Reading Challenges 2021

[Artemis Prime]

I WAS INSIDE MY LIBRARY YESTERDAY!!!!!!

Just popped in for a minute at the end of the day to pick up a hold, but still, it's the first time I've actually been inside the building in over a year and it was GLORIOUS! I forgot how wonderful libraries smell.

[Scaly Freak]

39 minutes ago, Artemis Prime said:

I WAS INSIDE MY LIBRARY YESTERDAY!!!!!!

Just popped in for a minute at the end of the day to pick up a hold, but still, it's the first time I've actually been inside the building in over a year and it was GLORIOUS! I forgot how wonderful libraries smell.

 

I am going inside my library next weekend and I can't wait!  

 

I am so jealous of you and your access to library smell.

[Scaly Freak]

On 4/23/2021 at 12:57 PM, Scaly Freak said:

 

I am going inside my library next weekend and I can't wait!  

 

I am so jealous of you and your access to library smell.

 

I have been inside the library. They are strict about pre-cautions to the point a librarian is stationed at the door, behind a plexiglass barrier, to keep a count of how many people are in the building and to make sure everyone who goes in wear a face covering and sanitizes their hands before entering. They've also set a time limit for browsing and computer use, to make it easier to comply with the occupancy restrictions.

 

I picked up my two requested books, and since there was a line to the hold shelf, I had several enjoyable minutes of soaking in library atmosphere and the smell of lots of books. I have missed the library.

[Artemis Prime]

So I just read a book where the protagonist has a ton of unresolved trauma and is being absolutely awful to everyone around her and the love interest helps her work through everything (she has other friends and family that help as well, it's definitely not a case of him "fixing" her) but she keeps pushing him away and when she finally tells him that she keeps pulling back from a relationship with him because she's done terrible things and doesn't deserve him, he assures her that he has forgiven her and loves her and doesn't hold her past against her. That quick little run through doesn't really do it justice, but my point here is that is so much better to read than if he had walked away from her during her awful phase and then she gets her act together and tries to win him back by telling him he has to give her another chance because she's a better person now. I had a discussion elsewhere recently about how toxic relationships shouldn't be portrayed as romantic vs idealized relationships not capturing the depth of flawed people who hurt each other but choose to stay together and work it out and I think this perfectly illustrates that it's more than possible to depict two people forming a strong relationship, even if one is significantly more flawed than the other, as long as neither party is portrayed as obligated to stay in the relationship for any reason. The whole thing hinges on the idea that these people are choosing of their very own free will to be with each other.

 

 

[Scaly Freak]

2 hours ago, Artemis Prime said:

I had a discussion elsewhere recently about how toxic relationships shouldn't be portrayed as romantic vs idealized relationships not capturing the depth of flawed people who hurt each other but choose to stay together and work it out and I think this perfectly illustrates that it's more than possible to depict two people forming a strong relationship, even if one is significantly more flawed than the other, as long as neither party is portrayed as obligated to stay in the relationship for any reason. The whole thing hinges on the idea that these people are choosing of their very own free will to be with each other.

 

The reason this is extremely difficult to portray in writing is one of the reasons there is so much garage in the romance genre... this sounds like a good one though.  

[Artemis Prime]

31 minutes ago, Scaly Freak said:

 

The reason this is extremely difficult to portray in writing is one of the reasons there is so much garage in the romance genre... this sounds like a good one though.  

Funnily enough...it wasn't romance. It was a fantasy novel, but the romance plot took up the most page space. Also it was behemoth of a book that follows up a behemoth series, so readers were already invested in the characters and familiar with all the backstory. I think that's why my favorite romances tend to be in series, because it's really hard to develop that much character in 300 pages without rushing it, but if your main characters played a supporting role in a previous book, you've got a leg up there.

[Jupiter]

8 hours ago, Artemis Prime said:

Funnily enough...it wasn't romance. It was a fantasy novel, but the romance plot took up the most page space. Also it was behemoth of a book that follows up a behemoth series, so readers were already invested in the characters and familiar with all the backstory. I think that's why my favorite romances tend to be in series, because it's really hard to develop that much character in 300 pages without rushing it, but if your main characters played a supporting role in a previous book, you've got a leg up there.

 

Now I'm intensely curious. What book/series is this? 

