Easy Reads

I hate getting asked whether a book is an easy read or not. Getting asked that question is like a police officer asking three witnesses to the same crime; The police officer will get three varying accounts of said crime. An “easy read” for me is when I get a book finished in two to three days… And that really hasn’t happened in years. When that happens it’s because I’m REALLY INTO the story and I literally do nothing else that day except stay in my room and read.

I don’t really call the books I read anymore “easy reads.” Now that I’ve don fairly well in my reading challenge, I’ve finally figured out that getting a book read within a month is a “moderate” read for me. If it takes me longer than a month to complete a book, then it’s a more difficult read for me. However, this really all stems down to one reason: Am I in the mood to read this particular book in my possession? If I’m not, the book may sit to the side for a while before I pick it back up again.

When I first started watching Game of Thrones, it took me maybe a year before I finally decided to pick up the first novel the TV series was based on. I’m glad I did because it was an entertaining read and a fantastic world to immerse myself in. However, it took me literally the whole month I picked that book up to complete when I fully expected to have AGoT read within a week.

It wasn’t because Martin is a terrible writer or anything—every chapter I read was damn good—but it took me so long because the story is just so heavy. I knew half-way through that I’d want to read the next book, but by the end of the novel, I literally got a few pages into ACoK that I thought to myself, “I can’t read this right now.” It’s not that Martin isn’t a good author, it’s because there are a fuckton of characters in his story coupled with the fact that a crapload of shit is going on and 99.99% of it isn’t happy shit. So, the idea of going through that all over again was just daunting on me so I set ACoK aside and I haven’t picked it up since, lol. Mark my words, though. I fully intend to read the whole series because I want to know what I’m missing that isn’t getting put into the show, :P.

To make a long post short, my point is me trying to define a book as an easy read to someone else doesn’t work. What if I say, “Yeah, this book is totally an easy read! It was great!” Which encourages someone to pick up said book and read it and they don’t find it easy to read?

Originally posted via Tumblr on 9/14/14

Just a Heads Up...

I'm going to try book blogging on Tumblr to see how it goes.

Blameless, The Parasol Protectorate #3

Author: Gail Carriger
Publisher: Orbit (2010)
Started: April 29th, 2014
Finished: July 29th, 2014
Rating: 5/5 Stars

Quitting her husband's house and moving back in with her horrible family, Lady Maccon is the scandal of the London season.

Queen Victoria dismisses her from the Shadow Council, and the only person who can explain anything, Lord Akeldama, unexpectedly leaves town. To top it all off, Alexia is attacked by homicidal mechanical ladybugs, indicating, as only ladybugs can, the fact that all of London's vampires are now very much interested in seeing Alexia quite thoroughly dead.

While Lord Maccon elects to get progressively more inebriated and Professor Lyall desperately tries to hold the Woolsey werewolf pack together, Alexia flees England for Italy in search of the mysterious Templars. Only they know enough about the preternatural to explain her increasingly inconvenient condition, but they may be worse than the vampires--and they're armed with pesto.

Well, it's time to sit down and review this bad boy, er... girl in this case. Of course, I decide to start a book blog in the middle of a series I'm reading, so I apologize that this is not the first novel, hehe. At any rate, every book I've read so far in Gail Carriger's Parasol Protectorate series has been absolutely fantastic and the third book didn't disappoint. Compared to the previous novel, Changeless, it had quite a bit of action in it. From Alexia being chased by mechanical ladybugs to vampires and quite a lot in between, the pace of the novel was certainly fast in that regard and I enjoyed it. Considering the pace of the novel's predecessor, it was different since Changeless had a tendency to drag a bit in places. Blameless, however, had a good balance of action and "quiet" scenes as I like to call them. Speaking of quiet scenes...

Going into the novel I was concerned that this would be the book where Alexia wallows and throws a pity party for herself and that would be the majority of the content of Blameless. I was delightfully surprised and relieved to discover that wasn't going to be the case because I'd be really, really upset if that had happened. Alexia is not the type of woman to wallow and pine after a man that's rejected her. She's a lady of action, getting things done, and being sensible about things and that is honestly the main reason I love this character so much. Alexia Maccon is an independent woman for her time but she also works within the etiquette and acceptable behavior of the time period (to a point). For example, there is a scene in the novel where Alexia and her companions need to make a quick getaway in a flying machine. The seating arrangements are less than desirable and her skivvies end up exposed, but given the situation, Alexia's common sense allows her to soak up the faux pas in exchange for being able to live a while longer. She'd rather deal with the embarrassment and keep her life versus taking extra time to fix her skirts. Had one of her step-sisters been with her at the time, the results of their getaway might've been entirely different!

