EPBOT Readers discussion

Clean Room, Vol. 3: Waiting for the Stars to FallHi everyone!

Hope everyone's reading is going well!! Getting down to the wire for any reading challenges still going on.

I had a pretty good reading week this week.

I read:

Etiquette & Espionage - finished this up, it was a fun read. I'll probably continue the series later.

The Dark Prophecy - Continuing on with the Trials of Apollo. I like the series ok, but I prefer his series where the perspective changes. The Heroes of Olympus is my favorite, it switches between all the heroes in the party. The Kane Chronicles also alternate between the two siblings. I get that Apollo is supposed to be an arrogant god getting humbled, but it got old. Getting some chapters from Meg's perspective would be a welcome break.

Clean Room, Vol. 1: Immaculate Conception, Clean Room, Vol. 2: Exile - tore through these in a day, it was a great series. Gail Simone is a compelling writer, and the art was fantastic if troubling. Super creepy and weird but really good.

The Dark Side of the Road - Hadn't read Simon R Green in a few years, it was good to get back. For his series, he tends to pick a genre and do a sort of sci-fi/horror/dark fantasy take on it. This one is sort of a riff of Agatha Christie style mystery, but darker and scifi/horror.

Cruel Beauty - This was a fairytale retelling of Beauty and the Beast, with some greek and a little Celtic mythology mixed in. I'd read another retelling by her that I didn't love, so I'd been sitting on this one for a while. Wish I'd started with this one, I really liked it! I really liked that the main character was really flawed. So many times in fairytales and fairy tale retellings, the heroine is perfect. Or if not perfect, at least very good, does the right thing, innocent, etc. I think they gave the Beauty of the story some disagreeable traits to counter the good ones. That was really the theme of the story, balancing the good with the bad. I enjoyed it. It did mean i mentally yelled at her a lot, but it really kept me invested.

Currently reading: Fire in Her Blood (which is written by someone in FoE!) It's the second book of the series. I like it alright. Fun paranormal mystery. Has an interesting take on witchcraft that I've not seen before.

The exciting part is that Cruel Beauty completed my personal goodreads challenge of 150 books! A lot of them are comic trades, which is partially why I set it so high. But still, I'm pretty proud!

How is everyone else doing? Think you'll make it? What are you reading?

Hello All,

I *finally* finished The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay!!! This book was totally worth the time it took to read it. Okay, I'll admit it, I don't really like books set in America. As a Canadian, I get so much US-content in my everyday life, that I deliberately pick books set elsewhere, and often like to read CanLit and other books set in the Commonwealth countries. However, the comic book aspect of this book pulled me in, and, I have to say, I can completely see why this was a pulitzer prize winner. If this is not a great American novel, I don't know what is (although I fully admit that I can't stand The Great Gatsby, and I've read it a few times now). The way this book weaves narratives of immigration, WWII, the holocaust, comic book creation, and the American Dream (warts and all) together is just brilliant. This was one of the best books I've read in the challenge.

Last night, I started Ham on Rye. I got about 1.5 chapters in and then fell asleep, so I don't have too much of a reference point for it yet, but I am appreciating the stream of consciousness narrative style. This is my book mentioned in another book, and (oops!) I can't remember which book it was mentioned in. I'm pretty sure it was Oryx and Crake. I just remember I was reading one of the books in the challenge, saw the name of the book, did a quick google search for it to see why the character would be reading it, thought it looked good, and put it down for this challenge. So, it may not have been from Oryx and Crake, but it was definitely from something I read this year. :-)

I only have two books left in the advanced Popsugar challenge, and them I'm done! I've got a few books lined up for the gap between then and the beginning of the 2018 challenge. I didn't start this challenge until late February, so I'm looking forward to having a bit more time next year to read off list.

I have had The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & ClayT on my bookshelf and to-read list forever. Thanks for the push, I'll pull it down and put it in sight so I remember to pick it up as my next book!

Yay for people reading AAKC! I think Sheri might attempt it this year, too. I hope you like it, Wendy!

Yeah I’m planning on reading it next year for the challenge:D