What are you Reading?

I talk about books, mostly complain, but sometimes I say nice thing! Send me book recommendations please, or your thoughts on books! Any pronous! (Side blog)

[clockwork-reads]

Because HBO's Velma is atrocious, may I recommend Edgar Cantero's Meddling Kids? It's a love letter to Scooby-Doo with a believable lesbian romance, Hanna-Barbera shenanigans, and all the fun stuff you would expect in a book with the premise of "Scooby-Doo but for adults". And no bullshit shoehorned in to make you angry.

Also the covers are dope.

[wetalkaboutbooks]

Very good book, although be warned the novel deals with some iffy mental health rep- although the lesbians are very cool

[wheeloffortune-design]

MAY 2, 2020 HIEROBOOK.COM

(please note that the link will not work prior to May 2, 2020)

All reblogs are appreciated  :)

[edhelwen1]

Most meet-cutes don't include assassins. Most love stories don't involve becoming a superhero. Then again, Westmeath isn't like most cities.

Kennedy Fairfield just graduated in the class of 2002, and is now trying to find her purpose in life, or at least a job in her field. When she saves Jason Johnson, the leader of a secret Community of supernatural people called Aetherborn, from an attempted assassination, they embark on a whirlwind epic romance and adventure.

For Kennedy and Jason to discover why people are disappearing in time to save her friends, they'll have to face teleporting assassins, grumpy wizards, gossiping hags, mafia robots, and secret military groups, all in the city of Westmeath, Ontario, which has more secrets than residents.

The first book of four in The Gates of Westmeath series.

Physical copy: https://49thshelf.com/Books/A/Assassins!-Accidental-Matchmakers

Ebook: https://books2read.com/u/mv1e0z

Cover art by @pinkpiggy93

[eleftherian]

“I heard that Miss Creakle was in love with Steerforth. As I sat in the dark, thinking of his nice voice, and his fine face, and his easy manner, and his curling hair, I thought it very likely”

HOW DO PEOPLE NOT READ DAVID COPPERFIELD AS QUEER smh 

[wetalkaboutbooks]

So, I finished Radio Silence. And, uh, it was very much not my thing. I'll post a full review soon, but I'm a tad too worked up over it right now to have cohesive thoughts.

Yikes, I suppose.

[wetalkaboutbooks]

My Name is Memory- Ann Brashares

Wow! Long time no update, which is the fault of being in a reading slump from AFTG, which still has not left me alone since I finished it. But, a simple review of a book that took me too long to finish is finally here, spoiler free as well!

This book was recommended to me by a friend, and so it holds a higher opinion in my mind then if it had not been recommended to me. It was, to put t simply, fine. I loved the concept but the main characters behavior is stalker-ish at best, and full on obsession pretending to be love at the worst. Would I recommend it to others? No. Did I hate it? Also no. It was just bland, especially after my last read. Who knows, perhaps I’ll revisit it later and have a higher opinion, but for now:

Overall opinion, good concept, boring book. 5/10.

Next book is Radio Silence, recommended by the same friend, hopefully it will take less time.

[bookish-bi-mormon]

There isn’t enough fan content of the Mirrorworld series by Cornelia Funke and that is a travesty

[wetalkaboutbooks]

The King’s Men- Nora Sakavic

Apologies for how late this is, but it’s here now! So, here is my final review for both The King’s Men, and for All for the game as a whole. Spoilers ahead for all books in All for the Game, and a warning for mentions of harder source material that the books do work with. Anyway, here we go! 

I think that I will split this into the good, the bad, and an overall review of the series as a whole.

What Was Good?

Characters

Starting with Kevin. I really adored getting to a softer, more hopeful side of him. I felt the way he engaged with UCS and Jeremy was incredible, seeing him act like a normal person, with friends, who didn’t live in a constant state of fear, was lovely. I love Kevin, I think his character development is very well paced. I do wish that his alcoholism would have been dealt with, and his girlfriend, but we will get around to that later. For now, I think that his tattoo was a good way to show him moving on, taking control of his life, and reclaiming his skin from Riko. Also, proud of him for telling Wymack the truth.

