Reading

Key of Valor

Key of Valor concludes the Keys trilogy by Nora Roberts.
It follows the same formula as the other two - this time, it's Zoe who has to find the third and final key to unlock the box of trapped souls and brings the overall quest to a conclusion.
Despite being the one of the three women I have the least in common with, Zoe was my favourite, so I was looking forward to spending the book mostly in her perspective - and I did enjoy that.
I loved the continuation of the three women setting up their joint business, I actually really liked spending more time with Zoe's 9-yr-old son, Simon, who was really funny, and the climax of the three-book quest was exciting and satisfying.
BUT - even though I liked how it ended up (especially with the inclusion of Simon), I just couldn't get on board with the romance, because Brad, as in the other two books, was absolutely awful (until he got what he wanted, and then he was amazing, but that might make it worse...).
One scene:
Zoe is annoyed by Brad's continued advances and expresses her rejection of him very clearly.
Brad GRABS her, LIFTS her, SWINGS her round, PRESSES her up against a wall, and KISSES her - all very much without her permission.
Worse scene:
They're in the car and Zoe is annoyed that Brad is always trying to diminish her independence by doing things for her without asking her first. She tells him angrily that she doesn't want a Prince Charming to rescue her.
Brad pulls over, says, "Fuck Prince Charming," squashes Zoe up against the door and kisses her again.
Zoe SCREAMS and STRUGGLES and the narrative says that it's a straight-up contest between her strength and his, that he 'brutally' demonstrates his dominance and that the kiss has 'nothing to do with romance and everything to do with anger'.
YIKES!!
So, no - sadly, I can't condone them getting together, however beautifully their relationship is presented in the end, and however sweet and funny the interactions are between Brad and Simon.
Ah well - I still enjoyed the series a lot overall!

The Perfume Collector

The Perfume Collector by Kathleen Tessaro tells the story of Grace Munro, who receives a mysterious inheritance from a woman she's never heard of, which takes her to Paris to uncover a story of lost perfumes and unknown family connections.
It's exactly the kind of book I needed this week and I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish.
It's a split timeline - Grace investigating her past in Paris in 1955, and her mysterious benefactor, Eva, whose story unfolds in England and across Europe in the 1920s, 30s and 40s.
I was generally more engaged in Grace's story, but they are closely intertwined and I never found myself wanting to skim to get through the book faster. I loved the development of Grace's relationship with Monsieur Tissot the French lawyer, as well as her breezy interactions with her friend Mallory from back home.
The story itself was indulgent at times and sordid at others, and I thought it built up over the course of the book brilliantly and in a very compelling way.
At root, it was very predictable, but I didn't care - though I did feel the ultimate conclusion seemed very rushed and I would have preferred to spend more time with Grace after all the reveals and her eventual decisions about what she wanted to do with her life going forward.
Really involving and highly entertaining, though!

Entry tags:

50th,
birthday

Another year older

Yesterday I turned 50, which feels like it should be a bit of a milestone, but in reality has just been an excuse for a lot of cake.

We went away as a family at Halloween, as it was the end of half term and meant we could get a slightly longer weekend away. Three days in a collection of cabins in the Forest of Dean, with Forest Holidays. We nominally had a halloween party on Friday night and a birthday party on Saturday but it was kind of hard to tell which bits were party (having an age range from 7 to 73 makes for rather varied party requirements) but there was cake and fizz and cocktails, and we did an outdoor puzzle game with the kids, and Mike and dad joined me in trying axe throwing, and we had a nice walk through the forest down to the river Wye with a very sulky Matthew and generally had a good time :)

Yesterday I decided not to take the day off work, and instead took in cake to share in the morning, and took my immediate colleagues to the pub at lunchtime (though they wouldn't let me pay for drinks). We had pizza and fizz and more cake for tea, and a generally chilled out and lovely day. Matthew has an inset day on Friday, so Mike's taking the day off too, and we'll go out for a visit to the Botanic Gardens and lunch at Browns. And I've invited some friends round in the morning to help eat up cake, instead of meeting them at a coffee shop (which is my usual Friday routine).

I suggested to Mobbsy and David that we should do a celebration of 150 years between us, given what a good party we had for our joint 90th, but I never did get round to throwing a party this time. We shall try and make it out to the pub next Wednesday evening instead. And next Friday our little coffee gang will be going our to the village annual wine tasting/dinner - organised by the twinning association. And then I think I'll be more or less done with birthday celebrations for the year. Thanks so much to everyone who found me elsewhere on social media (or text message, or card) to say Happy Birthday, it's been very much appreciated!

