What I Just Finished Reading
Fair Game by Patricia Briggs. It actually managed to keep my attention through the whole thing, but god, I am sick of the heroine of the book being captured/kidnapped/tortured somehow and for there to be male rescue and manpain. So, engaging plot for the most part and I do enjoy the world building, but fuuuuuck, I am sick of that plot point. Next.
Turns out I’m horrible at predicting what I’ll read next. The last time I did this, I thought I’d read Beyond Shame after I finished Fair Game. But what I ended up picking up was Neil Gaiman’s Ocean at the End of the Lane. It was honestly the first of his I had truly enjoyed in a while. If you liked his Coraline, I think you’re going to like this one. It has the same sort of kid’s fable feel, although this POV character is much younger and befuddled. Thankfully all of the rest of the characters seem to be very capable people (mostly women, which is really nice) and it worked well for me.
The Seduction Hypothesis by Delphine Dryden. DNF. Totally creepy hero completely turned me off. So the premise is that the couple in this book broke up but ended up still going to a comic convention that had had planned as a group trip before the break up. The break up was because basically the hero discovered the heroine’s burgeoning interest in BDSM and mansplained all over her how it was unfeminist and gross. Because there’s nothing that’s great for a relationship like telling your partner that their sexual interests are wrong and bad when they’re between consenting adults! There was also a jealousy problem on the part of the hero over nothing which causes him to dump her. Ugh. So on the trip to and at the convention, the heroine starts to explore her sexuality. She discovers that the BDSM comic she loves and started her down this path has a booth and that she would be a perfect substitute for their missing character. She even has a costume already! But while discussing with the booth crew her involvement, hero shows up and starts inserting himself in their negotiations like he has any goddamn standing. This is the point where I metaphorically threw the book at the wall. Go away creepy failbot. You should go sit in the corner and think about how wrong you are until you can apologize and interact with women like a goddamn grownup who respects boundaries.
The Drunken Botanist by Amy Stewart. I got this from an event I went to at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and have been slowly devouring it during meals. It’s a book that’s mostly a list of all the things that are used to make and flavor booze, so it’s a bit much for one sitting. But in bite-sized chunks, it’s a delicious mix of biology and history. You find out about how tequila worms are basically just marketing to sell shitty tequila and further evidence of just how shitty colonizing Europe treated, well, everyone. There’s also a lot of great cocktail and infusion recipes and tips for how to grow your drink ingredients. I’ve got a batch of aronia-infused vodka steeping right now for a cocktail event I’m planning for the fall.
Broken Homes by Ben Aaronovitch. This latest installment in the Rivers of London series follows the formula of the others with a bunch of seemingly unrelated incidents all pulling together at the end in a surprising way, but I am totally okay with that. I loved the focus on architecture and came away from the book wanting to learn more. Talk about something that doesn’t usually happen in a supernatural history. This one’s also got a betrayal in that was totally foreshadowed yet completely unexpected. Wow, well done. I hate to be the person going “Write faster!” but I can’t wait for the next one.
What I’m Reading Now
Beyond Shame by Kit Rocha. Totally reading this one finally. Wonderfully porny and starting to get some plot going. Really looking forward to getting some more information on the larger world of Eden and the surrounding sections.
What I’m Reading Next (best guess)
I’ve got Brown River Queen by Frank Tuttle finally on the ereader. This is the 7th in the The Markhat Files series. It’s another of those supernatural mysteries I like, ala the Dresden Files but without all of the failboating that the Dresden Files does. A+ for that alone. Plus a lot of fun characters and while the world building’s not completely original, it’s done in a fun way and honestly I just like these books a lot.
Magic Rises has also made its way onto the reader, but while I’ve enjoyed this series in the past, they’ve sort of fallen off my radar and I’m not in a huge rush to read it. I should probably reread the last few because I honestly can’t remember what all happened in them. Shapeshifters and vampires and stuff. It all blurs together after a while.
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