Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

Water for Elephants is so good. I was initially reminded of Stone Angel by Margaret Laurence because the narrator is an aging person who remembers important events in their youth, but this book is less angry and regretful and more a homage to the circus rather than the narrator's decline.

The narrator is Jacob, a 91 year old man living in a nursing home. The circus arrives and sets up beside his nursing home, and he relives his youth in the circus. He remembers the circumstances that got him there, how he met his wife, and how he came to be the man he is. The details are vivid, and paint an amazing picture of what life was like in a circus during the 1930s Great Depression.

It also painted a genuine picture of what it is like to age... and that always makes me sad when I can see it myself in person.

Sara Gruen is a great writer, and I can't wait to read her other book.

Angel Time by Anne Rice

I used to love Anne Rice books, Queen of the Damned seriously influenced my perception of the world and religion in particular. But as she became more devote in her catholicism, the less I related to her books. This time, I thought I would give her another chance. Mostly just cause it was short, and not about vampires.

Angel Time is about a contract killer who gets tired of his life and is saved by an Angel who gives him a new calling. Plotwise... its weak. It's mostly about the killer's conversion from a believer-non-believer-sceptic-believer. His mission from god to save a Jewish family in the middle aged was random. And of course, it worked. She doesn't go into much detail about events in the story, just a brief overview of the events and reflects on the magnificence of god.

I was not a fan, I liked Toby (the killer's) humanity and want to see more of that rather than his spiritaul struggle. How does he become a better person? without an angel or a divine calling...

The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson

I know I said I wouldn't read the second book in the Millennium series... but I couldn't help myself. The second book isn't as graphic as the The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo but it's definitely as compelling.

This book is about Salander's past, and better characterization of her personality and motivations. It starts with two sets of seemingly unrelated murders that are randomly tied together by a loose connection to Salander. But the connection is actually deeper than that. The murder of the couple research journalists and Salander's "guardian" is tied by their connection to Zalachenko (thug, spy, Salander's father). She hates Zala, and uses the murder to find her father and kill him. However, the book ends in a cliffhanger, where Blomkvist finds her slowly dying and Zala hacked to pieces but alive... and the third book in the series is about Salander's trial, and we'll find out if she is set free or if she's subject to a legal system that's failed her again and again.

That Perfect Someone by Johanna Lindsey

I've been rather neglectful in the posting... probably just because the last two books I've read were candy - easy in and easy out. Quick and sweet.

That Perfect Someone by Johanna Lindsey is exactly that, quick and sweet. It's the story of a fake French Pirate (who's actually an English Lord) who accidentally falls in love with the woman he's bethroved to. It's a Malory story, and its nice that though they've run out of Malory siblings to write about, they've found someone interesting and compelling and funny to read about. This one is actually really sweet, and has a hint of some of Lindsey's old books. Her last book was rather unplausible and her main character wasn't as likeable. But this one was much better. Still implausible but cute. The antagonist in this novel is the pirate's father who is forcing him to marry for the girl's money... money he wanted so he could buy specialty art vases... Implausible, but the characterization was properly severe.

Last Dragon Standing by GA Aiken

Fun book, despite the unfortunate cover of a topless man holding a sword across his back.

It's the most recent book in a series of "romance novels" (more like fantasy story with graphic sex scenes) about a royal family of dragons and their escapades when they encounter the love of their lives. The family dynamic is soo hilarious because the sibling dragons fight a lot, and the women have a mind of their own and the men are macho and silly... its sooo cute and funny. I love this series. I need to read the rest, since I've only read the first one and this one.

This book in particular is about Keita, the youngest sister who is the self-proclaimed man eater and spy to protect the throne. She gradually falls in love with the king of the northern dragons, otherwise known as the barbarian horde, as the two go on a mission to save the world from invasion by the evil monsters of the ice and snow... dun Dun DUUUNNN...

The Legacy by TJ Bennett

Um... I picked this book up because I wanted something entertaining and stupid... this was sort of entertaining and not terribly stupid.

It's about a man and a woman who get forced into a marriage but gradually fall in love with each other. Fairly cliche so far...

Sort of entertaining: she's a former nun, he's a printer. His family is cute and hilarious. She's an optimistic nun with an incredible patience. Kinda mysogenistic, but forgiveable in the context of the genre.

Not terribly stupid: it's set during the reformation, some discussion about religion and the morality of what is right and what is god's will etc...

Deja Dead by Kathy Reichs

The title is unfortunate, but I read this book because this is the series the tv show Bones is based on. I was so enamoured with the Castle novel for the series, that I was hoping I would have the same amount of fun this book because there is the same general vibe of fun and camp between the two series.

Unfortunately, this book is alot more serious and graphic than the actual tv show. My biggest disappointment is that there is no squint gang... its just Brennan, by herself, and her loneliness is emphasized. She is older, she is divorced, and she is professional but less straight forward than the character that is portrayed in the show.

