I hope it goes without saying that, if you haven’t read these books, beware the spoilers that follow. I’ve tried to not give away major plot points for each book, but if you’re on book three, you may not want to read the following reviews. Harry Potter was one of those foundational stories, for me. It laid the groundwork for what I deem good in this world. To some degree, everything I’ve read since has been weighed against the mark left on my soul by […]
Teach me how to say goodbye
The stakes are high in this one, for Blue especially, as her mother has gone missing. She’s underground, figuratively and literally, and no one can find her. SHIT IS GETTING REAL, Y’ALL. Not only is Blue dealing with the loss (misplacement?) of her mother, but her feelings for Gansey are getting harder to ignore. The two are playing with fire, really, growing closer and trying to hide it from their friends and themselves. They still can’t kiss, due to Blue’s prophecy that she’ll kill her true […]
I’m running out of time, I’m running and my time’s up
This is the second in Maggie Stiefvater’s The Raven Cycle series, so will most definitely (probably?) contain spoilers for the first novel. At the end of The Raven Boys, we learn that Ronan, Gansey’s difficult, hot-tempered friend and (ware)house-mate, pulled his pet raven, Chainsaw, directly out of his dreams. (That was a weird sentence I just typed.) This novel picks up that thread and runs (and runs and runs) with it and IT IS DELIGHTFUL. And also sort of horrifying and worrisome. Ronan inherited a […]
The Space Time Continuum Is Collapsing in a Delightful Romp
It is inevitable that I start by comparing To Say Nothing of the Dog to Doomsday Book, the other Connie Willis novel I recently reviewed. Though very much related in that involves the same delightful Oxford time travel team, this is a very different story, much more a light-hearted romp through Victorian England with references to mystery novels of that time (and later times). In spite of how very different the tone of the book is, I loved it as well. It’s like Doctor Who–some episodes are fun and […]
They’ll tell the story of tonight
I’m rereading all of these since the final book comes out TOMORROW (EEEEEEK!). I liked this book much more this time through. I think it has something to do with having spent more time with the characters in the following two books. I’m finding myself more wrapped up in this series than I thought I would be and I’m not gonna lie…I’m a bit worried about how everything is going to shake out. (I’m also getting closer to being able to spell Stiefvater correctly without […]
A Practical Heroine in a Fairy Tale Wedding
Ursula Vernon writes extremely practical heroines, they simply don’t have time for nonsense when there is danger around. It makes for some extremely humorous situations, and very good story telling. Here, under the pen name T. Kingfisher, she creates a fairytale and gives us the very practical miller’s daughter Rhea as our protagonist. Rhea, is as I said a miller’s daughter, so when a lord asks for her hand in marriage there is very little she or her family can do to deny him. It […]