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Hi All, Thanks Susan for posting last week! It was really hectic and I just didn't get a chance. And I thought yesterday was Friday all day and kept being disappointed.

The last couple weeks I finished:

A Restless Truth - I liked this quite a bit, good romance and a fun mystery, I liked the magical setting. A lot of spice for those not into that sort of thing.

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics -This was an interesting audiobook. I don't really follow sports or olympics much, but it was interesting to learn more about that year's olympics and some of the logic behind WHY America still went to the olympics in Germany during that time. (1936 Olympics). Ended up being pretty typical eye rolling type reasoning.

The Weaver and the Witch Queen- I'm not really familiar with Icelandic/Nordic historical sagas, beyond the more famous Norse mythology. But this apparently is a historical fantasy version of a quasi-historical figure of Gunnhild the Mother of Queens. She's often painted as very unsympathetic, ruthless, an evil sorceress, using her beauty and sexuality as a weapon etc. So this is a kind of similar take that a lot of other authors are doing with Greek mythology and the like, reimagining these myths and histories from the women's perspectives based on what we know of the times. This was historical fantasy though, and the author makes it clear how much hard evidence we have of the time, since so much of what we have is based on oral history. I liked it quite a bit.

Weyward - Did the audio for this, I liked this a lot but it needed many CWs. You can ask if you're interested, but mostly it involves the sort of violence and trials a woman can face and the different ways they can react and respond to that trauma in their lives. But coated in a sort of fairytale like setting with earth magic and a tale twining between three lives set across centuries. I liked it, but a bit difficult at parts.

Record of a Spaceborn Few , The Galaxy, and the Ground Within - re reads

Hamlet - did the audio drama from bbc for this specifically for Michael Sheen as Hamlet, he did amazing as always. I needed another play for my library's genre genius challenge.

The Doctors Blackwell: How Two Pioneering Sisters Brought Medicine to Women and Women to Medicine - needed another biography/autobiography/memoir for the genre genius. I had done a biography of Elizabeth Blackwell when I was a child in elementary school, so it was interesting what I remembered an didn't. I didn't remember that she also had a sister who became a surgeon, or that she worked some with Florence Nightengale. I also don't think the children's version went much into the politics of being a woman doctor or things like her refusing to sit out the reproductive lectures just because she'd be the only woman in a class of men.

The Night Circus - It's fall, so was time for my annual Night Circus re-read. Lovely as always.

Currently Reading:

These Violent Delights - need another retelling for my genre genius challenge. This is sort of very loosely a Romeo and Juliet but set in 1920's Shanghai with the Cais vs the Montagovs as rival gangs fighting for control of the city.

Seeds of Hope: Wisdom and Wonder from the World of Plants - Audio book, need one more book of scientific nonfiction.

QOTW: Would you rather be stuck on an island without a book OR be stuck in a room full of books you don’t like?

This is a tough one, but I think I'd personally go for no book. Books I don't like become a chore. If I had an island without books, I could run around. It doesn't say either situation is a "and you'll die because there's no other basic necessities". So i'll assume the island has food, shelter, just no books. So I could figure out paper, or maybe find some and finally write my own, or draw, paint, create things etc. Yes I'd miss books, but in a room with only books I didn't want to read, I'd still have no books I'd WANT to read, but they'd be taunting me.

Happy check-in! I just realized I didn't post last week either.

Finished:
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford - 3.5 stars - I really enjoyed this. Good historical fiction.

Starling House by Alix E. Harrow - 5 stars - I loved this so much. Atmospheric and creepy without being too scary (for me at least). The main character's voice was great, too.

Comics & manga:
Horimiya, Vol. 1
Akane-banashi, Vol. 1
My Happy Marriage 04
The King's Beast, Vol. 11
The Apothecary Diaries 03
The Apothecary Diaries 04
The Apothecary Diaries 05
The Apothecary Diaries 06
The Apothecary Diaries 07
The Apothecary Diaries 08

Currently reading:
Half-Off Ragnarok by Seanan McGuire - continuing my catch-up (re)read of this series

Upcoming/Planned:
The Undetectables by Courtney Smyth

QOTW:
I agree, I would go for the island with no books. I can always tell myself stories. :) I'd miss books, but at least I wouldn't come to resent them the way I probably would in the other scenario.

Sheri, do I need to read the previous book before A Restless Truth? I find this blurb slightly more intriguing (mostly the "disrespectful parrot").

Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) - This is a comic novel in which the titular characters take a vacation up the Thames. Stylistically I'd put it somewhere between Dickens and Wodehouse, but there's pretty much no plot, just a series of anecdotes. I found it very funny. There's some minor of-its-time racism/misogyny, but also some bits that feel surprisingly current. Wikipedia says "the number of registered Thames boats went up fifty per cent in the year following its publication."

QOTW: I'm finding this one difficult without asking a bunch of questions. Is the island, like, Hawaii but with no books, or a deserted isle with a hut and a palm tree? Is the room cozy, and does it have a window? How long am I stuck anyway?
I will say that I have a fairly high tolerance for books I don't like, and might get some entertainment value out of them.

Rebecca, depends I suppose. It’s semi self contained, in that it’s dealing with separate characters so it’s not entirely reliant on the first. However there is an overarching plot that is established in the first book. It does get rehashed in the second, to some level. You would be missing a fair amount of that, but you could probably kinda figure some of it out based on what this book gives you. If you’re not too picky about spoilers and the like you could probably read this one first to see how you like the authors style and go back and read the first if it caught you enough you want to fill in the gaps

Today is the 16th rainy weekend out of the last 19 in New England. I finished three books today. That is very rare for me.

I finished Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures. This was very interesting. If you have read The Hidden Lives of Trees then this is one you'd probably like also. The content was really fascinating. But I found it did suffer from that non-fiction trope of getting repetitive. I kind of skimmed the last three chapters.

I also joyfully finished Necessary Trouble: Growing Up at Midcentury for neighborhood book club this week. It was joyful because it was over! I was not much of a fan of this book. Memoirs are not my jam and I really just didn't care very much. I was barely born during the times she discusses. Many others in the book club would be the author's peers (or at least much closer than I am) and maybe could relate more.

I also finished listening to Starter Villain. Yes, it was a fast romp that was enjoyable. As I read it, there were a few times that I felt like Scalzi, with just a few tweaks, could have connected this world to the one in The Kaiju Preservation Society. But anyway, it was fun.

After just finishing two non-fictions, I need a fluffy book. I got a bunch from my sister on our recent road trip so I'll grab one of them.

QOTW:
Like Rebecca, it depends on how big this island is and how long I'm going to be there. I could occupy myself for a while. But I can also give genres or books another try if I didn't like them initially. If I had to pick I would take the books.

Been a hectic week, so just one finish for me, The World We Make by N.K. Jemisin. I didn't think it was quite as good as the first one, but that's four stars instead of five, which makes it still pretty darn good! In the afterword, she says that she'd originally set out to write a trilogy, but with Covid and everything else that was going on geopolitically she felt she either had to wrap it up in a duology, or include recent events in the trilogy, so she went for the former. I think it was the right choice.

Rebecca, now you have to read To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis, which is a brilliantly funny science fictional time-traveling homage to Jerome K. Jerome's original.

QOTW: I think I'd go for the island. I could be active outside, and I could tell myself my own stories.

I saw a lot of love for that in the GR reviews on the original! I am hesitant because I'm not super into time travel. Also there is a blurb saying it is as funny as A Confederacy of Dunces, which I did. not. like. I will add your recommendation to the currently wavering scale and we'll see which way it eventually tips. ;)

I have not read Confederancy of Dunces, so I can’t be helpful there��