This book has been on my radar for quite some time—I’m always up for a good urban fantasy every once in a while, and the V.E. Schwab comparison had me hesitantly optimistic. I figured it would be a good read for AAPI Heritage Month, but…alas, it was such a mess, and ultimately not worth my time.
Joan is set to have the perfect summer. She’s staying in London with her late mother’s side of the family, amidst historical buildings, a steady job (with a handsome co-worker, Nick), and the smell of magic in the air. But when a disaster leaves most of her family dead, Joan is confronted with an ugly truth—she comes from a long line of time-stealing monsters. Worse still, the handsome Nick comes from a long line of monster hunters. Can Joan hone her powers before the monster hunters track her down?
TW/CW (from Vanessa Len): murder, violence, blood, loss of loved ones (on & off-page), substance abuse, xenophobia (fantasy), racism, interrogation, brainwashing, weapon use
DNF at 27%.
Before I get into my rant: I’ll always appreciate how much time and love it takes to write a book and put it out there. Any kind of creative output like this is highly admirable, and I can give this novel a certain degree of slack knowing that it’s Vanessa Len’s debut novel. That being said, Only a Monster really wasn’t it for me, and sometimes 1-star rants can be good for the soul as long as they aren’t actively hurting anybody. Gotta air it all out sometimes.
I went into Only a Monster expecting for it to be a nice break from some of the denser books I’d just read—something fun, something charmingly over-the-top. And…well, the over-the-top element was very much present, but not in a good way at all. From what I read of this novel, it was really just a mess that lacked any sort of nuance whatsoever.
We had the setup right from the start—a monsters versus monster-hunters conflict, “Joan is not the hero of this story,” et cetera, et cetera. Before reading this, I figured a lot of that language was just going to be for the sake of putting a nice hook on the front cover and other marketing purposes; I assumed that the book was going to get into some of the morally gray (as much of a buzzword that’s become with books these days) aspects of that conflict, but…no. From the get-go, we’re hit over the head with a comically large sledgehammer that JOAN IS NOT THE HERO OF THE STORY!!! and that BEING A MONSTER IS BAD BAD BAD!! and that MONSTERS AND HEROES!!!! DO NOT MIX!!! EVER!!! It’s not so much a theme so much as it is a metal pipe that gets painfully shoved down your throat. It got to the point where I felt like it was insulting my intelligence—I didn’t need to be told all this over and over. I really didn’t. Jeez. It could’ve been developed somewhat compellingly, but….no.
Beyond that, I didn’t know going in to Only a Monster that there was going to be a dreaded love triangle, which…[EXTREMELY LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER]
If there’s anything that can instantly ruin a book, it’s that. THERE’S NO NEED. And the setup wasn’t even anything that hasn’t been done before—each love interest is on one side of the conflict (monster and monster-hunter), and while I didn’t care to stick around to find out how it was resolved, I had a feeling that it would end up as a trash fire. What I did manage to get, however, was the description of Nick as “stupidly good-looking.” Can we please, as a society, get rid of this? Please? It’s starting to become just like “she let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding” at this point. Again: zero nuance.
All in all, a bitter disappointment of a book that lacked the creativity and nuance that the blurb and reviews promised. 1 star.
Only a Monster is the first in Vanessa Len’s Monsters trilogy, which will continue with Never a Hero (slated for release this August) and an untitled third book.
Today’s song:
WE LOVE THE MAGNETIC FIELDS IN THIS HOUSE
That’s it for this week’s Book Review Tuesday! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
Happy Sunday, bibliophiles! I hope this week has treated you well. 💗
Not to worry, folks: the inevitable Boygenius Breakdown™️ is scheduled for next week to allow for some time for everything to sink in. As per the never-stated-but-generally-just-implied agreement, however, this week’s Sunday Songs meets the required Queer Quotient™️ that every Bookish Mutant post is required to pass before entering the blogosphere. I’m running a tight, gay ship over here, and I’ll see to it that it stays that way.
In the span of about a week, “Born on a Train” sprung from just being downloaded to my third most listened-to song of this year, according to Apple Music. Maybe that says more about my penchant for wearing songs into the ground than it does about the song itself, but I swear there’s an infinite magic woven into every note of it. Snugly fit in The Charm of the Highway Strip, a loose concept album about traveling and roads, this third track gently chugs along like the train the chorus speaks of. (And another example of the band’s generally wry humor—I haven’t listen to Charm in full yet, but the fact that “Fear of Trains” is only four tracks away from this song always cracks me up. Duality of man.) The drums and muted, acoustic guitar strums throughout recall the machinery of a train, in contrast to the ringing chimes as Stephin Merritt finishes out each chorus. And as with most Magnetic Fields songs, it’s laced with bittersweetness to the core; there’s a sense of the narrator grappling with their own nature, knowing that they’re bound to leave everyone that they love, that same lonely, fleeting, twilight feel as the “ghost roads” that Merritt describes in the first verse. Merritt’s voice has the same resonance that you feel inside a cave, reverberating through your bones—it was easy to feel, hearing this song live at a smaller venue, which I still count myself incredibly lucky to have experienced.