[Rebel Pilot Gar]

9 hours ago, Artemis Prime said:

Funnily enough...it wasn't romance. It was a fantasy novel, but the romance plot took up the most page space. Also it was behemoth of a book that follows up a behemoth series, so readers were already invested in the characters and familiar with all the backstory. I think that's why my favorite romances tend to be in series, because it's really hard to develop that much character in 300 pages without rushing it, but if your main characters played a supporting role in a previous book, you've got a leg up there.

 

51 minutes ago, Jupiter said:

Now I'm intensely curious. What book/series is this? 

Echoing this curiosity if you’re open to sharing the series.

[Artemis Prime]

On 5/5/2021 at 7:46 PM, Jupiter said:

 

Now I'm intensely curious. What book/series is this? 

 

On 5/5/2021 at 8:38 PM, Rebel Pilot Gar said:

 

Echoing this curiosity if you’re open to sharing the series.

Don't mind at all, just being deliberately vague since it was a bit spoiler-y. But the series was

Spoiler

Sarah Maas's A Court of Thorns and Roses. This was A Court of Silver Flames.

 The main series is over now, and I don't usually like the "extra" stories tagged on to the end of a series, mostly I think because it tends to feel more rushed and less well developed, but that wasn't the case here. In fact, it may have been my favorite book of the series, although it's been a while since I read the rest of them, so I might change my mind if I re-read all of them.

[Scaly Freak]

2 hours ago, Artemis Prime said:

The main series is over now, and I don't usually like the "extra" stories tagged on to the end of a series, mostly I think because it tends to feel more rushed and less well developed, but that wasn't the case here. In fact, it may have been my favorite book of the series, although it's been a while since I read the rest of them, so I might change my mind if I re-read all of them.

 

It's been a while since I read them now, but I remember really enjoying how the Lord of the Rings had several chapters left after the end of the main story.  The entire homecoming sequence was a pleasant surprise.

[Artemis Prime]

1 hour ago, Scaly Freak said:

 

It's been a while since I read them now, but I remember really enjoying how the Lord of the Rings had several chapters left after the end of the main story.  The entire homecoming sequence was a pleasant surprise.

I don't know why some people dislike that sequence so much. The hobbits were the heart of that story so it wasn't fully over until we saw them return to the Shire. 

[Scaly Freak]

31 minutes ago, Artemis Prime said:

I don't know why some people dislike that sequence so much. The hobbits were the heart of that story so it wasn't fully over until we saw them return to the Shire. 

 

Not only that... when someone goes off to fight a war, their struggles aren't over just because they get to go home. I like and appreciate that Tolkien forces us to acknowledge that.

[Artemis Prime]

On 5/7/2021 at 1:04 PM, Scaly Freak said:

 

Not only that... when someone goes off to fight a war, their struggles aren't over just because they get to go home. I like and appreciate that Tolkien forces us to acknowledge that.

Also important.  I've been asking myself lately why fantasy is my go-to when I'm feeling sad since it often has this bitter-sweet tone to the end that just yanks on all my heartstrings in an almost painful fashion and seems like I'm just piling fantasy sadness onto my real sadness, but after thinking about this, I've decided that's exactly why I go to fantasy. It's so cathartic to mourn with the characters.

[theophilus]

[posted to wrong forum!]

[juliebarkley]

On 5/7/2021 at 1:04 PM, Scaly Freak said:

Not only that... when someone goes off to fight a war, their struggles aren't over just because they get to go home. I like and appreciate that Tolkien forces us to acknowledge that.

Makes sense. Tolkien fought in World War I and you can see its influence throughout. Writing the series probably helped him deal with what he lived through.

[juliebarkley]

Reading update:

 

I have made little progress on the classics that I intended to work on this year. However! I have just (re)discovered the Crash Course Literature series, and have written down all the titles in the four seasons. I'm going to try to read a few in no particular order and then watch the related video(s) to give myself a little book club experience. If anyone thinks this sounds like a lark, the book list is in the spoiler.

 

Spoiler

 

Season 1:

Romeo & Juliet

The Great Gatsby

The Catcher in the Rye

The Poetry of Emily Dickinson

 

Season 2:

The Odyssey

Oedipus Rex

Hamlet

Frankenstein

Jane Eyre

Things Fall Apart

To Kill a Mockingbird

Slaughter-house Five

Beloved

Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance

The Poetry of Sylvia Plath

 

Season 3:

Their Eyes Were Watching God

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Shakepeare's Sonnets

Lord of the Flies

100 Years of Solitude

Invisible Man

Sula

 

Season 4:

1984

The Handmaid's Tale

Candide

The Parable of the Sower

The Yellow Wallpaper

To the Lighthouse

Macbeth

Pride and Prejudice

 

 

I'm also dipping my toe into a new-to-me genre: romance. Initially for career development reasons, but also personal development. So I guess what I've been lacking in volume I've been making up for in novelty.

