EPBOT Readers discussion

Hi Everyone,

Hope the Americans had a nice Thanksgiving!

This week I finished:

Chimes at Midnight - re-read because I wanted to continue the series and forgot what all happened.

The Winter Long - this was a fun addition, started filling in blanks of things that were hinted at earlier. Enjoyed it a lot.

Wires and Nerve, Volume 1 - bit of a break before diving back intto October Daye, it was fun. I liked the Lunar Cycle books, was good to revisit.

House of X / Powers of X - xmen is getting all rebooted so I checked out this, i thought it was kind of a mess. It would bother me less if it was an alternate universe or a novel completely unrelated to marvel. But as it stands it seems like it's just straight up chucking a lot of established lore out the window because they just...feel like it? Doesn't make me excited to to read any further xmen, really.

Small Favor - finished my audio re-read, finally. I ended up borrowing a friend's library card because i think my hold glitched out.

Currently reading:

A Red-Rose Chain - enjoying so far, things are ramping up again. I own all the rest of the books physically, so i've been slow continuing on with it since i generally only book splurge at Powells, but i don't know if i can wait 6 months or more to read the next one haha. We'll see.


Also as a note for anyone interested, Read Harder has released their challenge list, and i'm actually really excited about it! the last couple years were a little meh, with a bunch of prompts I either wasn't excited about or had trouble filling via the library. This year has some really interesting prompts, but none that seem so specific/hard to find that I won't be able to manage. I was a little dubious about the poetry audiobook because overdrive didn't have many options, but hoopla actually has a ton. I'll also have to research indie press horror, but hopefully it won't be too impossible. https://bookriot.com/2019/12/03/2020-...


General question first: Should I start a new round of book club selection post new-year? Not a whole lot of responses to this one. I'm not sure if it's that people are still reading, or that most people aren't actively participating anymore. I don't want to rush anyone, but new year, new book would make sense. I think I'll do a general "hey we have a book club/goodreads group" post again soon, to try to stir up some new/refreshed interest too.

QOTW: Does the end of the year affect your reading? If so, how? For example, do you tend to read holiday related material, have yearly traditional re-reads, etc.

As the year ends I tend to like to either catch up on fluffy stuff I didn't get around to earlier, or go into re-reads. I don't like to read anything too overly serious or challenging, I just want to relax. I don't tend to go for themed holiday reads though.

Seeing you reading the October Daye series makes me want to get caught up again, Sheri. I've read the first few years ago, but I fell behind. I think I'll start over in the new year, maybe.

This week, I finished:
Made Things - I really enjoyed this novella and would love to see a full-length work about this setting.

The Princess and the Fangirl - In the same way Geekerella is a retelling of Cinderella, the sequel is a retelling of the Prince and the Pauper, set at a geeky convention, where an ordinary fangirl winds up filling in for the actress she looks like. I loved it. It was fluff, but it hit exactly the right fluffy notes for me.

Manga: O Maidens in Your Savage Season 3, Noragami: Stray God, Vol. 9, The Promised Neverland, Vol. 12, Skip·Beat!, Vol. 43

Currently reading: Black Spire - I've been on a Star Wars high with the new movie coming out soon, and we're going to Disneyland next year, so I wanted to read this tie-in for the new Galaxy's Edge attraction.

Sheri, for indie press horror, some of the work Seanan McGuire/Mira Grant puts out through Subterranean Press, such as In the Shadow of Spindrift House, might qualify.

As far as the book club, I do enjoy the reads. I haven't had a chance to re-read the latest book to participate in the discussions, though. I do enjoy having a book club. I used to help run an online book club on LiveJournal, so I'm happy to help if needed, too.

QOTW: The end of the year doesn't really affect my reading too much. Sometimes I like to just read fluffy, cute stuff, like happy romances or similar, but I don't especially go for holiday-themed work.

Jennifer, thanks! I love her writing in general so if I can find one that counts, awesome.

I adore the October Daye books! I'm caught up and sad that there aren't more of them. I hope she writes more.