The story was intense, suspenseful... but too much like what I've been reading lately that's made me scared silly. I need something lighter.

Her Feaful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger

I don't like reading comtemporary literature, because there are no heroes, no one we can aspire to become.... all there are are flawed, broken, unhappy people like there are all over the world.

I decided recently that I would try reading more literature, I was starting to feel bloated from the amount of candy I'd been reading. I was well fed with a couple books I'd read before, then this one came around... I thought it would be intriguing, but it turned out to be sad and depressing to me.

It's the story of two sets of twins. There are Edie and Elspeth, and Julia and Valentina. Elspeth and Edie had been estranged for many years, however when Elspeth died, she willed almost her entire estate to her nieces Julia and Valentina on the condition that they live in her flat in London for a year, and their parents may not enter the building.

Julia and Valentina love and hate each other. They love what they have always known best, and hate how they cannot leave each other. When they come to London, they start to grow apart and meet new people, but one girl always manages to keep the other girl from growing too far apart. Finally, Valentina devises a plan to leave Julia forever... she tries to kill herself, thinking she will be able to come back with the help of Elspeth's ghost. However, that doesn't work and Elspeth steals Valentina's body instead.

There are so many layers to this book, and it will take forever to unravel it all. I am a bit reluctant to embrace the analysis of books, afraid I will lose my enjoyment of them again, like I did in school... There are two important side characters, Robert and Martin. Robert is Elspeth's former lover, who is drawn to Valentina. Martin is trapped in his apartment by his OCD, and Julia feels compelled to unravel his mysteries and set him free of his illness. They each have their lives, flaws, and intricacies. I am afraid to go through it all.

The story made me sad and lonely. It was good, but I'm just not prepared to dive in so soon and lose myself again.

Heat Wave by Richard Castle

Heat Wave is the novel written as part of the tv series Castle, which is about a crime novelist that follows a female NYPD homicide Detective as a muse. The novel follows the tv show exactly in its feel and characterizations, which makes it a perfect companion to the tv show because this is supposed to be the novel written by the author in the show.

The plot of the novel follows a murder/theft taken from several different episodes in the show. There are differences of course... like Castle gives the best lines to Jameson Rook, his counterpart in the story. And the sexual tension between Castle and Becket are released in the sex scene between Nikki Heat and Rook. Riley is Raley, and Esposito is Ochoa... the characterizations are eactly the same... so awesome because I'm suffering Castle withdrawl from the long summer hiatus.

Mistress of the Art of Death by Ariana Franklin

This book is like TV's Bones set during the reign of Henry II in England. The main character, Adelia, is almost exactly like Temperence Brennan in Bones. Adelia is a singular woman, orphaned as a child and raised by two doctors in Solerno, a cosmopolitan city that allowed for the existance of female doctors.

Adelia is sent to England at the request of the King Henry to help discover the sadistic serial killer of children that has been prowling through Cambridge. At the start of the book, the Jews in Cambridge were blamed. She examines the bones of the dead children and helps look for suspects. She is constantly up against the moral dilhemma of granting people life or justice. Despite her affinity for the dead, she is still a doctor and want to ease suffering. She is accompanied by her eunuch manservant, Mansur, and is helped by Simon of Naples, a Jewish spy. She meets Sir Rowley, a former crusader turned tax-collector/spy who she gradually falls in love with. In the end, we find out the killer is the generous, wealthy and sadistic knight and his accomplice is the angelic, masochistic, victim/lover nun (the least suspected, of course).

This story actually read like a movie or tv episode too, not just in the story. The start of the story is written in a series of vignettes that jump back and forth as an introduction to the story. And in each of the main event scenes, you only get Adelia's impressions and aren't able to guess anything because you don't get to "see" what happens, so you have to wait until Adelia draws her own conclusions after she experiences each event. It's a little odd to read at first, but not terrible, just weird...

I have yet to decide if I would read the other books in the series.

Tales of the Otherworld by Kelley Armstrong

This is a series of short stories that Armstrong once had posted on her website. It included the story of Clay and Elena's first meeting, Eve and Kristof's life together, Lucas and Paige's wedding and a couple other short stories involving other characters in the Otherworld universe.

Good, but not as exciting as I hoped it would be. Although, Clay and Elena's story got me interested in reading Bitten again.

Beyond the Shadows by Brent Weeks

Entertaining enough books, but my complaints remain the same as his other two books.

Kylar helps Logan become king. Dorian becomes GodKing because the alternative is too terrible, he marries Janine to compensate but she doesn't love him. Kylar gets to marry his beloved for awhile. Durzo is still alive and is around for awhile, and helps Kylar out but doesn't take too much of center stage. A bunch of minor characters do stuff, and everything comes together at the Black Barrows, where Kahli gets a body and all the armies clash for one reason or another. Kahli is defeated, loose ends are vaguely tied, the book could probably go on for another couple books.

