EPBOT Readers discussion

Hi Everyone!

It's another sunny Summer day in Michigan. (yes, i know it's first day of summer. Michigan doesn't hold with your seasons nonsense, it's been summer since may. Except that one week of fall-like temperatures).

I was traveling over the weekend, so I was mostly reading comic books. I have a bunch on my ipad, and I find them easier to read on vacation. Easier to pick up/put down than a novel.

I still managed to finish a few things.

The Fate of the Tearling - Read this for fun. It was alright, conclusion to a trilogy. The ending was dissatisfying though, so I was a little disappointed.

Dragondrums - Finishing up the series, procrastinating on starting the next books.

The Underground Railroad - This was my book about a difficult subject. I'd been dragging my feet on hitting the prompt because I don't LIKE reading books about difficult subjects. Reading is my escapism, so i have a hard time getting myself psyched to read something I know is upsetting. I was disappointed in this though. I've read books about slavery that were hard to read, but really moving and good. This one was just upsetting because of subject matter, but it was too clinical and I didn't really connect to the characters.

this puts me at 51/52, SO CLOSE. I'm #4 of 1 copy for my last book. I really wanted to wrap this challenge up in June, just for my own pride. but I dunno if it'll come in on time. It's a book with a family member in the title, was having trouble finding one that sounded interesting. So i'm waiting on My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry. It looked interesting. Crossing fingers it comes in soon!

Currently reading The Hammer of Thor for fun. I like Rick Riordan books, fun to turn mythology on it's head.

How's everyone else doing? Reading anything amazing? Amazingly bad? Feel free to post, even if you're not doing a challenge, or are sticking to the goodreads yearly challenge :) No judgements, I just like talking about books!

Yes, please post if you feel like it, everyone. Sherri is probably getting tired of just conversing with me, heh. :-)

Particularly when all I have to relate is that I'm STILL reading Oryx and Crake. Sigh. But, the good news is that I'm done my major editing project this week and I can stop working on editing chapters for my own book and start reading books written by others--and I can't wait. I need a serious dive down the rabbit hole of good fiction after this first round of editing. I pledge that I will have two books to report on having finished reading by next week!

Sherri, how can I resist learning more about Mjølnir? :-) (Yeah--I'm the Stephanie FOE with the floofy tabby named Mjølnir). I'm looking forward to hearing your review of it.

It's been raining most of the week here in Ontario, and I'm super happy about it because we put in some new gardens this week and nature is doing the work of keeping up the watering regime while the plants put their roots down! You must have had some good storms, too, Sherri!

Oh! I didn't realize you were Stephanie of the beautiful cat! :D I love all your Mjolnir photos, she's gorgeous. Such a floofy tail.

It's pretty good so far. If you've read any other Rick Riordan, you know he takes a lot of liberty with mythology, but I think it's fun :)

We've been having rain aplenty. Sun actually JUST came out, after pouring all morning. Also lost power due to a storm last night, for a while. Made for a really stuffy night. Boo.

Wait, are you Sherri Chap Spangenberg? Goodness: all the social medial threads are colliding!

I've never read Rick Riordan. I'll have to look into his work. I want to read Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology at some point this year. It doesn't fit into my list, but I'll make it work somehow.

It it's sunny at your place, it will be sunny here in a few hours. It's currently still pouring (yay!).

Yep, that's me :D Well, this is a FOE group, so all of us are in there somewhere. I just am bad with names, so didn't make the connection.

Riordan's stuff is YA, but it's pretty good reads. Percy Jackson is what he's most known for. Magnus Chase series is newer, so this is only book 2. I think book 3 maybe just came out?

Sun just went away, I think it's playing peek-a-boo. but i think the rain's over for a little bit. says it might rain at noon, but only 30%. So who knows! Plants got watered, at least.

Hi! This is my first time posting!

I am just starting Foundation by Mercedes Lackey. I mostly like to read genre fiction -- all types of genres. Last weekend I was browsing the sci fi/fantasy section of the bookstore and came upon the Mercedes Lackey's books. She has a ton of them. From a discussion on the FoE Facebook page this week, I gather it can be difficult to tell where to start with her books, so hopefully I've picked a good series to start with.

I can't wait to hear how your reading progresses this week!

Larissa, welcome to posting!

I like the foundation series ok, the first one of it is my favorite. It gets kind of confusing as it goes on. If you start not feeling it, don't give up on Valdemar! Id recommend going on to the Arrows for the Queen series,those were the first written and lay the groundwork for the whole world. Or the oath sister series which are really good but more stand-alone.

She's my favorite author, hope you enjoy!

Hi Larissa! Welcome to the group. It's nice to virtually meet yo, and sorry for taking my sweet time getting back to you. I usually only post on Fridays, but tomorrow is a holiday for me, so I'm checking in early. (Sheri--I'll still post something, but after I sleep in, do some gardening, have a nap--probably with Mjølnir--read a bit, etc., heh. So, post might be a little later in the day!)

I saw that post on Mercedes Lackey's books, too, and I'm completely unfamiliar with her work. How is Foundation going?

I read the word "Foundation" and only thought of Isaac Asimov. I'm such a geek.

I finished Foundation this weekend and lived it. I have the second book but want to read some other things first. Thanks for the tip about the later books becoming confusing. I won't give up on Mercedes Lackey! And I do plan on reading the Arrow books next.

I found it interesting that Foundation was in the adult fiction section of the library, but it read a bit like a YA novel - probably because the protagonist is only 13 years old. My guess is that because the Collegium books are part of a larger world and the rest of the books are adult fiction, they are kept together. (Please note that I'm actually a librarian in this library, so I'll just ask someone in tech services, lol.)

Right now I'm finishing One Book in the Grave by Kate Carlisle. It is a cozy mystery. I'm an unrepentant genre reader and I like many different genres!

Larissa wrote: "I found it interesting that Foundation was in the adult fiction section of the library, but it read a bit like a YA novel - probably because the protagonist is only 13 years old."

yeah he grows up as the series progresses. The Valdemar series in general she writes as adult fiction, even though a lot of the series start with the protagonist as a teen, they grow as the series progresses. I think Mags is more like 18 by the time the series ends, and the next series involving him i think he's in his 20s or so. The Arrows series starts with Talia as 13, but she's probably 20-ish by the time it ends.

She does write some YA too, but that's usually co-authored.

If you like her writing, I also recommend her 500 Kingdom series, and the Elemental Masters. :)

Also The Black Swan is one of her solo books, and it's basically one of my favorite books ever. I've read it so many times entire chunks of pages are falling out of it.