On that habit of riding songs into the sunset, I think I get sick of only about half of them—”Born on a Train” feels like one of the ones that’ll stick.
At this point, all that’s keeping me from listening to more Palehound right now is the fact that A Place I’ll Always Go is too complicated of an album cover to draw on the door whiteboard on my dorm (wait, I forgot about posting those…maybe once school’s out? Don’t hold me to it), and for some reason, even though I can listen to any other artist’s discography out of order, I’ve stubbornly decided to do so with them. (With the albums, at least—I didn’t know this EP existed until recently…oops…) But…Dry Food was just so good. I couldn’t get enough of the whole album. Something about El Kempner’s talent for letting every instrument go loose and reining them back in just as quickly keeps me listening over and over again.
So I ended up finding and promptly listening to her very first musical outing as Palehound, 2013’s Bent Nail – EP. The decision to make “Drooler” the first track was a clearly calculated one—it lulls you in with Kempner’s brightly-toned guitar notes that seem to gently roll like a loose wagon wheel, but drops off just as quickly, breaking into a bluesy, catchy groove, strangely accented at times with the sounds of pots and pans clanging against each other. All the while, Kempner’s voice does similar gymnastics, slipping into lower tones and spiking airily high in the space of seconds. It’s hard to keep that balance—something that she frequently tests on songs like “Pet Carrot” (which works on the EP, and bafflingly maintains on her performance of it on her Tiny Desk Concert), but “Drooler” toes the line with ease. And just like that, everything that Kempner builds devolves into riotous fuzz at the end, a skidding, spark-flying crash to a perfect piece of guitar-driven indie-rock.
So I’ve got another De La Soul album to add to my never ending album list, huh? I’m not complaining. Anything for another experience of wonderful, creative music, that Pos, Dove, and Mase seem to exude from their very pores, or something…
Two albums after their breakout Three Feet High and Rising, De La Soul had made a point to shed the sunshine-colored, mislabeled hippie image that had followed them everywhere, but even though that image was a major point of resentment for Plugs 1, 2, and 3 after the album’s release, listening to songs like “Eye Patch” leads me to believe that, at least musically, that spirit never quite left. Backed by the endlessly catchy samples of Jimmy Reed, the Outlaw Blues Band, and the same French language learning program that they sampled for Three Feet High and Rising, it’s another earwormy patchwork that, even from my limited experience with the band, feels like their trademark. It’s smooth, rolling like waves over your skin, the perfect walking soundtrack for a movie, or just walking to class and feeling the sun on your skin. And despite the more serious undercurrent that emerged in everything post-De La Soul is Dead, there’s still samples of sheep and children laughing—there’s no denying of the original, three fresh-out-of-high school friends making music in the basement ethos that have made De La Soul so lasting.
Part of what I love about this song is that there will never be another song called “Crocodile Tears and the Velvet Cosh.” If there is, I can guarantee that it’ll be ripping this title off.
I can never claim to be fully goth (even though I can and will go overboard with the black eyeliner, without hesitation) partly because both Bauhaus and Love & Rockets (a.k.a Bauhaus – Peter Murphy) have historically been hit or miss for me. I’ve still found some of the latter that are already classics for me (“Holy Fool,”“Bad for You,”…why do I keep putting off listening to Lift?); the solo careers have been similarly hit or miss, though I’ve been hoarding a small handful of songs from Murphy, Ash, and David J., respectively as of late. Strangely, even though I’ve only heard two songs of his (the other being “I’ll Be Your Chauffeur”) David J. has been the one that I’ve liked the most consistently. As much as I love and respect the eclectic spirt of Love & Rockets (okay, scratch that: I can’t forgive them for “The Purest Blue,” there’s NO excuse for that nightmare fuel), sometimes you have to sit back and linger on the gentle side of things. That’s exactly what “Crocodile Tears and the Velvet Cosh” feels like for me: it slings a reassuring arm over your shoulder, and lets you relax while the breeze tugs at your hair. Filled with tiny packets of clever wordplay (“I read you like a book/Seeing through/without ever losing my place”), it’s an unassuming, acoustic piece with hidden bits that glisten in the dark.