WORST SERIES EVER.

Poorly written, plot barely hangs together, pointless characters. Don't bother.

Still makes me angry that I actually read the whole trilogy.

The Agony and the Ecstacy by Irving Stone

This book me a long time to read because it is a long book about a man with a long life. Michaelangelo lived to be 90, and every step of the way he suffered agony and ecstasy for his art... in other words, he whined alot.

The book spanned Michaelangelo's entire life, and included some discussion about his artistic process and his beliefs on religion. It was a biography, and included the banal things that occur in everyone's life inbetween all the drama... so it was hard to read at some points.

It was definitely interesting to see what life was like in that period, especially the life of someone who was so immersed with so many powerful people. But his artistic temperment caused him to whine alot, although his life and works would be far less astounding if he didn't.

Shadow's Edge by Brent Weeks

Ok... I read the second one. Same as the first one, interesting action sequences but I don't like that there's no overarching plot so things keep happening but I can't look forward to the resolution the events may bring. It's actually kind of annoying because he keeps introducing new characters, and have them start a plot for themselves but it doesn't mesh with the other plotlines until later in the book. It's like... long exciting action sequence, then long sequeway that doesn't really go anywhere.

This book starts about a week after the last book. Kylar has decided to give up the ways of the wetboy and run off with Elene and Uly (Durzo and momma K's daughter). They live in peace for awhile, but he isn't able to give up his calling. The Ka'kari won't let him, but Elene won't let him kill either so he's living a bit of a double life. Meanwhile, in Cenuria, the rebellion is in full swing because the Godking is a mother fucking bastard; Logan is still stuck in the hole; and Jarl becomes king of the underworld and realizes that he needs Kylar's help to bring down the Godking. Jarl goes and finds Kylar, Jarl get assassinated by his friend Vi (a wetboy who is a girl), Kylar runs off to help the rebellion for Jarl. Vi kidnapps Uly as a hostage, Elene goes after Uly, Vi and Uly get kidnapped by a wytch of some sort (Ariel who is a scholarly woman who wants to study Kylar), Kylar dies again, Vi runs away from Ariel, Ariel takes Uly to the Chantry where she will learn to be a wytch. Kylar comes back to life, gets to Cenuria, kills Hu Gibbert (traitor wetboy), rescues Logan, Logan leads the attack against the Godking's army, while Kylar is forced to team up with Vi to kill the Godking. Kylar dies again in the attempt to kill the Godking, and Vi magically binds herself to Kylar so she is able to break the spell the Godking has on her so she can kill the Godking. Godking dies, Logan wins, Elene is kidnapped, Kylar is depressed and finds out that Durzo is alive again....

A whole lot of other things happen that don't help the story, but occur and annoy me because they don't have a purpose or conclusion. Like Uly getting kidnapped, then what?! Is it a good thing, is it a bad thing, will Elene ever catch up, will the Chantry get what they want... or is this all some annoying ploy to make me read the third book. And there's no point for a third book to even exist. The main plot of the story is complete, the third book is only wrapping up the loose ends the author purposely added to the second book so there could be a trilogy.s Sigh... I will probably read the third book, just cause its convenient.

The Way of Shadows by Brent Weeks

I haven't read anything this hard core into the Fantasy genre in a long time, and I was quite nostalgic reading it. It reminded me of my angst filled youth.

The Way of Shadows is an entertaining story, but by no means especially well written or with particularly interesting ideas. It's a story about a street urchin who leaves his abusive life on the streets by apprenticing himself as a "wetboy" or super assassin. The author never really explains why they're called wetboys, just emphasizes the fact that they are supposed to be better than mere assassins because they have magic powers or "Talent". The kid, Azoth (renamed Kyler after he becomes an assassin) has the usual moral issues, becomes good and starts killing people. Near the end, the climax of the story arrives in one big long arc where the King of Kyler's country is assassinated, and the neighboring GodKing invades. There's conspiracy and subterfuge, and this thing called a ka'kari that gives special people super powers that Kyler's master spent his life guarding and collecting. Of course, Kyler's one of the few people who can use a ka'kari, so it ends with Kyler getting super powers to work as a bit of a cliffhanger for the next book. The biggest cliffhanger of course is when it is revealed that Kyler's best friend, Logan, and natural heir to the throne is still alive but stuck hiding in jail with psychopaths - makes you wonder how twisted he will become when he gets out.

The story itself is not very interesting, but the background is. The world created for this story is very complex, but unfortunately not very well explained. The author almost assumes you know a bit of the world before you start, so the reader just ends up being kinda confused as names and histories are thrown at you.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

An English translation of the Swedish crime novel "the Men who Hate Women". The Swedish title says alot. It's a thriller based around two crimes, sadistic hate crimes against women and financial crime. Officially there are two plots running through the story, but they never overlap.