Next, Matt and Dan. They’re so cute, the final scene where her strip club family comes to see the game, and how her and Matt work together is fantastic. I don’t know how to express exactly how much I love their relationship, it works so effortlessly and pays off in every scene they have together. They are such a highlight for me, and make the book a lot better.

Allison is a babe. When she just backhanded Aaron for talking smack to Neil about Seth, I have never rooted so hard for a character as I did for Allison in that moment. She had the least amount of development by far, and the least amount of time within the novel. The scene where she is looking at the banners did the same thing that Kevin’s tattoo did, in a smaller way. It was the idea of moving past a person’s control, moving into oneself, and standing without an essential pillar to their inner ideas and person. Allison and Renee were also very cute, and their relationship is adorable.

Seth, if you read my other reviews you knew this was coming, I love him, I miss him, he’s wonderful because he was so flawed. I do have some genuine thoughts about him this time around. So, I felt like this time around his death was finally properly acknowledged. He was allowed peace and closure, I miss him yes, but his death means something. Which is conflicting, but I think it's good. It’s more than just Allison that sees this, it’s Neil as well. I think he finally gets the remembrance he deserves in this book, as it comes from the people who matter.

Neil! I love him, he’s different in this book, more soft. And loved, he knows what he wants and knows that he can have it. He can let go of some of his walls and learn who he is again. He’s wonderful, and stronger as a character than he has ever been. I don’t really have all too much to say, mostly because his development was so natural. He’s wonderful, I think I love him too.

Nicky and Aaron, eh. I don’t really feel too strongly about them, I like Aaron, and Nicky is alright I suppose, but they didn’t get a lot of development throughout this book. They were better, so that’s good.

Renee is my love, what a badarse, bless her soul.

Andrew, he’s done it, I like him a lot now as a character. His growth this time around has been wonderful, the way he and Neil work together is so well done. The whole “I hate you” bit is endearing, the pipe dream scene, the mountain scene, the bandaging scene before the shower. But beyond them together, Andrew can stand so much taller on his own now, without Kevin and Neil he is a good character, he isn’t redeemed, but I think from this point on he will be.

OTHER

The fact that Andrew and Neil didn’t get together until after he was off his drugs, wonderful.

The amount of cop disrespect, go off.

The dialogue is very good at times, and had me laughing or almost crying at times.

The scene where Neil is kidnapped, and his dad just, you know. Walks down the steps barefoot. Just, slap slap, his bare feet on the cold ground. Pfft, can’t.

“My dad comes to all my games.” Kevin stop I’m already crying.

The blood in the locker scene was wonderful.

Jean, my French loving heart goes out to him. Also, poor boy, glad he’s free.

Game scenes, love them as always

The Not so Good

Less in this book then in the rest, so that’s a great sign.

Kevin. I wish he got to recover more, he’s a main character and deserved more than a half done revival. His girlfriend was a shoddy put it to give him something to go for. I love her, don’t get me wrong, but she deserved better than being Kevin's eventual redemption. And Kevin deserves to live for himself for a while. Without Riko, or Andrew, or anyone else. Let him live. Also, would have loved to see him take the tattoo off without being pissed.

Trauma. Can’t these characters have some respect for the suffering of their friends. They all need a break, and honestly so do I. I can’t anymore with the disregard of pain, a lot of it comes off as victim blaming, namely Neil in regards to Andrew. 

The trigger warning need to be taken seriously, please look them up if you are planning to read it. The dead animal scene was terrible and unnecessary. 

Which leads to Riko. Yikes, where to begin? Let’s start with the end. His death was shocking and a messy way to tie up the fact that he wouldn’t stop unless someone made him. He became far too easy to hate, see the fox scene, and I stopped hating him. Just felt pity for him, which isn’t very fun. I suppose there’s a bit of nuance to it, if you think, but I don’t think it played out well with his end being so dull. Yikes, what a let down, all this build up to his death and then it didn’t mean anything.

