The fun we had: Fall 2019
December 30, 2019
Fall! September 23 through December 21
What I read
Tamora Pierce. I just discovered this author and dove in headfirst.
Circle of Magic quartet (meant for ages 9-11): Sandry’s Book, Tris’s Book, Daja’s Book, Briar’s Book
The Circle Opens is the next quartet but the library didn’t have them so I moved onto the quartet after that, The Circle Reforged, which was a little confusing but not insurmountable: The Will of the Empress and Melting Stones. I’d like to fill in all the gaps now.
Then I moved into The Song of the Lioness quartet. Only Alanna: The First Adventure and In the Hand of the Goddess were available but I want to read more.
Then I found the Beka Cooper trilogy which precedes The Song of the Lioness by 200 years: Terrier, Bloodhound, Mastiff, which I loved. But I’ll tell you what, the last choice in the end of Mastiff had me steamed! It did not take long for me to become thoroughly emotionally invested. That last reveal felt completely illogical and not in keeping with the character. I won’t say anymore in case someone else out there hasn’t yet discovered these books but GR.
My mom always thought it was weird of me to be so emotionally invested in what I read.
Tanya Huff
I don’t know how I’ve read sci fi and fantasy for 30 years and NOT read any of Tanya’s books but I’m happy to make up for lost time now. The library only had the Tony Foster Series so that’s where I started: Smoke and Shadows, Smoke and Mirrors, Smoke and Ashes
I don’t do horror as a general rule, so Smoke and Mirrors verged on a bit much for me, but the rest of the supernatural bits were in my wheelhouse.
Angela Duckworth
Grit
I’m annoyed that I ran out of time to read this while the loan was available – I’d waited about 6 months for my turn to come up! I’ll have to wait another 18 weeks to pick it up where I left off but it was very readable.
Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Gods of Jade and Shadow
Elizabeth Bear
Neither steampunk nor Jack the Ripper yarns are typically my interests but I keep an open mind and this one was quite good: Karen Memory
Becky Chambers
The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet
R.F. Kuang
The Poppy War: this was gutting, intense read.
Rivers Solomon
An Unkindness of Ghosts. WOW. This book was a whole lot. It was subtle but a friend pointed out that the protagonist’s sensory experiences, and physicality, were so well done and true to life for a person on the spectrum and it was really incredibly fascinating to glimpse how that works. I couldn’t put the book down, I read it in one single go.
The Deep. I picked up this book without a notion of the plot and it gutted me. It was so well written and well worth a read.
Where we went
We finally managed to pull together a trip to Napa to visit a friend and it was such a wonderful weekend off. I didn’t bring my laptop, we ate tacos for most of our meals, we enjoyed our friend’s company. We stopped off at a park to eat our taco truck lunch and JB made friends with a random child there – this is a skill I’ve never had and am always bemused by.
What I watched
I discovered The Mentalist is streaming on Prime and since I’d never seen it in its entirety, I decided to give it a try. Cho is my favorite.
We also watched Tangled and JB called me Mother Gothel for weeks after – I leave it to you to speculate why.
The Alanna books are really sketchy in the later books in terms of consent, age differences, having sex with your boss, having sex with your much older mentory father figure, etc. I read it back when I was a teenager when it first came out and still feel a little scarred and disgusted. So disappointing after such a great first book. A quick google doesn’t find anybody agreeing with me, so it’s possible I’m misremembering.
Not to say that it bothers me that she sleeps with lots of different guys, just that she always sleeps with people who are in positions of power over her and it has always seemed really sketchy. Like can’t a male mentor or boss NOT have sexual designs on a young woman? Why can’t she sleep with people at her same level or that she doesn’t work for?
Sex with lots of different guys wouldn’t bother me either but definitely sex with people with power over her would bother me on principle. The first relationship bothered me along those lines but they were also previously nearly peers in the training schedule sense so it didn’t stand out quite as much. The one later relationship that I did read seemed to be a peer but I did miss a book so not sure what happened along those lines elsewhere.
I loved the Alanna books in middle school and still reread them occasionally 🙂
I don’t know why it took me so long to find Tamora Pierce!
I’ve been wanting to read Grit after hearing Angela Duckworth on Freakonomics so many times. I think she may have the idea of the decade there: perseverence trumps other measures of performance.
Napa sounds absolutely lovely right now. Mrs. Done by Forty is originally from Sonoma County, so just up the road.
We haven’t seen Tangled (or many children’s/family films) as we’ve been saving them for when we have kiddos. When Baby AF is a couple years older, we’re going to burn through the Disney+ catalog in its entirety. 🙂
Glad to see all the fun you had this year, friend!
You MIGHT want to prescreen those movies so you can get a feel for age appropriateness. We forgot what was in some of them and paid the price in JB having nightmares for months 😀
I love and appreciate your reading lists and comments. Please keep doing them. This is how I find out about other books that may be of interest. Love your blog.
Thanks for weighing in!