It starts off with Mikael Blomkvist, who is convicted of libel against a corporate magnate. He never defended himself during his trial because he knew he could not prove his innocence. After he is convicted, he is hired by an old man looking to solve the supposed murder of his beloved niece, Harriet, 30 years ago. Mikael agrees, not really expecting to find anything... but he does. He is joined by Lisbeth Salander, a delinquent investigative genius with a twisted view of the world. She is the other protagonist in the story and you become very sympathetic towards her when you learn of her background. Together, they find out that Harriet is alive and living under a different name in Australia after running away that fateful day 30 years ago. She'd run away because she'd been suffering sexual abuse from her brother, a sadistic serial killer who continued to practice his twisted hobbies with other women after his sister left.

After Mikael solves the case, he goes back to clearing his name of the libel conviction - which he succeeds.

This is a great book, the story is suspenseful and unexpected. The crimes are graphic and unapologetic. I don't think I could ever read it again, nor could I ever watch the film version.

Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips

Really fun book. It's funny and interesting and well written. The summary on the book jacket only talks about Artemis, but the story involves all the Olympian gods and the mortals who come into contact with them.

The story is about the Olympian gods who moved to London, England, during the industrial revolution. Slowly, over the years the gods started losing their power because they were getting old and people stopped believing in them. In present day, Artemis is a disillusioned dog-walker, Apollo is a tv psychic personality, Aphrodite does phone sex, etc... to pass the time. One day, during a taping of Apollo's tv show, Aphrodite, who was angry at Apollo for something, convinced Eros to shoot one of his love arrows into Apollo to force him to fall in love with a mortal. The mortal, Alice, was already in love with a man named Neil, so no matter what Apollo did to seduce her, it didn't work. Finally, when Alice refused Apollo, he decided to take his revenge on her by having Zeus kill her by lightning. She dies, and Neil becomes the unlikely hero that brings her back to life and saves the gods from the pathetic life of useless boredom.

It's an interesting imagining of what old gods might be doing after they cease to be worshipped... but I would be even more interested to know if the Olympian gods interacted with other deities in other parts of the world. Like, what if Artemis was a good friend with Kwan Yin. Or Hades played tennis with Osiris... now that would be interesting. Although, if the other gods existed, then the world wouldn't end if Apollo fell into a coma, because a different god of the sun could pick up the slack... I guess that would have to be a different story then.

The Golden Mean by Annabel Lyon

Amazing book. This book is so well written that it both explains my complaints about The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane and crushes the other book with its superior quality as a book. Annabel Lyon writes in first person as Aristotle, so you get to hear his thoughts and you get to feel his impressions for people - you are never told that he is a manic depressive little man with a great mind, you see it and you feel it instead.

The story revolves around Aristotle's life as he begins teaching Alexander the Great as a child. You get a good sense of what life could be like in ancient Macedonia, and you get a distinct impression of Alexander and Aristotle's personalities. Both become great men in the eyes of history, but both were seen as wild and crazy and unusual in their time.

My one complaint is the amount of swearing included in the book. It's a little jarring when you read it for the first time, because you don't expect to see it in a historical novel. However, when you think about it, that is the language they would have used in a warrior society - not everybody spoke as eloquently as Shakespeare would have us believe.

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe

This book had a lot of potential, but it just didn't quite achieve it. The story is based around an American Colonial history PhD student who discovers a primary source that could potentially change the way the Salem witch trials are discussed. The idea being that if people believed in witches back then, then practicing witches must leave some documentation behind, not just fear mongering propaganda created by witch hunters. So Connie Goodwin goes on a hunt for this Physick Book, which she first gets hints about among her grandmother's things. She meets a boy, falls in love. The bad guy is her PhD supervisor who wants to use the book to prove that magic actually exists in the world, and create a real Philosopher's Stone. And of course, she can actually do magic once she gets her hands on some real spells.

When I first read the summary for the book, I immediately thought "Possession" by A.S Byatt. That was such a good book, with so much depth of character, and the reader becomes so involved with the story- and the story the characters discover. But this one, just doesn't compare. There is so much potential for this to be a great book, but you can tell right off that this is Howe's first book. There isn't much subtlety to the writing, and the main character feels flat. My biggest beef with Howe is that she doesn't quite grasp the technique of "show, not tell" with character development. The first chapter is her explaining how Connie is anal and uptight without really showing it. She tries, but doesn't quite succeed. She does a better job with Connie's mother, Grace, who is a minor character but has much impact on Connie's life. Most of Connie's character development comes from comparing herself with Grace... The main plot of the story is fairly obvious, and the interludes that jump back in time to show bits of Deliverance Dane's life is kind of weird. Where Howe chooses to add these interludes don't always make sense. And she doesn't stick with one character, she writes these interludes through several points of view. I think Howe should have kept with Mercy Lawson's (Deliverance Dane's daughter) character for all the interludes, because she is the most well written character in the whole book but she doesn't have any distinct ties with the present day plot of the story. Mercy Lawson is referred to once or twice in Connie Goodwin's story arc, but the focus is still on Deliverance Dane. If they'd switched the focus to Mercy Lawson, it would have been a better story. In my opinion anyways.

