When in Quarantine, We Read - April Books

2020 Reading Goal: 30/100

1.  Tess of the Road, Rachel Hartman - Oh.  My.  This book has been in my wish list since I read about it in NPR's 2018 Book Concierge.  I've checked it out from the library several times.  I don't know why I never got past the first couple of pages.  I made a snap decision to buy a copy as I was perusing my wish list, and I started reading it the very next day.  And.  Oh.  My.  I adore Tess.  I adore this book.  I adore Rachel Hartman and must-read her Serephina books.  This is a coming of age book and it's a book about healing from trauma.  It's a book about learning how to be yourself and making your own path in the world.  I'd both love to have a sequel, and I'm quite happy to send Tess off into the world on her own.  This book is 100% going on my Best of 2020 list!

2.  The Night Country, Melissa Albert - I'm disappointed.  I adored Albert's first book, The Hazel Wood, but the sequel just didn't live up to it.  It's not good when I start a book, read the first 25-50 pages, and then don't pick it up again for another month.  I will admit that the payoff at the end was good - but it took too long to get there, and I had trouble caring about any of the characters for the first half.  The tone felt kind of whiney for a while, and that was annoying.  I don't know.  I think Albert was trying to say some of the same things that Hartman was saying - but she just didn't get there.

3.  Fledgling, Octavia E. Butler - I have an odd relationship with Butler.  On the one hand, I recognize her literary genius and appreciate her importance.  On the other hand, with the exception of Kindred I've never particularly enjoyed reading her work.  I picked up Fledgling from a sale table some time ago, intrigued by the description of a story about a genetically modified, 53-year-old vampire with amnesia.  It's been on the to-read pile for a very, very long time, though.  (Never a good sign.) Needing a bit of a fairy tale break, I picked it up the same night I finished The Night Country.  To my surprise, I was very quickly pulled into the story and felt compelled to read it as quickly as I could.  Much as it fascinated me, though,  the experience felt very cold.  There just wasn't any emotional warmth to the book at all, and thus no way to connect with the story or the characters.  It was more like reading a great anthropological study than a great novel.  Having said that, I did love this very unique take on a vampire story.  I thought I'd read it all.  I was wrong.

4. The Mermaid's Child, Jo Baker - I wasn't sure what to expect, but I was intrigued by the title and description, and I had loved Baker's Longbourn.  It's a story about an often abused young woman who's looking for her mother, who may be a mermaid.  It's a fantastical tale that stretches the limits of belief, while at the same time bearing so much truth that it hurts.  Curiously, it's my second coming of age novel this month.  I wish the ending had been longer.  It felt right, but it also felt pinched off too soon.  I wanted to know more.

5. The Gilded Wolves, Roshani Chokshi (audio) - I had big expectations based on my reading experiences with Chokshi's earlier books.  Unfortunately, those expectations were not met....which isn't to say that I didn't enjoy this book, it just wasn't what I had hoped it would be.  For starters, it's a heist, which is never my favorite.  Second, Leigh Bardugo did it way better with her Six of Crows duology.  Way better.  Finally, the interesting things really didn't happen until the end, when the group dynamics were upended a bit.  I'm undecided as to whether or not I'll read the next book.  (Although I have preordered it...which I can cancel.)

6.  A Field Guide to Getting Lost, Rebecca Solnit - Lordy.  I have a love/hate relationship with Solnit.  Her writing is gorgeous, and her stories are beautiful.  But.  I quite literally struggle to stay awake while reading her books AND I don't seem to retain anything.  It's not good when you pick up a book and can't remember what you read the day before.  I so want to love Solnit.  I recognize her importance in the literary world, and I do admire what she does.  It's just so boring to read, though.  (Note: While it's true that I seem to need reading material that's high in the engagement factor right now, this is a problem I've always had with Solnit.)

7.  The Queen of Nothing, Holly Black (audio) - Finally, the trilogy is completed!  Felt right to use audio as I listened to the first two books while training for long races.  (Strong memories of where I was when listening to the first as I was training for my first marathon!)  I really like Black's fairy tales, which are every bit as complex as the world of fairy should be.  Light and dark, dangerous and seductive...a caution as much as a temptation.  I forgive Jude for the character qualities which annoyed me in the second book.  I'm also delighted with plot details and character growth on multiple levels.  Quite satisfying.

8. The Queen of All Crows, Rod Duncan - I really enjoyed Duncan's first trilogy about Elizabeth Barnabus, a young woman who moves through a gaslamp Victoriana as a man or a woman as the situation needs.  Elizabeth was a fabulous character in that trilogy, engaging and fully-formed.  It was a series I stumbled across and picked up by instinct, and I loved it!  So here we go with the start of the second series, and it was - well - just ok.  Duncan has clearly grown bored with the world he built, so he's moving his character away.  While the ocean world he built was interesting, it never really captured me as the first books did.  (Hello Waterworld...)  I do still love Elizabeth, though, enough that I read this quickly and then bought the second book.  But.... (See below)

9. A Memory Called Empire, Arkady Martine - This made all of the best of 2019 books and is now up for a Hugo.  I ordinarily don't read science fiction, but for whatever reason, this snagged my attention.  So what did I think?  Hmmm....  I think I read this more with my thinking brain than with my heart.  While I do think it's an excellent book, I also found myself impatient at times - as if it needed some editing to condense it a bit. Ultimately I enjoyed it...but I also don't feel a burning desire to read that sequel. 

Unfinished:

1. The Outlaw and the Upstart King, Rod Duncan
- and here we are.  The second book stunk so bad that I didn't finish it.  I just hated reading it, in large part because we shifted from Elizabeth's perspective to that of an entirely new character that I didn't like or enjoy.  AND, Elizabeth was practically unrecognizable.  The whole thing was set in a new location, and the culture of that location was extremely violent in a way that was offputting.  Huge disappointment.  Huge.

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