Brigands and Breadknives

Brigands & Breadknives by Travis Baldree is the follow-up to Bookshops & Bonedust, the prequel to Legends & Lattes - and I'd been looking forward to its release this month.
I listened to the audiobook, as I have with all of them, since Baldree is a professional audiobook narrator, narrates all his own books, and is really good. I love the way he embodies all the characters, making them all engaging and distinct without straying into caricature.
This story follows Fern, the ratkin bookseller befriended by Viv in the prequel, as she tries to find purpose in her life again - getting embroiled in the adventures of an elven bounty hunter along the way.
And - it was fine.
Don't get me wrong - it was an easy and entertaining listen - but it didn't really grab me like the other two, and I felt it was rather lacking in the emotional depth and wonderful found family vibes that made the others so heartwarming and thoroughly enjoyable.
I did love the breadknife of the title - he was definitely my favourite character, and I'm glad to be keeping up with the series - but I definitely missed the community and shop-running focus of the previous two books, and it was a shame that Fern was the only recurring character to really feature in the story.

Amber Anthem and Emerald Gate

The Amber Anthem is the fourth volume of the 5 Worlds comic book series by Mark & Alexis Siegel - and my favourite of the set. I loved how everyone came together to complete the mission and how it brought an end finally to the problematic attitudes of one of the main characters. It was a great lead-in to the ultimate conclusion - and the sentient oil was particularly awesome.

The Emerald Gate is the fifth and final instalment of the 5 World comic book series and provided a very satisfying ending to the whole story arc. I'm really glad I found this series and I thoroughly enjoyed it all the way through. Great characters, layered story, high stakes and emotional depth, great found family and some really beautiful art. Highly recommended.

Keys and Beacons

Key of Knowledge by Nora Roberts is the middle instalment of her Keys trilogy, in which three young women are selected to undertake a quest to find three keys, in order to free three demi-goddesses, whose souls have been trapped in a magical box for 3000 years.
This book tells Dana's story, looking for the titular Key of Knowledge, and rediscovering love with an old flame along the way. She and the other two protagonist, Mallory and Zoe, are also in the process of opening a combined beauty salon, art gallery and bookshop - and Dana is the bookseller of the group.
It's all very silly and predictable, but so much fun. I really like this world and these characters - though the romance aspect is even worse than in the first book, with two of the men planting surprise kisses on the objects of their affections at moments directly after the women have very specifically rejected them. Grrrr!
Still, I can't deny I really enjoyed this audiobook and I'm looking forward to completing the series with Key of Valor in the near future.
I especially liked the focus on books and writing in this one. And the dog is still awesome.

The Sand Warrior by Mark and Alexis Siegel is the first in the 5 Worlds comic book series, in which three young protagonists set out on a mission to light beacons across the titular five worlds, in order to reverse a climate catastrophe. Along the way, they face opposition from various of the worlds' leaders, as well as a dark entity called the Mimic.
There's a huge amount of diversity in this series - but also a lot of very complex racial politics and intolerance. Most of the authority figures turn out to be weak, corrupted or evil, leaving the youngsters floundering in trying to establish the right path to victory and unable to figure out who they should believe.
Deeper than I expected in a lot of ways, also very exciting and fun.

The Cobalt Prince continues the 5 Worlds series, with even higher stakes, even more deception from the authorities, some very weird genetic identity layers, intolerant attitudes from one of our protagonists (though clearly part of a journey of improvement), an unexpectedly high body count, and some pretty emotional aspects.
I'm really enjoying this series and keen to find out where it goes.

The Red Maze is the third in the 5 Worlds series and the best yet - really exciting, lots of interesting character development and intriguing plot. Raised stakes, great found family vibes, engaging new characters and new questions to be answered.

Winter Burrow

I tried out some game demos from Steam last week and discovered Winter Burrow, a resource management and survival game about a young mouse travelling back to their childhood burrow in the woods, after losing their parents in the city.

The cutesy art style and adorable anthropomorphic animal characters are rather at odds with the constant threat of freezing to death and brutal attacks by giant insects...

However, the cold is manageable, once you get the hang of things (my biggest problem at the start was getting lost and not being able to find my way back to the burrow in time) and the combat wasn't too difficult to master.

The storyline was mostly really lovely (with a few rather traumatic incidents along the way) and I really enjoyed completing all the various quests, which were all to do with helping and building bonds with other creatures throughout the forest.

I also particular liked the cooking progression tree, working my way up to the more complicated recipes, so as to be able to better prepare myself for the longer journeys that were required later on in the game.

It took me 12 hours to complete the whole thing, which felt about right for both the story and the repetitive nature of the gameplay.

This game was just what I was looking for - some challenges, a good story, a clear to-do list and not too grindy. It was shorter than I would have preferred for the price, but I might have got bored with it if it had gone on much longer, so I think it's been well designed after all.

The Story of a New Name

This is the second of the Neopolitan novels by Elena Ferrante.
I enjoyed the first one a couple of months ago, but just really couldn't get into this one.
It's very similar in style and content - so I think I just wasn't in the right frame of mind for it when I picked it up.
I've given up on it for now, but I may come back to the series at a future date.

Current Mood: cheerful

Entry tags:

Costa Xmas range

We had a family trip to Costa today to try out their Xmas range. Dom had the Caramel Nutcracker Latte, Bea went for the Chocolate Orange Hot Chocolate whilst Ryan and I had Gingerbread Lattes. The others all went for savoury options to eat but I chose the Festive Spice Muffin. I thoroughly enjoyed both my drink and muffin and I'm rather sorry that they aren't available all year round.