Not sure I like how Connie spontaneously does magic. It adds a nice twist to the story, but it doesn't need to be there. The story was interesting on its own without the magic. The magic would have been more interesting if Howe did more with it, or incorporated it in earlier in the story rather than make half assed cracks against new aged theology.

The story's Ok, but not sure I would ever read it again.

Men of the Otherworld by Kelley Armstrong

Yes... I admit, I have an addictive personality. But this is the last Kelley Armstrong book for the next little while, because I won't have access to her next book for at least another two months.

I picked up this book because I was under the impression that I would get to read about how Clay and Elena first met. I was wrong. I misread the intro, the Clay and Elena story is published Stories of the Otherworld instead. Men of the Otherworld is primarily about Clay and Jeremy when they were growing up and a bit about Malcolm, Jeremy's abusive father. You get to read stories from Clay's point of view, so his eccentricities are shown from his POV - where they make sense. You also get to learn more about how Jeremy turned out to be so different from his father, and how he might be a supernatural mix of some kind. The secret of the runes Jeremy draws is revealed - sort of.

Good book, but not as interesting as the other ones I've read by her... although that could be just because I was expecting something else.

Divine Misdemeanors by Laurell K. Hamilton

I feel like I sort of have an abusive relationship with Laurell K Hamilton. The first book I read of hers was Obsidian Butterfly, and it was perfect. A great balance of suspense, eroticism, and supernatural characters. Then I read her other books... Some of her more recent books have been more supernatural porn than anything with a plot. I stopped reading her books at one point because I couldn't handle one chapter of plot and four chapters of pointless sex - some of which is extremely graphic. But I keep going back because I keep hoping her books will reach that perfection again.

Before I started this blog, I picked up her most recent Anita Blake book, Skin Trade, which was supposed to be only about Anita and Jason. I thought "Wow, only one male character, there might actually be plot rather than 8-somes." And it was good. There was plot again, not as much sex, and more insight into one of the more interesting characters. So when the newest Merry Gentry book, I decided to give it a go thinking the trend would translate to her other series. I was wrong.

Despite the fact that Merry is now pregnant, and is no longer on a sex-spree trying to make babies, Divine Misdemeanors still disappoints in that it has a very vague cursory plot. There is a serial killer on the rampage killing fey in L.A, and Merry is the lead consultant on the case but that doesn't stop her from having sex with a different man in every other chapter. I feel like one of those guys who read Playboy exclusively for the articles. Of course they catch the killers, with no real effort exerted by the main characters, except worrying a lot.

And in the Merry Gentry books, LKH has this thing she does where she tries to be subtle but is afraid her readers are too stupid to catch on, so she repeats a piece of information several times until it ceases to be subtle and becomes annoying. She does this several times in this book, but the instance that stands out most in my memory is whenever Merry refers to Queen Andais in the first couple books in the series:

1. She points out that Merry must remind the Queen that they are kin so she isn't killed.


2. Merry says "Aunt Andais...."


3. The Queen points out "Merry, you're clever for reminding me of our relationship. Are you afraid I will kill you?".

I hate that. Hopefully, by writing all this about LKH, I'll remember not to read her next book, despite my hopes for her eventual improvement.

Haunted by Kelley Armstrong

This is going to sound short and vague and disinterested, mostly just because I finished reading this awhile ago and forgot to post about it.

Haunted is good, like all her other books. It's about Eve Levine, Savanna's mother and we get to see that she's not completely crazy and sociopathic. She starts off spending the majority of her time watching over her daughter, and hanging out with Kristof Nast, her baby daddy - who she decides that she is truly in love with later on in the book. To give her something to do, instead of obsessing over her living daughter, the Fates give her a task to catch a demonic doppelganger killer. She spends the book investigating clues, and working with Angels to catch this scary killer. During this process, she learns that this is a task to test her abilities. If she passes, she becomes an Angel - defender of humans against the scariest supernatural. Of course she achieves this status, but nobody knows this except Kristof... and in the following book, Jaime - and only because she guessed, otherwise this information is censored from Eve's conversation.

This was book 4, and I read all the books following about Eve Levine, now I know how she came to be so cool.

