For the month of April, we have to pick a book that’s been left on the list for more than 6 months, and this book definitely fits the bill.  for a start, I never quite finished the original by Morgenstern.  For another, this abridged version by William Goldman has been left to gather dust since, gosh, last July?  Anyway, here’s the verdict: 

Title: The Princess Bride

Author: William Goldman, who abridged S. Morgenstern’s original into what he calls the ‘good parts’ version as read to him by his father.

Year published:1998, first published in 1973

Why did you get this book?
I never quite finished reading the Morgensten original in my teens, so when I stumbled upon this abridged copy by William Goldman, who’s a great fan of this ‘classic tale of true love and high adventure’, I had to try to at least complete it … y’know get the full picture.

Do you like the cover?
I like this cover quite well. I think it depicts Buttercup and Westley escaping the evil cowardly Prince Humperdinck and it evokes the mood pretty well.

Did you enjoy the book?
Okay, a warning first.  If you hate cliffhanger endings, don’t pick this up. Morgenstern actually left the story dangling so you’re left to wonder a little over whether the protagonists escaped the villian or not. That said, I enjoyed it so much I’m going to try borrowing the original from the library. I’m going to look out for the sequel, Butercup’s Baby. This copy includes the first chapter of the long-lost sequel, and it reads like another adventure.

Another update: Early this morning, Yahoo’s server came back on, and the import tool worked!!!!

Oh yes, so I quickly ported over all my blogger posts to my new home over here at http://inmybooks.com and am now going over the posts and adding the split page tag to the longer ones so they don’t eat up all the space. But I’ll still keep this my Blogger blog if the Qumana tool works out fine this round. One blog guru (think it was Scoble) who advised not changing URI, but hey, since I can cross post I don’t see this as much of a problem. Besides, I’m still adding links and widgets over at my new pad.

On a brighter note, I finished reading The Princess Bride for April’s challenge, so the review will be coming soon.

With no need for a WP-hosted one (it was a dummy just to test out the importing function, I deleted it.) Sorry, Kristie, couldn’t save your comment.

And thanks so much for your concern and encouragement too, Maili. They fixed the bug after all, so my importing frustrations are over. I’m very glad to inform you both that, except that I still can’t make up my mind between a 2-column or 3-column layout, In My Books is up and running. FINALLY!!!! Yippee!

Update 27 April: I’ve discovered that Qumana does not work with this Yahoo server hosted blog.  Which means I have to make a decision whether to keep the Blogger blog or not. Hmmm … decisions,decisions ….

I’m testing out the Qumana blog editor here and attemtpting to cross post to my BookLover blog,as well as my Wordpress hosted blog since my InMyBooks WP hosted on Yahoo server is down. AND it appears I’m not the only one. My IT colleague at work actually advised me to select another host, just not Yahoo — he hasn’t heard great things about their web hosting services. I should heed that warning.

Yep, it’s been a tumultous journey to say the least. Since last Tuesday, I’ve been trying to set up a Wordpress blog on Yahoo, since I already have a Yahoo ID, and I’ve read that the partnership with WP allows WP user to easily add several tools such as a built in Flickr album, and several other goodies that come with activating a WP blog on Y!.

Selected a few themes (see below images posted manually above) and finally settled on the Narnia theme. Then, disaster struck when I tried to import my posts from Blogger but couldn;t. I trawled the support forums and tried various methods and suggestions, reading and re-reading the installation instructions over and over and over. I was up at it for two night straight trying all kinds of tricks to get this done.

Got my own domain, setup this WP-blog, hosted on Yahoo, but the blogger posts and comments refused to be imported.

I’ve simply lost count of the number of attempts! I’m going to give this blogger’s tips a try tomorrow. And if that don’t work ….

I’m in for the night.

Thanks, Maili and Kristie, for dropping by!

I was experiencing what those gorgeous Georgians would call ennui, only in this instance it’s a reading slump I’ve fallen into trying to get past the half-way mark of Judith Ivory’s The Proposition, when I decided to give the latter a rest and try reading Heiress for a change on Friday. 

It turned out to be a good choice after all. Reading the synopsis, you would have dismissed this as nothing more than another contemporary fluff, something of a spoof of the reality TV show, The Simple Life.

But this is a truly surprising find for me. It was a hilarious, laugh-a-minute great read, perfect for that entertaining break between period and serious literature that I badly needed to recharge myself on my reading journey. [Not to mention the TBR challenge].

Picked up this book from a rental ‘cos I couldn’t remember if I’d read it. But when I settled down one week night last week to read, memories started flooding in by the end of page 2, and I recalled this is one of the books by Thornton that I enjoyed.

She writes such intense romances, and in this instance the relationship between hero and heroine is tempestuous, wildly passionate and at times reckless.

Dangerous. Wild. Reckless. Those were the words that crossed Serena Ward’s mind when she met Julian Raynor. But she never thought they would also describe her relationship, and marriage, to him. Our star-crossed lovers met when Serena was disguised as an aspiring actress while stowing Jacobites to safety, and needed to steer clear of the militia when they surprised a check on the tavern she was gambling at. She thought to make use of Julian, only they both ended up in bed but parted on acrimonious terms.

Julian, who is really a Renney, has vowed to avenge his parents’ death on her father, so when he learnt of her true identity, he manipulated her, with the help of her footman and some friends, into a hasty wedding. His excuse was to get at her father through her, at first, but he’s also wildly attracted to her, having tasted her passion on that unfortunate night. They couldn’t foresee the dangers and treachery headed their way which could either destroy the love/hate relationship utterly, or really strengthen their feelings for each other.