Snap by Belinda Bauer

At the start of Snap by Belinda Bauer, three young children are left in a car by the side of a motorway when it breaks down and their mother leaves them to find an emergency phone to call for help - and never comes back...
Things devolve quickly from there in quite unpleasant ways - and, after not that far into the book, I decided it wasn't for me. I wasn't invested enough in the mystery to want to find out what happened and parts of it were quite creepy in a way I wasn't keen on.
So, a DNF, unfortunately.

Amulet Revisited

I reread the whole Amulet comic book series by Kazu Kibuishi over the last few days, as it was picked by Dave for our next family book club meeting.

The art is gorgeous - especially all the double-page spreads - I love all the characters, and I'm impressed by the depth and complexity of the story and the emotional arcs.

I didn't enjoy it quite as much this time around - but it's still awesome.

The Strength of the Few

I was really looking forward to continuing with the Hierarchy series by James Islington...
Rare occasion of my jumping on the band wagon, reading a really popular book and then getting hold of the sequel as soon as it comes out.
Decided to go with the audiobook because I didn’t want to buy a hardback or wait for ages from the library
Looking back on The Will of the Many now – I don’t have wildly positive feelings towards it (other than the desperate need to know what happens after the cliffhanger ending) – though my review from last year is definitely very positive.
And then I listened to about the first hour of the book – and I just didn’t care…
Audiobook probably wasn’t the best choice because I struggle when I can’t visualise character names and there was a huge amount of background info that was hard to follow…
I decided I didn't want to commit to 30 hours listening to a book I wasn't that interested in, so I DNF'd.

The Map & The Echo

This was a weird but fun event at the British Library.
We started by getting access to the current Secret Maps exhibition, which had some very interesting stuff in it (silk underwear made from World War Two escape maps, some really beautiful maps from the 1500s, a hilarious Sellafield tourist poster from 1989).
Then we got a tour through the library from a very engaging guide, who talked about various aspects of the building and the collection that aren't easily visible.
The evening culminated in an entertaining choose-your-own-adventure performance from a very impressive guy, who led us through the adventure, asking different members of the audience to make choices about what to do and where to go. I was amazed by his ability to keep track of where we were and deliver the relevant room description at each point. It was also very funny when we kept ending up in the same place over and over again and he had to keep describing it. The eventual outcome of the game was very sweet, and I had a lot of fun.

Mysterious Houses

Rose/House by Arkady Martine is an odd little novella about a locked-room murder in a house embodied by a very sophisticated AI. I liked the atmosphere, the mystery and all the different viewpoint characters, though I have to admit I don't think I fully understood even aspect of what happened... The changing dynamics between the various characters and the house were particularly well portrayed, though, as was the house's very alien perspectives on things. I definitely didn't enjoy this as much as Martine's space opera duology, but it was an interesting read and the audiobook was a good choice because the narrator did the house's detached, slightly creepy voice really well.

Asa James by Jodi Lew-Smith was my first ever Netgalley ARC and I really lucked out because I absolutely loved this book! It's set in the 1870s, following the titular character as he navigated finding his place in the world. Asa grows up on a poor farm, which provides work and shelter for troubled youth, though his status is more as part of the family, since he was 'adopted' by those running the farm as a baby. He eventually leaves and finds a job as a tutor at a large country house in Vermont, where he quickly builds close ties with the inhabitants. There's a lot about societal status, ethnic identity, pursuing dreams and education outside of background circumstances, and where morality fits in with rigid societal expectations and the desire to be happy. The characters were extremely well drawn and engaging, as was the setting. There were a few inconsistencies here and there in the story (and one quite glaring cliche in the central mystery), which detracted a bit from my enjoyment, but the book also took me by surprise with most of its twists and turns, and I thought Asa's overall journey was very satisfying in both physical and mental terms. Highly recommended if you like compelling and immersive historical dramas with layered characters, interesting themes and emotional depth.

Red White & Royal Blue

Red White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston was a reread for me - and I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would (and more than I thought I had the first time around, but what do I know?).

The premised is extremely ridiculous - the first female US president's son in a romance with one of the grandsons of the British monarch - but once you go with it, it's generally very well executed.

It certainly shows a 2020 I really wish we'd had, rather than the one we actually lived through...

The romance builds very credibly and is very cute and heartwarming, even if the seriousness of the relationship seems a bit OTT and a bit fast - but hey, it's a romance book, so what did I expect?

And I also enjoyed the politics - both small 'p' and big 'P' - of which there was more than I'd remembered.

It's all a complete fantasy but overall a very enjoyable one.

I also watched the 2023 film version and really enjoyed that too - though the pacing made the whole thing even more ridiculously fast, and some of the compression of characters and plot points was a bit disappointing, even though I could see why it was done. Awesome casting all round - especially Sarah Shahi - apart from Stephen Fry, who was a very odd choice for the hidebound and homophobic king...