I finally got around to listening to Home Video last week, and although I wasn’t as wowed as I was with her sophomore album, Historian, it still exists as an insect trapped in amber. The album chronicles Dacus’ childhood and adolescence in Virginia, grappling with her latent queerness in contrast to her Christian upbringing, as evidenced in “VBS,” a slice-of-life recounting of church camp. Musically, Home Video wasn’t as expansive and vast as its predecessor, but Dacus’ lyricism throughout the entire album is as strong as ever—I can’t stop thinking about the lines “Sedentary secrets like peach pits in your gut/locked away like jam jars in the cellar of your heart.” For such an unassuming-sounding song (in the beginning), there are so many tiny layers to peel back, from the underlying seeds of questioning everything she’s known to the explosive burst of guitars as Dacus describes, “There’s nothing you can do, but the only thing you’ve found/playing Slayer at full volume helps to drown it out.” The latter makes me wish for more of the guitar work that Dacus displayed on songs like “Timefighter,” but that moment as a self-contained piece, like the glass butterfly boxes that form each song, makes the storytelling even clearer and cleverer than ever.
Since this post consists entirely of songs, consider all of them to be today’s song.
That’s it for this week’s Sunday Songs! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
How is March already almost over?? Mentally I’m still in the first week…but it’s spring break, so that’s always good. And although I woke up sick this morning, at least I have boygenius, the cure for all that ails. Maybe their queer antibodies will help me fight this nastiness off before I have to go back to school.
[shaking the image file for the record on my iTunes library] c’mon, man, do your thing…
GENERAL THOUGHTS:
I still can’t bring myself to believe that I’m almost done with my first year of college. It feels like I should have at least 5 months left, or something…how? Either way, it’s been much easier on me taking mostly humanities classes, and even with midterms, I’ve been able to keep my head above the water. The weather’s slowly but surely starting to warm up—there were a few days were it felt like early summer, and then we got snow the very next day, and if that isn’t Colorado weather in a nutshell, then I don’t know what is. But I’ve savored the little moments—the bits of sunshine that come through the trees in the morning, the view from my dorm, and the day I had both my classes off, so I visited my friend at my dorm for next year and got coffee on the way back.
My reading’s been a little bit slower, I suppose since I’ve had several books to read for at least 3 classes, so I’ve had to read a lot of them in smaller chunks. They’ve been very different but all very good books—again, what I love about college (or at least being an English major) is that I’ve been reading books I’d never imagine reading in an academic setting—Annihilation and Harley Quinn: Breaking Glass were both on my reading list this month. I’ve managed to get some other great reads in as well, even though I had to slow down for midterms. It was harder to see since I slowed down more than usual, but it was a pretty solid reading month—only 2 books in the 2-star range, so that’s always a plus in my book (no pun intended).
Other than that, I’ve just been drawing, playing Minecraft over break (you have NO IDEA the absolute havoc some loose axolotls can do to an ocean ecosystem), watching Flight of the Conchords (as hilarious as I imagined it being), season 2 of Shadow & Bone, and Dark, and wishing for all this snow to melt. I swear that one pile of slush outside of the dining hall has been there since January…
READING AND BLOGGING:
I read 18 books this month! Better than I thought I’d done, given midterms. I found my first 5-star read of the year, though, and I also participated in the #transreadathon for the week of March 20-27, and found some great reads as a result!
Happy Sunday, bibliophiles! I hope this week has treated you well.
It’s finally spring. Sprouts are crawling out of the crumbly earth, the fog is lifting, and I have a depressingly gray color scheme to show for it. My overexcitement for getting Peter Gabriel tickets (HUUUAUAAAAAAAAAAAAGGHGHGH BIG THANK YOU TO MY PARENTS) trumps any hope of a springtime aesthetic for this post.
Picture this. It’s early in the morning. You have a 9 AM class you have to get ready for. You’ve decided to listen to Up, so you put it on while you start putting your makeup on. Track 1. You turn the volume up, because nothing much seems to be happening. 0:29 hits. All hell breaks loose.