Seth. Wow, yikes, here we go again. This is sort of the same idea as Riko’s death, don’t tell me a character’s death means nothing, and then shoe in it means something at the end. It’s cheap, and takes away the message you gave in the first place. In this case, that being that sometimes people die and there are only a few who mourn, and it doesn’t mean anything big, but it still means something. Then boom, it’s a plot point for character development and all that work, accidental or not, is thrown away.

OVERALL

As a book

This is the best book in the series, by far. Sakavic really grew as a writer and it show’s in this book, in the pacing the game scenes, the dialogue, in the overall themes that were presented. I loved it, I really did. I loved this book, it was fun and I had fun.

8.5/10, Thank you for a wonderful ride.

As a series

Everything above, while true, does not extend to the series, I of course cover the flaws in my other reviews, but to summarize it’s not worth the wait. It takes too much bad writing, to much pain, and disregard, to get to this point. If you can put up with it, then it get’s fun, but overall. Eh, didn’t like it that much. 5/10 for the series. 

Book 1 Book 2 

[wetalkaboutbooks]

The King's Men- Nora Sakavik

Just finished the King's Men, review will be up sometime this week as I'm very swamped right now. But, the plan for this book review is for it to be my most in depth one yet! I'm looking forward to closing the series off, It's truly been a wonderful ride.

[wetalkaboutbooks]

The Raven King- Nora Sakavic

So, I’ve finished book two. I am a little bit heartbroken, but a lot more excited to see how this series ends. This review will hopefully be shorter than my last one as I have a lot less to complain about. I’ve decided to split it into two sections again, one fore small things I liked/disliked and another for the more serious things I’d like to talk about. Spoilers for book one and two of All for the Game under the cut, so be warned. Here we go!

The Small Things

The dialogue was far better in this book. It was consistent and you could see that Sakavic has gained a better understanding of her characterization. It was still jilted at times, and by no means have the exposition dumps stopped, but since discovering this is self published I feel that it is necessary to be more lenient with the writing flaws.

Neil wearing jorts that one time, not very notable but it made a lot of sense for some reason.

The Foxes fans are a bit too much like furries for me to be comfortable, seeing as I have a deep seated fear of mascots, so that added both a wonderful dose of realism and fear to the pre-game scenes.

Why did Riko kiss Kathy, also was it implied to be more than a kiss? If so, what the hell dude, that’s weird.

The scene at the first banquet with the ravens was wonderful, they should be so lame but somehow came across as genuinely intimidating and cool.

The game scenes were incredible as always, the way Sakavic over describes everything builds tension so flawlessly. It has you on the edge of your seat, and I truly enjoyed each chapter where they were playing.

Another wonderful scene was with Andrew after one of the games, sitting on the floor with Wymack, surrounded by his pills. It was so well done.

I hope to see more of Renee and Allison, I think they’re quite brilliant

The character interactions worked a lot better in this book, it started off a bit rough but by the end everything just flowed so wonderfully, it’s very nice seeing the characters grow through the authors writing.

Aaron was fantastic this time round.

The Big Things

I think I’m going to start a bit smaller and work my way down, this book has so much to cover that I doubt I’ll be able to hit every point worth talking on, but that being said these are the things I recall as sticking out and that really stuck with me.

Seth. Yes, I know, he’s not really an important point in context to the rest of the book, but I feel the need to address the importance and handling of his death. I felt like the mix between Neil’s apathy and difficulty with acknowledging death as something difficult to confront and how heartbroken Allison was fascinating. Allison was the perfect portrayal of grief, the withdrawn outsider attitude that pushed her away from the team and the pressing weight of her absence as she came to terms with the loss. It gave his death a feeling of fleeting importance, something that affected the people who cared for him but left the world around him almost untouched. I think that it shows that while the entire world doesn’t stop when someone dies, the world of the people who care for them stops as they have to come to terms with what happened. I hope that in the next book we can see a bit more of Allison.

Kevin. Another positive thing that this book did! I will be blunt, as far as book one goes, I did not care about Kevin. He was one sided, boring, and just plain compared to the rest of the cast. This book, however, I find him to be so much more interesting as he provides such a bizarre perspective, namely after Andrew takes leave. I can’t quite explain it, but the way he deals with his anger and pain is just very relatable to me. I love him quite a bit. A bit odd with Wymack being his dad, that was a turn I didn’t really expect.