Carriger continues to reveal information of Alexia's kind beautifully. There isn't too much or too little information being revealed about Preternaturals--it's just enough to keep you wanting to read more and get the next book to see what happens! Although, at first I didn't really like the tease I got as a reader regarding the extremist group from the first novel. However, after sitting back and thinking, Blameless is really an exploration of Alexia and her kind and not necessarily a focus on the nefarious underplot of what possibly awaits all supernaturals in the universe of the Parasol Protectorate. In all, if you like Urban Fantasy with bite (pun might be marginally intended), Steampunk, or Historical Fantasy set novels, you'll really enjoy Blameless and this particular series written by Carriger.

Books I'm Looking Forward To Reading

The Oversight by Charlie Fletcher literally had my attention with the first sentence of the summary:

Once the Oversight, the secret society that polices the lines between the mundane and the magic, counted hundreds of brave souls among its members. Now their number can be tallied on a single hand.

As the borders between natural and supernatural begin to break down, brutal murders erupt across London, and the fellowship's enemies draw ever closer.

Will a screaming girl brought to the Oversight's headquarters be the instrument of their final downfall or their last, best hope of defense?

A tale of witch-hunters, magicians, unlikely heroes, and the secrets hidden in the shadows.

Meet the Oversight, and remember: When they fall, so do we all.

My, how ominous! While the last sentence is certainly attention getting, that's not what grabbed my attention. The first sentence kind of reminded me of, well... the Night's Watch from George R.R. Martins, A Song of Ice and Fire. Only, ya know, in this case it just might very well be dealing with magic, witches, and possibly vampires (God, I hope there are vampires and werewolves because that would be just so badass). So, for that possibility, I'm really looking forward to picking up Oversight soon. But, I guess we'll see what happens, hm?

Next on my list of books I'm looking forward to read is The Supernatural Enhancements by Edgar Cantero. While the summary is certainly intriguing...

When twentysomething A., a European relative of the prominent Wells family, inherits a beautiful, yet eerie, estate set deep in the woods of Point Bless, Virginia, it comes as a surprise to everyone—including A. himself. After all, he never knew he had a "second cousin twice removed" in America, much less that his eccentric relative recently committed suicide by jumping out of his third-floor bedroom window—at the same age and in the same way as his father had before him...

With his companion, Niamh, a mute teenage punk girl from Ireland, A. arrives in Virginia and quickly comes to feel as if he has inherited much more than a rambling home and an opulent lifestyle. Axton House is haunted... A. and Niamh know it... but the presence of a ghost is just the first in a series of disturbing secrets they slowly uncover. What led to the suicides? What became of the Axton House butler who fled shortly after hid master died? What lurks in the garden maze&mash;and what does the basement vault keep? Even more troubling, what of the rumors in town about a mysterious yearly gathering at Axton House on the night of the winter solstice?

From rifling through the book and reading the summary on Goodreads, it looks like the format of the novel is as intriguing and interesting as the summary itself. Full of documents, musings, and letters, I think reading this book is going to be very enjoyable simply because of that. Of course, there is the feel of the mystery—many mysteries!—that is going to be just as fun and another reason I'm also looking forward to reading this book.

Honestly, between Oversight and The Supernatural Enhancements, it's going to be extremely difficult in choosing which to pick up first!

Bitten, 111/530 pages

Having given Bitten a chance, I can safely say that I spoke too soon when I was previously unsure on whether or not I'd continue reading. As you can see from my progress, I've definitely continued reading but I still stand by my earlier statement of the language used. Some of it seems a little... dated even for a novel originally published in 2001. Now and then, the vocabulary that Elena uses whether internal or spoken, seem to make her much older than she is. But, given that werewolves in Armstrong's universe age more slowly, perhaps the choosing of these words on the author's part is on purpose to show that. A couple other points that sort of have me annoyed or otherwise thinking further thus far:

• Every time she's picked up like a 5-year-old. The way some of the pack treat her I find a bit... insulting? I'm not sure that's an accurate term to use here, but I find it highly annoying and I'm surprised that Elena hasn't voiced the same concern. She's a grown woman for cryin' out loud, not your 5-year-old kid sister.
• The angry undertone of the novel thus far. When reading earlier today, I sort of made the mental comment to myself that a lot of Elena's... internal musings had such an angry feel to it that sort of had been feeling taken aback. Like, "Whoa, relax lady!" But then I thought on it some with the information I had so far and I can see how a lot of what Elena thinks, feels, and says (out loud or just an inner musing) can seem angry. She's been dealt a really shitty hand and, according to her, been betrayed by someone she loved and trusted. At this point, I'm going to assume it's Clay, but I'm not 100% on that theory since it's based off what I know from the Syfy TV series and we all know that creative license tends to overtake book-to-film/tv adaptations. Basically, in all, I definitely see how everything she talks about is peppered with anger.