And yet, even though I do my SPD jumpscare dance every time it rolls around, I find myself listening to this song like an adrenaline junkie. Peter Gabriel knows how to open an album—lulling you into near-silence, then hitting you with a concentrated, almost industrial opening that probably keeps Trent Reznor up at night wondering how he could top it. More than that, “Darkness” is another song I’ve added to my internal list of reasons why Gabriel is such a uniquely talented musician—he makes creating a musical atmosphere that mirrors the lyrical story look so easy. As he speaks of being consumed by fear, the instrumentals crash in, enveloping all else as his voice grinds to a gravel-edged plea for solace. It was enough to give me a heart attack, and, if I’m going by the YouTube comments, enough to give people nightmares. Gabriel whispers of fearing “swimming in the sea/dark shapes moving under me/every fear I swallow makes me small,” and in the edges of the near-silence, a strained moan sounds, like a distant whale call or the grinding of a boat. The imagery is startling in its clarity—if I had the patience, I’d jump at the chance to make some kind of stop-motion or claymation music video. Unlike other artists, Gabriel’s instrumentally darker, more abrasive side doesn’t surprise me—after the first listen, all I could think of is that it was the next natural evolution of “Intruder.”
But over two decades after the release of “Intruder,” (which, unlike this song, was enough to keep me up at night—on the first night alone in my dorm, no less…good times) Gabriel has a deeply nuanced understanding of fear. Even as these fears swallow him like the whale in Pinnochio, he finds a way through the tangled woods, knowing that fear will pass—”I have my fears/but they do not have me.” Well. I needed to hear that. Sometimes it’s hard to hear these things when we’re swallowed up so easily—which I can relate to a little too well, with my experience with general fear over various things, as well as the truckload of anxiety that came along with making the move to college—but as the song ebbs and flows from monstrous crescendos to something more bare and gentle, so too do our fears. It’s all too easy for me to think that there’s no light at the end of the tunnel when I get in a place like this, but fear, like everything else, is impermanent. And when we look back, like Gabriel, we can “cry until [we] laugh.” Maybe that’s why I find myself seeking out this song so much—I love when I can give myself a musical mantra. It has no control over me.
I’ve been meaning to listen to Shakey Graves and the Horse he Rode In On solely because of how much I love that name, but I’ve got more motivation (not that I didn’t have any—the eternal album bucket list waits for no man) after hearing this one in my brother’s girlfriend’s car. Shakey Graves can make anything seem natural, be it the more experimental wanderings of Can’t Wake Up to the classic folkiness of this song. And like a classic folk song, there’s something inherently haunting about it—even without the lines about drinking and deep-seated regret, there’s an off-kilter waver to “Nobody’s Fool,” a shadow creature that’s emerged from under the bed, hanging over Alejandro Rose-Garcia’s shoulder. If that’s the case, he’s probably given said creature a banjo or something since this song, but here, it lingers. “Nobody’s Fool” is a song so atmospheric that it feels like there’s a tangible coat of dust over it—again, the lingering eeriness about it, but something of a good kind of dust, given this song’s bizarre pull.
I love the irony in the fact that I just got an ad claiming that “99.9% of women will chase you when you do this” above the search results for this song. At that point, you can’t even say that YouTube has bad gaydar—it just doesn’t have any gaydar whatsoever…
There’s a solid chance that I’ll be blabbing about The Magnetic Fields for the next week or two afterwards, but I had the incredible privilege of seeing them last Friday night! At a small venue, too—no annoying drunk people, no jostling for a good view, just cellos, sad gay breakup songs, and Stephin Merritt’s three mugs of tea. And other than the pure genius of playing “The Book of Love,” getting everbody sobbing (it’s me I’m everybody), and then launching into “The Biggest Tits in History” (IT’S ABOUT THE BIRD IT’S ABOUT THE BIRD I SWEAR GUYS GUYS) directly after, this show made me remember how many pockets of Merritt and co.’s genius that I hadn’t heard of, or just forgotten about. Take this song; with the amount of wry, folky breakup songs that they’ve produced, you’d expect for there to be an eventual formula. Bitterness is a constant, but it’s delivered in such a clever, creative way that I can’t help but smile and nod along as if Stephin Merritt is singing about rainbows and kittens. He’ll never outright say “you broke my heart” or “I can’t forgive you for what you did”—like clay, he pulls that core emotion into “don’t you know love/goes home to Paris in the spring?” That’s the kind of wry, tongue-in-cheek magic that draws me to The Magnetic Fields again and again—Stephin Merritt never has any boring ways of interpreting love and heartbreak. Still, it’s been a few decades since they’ve started the band—I just hope he isn’t in for any “I Don’t Believe in the Sun” relationships anymore. Dude deserves a break.