Neil getting a phone. I feel like his trauma surrounding phone calls was dealt with in a very mixed manner. I think that the forced exposure therapy type treatment Andrew gives is not best to project as an appropriate way of dealing with past issues. This point also applies to his drugging of Matt to get over his drug addiction, because no? That is not how that works. But having Neil come to terms with parts of his past little by little is very nice to see.

Andrew. As of last post, I didn’t exactly like Andrew. He is a lot, to put it simply. And while I still stand by everything I said against him, I think his trauma in this book should be acknowledged. The assault scene was well handled, Sakavic didn’t over exploit the scene, nor did she paint her characters as anything but what they already are. It is a way better way of handling trauma then what we as readers were given in the first book. I think Andrew deserves an entire post of his own to unpack everything I want to say about him, but so summarize it, while I do not think his past actions are excusable or justified, his behavior can be seen as a product of who he is as a character. I see why so many people are attached to him as a character.

The characters are inherently problematic, they will never not be problematic. There is no justifying some of their actions, there is no excusing it, but so long as that is understood the characters can be understood.

Riko. God, I hate him. I hate him so much. What a terrible character. Knowing what he threatened Andrew with, how he killed Seth, what he did to Kevin, What he’s done to Neil, the way his teammates are treated. Makes him easy to hate. However, he is also a poorly written character, and I wish the book had a less comically evil antagonist. It puts a real dimmer on the whole idea that people are not black and white in their actions. Jean is a better example of a good antagonist, he’s serving himself without being the literal incarnation of human sin, I think he makes a wonderful antagonist and hope to see more from him.

The way she deals with trauma is still mixed, but I think I’ll leave the final verdict on that for my review of book three.

Well. That’s that I suppose. Can’t wait to finish book three and then want to read the whole thing again to see what I missed! This series has grown on me, not enough that I would recommend it to others, the trigger warnings should be taken very seriously, but enough that I am glad to have read it. Overall, a solid 6/10, not perfect but years better than the last. Cheers to book two, and down to the final act! I think that I won’t be disappointed. 

[wetalkaboutbooks]

The Raven King

Just finished The Raven King, I’ll probably post my thoughts tomorrow as I will be busy with Thanksgiving tonight. However, I have a lot to say and am looking forward to getting down a review.

[wetalkaboutbooks]

The Foxhole Court- Nora Sakavic

Well, here it is, my full review of the first book of All for the Game, I went in to this more or less blind, so this is what I’d like to believe a rather unbiased review. I wasn’t really sure how to start this out, so I’ve split it into sections of the things I enjoyed and the things I did not enjoy. Spoilers for the first novel below, so read at your own risk!

Things I enjoyed:

Neil. I really liked his characterization, he was easy to connect to, I felt for him and all of the pain he was put through. He’s been through so much, and I really do want the best for him. I enjoyed watching him open up more as the book went on, and seeing him admit to his desire to belong broke me. His trauma was a bit mishandled, but we’ll get to that. Other things, he’s fun to read about, this kid is wild and I adore it.

Matt, he’s baby and I love him

Same goes for Abby and Dan

I actually really liked Seth as a character, which is a less than popular opinion from what I have seen.

The first big game, that scene is incredible. The character interactions are so well done. Gorilla and his interactions with the other characters brings such a lively change to the dynamics.  Seth flipping off both his and the opposing team. Neil getting called a whore, don’t ask why it made me laugh. Matt hiding behind Andrew. Just, wow, well done.

Neil calling out Riko, yes.

Things I did not enjoy:

The writing style. I am not the first person, nor will I be the last, to point out how poorly written these books are when compared to other’s in their genre, and just in general. The dialogue is jilted, with character’s randomly dumping exposition on your head whenever they can. This also leads the the mystery being erased relatively fast, as a reader wondering who Kevin really was to Neil it was disappointing to get the answer handed to me so early on. This is a problem that lends itself to destroy a good deal of the fun in figuring things out.