Word Nerd by Susin Nielson

I picked this book up on a whim while I was picking up my last Kelley Armstrong book from the library. It sounded funny, and it was.

Word Nerd is about a 12 year old boy named Ambrose with a peanut allergy and an affinity for Scrabble. He is raised by his overprotective mother, who is driven to shelter her son from the world after her husband suddenly died of a brain aneurism before Ambrose was born. This book is basically about a boy's relationship with his mother, cliche as that may be. Everything he does is driven by his need paradoxical need to break away from her control and the need to protect her.

We are first introduced to Ambrose at school, where three bullies place a peanut into his lunch and almost cause him to die. After this incident, Ambrose's mother decides that Ambrose should stay at home and complete school by correspondence. Meanwhile, their landlord's delinquent son, Cosmo, returns from jail and accidentally becomes Ambrose's best friend. Ambrose helps keep Cosmo out of trouble, and Cosmo helps Ambrose gain self confidence and learn to defend himself. All this occurs around a weekly Scrabble club where Ambrose finally finds a place where he belongs and meets people who appreciate him besides his mom.

I don't normally read contemporary fiction, because I keep expecting it to be deep and profound and hard to read (an unfortunate by product of my post secondary education). So I stick to my scifi, fantasy and romance novels because I know they will be entertaining and won't hurt my brain. This book did not hurt, it read simply, almost too simply, like it was actually written by the boy narrating the story. Which makes sense, but left me wanting a bit more depth because everything was so obvious.

Frostbitten by Kelley Armstrong

Ok... My Kelley Armstrong binge is not quite over yet, but almost. I just have Haunted left to read out of the Women of the Underworld series, but I'm saving that for the my upcoming trip.

Frostbitten is the most recent book of the series, and it is about my original favorite character - Elena the werewolf. Knowing the characters just helps me get into the story right away, and this one jumped right into the story. In this novel, Elena is chasing a rogue, non-pack werewolf (aka. Mutt) across the USA and into Alaska, where she and Clay encounter more man eating werewolves who try to kidnap and rape Elena but of course are trumped and destroyed. We also meet a previously unknown supernatural - Ijiraat, Inuit shapeshifting creatures who live in natural seclusion. In this novel Elena deals with her past, not with Clay, but with her abusive foster fathers. She also deals with the idea that she is in line to be the next Alpha, and works to overcome her personal insecurities on gaining the position.

I really liked this book, just because I've followed Elena's character from the beginning, and it's just nice to see her in a place where her character is genuinely happy, though still a bit insecure. It was really cute to read Elena and Clay's interaction with their children, and their interactions with each other. Clay is less agile and menacing... or older and wiser depending on how you look at it. The pack gains some new potential pack mates, while we meet a few former pack mates who were just so submissive you're glad they were never part of the story.

Living with the Dead by Kelley Armstrong

I read this one considerably slower than the others just because of two things:1) a slew of new characters, which I imagine will allow Armstrong to branch off and write a new series, potentially. 2)Creepy cult... humans doing bad things to humans while logically justifying their actions is just disgusting to me, and there was a bit of that in this one.

This novel was slow to start because it is partially set around a new character, Robyn Peltier, who is human. So there is a lot of confusion at first, because she doesn't know what's going on, and nobody wants to tell her. Then there is the parallel storyline about Adele Morrissey, the psycho clairvoyant and the world that she lives in that needed to be explained. More confusion, just because neither of the main characters know what they're doing and assume giant leaps in logic... or not so giant leaps depending on how well you understand the world of the book. Hope and Karl are the only characters who were introduced in previous book. The other series characters are often referred to, but none of them take a significant part in the story.

Living with the Dead primarily involves Robyn, who is falsely accused of murder. Her boss accidentally took a photograph of Adele and a member of the Nast Cabal together, and Adele goes out of her way to destroy the evidence. Adele, who is part of a clairvoyant cult, is trying to break out of the cult and sees joining the Nast Cabal as the ideal way of doing it. However, her mind is so twisted by the life she's lived, that she is a sociopath who manipulates and/or kills everyone who gets in her way... and there are quite a few bodies by the end. Hope and Karl are there to help Robyn, who is Hope's best friend from high school. They do their best to save Robyn, while shielding her from the world she accidentally fell into. Hope is still struggling with her powers, and is getting increasingly powerful. Karl is tagging along to keep Hope safe. By the end of the book, Hope and Karl both realize that she needs space to figure out if she can survive without him, because her demon is not something that he can help control all the time. Dropped in the middle of all this is Detective Finn... a LA homicide detective who starts off in charge of Robyn's case and finds himself knee deep in supernatural shit. Over the course of the book, he learns that his ability to see the dead is a mild version of necromancy, and Robyn's dead husband is following him around to save Robyn from a terrible fate.