Before I get into the song itself…another reason why I admire Peter Gabriel so much—skip to 1:00 in the video and you’ll see him performing an early, unfinished version of “Playing for Time” without any lyrics. The prospect of performing…well, anything is already nerve-wracking enough for me, but playing something that you haven’t even finished live? That’s a feat, but I guess you can just do that when you’re Peter Gabriel. I can barely even make myself share in-progress bits of writing with friends.
Onto the song itself…I’m not gonna survive this album. I barely survived this song. Gabriel’s ability to dig into our most base emotions has never faded away, and “Playing For Time” is no exception. It’s a meditation on aging, on time, and on the memories we share between loved ones. He envisions a planet comprised of the memories made by a couple— “any moment that we bring to life/will never fade away.” It’s a song that came tragically late for Arrival, but maybe that’s the way it should’ve been—the movie, and the message that mirrors this song, already made me ugly cry three separate times. I could barely hold it together after listening to this twice. But along with this song and this movie, it’s something that I’ve been thinking about a lot; I’ve always treasured moments with my loved ones, but moving to college and being alone and independent for the first time has made me realize how precious it really is. But it’s also made me realize that these memories really do never quite go away, as long as we keep them close. Don’t let these things pass you by.
Okay, I need to stop. I think one sitting is the only time frame that I can listen to this song without curling up in a ball.
The Shape of Water has been my all-time favorite movie for several years now—I’m looking over my shoulder at the poster above my bed as I’m writing this. I had the novelization on my TBR for a few years, but only got around to it recently, probably for fear of it not living up to the film. I had no idea that it was a dual release with the film, but after reading it, the novelization of The Shape of Water struggled to live up to the poetic poignance of the film.
Visionary storyteller Guillermo del Toro and celebrated author Daniel Kraus combine their estimable talent in this haunting, heartbreaking love story.
The Shape of Water is set in Cold War-era Baltimore at the Occam Aerospace Research Center, which has recently received its most sensitive asset ever: an amphibious man captured in the Amazon. What unfolds is a stirring romance between the asset and one of the janitors on staff, a mute woman who uses sign language to communicate with the creature.
Developed from the ground up as a bold two-tiered release—one story interpreted by two artists in the independent mediums of literature and film — The Shape of Water weaves together fantasy, horror, and romance to create a tale that is equally gripping on the page and on the big screen.
TW/CW: racism, homophobia, xenophobia, ableism, misogyny, sexual harassment/assault, blood, gore, murder, animal death, loss of loved ones
The Shape of Water is a movie that’s touched my heart in a way that I doubt any other will. In summation, the film is a testament to the marginalized experience—any kind of marginalized or othered group—and self-love and acceptance. Guillermo del Toro is a storyteller without parallel, and maybe that’s why I was so hesitant to pick up the novelization for so long. I had no idea that it was a dual release with the film, but either way, my fears ended up being confirmed—Daniel Kraus’ novelization is faithful in the barest, structural way, but largely failed to capture the heart of the film’s message.
I’m not familiar with Daniel Kraus’ other novels, but even a quick scan on Goodreads tells me that he’s a frequent collaborator with Guillermo del Toro, which, after reading this, frankly surprises me. Del Toro’s storytelling, from this film to Pan’s Labyrinth and the most recent Pinnochio, has a consistently strong emotional core, something that anchors the fantastical elements to our most core human experiences. And somehow, Kraus chose to adapt this novel in the most flat, checklist-like way possible. Yes, all of the beats of the film were there, as well as some bonus content. But thanks to Kraus’ dry writing, the emotional core—what made the story so deeply impactful in the first place—apparently flew straight over his head.
Now, before I get into my major gripes, I will say this—the novelization picks up far more at the halfway point. The chapters that Kraus writes from the perspective of The Asset were an unmistakable highlight, charming, dreamlike, and refreshingly strange compared to most of the other perspectives. I almost find myself wishing that the scene with Bob Hoffstetler and The Asset made it to the film. And the very climactic events in the third act were dealt with the appropriate amount of weight, and the pace picked up significantly, unlike the steady pace of the movie. And as much as I love the dance scene, I completely get the decision to nix it from the novel—out of all of the scenes to translate from screen to page, that would be at the top of the page.
With that out of the way, I was bothered by how much emphasis Kraus places on the antagonist, Strickland. There were some fascinating scenes that never made it to the film of the process of him capturing The Asset in the South American rainforest; they were interesting additions, and although I liked them in general, it mostly ended up being Strickland being incredibly racist. It’s painfully on brand for his character, but beyond that, it seemed like his character got the most page time out of the whole cast. He is the main villain, sure, but given that this story is about the marginalized experience and he is the predatory antithesis to what the film stands for, the decision didn’t leave the best taste in my mouth.