Beyond the writing style, the author chooses to over describe everything. I knew how Neil opened doors and how he walked, and how he moved his fingers, before I had a clear idea of what he looked like. At times this works, note the game scenes as well as the interview, but mostly it just drags the scenes on for longer than they should.

Seth. His death left me a bit shell shocked, and it was handled well in regards to mood. In regards to anything else, not so much. I was upset, to say the least, and can’t speak all too well on how she will choose to handle the aftermath as I have not started book two. But from what I have read, his death being treated like an ironic joke by Andrew was unsettling, and Neil’s indifference had much of the same effect. The real problem was in what happened next, Neil claiming to find home after hearing the person he’d been living with died. After spending the night with Andrew.

Andrew. Where do we begin? He’s got knife arm, so that’s pretty rad. But he is an unstable character, who will need a lot of work to get to a point where Neil can logically trust him, and even a longer time for him to be reasonably redeemed. He has physically and verbally assaulted, abused, and forced drugs upon Neil. He is violent, and vicious. I don’t like him. Maybe I will, but as of right now I don’t.

Nicky. So, why is Sakavic’s only current openly gay character portrayed as being completely perverse. The amount of rape jokes made towards Neil are disgusting. Nicky forcing himself on Neil to push drugs into his mouth has made me so upset that I cannot even begin to put it into words. 

The night club scene, this was godawful. The way that Neil was treated, the way he is tossed about and forced into situations that he obviously wanted no part in, the way he is stripped of his consent, made me want to throw up. Andrew and Nicky acting like it was for the protection of the group, that this was Andrew’s way of looking out for them, is a cheap way to excuse the behavior of the characters. Neil gets himself knocked out to escape from the situation, and then hitchhikes back to the court. After, we get a poor reconciliation of sorts with Andrew, where Neil is forced once again to do something he doesn’t want to. I didn’t like this scene, I thought the removal of Neil's consent in every situation, giving him no choice but to keep moving, disrespected his trauma as a character

I think that’s one of my biggest issues with this book, the disrespect of trauma. Every single character is mishandled, every single one. Neil is forced into situations that remind him of his past, he is forced to open up, from showing his scars, to his eye colour, to talking about who he is. Seth, a recovered drug addict, overdoses and dies. Kevin and his experience on the talk show. Andrew and his drugs and his pain, the way it’s a joke and brushed off as just ‘how he is’. This is not healing, this is not growing over trauma, this is simply disrespecting the pain of others.

I just want these characters to be able to learn and heal and have the time to properly get better, and the way that things are going I have the strong feeling that i am not going to get that.

I understand that people are problematic, but this is beyond that in so many ways.

Conclusion 

The book has an evident appeal, but the topics are so poorly handled that it removes any possible potential the book could have. I feel like the characters have the capability to be well fleshed out and interesting in their flaws, but as I said, it is not well handled. I think you can still enjoy the books so long as you think critically about the issues brought up in it. Anyway, only two more to go! Overall, my rating for the first book is 3/10.

[wetalkaboutbooks]

Just finished The Foxhole Court, I have, well I have some unpopular opinions. I'm going to do a more detailed post later on, once I've had some time to think it over, but for now:

I did not enjoy it, and feel that it has many flaws I cannot simply look past.

A bit of spoilers in the tags, so do be warned!

[wetalkaboutbooks]

Dark Legend- Christine Feehan

Hoo boy, here we go.

So I got this book as a Holiday gift from my brother because he thought the model on the front looked like me. To preface even more so, I love vampires but I am not an erotica or a romance fan, but I was willing to try.

So I haven’t read any of the other books in the series so that may account for some of my confusion to the lore, but other than that this book is bad. The romance is poorly written even for an erotica, and the erotica is poorly done as well. If I have to hear about a character’s “sensual lips” ever again I will collapse on the scene. I have a lot to say, but can’t formulate it properly as of right now. 

Anyway, 3/10, it made me yell out loud so that is something.

[wetalkaboutbooks]

Hello!

Welcome to my blog, I started this to catalog my journey of reading, but more so to force myself to finish the giant ‘to be read’ pile that has taken over my desk through putting short reviews and updates about what I am reading.