Living with the Dead is a bit slow, creepy and not my favorite. But now that we've passed the awkward phase when we first meet new people, I imagine I will quite enjoy her new books about this new set of characters whenever they come out.

No Humans Involved by Kelley Armstrong

I love Kelley Armstrong's books because you don't have to read them in order. And I didn't. But it's so cool because you read a later book, discover that the character you didn't like in an earlier book is actually kinda awesome, so you go back and read the book devoted to that character.

I actually liked Jaime's character from the beginning, but in No Humans Involved I discovered that I kind of like Eve, even though I was kind of thrown off by her reputation with the other characters... but that I think, was intentional because her reputation in the book's world is supposed to be sketchy and seedy - of course that has no bearing on her actual character.

No Humans Involved is Jaime's book, she's in Hollywood, contacting ghosts for a tv special. In the process, she discovers the spirits of children trapped between planes. She researches the situation with the help of Hope, Karl, and Jeremy and discovers a ring of human magicians who have made human sacrifices to gain power. She also manages to convince Jeremy to fall in love with her, despite his reservations. She brings out his fun side, even though it's a little hard to buy, just because he is so different in the other books... but that could be explained by the fact that he is not accompanied by any of the other werewolves in this book... Karl doesn't count.

The story was so interesting, and had enough parallel storylines that I never got bored. I wanted to read Eve's book Haunted right after, but I wasn't able to get my hands on a copy. So, instead I'm going to read Living with the Dead...

Personal Demon by Kelley Armstrong

I started reading Kelley Armstrong a long time ago, and I stopped for awhile because I wasn't as big of a fan of one of her characters. But I found myself coming back recently when I discovered her newer books. Armstrong has created new interesting characters and I quickly fell in love with her writing again.

The writing is good, the plot is engaging, the character development is interesting - what's not to like? I think it's unfortunate that she's put in the same category as LKH because Armstrong's writing is so much better.

Personal Demon is about Hope Adams, half demon, daughter of Lucifer and an East Indian princess. The story is about her efforts to learn to control her powers in a controlled environment. Her power is to see visions of chaos, and feed on the energy. The most powerful high for her is the feeding on someone's chaotic death. She finds it orgasmic but she also knows its wrong and feels revulsed by it. In this novel, Hope is recruited by the Cortez Cabal to work undercover with a supernatural gang and mitigate any damage they could incur. She also figures out how much in love she is with Karl Marsten - rogue werewolf/jewel thief.

Since this book is about the Cortez Cabal, Lucas is in it of course. You get to see how cabals work in more detail and can sort of foresee Lucas taking over... just because his brother is such a bad choice. I'm sure there will be a book on that too in the near future. Fingers crossed.

The book was so good, I immediately picked up one of her other books and devoured it to. Post to follow.

Echo in Bone by Diana Gabaldon

I would have finished this book a lot sooner if it were not so enormous. 800 pages of hardcover goodness, which is, of course, very annoying to carry around to read while on transit.

I first read her books while in high school, and I am always surprised when I see a new book in the series come out. The books always end with some loose ends, but not in any big cliff hanger that would annoy me to wait the 5 years it takes her to write the next one. This one is good, better than "Dragonfly in Amber" which felt like a hodge podge of things she just felt like talking about. Like always, there is an abundance of historic details, and Jamie & Claire are as loving as always.

I think, subconsciously, I've taken Jamie and Claire as my ideal married couple. They love each other so much, you can't help but admire their strength and trust for each other in times of peril. They never doubt each other. I want to have that, I hope I have that, but only time will tell.

Young Ian is back in this one. He's recovering from his "divorce" in this book, and I find myself wanting good things to happen to him and it does! Ironic though that he finds love with a Quaker.

William, Jamie's bastard son, becomes more prominant in this book. I didn't really like reading about him because he's so boring. The book establishes him as a genuinely nice guy, who is unconsciously similar to his biological father. He plays Ian's rival for the fair maiden, but Ian wins (which is what I preferred anyways). The good stuff doesn't happen to him until the very end when he finds out his true parentage. The book ended before I got a chance to really like him.

There is a parallel storyline where you get to read about Brianna and Roger's life in the 1980s, and how they cope with modern life. They are able to read letters left to them by Jamie and Claire, so there remains a link between the past and present. In the middle of the book, a person from the past comes and gets stuck in the future. I hoped it was William, the son, but it was William - the man who tried to hang Roger in a previous book. And a friend in the modern world kidnaps Jem and Brianna to find the gold Jamie hid for them. Unknowing that the kidnapper remained in the modern world, Roger and William(the other)went back in time to find Jem.