My other main issue was how Kraus wrote the character of Elisa Esposito. For the most part, Kraus was somewhat faithful to her personality, but there were multiple instances where the descriptions of her were incredibly concerning. On several occasions, she is described as “childlike” and “[like] a kindergartener” in scenes where she is struggling to communicate her needs—for those of you who have not seen this film, Elisa is mute, and she uses ASL to communicate. It’s already offensive on the front that Elisa is such a treasured character to me, but Kraus seems to, once again, miss the message of the film by a mile, and ends up right smack in the middle of the all-too-common trope of infantilizing disabled people—especially disabled women. Elisa is in no way “childlike” for trying to communicate her needs—she is a grown woman, and she is frustrated by the struggle to communicate with her abled peers in a world that is not built for her. Let me say it again: Elisa Esposito is a grown woman. Even though Kraus was somewhat respectful in some of his other descriptions of her, but these instances all but negated everything else that he had established in the adaptation.
All in all, a structurally faithful, occasionally beautiful, but often frustrating adaptation of a film that will forever have the prime spot in my heart. 3 stars from a peeved Guillermo del Toro fan. Just watch the movie instead.
The Shape of Water is a standalone, as the film is, but Daniel Kraus has also collaborated with Guillermo del Toro on the novel Trollhunters. Kraus is also the author of The Life and Death of Zebulon Finch, The Teddies Saga, and several other books for all ages.
Today’s song:
saw these legends on Friday night—such a beautiful experience, and I’ve had this song on repeat ever since
That’s it for this week’s Book Review Tuesday! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
Happy Sunday, bibliophiles, and for those of you in the U.S., happy fourth! I still find it hard to be proud of my country sometimes, but it’s my personal belief that recognizing the flaws in your country and wanting to change them is patriotic. And hey, at least Trump’s out of office, right? It’s been so nice to not have to worry about my human rights being taken away…
(I swear it’s a coincidence that I’m reading The Handmaid’s Tale today…)
[ahem] anyway, it’s been a pretty nice week. We got a whole lot of rain last week, and now it’s starting to get warm again, which is always nice. I got a lot of reading done, but part of it’s because a) I read a lot of somewhat short books and b) I ended up having my first DNF of the year, so… [sad harmonica]
Writing’s been going well too! I started Camp NaNoWriMo on Thursday, and I’d say it’s going well so far. I accidentally misunderstood the word count goal feature for the whole “working on a draft you’ve already started” thing, and now that’s a little screwed up, but I’m trying to get it fixed, so it should be fine.
Other than that, I’ve just been making/organizing my playlists, watching Loki (AAAAH THAT LAST EPISODE) and Mars Attacks!, volunteering at the library, and playing Minecraft. I also got to make a trip to my favorite bookstores, and I have some books I’m super excited for lined up next week!
Do each of the prompts unless you have never read that type of disappointing book
For some of the prompts, you can twist them into what fits your book. For example: Sequels where the characters change in a bad way could change to Good story, Bad characters or good characters, the rest was meh
Have fun!
Let’s begin, shall we?
😑THE DISAPPOINTMENTS BOOK TAG 😑
A DISAPPOINTING DEBUT
Part of why Crown of Coral and Pearlwas so disappointing for me was the fact that I thought that there would be mermaids (oops), but even with that aside, I found this novel to be rather dry. Save for a creature or two, there’s hardly anything “fantasy” about it.
AN AUTHOR WITH A NOVEL YOU LOVE AND A NOVEL YOU DISLIKE
Adam Silvera is a hit-or-miss author for me; I liked They Both Die at the End a lot, but I had to DNF Infinity Sonbecause it was such a mess. Maybe contemporary is just more his speed.
A DISAPPOINTING SEQUEL
Speaking of books that were kind of a mess…
Book 1 was a lot of fun, but Blood & Honeyjust dragged so much…so much filler, and then a whole bunch of twists that made no sense crammed at the end.
GREAT IDEA, POOR EXECUTION
It always pains me to think about this one…
Cinderella is Dead was one of my most anticipated releases of 2020 – the premise of a dystopian kingdom 200 years after Cinderella found her prince sounded incredible! Alas, the worldbuilding was sloppy, none of the characters had much personality, and the commentary on misogyny/abuse/etc. was very forced, and relied more on telling than showing.
