The New Me
Oh look, I finished an actual novel – for adults! I didn’t love The New Me but I didn’t hate it either. A little too cynical, misanthropic, and depressing for a readathon, probably.
Women
Dreams of Falling
Another Karen White book set in South Carolina. Georgetown, this time. I liked Dreams of Falling, though I did find it just a little bit slow. I also didn’t really love Larkin and was a lot more invested in Bitty, CeeCee, and Margaret – even Ivy was more interesting than Larkin.
More important than this book is that I just realized I missed some of the Tradd Street books and there’s another book co-written by WIllig, Williams, and White. Must reserve, soon!
The House of Unexpected Sisters
It’s been a long time since we listened to a #1 Ladies Detective Agency book. Our darn library has significantly reduced the number of audiobooks available (even on digital versions) so I was pretty pleased to see that one of their new e-Book services had The House of Unexpected Sisters. It was fun to listen to, mostly on our drive to WDW, and I enjoyed it a lot more than I have some of the other books recently published in the series.
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To Die But Once
We did it… we finished an Overdrive audiobook before it was viciously yanked from my account by the library’s annoying rule about NO renewals of Overdrive books. Hmph. Anyway, we listened to To Die But Once and yippee, Maisie Dobbs.
In the (very long) epilogue I started feeling some anxiety about how Maisie Dobbs and Maggie Hope are crossing streams. I keep picturing Maisie as the woman in the Maggie Hope books who oversees the Prime Minister’s special project, (what is her name? It isn’t Maisie Dobbs, that’s for sure.)… and the picture just doesn’t work. I might have to just be very careful not to read the two series really close together. (Big problem since there’s a Maggie Hope book waiting for us at the library and because I’m about to reserve the next Maisie Dobbs. Ugh.)
Two Maggie Hope Books!
Yep, I finished two Maggie Hope books this month. Back to back, even! (The Queen’s Accomplice and the Paris Spy.)
I ranted for a bit after the Queen’s Accomplice because it seemed like a bit of a wasted book. Did we really need that fake Jack the Ripper stuff? Also, I think it was titled poorly. In the past, the X’s _____ meant Maggie worked with or on behalf of the X. In this book, not so much really. Instead, Maggie took advantage of her relationship with the Queen to ask for favors. That’s not her being the Queen’s accomplice. That’s the Queen being HER accomplice. I didn’t hate the book, I just felt like it dragged on and the places where the storyline progressed could have been done more quickly and efficiently in other ways.
Having said that, the Paris Spy was nicely set up by the events that did happy in The Queen’s Accomplice. (Minus the fake Jack the Ripper stuff.) And I think this is one of my favorite Maggie Hope books in a long, long time. The cliffhanger is VERY CLIFFHANGERY and I need the next book ASAP. Sheesh.
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Young Jane Young
Woot, we finished an audiobook! Right after we finished the last audiobook, which was MONTHS ago (or at the very least, weeks ago) I didn’t have another one waiting for us so I just grabbed something we hadn’t read that also looked like we wouldn’t hate it.
So, I ended up with Young Jane Young.
I didn’t hate it but didn’t love it. I liked parts of it quite a bit. I did not like the “choose your own adventure” section at the end. TW apparently didn’t enjoy the book at all.
The Plastic Magician
Once I got over the fact that The Plastic Magician isn’t part of the Paper Magician series but is about completely different people, I enjoyed it. (Many characters from the Paper Magician trilogy do make appearances in The Plastic Magician, so that’s a bonus.)
I might actually like Alvie better than Ceony.
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Lady Jayne Disappears
I was pleasantly surprised by Lady Jayne Disappears. It was a pretty decent mystery that kept me trying to sort out the mystery right up until the end. The love story part was pretty typical of books of this nature. All in all, a good way to end the reverse readathon and it was easy to finish the next day.
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Stray City
Yay! Lesbian fiction I don’t hate! LOL
Stray City was very good. I liked every one of the characters. It’s exactly how you’d picture Portland in the late 90s. The Lesbian Mafia and Family dinners are perfectly imperfect. I didn’t even mind the jump from 1999 to 2009, and I normally find that really annoying.
The Master Magician
I finally, FINALLY finished The Master Magician. I started it a couple of weeks ago and couldn’t get into it. Too much work stress and then a trip to California and then the boys and their parents moved to Georgia and I just didn’t read a darn thing.
This book moved really quickly, once Ceony moved out of Magician Thane’s house. It also didn’t feel very suspenseful, which is interesting since they were fighting the Excisioner. Overall, I liked the book but I wish Ceony had really been recognized as a Master Magician.
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