading now:

Quicksand by Steve Toltz

This week I started reading Quicksand and am racing through it, I’ve almost finished it already. I’m not sure what I was expecting from this book, but what I got is very different to anything else I’ve read in quite a while. I’m really enjoying it and I’ll be reviewing it on Friday for the blog tour.

Synopsis:

A daring, brilliant work by one of our most original and fearless novelists.

‘Why should I let you write about me?’
‘Because you’ll inspire people. To count their blessings.’

Aldo Benjamin, relentlessly unlucky in every aspect of life, has always faced the future with despair and optimism in equal measure. His latest misfortune, however, may finally be his undoing. There’s still hope, but not for Aldo.

His mate Liam hasn’t been faring much better – a failed writer with a rocky marriage and a dangerous job he never wanted – until he finds inspiration in Aldo’s exponential disasters. What begins as an attempt to document these improbable but inevitable experiences spirals into a profound exploration of fate, fear and friendship.

Anarchically funny and wildly entertaining, Quicksand is a subversive portrait of 21st-century society in all its hypocrisy and absurdity, an exquisite interpretation of suffering and resilience, and a powerful story about taking risks and finding inspiration.

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When She Was Bad by Tammy Cohen

I also started reading When She Was Bad this week. This book is an ARC that I was lucky to be approved for on Net Galley, it’s not out until April but I just couldn’t resist picking it up straight away. I love Tammy Cohen’s writing, and although her books always majorly give me the creeps and really unsettle me I just can’t resist them!

Synopsis:

YOU SEE THE PEOPLE YOU WORK WITH EVERY DAY.

BUT WHAT CAN’T YOU SEE?

Amira, Sarah, Paula, Ewan and Charlie have worked together for years – they know how each one likes their coffee, whose love life is a mess, whose children keep them up at night. But their comfortable routine life is suddenly shattered when an aggressive new boss walks in ….

Now, there’s something chilling in the air.

Who secretly hates everyone?

Who is tortured by their past?

Who is capable of murder?

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Truth, Lies and, O-Rings: Inside the Space Shuttle Disaster by Allan J. McDonald & James R. Hansen

I’ve always been fascinated by all things space and space travel. I’ll never forget the day Challenger exploded because it happened on a day that was special to me and I’ll never forget my dad rushing in the door from work and putting the news on and us seeing the explosion. I was too young at the time to really grasp the wider significance of what had happened that day but over the years I’ve wanted to know more. This book is much more technical than any other book I’ve read on the subject so it’s going to take me a while to read it. It’s an eye-opening book though.

Synopsis:

On a cold January morning in 1986, NASA launched the Space Shuttle Challenger, despite warnings against doing so by many individuals, including Allan McDonald. The fiery destruction of Challenger on live television moments after launch remains an indelible image in the nation’s collective memory.

In Truth, Lies, and O-Rings, McDonald, a skilled engineer and executive, relives the tragedy from where he stood at Launch Control Center. As he fought to draw attention to the real reasons behind the disaster, he was the only one targeted for retribution by both NASA and his employer, Morton Thiokol, Inc., makers of the shuttle’s solid rocket boosters. In this whistle-blowing yet rigorous and fair-minded book, McDonald, with the assistance of internationally distinguished aerospace historian James R. Hansen, addresses all of the factors that led to the accident, some of which were never included in NASA’s Failure Team report submitted to the Presidential Commission.

Truth, Lies, and O-Rings is the first look at the Challenger tragedy and its aftermath from someone who was on the inside, recognized the potential disaster, and tried to prevent it. It also addresses the early warnings of very severe debris issues from the first two post-Challenger flights, which ultimately resulted in the loss of Columbia some fifteen years later.

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This week has got off to a tough start with a medical appointment on Monday morning that has left me with increased pain and spasms so I haven’t managed to finish reading these books, which I started before this week. They’re all great reads though and are keeping me hooked.

A Proper Family Christmas by Chrissie Manby

Ghostbird by Carol Lovekin

A Mother’s Reckoning by Sue Klebold

Sally Ride by Lynn Sherr

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What I recently finished reading: 

Bone by Bone by Sanjida Kay

I started this book one day last week and finished it the following day. It just grabbed me straight away and I couldn’t put it down! I plan to review this on my blog in the next week or so.

Synopsis:

Laura loves her daughter more than anything in the world. 

But nine-year-old daughter Autumn is being bullied. Laura feels helpless.

When Autumn fails to return home from school one day, Laura goes looking for her. She finds a crowd of older children taunting her little girl.

In the heat of the moment, Laura makes a terrible choice. A choice that will have devastating consequences for her and her daughter…

A Woman in A Million by Monica Wood (short story)

This was a free short story available on Kindle. It’s the prequel to the forthcoming novel One in a Million Boy, which I cannot wait to read. This prequel has really got me very keen to start the book, it’s a wonderful story.

Synopsis:

If you loved The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry and The Shock of the Fall, this is for you…
There’s someone you should meet. But, before you do…
She’s just turned one hundred. She doesn’t want a birthday party. Or a TV interview. She’s too busy practising for her driving test. And hoodwinking church visitors with magic tricks. She’s Miss Ona Vitkus. And she’s one in a million.
Warm, funny and heartbreaking, this short-story prequel to THE ONE IN A MILLION BOY – the book destined to be on everyone’s lips this summer – will make you laugh and cry with the turn of a page.

 

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What I plan on reading next:

The Truth about Julia by Anna Schaffner

I was sent this review book unsolicited but it sounds so good and I really want to start reading it very soon. I reckon it’ll be a book that hooks me in very fast and will be one I want to read in one go!

Synopsis:

In June 2014, Julia White – a beautiful and intelligent young woman – blows up a coffee shop in central London, killing twenty-four people before turning herself in to the police. Apart from publishing a potentially ironic manifesto, she refuses to explain the reasons for her actions.

Clare Hardenberg, an investigative journalist, has been commissioned to write a biography of Julia but at the start of the novel she is on her way to prison herself. What has brought her to this point?

The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena

I spotted this one on Net Galley and couldn’t resist requesting it, it sounds like such a good read. It’s not due to be published until July but I don’t think I’ll be able to resist starting it for much longer!

Synopsis:

You never know what’s happening on the other side of the wall.

Your neighbour told you that she didn’t want your six-month-old daughter at the dinner party. Nothing personal, she just couldn’t stand her crying.

Your husband said it would be fine. After all, you only live next door. You’ll have the baby monitor and you’ll take it in turns to go back every half hour.

Your daughter was sleeping when you checked on her last. But now, as you race up the stairs in your deathly quiet house, your worst fears are realized. She’s gone.

You’ve never had to call the police before. But now they’re in your home, and who knows what they’ll find there.

What would you be capable of, when pushed past your limit?

 

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What are you reading at the moment? Have you finished any good books recently? Any books you’re looking forward to reading soon? Please feel free to join in with this meme and share your link below, or if you don’t have a blog please share in the comments below.