SEQUELS WHERE THE CHARACTERS CHANGE IN A BAD WAY
I wouldn’t say that it was the characters themselves in Cold Falling White that changed in a bad way, but the way Prendergast handled them. Most of the characters that died in Zero Repeat Forever were resurrected in a really weird way, and the characters that survived were either separated or shoved into a plot that made no sense. Sigh…
+ anyone else who wants to participate! If you see this tag and want to do it, I’d love to see your answers! And if I tagged you and you’re not interested, no obligations to do it.
Today’s song:
That’s it for this book tag! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
Goodreads Monday is a weekly meme created by Lauren’s Page Turners. All you have to do to participate is pick a book from your Goodreads TBR, and explain why you want to read it.
I figured that I’d mix it up a little for this week, since I don’t give a) sci-fi and b) graphic novels as much love on my Goodreads Monday posts, even though the former is my favorite genre. This one’s been on my TBR for about a year and a half, and it looks absolutely fascinating.
Let’s begin, shall we?
GOODREADS MONDAY (7/27/20)–ONE TRICK PONY by Nathan Hale
The aliens have arrived. And they’re hungry for electricity. In the Earth of the future, humans are on the run from an alien force — giant blobs who suck up electrical devices wherever they can find them. Strata and her family are part of a caravan of digital rescuers, hoping to keep the memory of civilization alive by saving electronics wherever they can. Many humans have reverted to a pre-electrical age, and others have taken advantage of the invasion to become dangerous bandits and outlaws. When Strata is separated from the caravan, she must rely on a particularly beautiful and rare robot pony to escape the outlaws and aliens — and defeat the invaders once and for all.
So why do I want to read this?
Art by Nathan Hale
First of all, unrelated to the plot itself…I am LOVING this minimalist color scheme. Reminds me of the different colors in The Search for WondLa trilogy–most of it was rendered in shades of gray, but for each book, there would be a different color incorporated in–green for book 1, blue for book 2, and orange for book 3. Seems like Hale’s gone in the same direction with yellow.
That aside, this sounds like a truly unique graphic novel! I haven’t read anything of Hale’s before (though I think I might have another of his graphic novels on my TBR? Not sure), but One Trick Pony has the potential to be incredibly inventive. I love the design of the aliens, and there’s inexplicable charm about a lone girl riding atop a mechanical pony through a wasteland invaded by aliens. Count me in!
Today’s song:
Aww, this song…
Always makes me think of late summer in 2018, after I’d bought The Rose Society…
That’s it for this week’s Goodreads Monday! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
I don’t think I’ve anticipated a book as much as I’ve anticipated Aurora Burning (though Soul of Stars is a close contender). After falling in love with book 1, I jumped at the chance to preorder it, and as the date came closer (it’s officially been a week since its release), I counted down the days. My day got SO much better once I got it in the mail, and my day was filled with so much joy thereafter. I read it twice, and I must say, this is a truly worthy sequel, filled to the brim with plot twists and heart-wrenching writing.
WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR BOOK 1, AURORA RISING. If you haven’t read book 1, then I suggest you don’t read this review yet.
Squad 312 is in more trouble than they’ve ever been in.
After the tumultuous exploration of Octavia III, the colony that Aurora was set to live in, Tyler, Scarlett, Finian, Kal, Zila, and Auri are back on the run. The TDF now blames them for the destruction of Sagan station, and with targets on their backs, the stakes are higher than ever. Especially considering that the Ra’haam–an interstellar entity bent on consuming the galaxy and all its denizens–is after them, infiltrating the Global Intelligence Agency, and bent on assimilating Auri. Now, Squad 312 must unlock the mystery of the Eshvaren–the beings that defeated the Ra’haam millions of years before–in order to complete Auri’s destiny as the force that will purge the Ra’haam from the face fo the galaxy. With targets on their backs and bounties on their heads–and not to mention, Kal’s sister after them–will Squad 312 defy all odds once more?
WOW. WHAT. A. BOOK.
Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff have absolutely done it again, pulling out all the stops of a sequel truly worthy of the near-perfection of its predecessor. There was nothing I enjoyed more than being back with Squad 312–especially now that we’ve got some necessary backstory on all of them.
Namely, Zila and Kal. We learned almost nothing about Zila in book 1, other than something vaguely hinted in her (very short) POVs; now that we have some insight on her past life…whew, somebody give her all the hugs the universe has to offer…
But beyond that, we also saw her grow such a great deal, and watching it made my heart so happy. Kal gets a similar treatment–we get an insight on his past (namely, his family), and we also get to see his relationship with Auri grow. I already adored both of them in book 1 (I mean, hey, they’re my favorite characters), but seeing them blossom together was one of my favorite aspects of this book.