The Cold Dish

3.5 out of 5 Stars

Author: Craig Johnson

Publisher: Penguin (2012)

Started: August 3rd, 2013

Finished: July 28th, 2014

After twenty-four years as a sheriff of Wyoming's Absaroka County, Walt Longmire's hopes of finishing out his tenure in peace are dashed when Cody Pritchard is found dead near the Northern Cheyenne Reservation. Two years earlier, Cody had been one of four high school boys given suspended sentences for raping a local Cheyenne girl. Somebody, it would seem, is seeking vengeance, and Longmire might be the only thing standing between the three remaining boys and a Sharps .45-70 buffalo rifle.

With lifelong friend Henry Standing Bear, Deputy Victoria Moretti, and a case of characters both tragic and humorous enough to fill in the vast emptiness of the high plains, Walt Longmire attempts to see that revenge, a dish best served cold, is never served at all.

The first thing that stuck out at me and what made reading The Cold Dish immensely enjoyable was Walt's sense of humor.  Walt is portrayed on Longmire, in my opinion, as an old hardass with a soft and caring inside coupled with a strong sense of lawful justice. It appears the TV series has stayed true to its source material in regard to Walt's core sensibilities, but it was a treat to read that Walt also possesses a dry and witty sense of humor and isn't above a little self-deprecation when he does something stupid. That, I think, is a good sign when a character can call themselves out on their faults and mistakes and own up to them once they've gotten past their stubbornness.

In regard to the murder investigation of the novel, there was a pleasant balance between the present and Walt's recollection/POV of the past investigation that Cody Pritchard was a suspect in along with his cohorts. Craig Johnson also wrote a nice balance between the serious nature of both crimes and lightening tense situations and circumstances with well-timed (and sometimes poorly-timed) humor. In addition to a great supporting cast, each character contributes just enough to the story without leaving the reader wondering why one character got more "screen time" than another. Overall, this lead to a great story and storytelling experience. However, I'm sure you're feeling a "but" coming on and you would not be wrong.

You're probably wondering why it took me nearly a year or so to finish reading The Cold Dish, right? I kind of wondered that myself and I'll admit that there are one or two spots where the story drags a bit and my attention wandered to other books in the meantime. These spots are usually where Walt is wrapped up in thinking on a personal issue that leaves you kind of wondering if Johnson couldn't snip a few sentences here or there and still get the idea across. However, overall, the novel was very enjoyable I found, particularly when the Who Dun It was revealed at the end and I was very surprised by it (and then subsequently facepalming at all the "obvious" signs throughout the book if one is paying close attention). So, in the end, despite the slot spots, I highly encourage to give Craig Johnson's, The Cold Dish a try as it's an entertaining mystery novel.

Bitten, 6/530 pages

Given that I seem to only be able to read two to three pages at a time, I'm not particularly sure at this point if I'm going to continue reading this book or not. The style and language has not really grabbed me, but this may also be due to the fact that I've really enjoyed watching the TV show and I've found that when I see a movie (or read the book) first that I have a difficult time getting into one thing or another. However, I'll try to give Bitten a few chapters before deciding to continue or drop it.

To Do List (Updated: August 21st, Completed)

1. Add Current Reads.
2. Add additional Reading Challenge.
3. Start on Savages review. (On hold)
4. The Cold Dish review.
5. Blameless review.

New Direction

General Re-Vamp

Since I don't do much with this blog, I recently decided to repurpose it as a book/personal blog. What this re-vamp will entail is to serve as my progress bar, so to speak, of the books I'm reading along with my thoughts on said books.

Reading Challenge

In the past, I've tried Goodreads reading challenges without much success. This year, I'm proud to say that I've been pretty good at keeping up with the challenge and hope to incorporate other challenges in the future. I've found that having friends to help me by participating in a challenge is really beneficial, so if you need someone to help you like that, please let me know!

Book Reviews

As previously mentioned, I'll be posting book reviews along with the progress I'm making withy current reads. Reviews will include a rating, what else the book is similar to, and what I liked and didn't like about the book.

Personal

Lastly, the blog will also include a smattering of personal thoughts and photos. As of right now, I think I'll limit such posts to travel and outings. :)