[Scaly Freak]

27 minutes ago, juliebarkley said:

Makes sense. Tolkien fought in World War I and you can see its influence throughout. Writing the series probably helped him deal with what he lived through.

 

I have hoped it did ever since I found out he literally was in the trenches on the Western front. I literally cannot imagine what that must have been like, and what it would have been like to come back to "regular" life in England after that, at a time when psychology was barely acknowledged as a real thing.

 

19 minutes ago, juliebarkley said:

 

I'm also dipping my toe into a new-to-me genre: romance. Initially for career development reasons, but also personal development. So I guess what I've been lacking in volume I've been making up for in novelty.

 

Edging out of our comfort zone when it comes to reading is never a bad thing. It's one of the main reasons I keep trying to do Book Riot and other reading challenges year after year.  

[juliebarkley]

12 hours ago, Scaly Freak said:

I have hoped it did ever since I found out he literally was in the trenches on the Western front. I literally cannot imagine what that must have been like, and what it would have been like to come back to "regular" life in England after that, at a time when psychology was barely acknowledged as a real thing.

Neither can I; it must colour how you interpret the world for the rest of your life. I am so looking forward to taking my son to the War Museum. I have heard such wonderful things about how they really help visitors connect with what it felt like to be there, and the human element of the war. I'm hunting down World War I diaries, slave narratives and biographies, and other first-person accounts for both myself and my son because it helps me to imagine how it must have felt to live through those experiences.

[Rebel Pilot Gar]

17 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

Reading update:

 

I have made little progress on the classics that I intended to work on this year. However! I have just (re)discovered the Crash Course Literature series, and have written down all the titles in the four seasons. I'm going to try to read a few in no particular order and then watch the related video(s) to give myself a little book club experience. If anyone thinks this sounds like a lark, the book list is in the spoiler.

 

 

That reading challenge/series sounds really cool

[Scaly Freak]

4 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

Neither can I; it must colour how you interpret the world for the rest of your life. I am so looking forward to taking my son to the War Museum. I have heard such wonderful things about how they really help visitors connect with what it felt like to be there, and the human element of the war. I'm hunting down World War I diaries, slave narratives and biographies, and other first-person accounts for both myself and my son because it helps me to imagine how it must have felt to live through those experiences.

 

Did I ever post here about the book I read about the Nightwitches from WW2? It's a series of interviews with the pilots, each of them telling her version of what it was like and why they joined the war effort. It might fit what you're looking for.

[juliebarkley]

1 hour ago, Scaly Freak said:

 

Did I ever post here about the book I read about the Nightwitches from WW2? It's a series of interviews with the pilots, each of them telling her version of what it was like and why they joined the war effort. It might fit what you're looking for.

If you did, I don't remember it. Post away!

[Scaly Freak]

16 minutes ago, juliebarkley said:

If you did, I don't remember it. Post away!

 

I am 95% sure it was this one: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1624103.A_Dance_with_Death 

 

The cover on the copy I borrowed from my library looked different, but the pages available in Amazon's preview are all very familiar.

[Scaly Freak]

I've been reading a lot of Lindsay Buroker books lately... anyone else here familiar with her? She wrote the Emperor's Edge books, and the Dragonblood series.

[Artemis Prime]

On 6/12/2021 at 6:32 PM, Scaly Freak said:

Lindsay Buroker

I'm not familiar with her, but just looked her up on GoodReads. Dragonblood looks intriguing, added it to my TBR, which really doesn't need any more books on it. 

I've been reading Robin Hobb's Farseer trilogy. About halfway through book 2 and so far I'm enjoying it. Except the cover is very steroetypical90's fantasy. I cringed when I picked it up from the library. Put a shirt on, Fitz, you're embarrassing me.

Also trying to get through Why People Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer. I thought it was going to be very interesting psychology, and it kind of is, but his overall tone is so condescending about those poor deluded fools who believe in things like UFOs and organized religion that I'm really struggling to power through. Think I might just give up on it since I'm not actually enjoying it.

 

 

[Scaly Freak]

6 hours ago, Artemis Prime said:

Think I might just give up on it since I'm not actually enjoying it.

 

I would, but I refuse to read books I don't enjoy