I suppose Jem's kidnapping and Roger going back in time is a bit of a cliff hanger, but I was less involved in that storyline. I always feel more connected with Jamie and Claire's story. Claire married John Grey, Jamie's gay lover, when she thought Jamie died in a ship wreck - I was most displeased when I read that. The reader knew Jamie wasn't on the ship, so it felt extremely contrived to read that so near the end. Gabaldon did it on purpose to force Jamie and Claire to separate, because when Jamie comes back alive in the second to last chapter, he's forced to run into hiding with John Gray's help.

Now that I think about it, there's a lot of things the next book needs to cover. So she better have another one out soon. The story needs to reunite Jamie and Claire (of course), have William (the son) deal with his actual parentage, Ian and Rachel get married (a must), Fergus and his family survive the revolution (I was glad we got to hear about his family again in this book, and I imagine they will have a bigger role in the next one with all the conspiracies afoot), Roger and Brianna's family are reunited - in one time or another... Also, Jamie's sister, Jenny, is going to have a bigger role. She's come to America with Jamie after her husband died... I remember her being a lot of fun, so it should be interesting to see what she does in the new world.

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams, audiobook read by Stephen Fry

I read this book a long time ago, and didn't really get into it. Alot of my friends did and thought it was the wittiest thing in existence. This was the only book I read in the series.

I tried listening to the book this time because it was read by Stephen Fry. I started idolizing him recently because he is the host of QI (or Quite Interesting). QI is a quiz show where contestants (usually noted British comedians) vy for scores based on how interesting their answers are. Obvious and wrong answers cause shame to the contestants, and interesting if wrong answers are awarded. Right answers are rare and well noted. After watching QI, I started to follow Stephen Fry's work and was quite surprised that I liked him so much. I always knew of his existence, in movies that I've liked, but never really knew what else he did.

This version of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is great because you could hear the irony and absurdity of what the story is telling you. When I read the book, I was 13 or something, and alot of the humour went over my head because I wasn't sure what was real or fake. Stephen Fry has a great voice, and I really appreciate his reading because he also does all the voices.

Unfortunately, Stephen Fry only has an audiobook out for the first book in the series. I was able to find older versions of book read by Douglas Adams. I just started Restaurant at the End of the Universe as read by Douglas Adams, and it's not bad. His voices aren't quite as distinct as Stephen Fry's, but you are still able to hear the nuances of language he meant when he first wrote the book.

Persuasion by Jane Austen

I recently discovered that all of the BBC adaptations of classic novels is available for free on Youtube. In the process of watching the various Austen, Dickens and Gaskell tv series, I discovered Persuasion by Jane Austen. I personally own an anthology of Austen's novels, and was never tempted to read Persuasion mostly because of the summary of the novel on my book jacket. It says:

"In Persuasion, a tender, autumnal love story, Anne Eliot, one of Jane Austen's most appealing characters, makes a difficult but, she believes, prudent decision to spurn her sailor lover. She spends seven years regretting this, and when he returns he chooses another, only to have Anne vie for his affections anew."

When I read that, I immediately thought "old people!" and "Jezebel!" - I mean seriously, who wants to read about middle aged (autumnal) people throwing themselves at each other (vie for his affections). If they hadn't put in "makes a difficult, but she believes, prudent decision", implying that only she believes the decision to have been prudent, I might not have been so biased against the story. But seriously, the short description of the novel is completely incorrect. I learned this after watching two of the BBC adaptations of the novel. For one, "autumnal" is just wrong. Anne Elliot is 27 in this novel, by no means near the end of her life, even in that era. And Anne doesn't technically "vie for his affections anew" - she does her best to be unintrusive because she knows that she rejected him first and has no right to his affections. Captain Wentworth himself discovers that having met with Anne again, she is the who remains first in his heart.

Ignoring the terrible summary on the book jacket, Persuasion is probably the most romantic of Jane Austen's novels, in the modern sense. Anne and Fredrick meet again with all these preconceptions and baggage about each other. But through the experience they both gained through time, they are able to take a step back and observe each other objectively ( to a point) - they are able to see what merits the other has gained and maintained over time, and rediscover that the affection they had for each other remains the same.

Like all Austen novels, the side characters are invariably interestingly cast. Anne's family is completely ridiculous, vain and hypocritical. Which helps make Anne look all the more sympathetic, and helps you understand why Anne rejected Frederick in the first place. His companions are a bit more normal, a little more pathetic, but at least less silly. But his companions factor in less in the story, because his character is strong enough that you know he wouldn't necessarily listened to them if he felt he was doing the right thing.

After reading Persuasion, I think this novel will hold my affection for a long time. Although it's hard to say that in any just sense, because the movie and tv adaptation of the Austen stories hold such a strong place in my mind that I don't know if I could ever read the books in the same way. Without the tv versions, I don't think I would have read this novel. And without Colin Firth, I don't think I would have known Jane Austen at all. Maybe it is time I re-read all the Austen novels again - now that I better conceive the distinction between novel and movie, and educated enough to read the story on its own merits.