I'm about 2/3 of the way through Consider Phlebas and finding that it's a really weird book. If I hadn't heard from multiple people that the first book isn't as good but I'll really like the rest of the series, I might have already given up on it. I just really don't like the main character and I'm having a hard time caring what happens to him! I'm hoping to make myself finish it soon and I have Fool's Assassin lined up to start next.

QOTW: The only way the end of the year affects my reading is that I'm on winter break (I teach 8th grade) so I have more time to read :)

At last check-in, I was finishing The Partly Cloudy Patriot, which was perfect for something to read in short spurts amidst the chaos of Thanksgiving.

Once everything settled down a bit after everyone went home, I started The Cerulean for IRL Book Club #2. I had picked it for the group because it had arrived in my book box earlier this year, and I never got around to reading it. After I put it on the list, I saw some negative online reviews and got worried that it might offend some of the other members, but I decided to leave it as my pick anyway, since we're all grownups. I'm so glad I did - I loved it, and it makes me sad that others might miss it because of reviews that I now suspect were written by people who didn't even read the book. I know from Twitter and other Goodreads groups that there's often behind the scenes drama with some writers and their fans, but I'm not hip enough to know if this could be part of that, Anyway, just one more reminder to not pay attention to reviews!

I then moved on to Catalyst, which had been on my radar for quite a while, since I read Speak when it first came out when I was in college and was so impressed by it. I'm not sure if it's just that I'm older now, or if Catalyst was just not quite at Speak's level - but it definitely didn't draw me in the same way. It was like that meme about how you feel like you're twenty until you're around actual twenty year olds...but it definitely didn't connect like I expected it to.

I'm currently reading The Widows, which sounded very promising but hasn't fully grabbed me over 1/3 of the way in. A mystery involving a female sheriff in 1920's Ohio should be fun, or at least action-packed, but it's definitely taking its time to get going.

General Question: I always enjoy reading the group books, even if there isn't much interaction with the posts about them (although I'd love to read other people's thoughts if anyone who sees this hasn't posted yet!), so I'm all for continuing to pick books and have posts about them. I would be glad to help with questions or whatever would be helpful, since I'm pushing for it. :)

QOTW: The end of the year often gets a bit hectic with travel and family events, so I often don't get as much reading in as I do during ordinary time. I'm not very good at aligning my reading to the seasons, although some of the book clubs will periodically pick seasonal reads - so I'll sometimes read a Christmas book in February or something like that. :)

Since last week, I've only gotten two light reads done:

The Myth of Multitasking: How "doing It All" Gets Nothing Done and the 6-page short story entitled Eight O'Clock in the Morning, which was the inspiration for the wonderful movie They Live .

I've also started The Strain by Guillermo del Toro, which is off to a great start.

QOTW: After I complete a few reading challenges, somewhere in early fall, I tend to drift off and read more freely. At this point of the year, I've finished all the challenges I'm likely to finish, so I pick up books rather randomly from the TBR pile that has grown after the two big fall book fairs I attend each year.

This week I finished Milk!: A 10,000-Year Food Fracas. As someone who consumes a lot of dairy, I very much enjoyed it.

I'm now finally starting the FoE Book Club book The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. I just got it from the library hold last week. So I'm slow on being part of the book club here.

I'm still listening to The Collapsing Empire. I listen while walking and with the snow we've had my walking has been a lot less lately. Hopefully that will improve.

General Question: I tend to be on the slow side in reading the books, but I have enjoyed them. Yes, a bit more interaction online about them might be nice. I have no suggestions on how to make that happen however.

I like the idea of posting in the mothership about the group here, maybe asking there for people's ideas on how to make it work better and perhaps even encouraging people to participate more on these weekly check-ins. I think these threads (again thank you Sheri for taking the lead to create these posts) are a very valuable resource for me and they have gotten a lot more interactive as time goes on.

QOTW: I'd say the end of year does not usually change my reading. Since I'm not doing a challenge, I'm not finishing that up and doing free reading. I'm just always doing free reading!