Another week, more fun books!
Jana: This week I waited for new glasses to arrive; I finally admitted to myself that experiencing constant eyestrain-related headaches and just scooting my monitor closer are not long-term solutions to everything becoming increasingly blurry. So while I can still read books in short spurts if I hold them just so, and I can get reviews written by hand, I’m spending less time at the computer than I would like. It is…frustrating, to say the least. I finished Mira Grant’s In the Shadow of Spindrift House and read Jane Yolen & Adam Stemple’s novella The Last Tsar’s Dragons, and had drastically different reactions to each. (Reviews inbound, pending those life-changing spectacles.)
Kat: My second summer course started this week and now I’ve got 150 freshmen in my life, so reading stalled a bit. I managed to finish Melanie Rawn’s Stronghold, the first book in her DRAGON STAR trilogy (but really the fourth book in her DRAGON PRINCE trilogy). I struggled to get through it, but I finally finished it. I reluctantly started the next book, The Dragon Token, and made it halfway through, but then had to quit. My freshmen’s panicked emails were more entertaining.
Marion: I finished The Grand Dark by Richard Kadrey. The review has been posted. Today I’m starting Malka Older’s third CENTENAL CYCLE book, State Tectonics.
Ray: I’m still pointing the finger at George Martin for being so quiet these past few months, but I’ve finally finished A Feast for Crows and am going to take a little break so I can turn my eye to other stories… This week I started my first Mark Lawrence novel, Red Sister. Maybe not the best book to read straight after a Game of Thrones binge (it’s impossible not to compare), but so far so good.
Sandy: Moi? After having enjoyed John Taine’s fifth novel, The Greatest Adventure, I am now going back to his very first, 1924’s The Purple Sapphire, which has been reprinted for the first time in over 70 years by the fine folks at Armchair Fiction; part of their Lost World/Lost Race series of 24 titles. I look forward to reporting back to you all on this one shortly….
Skye: I was part of a book club! We read The Traitor Baru Cormorant and I can HIGHLY recommend reading it with other people – I don’t know what I would have done if I couldn’t yell (sometimes literally) about it every other week. I’ve been picking away at An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green. While I think it could be a quick read, it’s got one of those characters that hits just a little too close to home, so I’ve been taking it a bit at a time.
Good luck with the glasses, Jana. If you’re like me, the eyestrain headaches will end immediately and you’ll be surprised at the degree of relief.
I am very, very much looking forward to a decrease in headaches and eyestrain! (And getting back to a normal workload, too, because all play and no work makes Jana a dull girl.)
Kat, I still remember writing panicked e-mails to my professors — looking back on them, I imagine some WERE highly entertaining to read!