Aurora Burning was just as action-packed as book 1, if not even more. I enjoyed every minute of it–everything from the escape from Emerald City at the very beginning to the chaos that ensued towards the end of the novel. I was on the edge of my seat for every page, and grinning from ear to ear through it all. (Well, almost all of it. More on that a bit later.)
One of my favorite scenes/sequences, by far, was Auri’s training by the Eshvaren within the Echo. It was such a beautifully written and archetypal few chapters–not only a chance for Auri to realize herself and her mindset, but a chance for her relationship with Kal to grow as well. The imagery was gorgeous, and I’ll admit that the last bit got me choked up. Mostly because it was so reminiscent of The Empire Strikes Back, with Luke undergoing training to be a Jedi knight in the swamps of Dagobah. The Hero’s Journey parallels between Luke and Auri made me swell with joy, for lack of better words.
And all of it built up to an absolute WHOPPER of an ending. If you love this series as much as I do, PLEASE prepare yourself emotionally, because I guarantee that you won’t be ready for what’s coming. I know you’ve all heard everybody saying something on these lines, but I mean it when I say that Kaufman and Kristoff DESTROY EVERYTHING THAT YOU HOLD DEAR. AGAIN. And now I have to wait a whole year to find out what happens…
@ Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff
And on a sidenote, REPRESENTATION! Finian is now confirmed to be bisexual, and Zila makes several comments about liking girls, though her label has not been confirmed. A+!
All in all, Aurora Burning proves once more that Kaufman and Kristoff are nothing short of a force to be reckoned with. A true stunner of a sequel, and one that I certainly won’t forget anytime soon. 5, ENORMOUS STARS! Or more, if that’s possible…
Aurora Burning is the second book in the Aurora Cycle, preceded by Aurora Rising. Book 3 is confirmed to be happening/in the works, but as of now, it’s untitled, and does not have a cover or a release date. [sad harmonica]
Today’s song:
Gah, I love this song…
Reminds me a little bit of Kal, to be honest. Not completely, but some of the lyrics and the general feel of the song have the same vibes as him.
That’s it for this week’s Book Review Tuesday! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
Goodreads Monday is a weekly meme created by Lauren’s Page Turners. All you have to do to participate is pick a book from your Goodreads TBR, and explain why you want to read it.
I put this one on my TBR more recently; it sounds a little bit like it’ll be out of my reading comfort zone, but I’m so excited to read it!
Let’s begin, shall we?
GOODREADS MONDAY (4/13/20)–THE INVISIBLE LIBRARY by Genevieve Cogman
Irene must be at the top of her game or she’ll be off the case – permanently…
Irene is a professional spy for the mysterious Library, which harvests fiction from different realities. And along with her enigmatic assistant Kai, she’s posted to an alternative London. Their mission – to retrieve a dangerous book. But when they arrive, it’s already been stolen. London’s underground factions seem prepared to fight to the very death to find her book.
Adding to the jeopardy, this world is chaos-infested – the laws of nature bent to allow supernatural creatures and unpredictable magic. Irene’s new assistant is also hiding secrets of his own.
Soon, she’s up to her eyebrows in a heady mix of danger, clues and secret societies. Yet failure is not an option – the nature of reality itself is at stake.
So why do I want to read this?
I have lived almost my entire life close to libraries. Though the role grew from a place for storytime with the other kids to my haven for books and a place to volunteer and give back to my community, my local library has played an integral part in my life.
So naturally, I’m drawn to stories about libraries.
Beyond that, I’m fascinated by the premise of fiction in alternate realities. There are infinite possibilities of what could be done and played within that vein, and I’m SO excited to see how it turns out! Adding onto that, the promise of rival organizations who want nothing more than one particular book…hmm, this could get interesting…
And what of alternate London? I’m glad the synopsis didn’t give much detail on what time period this London would be in, so I’m interested to see what Cogman’s vision of alternate realities–and fictions–end up looking like.
All in all, another reason why I want to enjoy The Invisible Library is that it’s SUCH A LONG SERIES. AND ALMOST ALL OF IT IS AVAILABLE ON THE KINDLE LIBRARY. Most of the books that I’ve checked out recently have been parts of a series, but their sequels haven’t been available, so I’m so glad that I might be able to have a lengthy series to binge! Of course, there’s the possibility of a story being perpetuated for an unnecessarily long time (there’s currently 7 books in the Invisible Library series), but I’m trying to push that from my mind. Fingers tightly crossed…
Today’s song:
That’s it for this week’s Goodreads Monday! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
The Bookish Mutant 