Gord’s Comments (group member since Apr 06, 2017)

Gord’s comments from the Vampires, Weres and Fae! group.

I went out shoe shopping yesterday because I've managed to wear down a pair of shoes in about 3 months. That's what happens when you walk some 500km/310 miles in only 3 months. Anyway, I get to the shoe store, I've got my mind made up what shoes I want and the store has none of them. Well they do, in children sizes. I like the Yokota 2's from Merrell and they had both the low cut and mid cut ones in stock but they only went up to size 8. I have giant Sasquatch feet and wear a size 12. I go looking or my alternative shoes and same story. The sizes stop at size 8. I end up getting another pair of Merrell's that I haven't tried before and a pair of Sketchers. The Sketchers were a complete random snag and I'm hoping they are kind of comfortable for a good bit. They've got memory foam and all the jazz in them. The upside with the Merrell's is that these ones are supposedly waterproof which is nice because it's supposed to be raining for the next week.

This week is going to be something a little different. It will be more novels than manga/comics. It's just the way things worked out for me.

Fractured -4 Stars
There is just something different about a Karin Slaughter book. It's a mystery novel that just doesn't fit with the usual mystery rules. They are just oddly intense and engaging. It's hard to fully explain but there is just something about these novels that just grabs you by the throat and pulls you into this dark and disturbing world. This takes place in Atlanta and involves the kidnapping of an upper crust teenage girl. Our MC is pulled into the case quickly after discovering the massive mistake that was made by the Atlanta PD. The novel spans only three days as the MC and others desperately try to track down this missing girl. For the first couple of days there are a lot of clues but there is no context for them. You're not going to be sitting there piecing together who the killer is before the main character does. Then we hit the third day and things start getting revealed as the clues start lining up and revealing the truth. You are then dragged along on this horrifying whirlwind as everything that has been established over the last couple of days is ripped apart and the truth is revealed. The icing on the cake though is over these three days is the personal lives of the characters involved in all of this. You get to learn more about Will, you get a glimpse into the life of this new character, Faith, you get just a slight glimpse into the enigma of Amanda. After two books I feel like I've barely scratched the surface of Will and Amanda and that there is this vast ocean of secrets just waiting to be explored. I'm just loving these books and the experience of the story.

The Royal Ranger: A New Beginning-4 Stars
Alright, time to talk about this book. This was something I was dreading and all because of one event. This was the start of a new spin off series that is also part of the original story line. Basically this novel picks up 15ish years after the short story volume that was the end of the series. Halt has retired, several other characters have advanced in life with retirement, death, promotion, etc. Will is dealing with some personal grief that is driving him down a dark path so the solution is to give him an apprentice. Someone that he can't say no to and someone that can help pull him out of this funk. On paper this sounds great. How this author went about doing this though is something that just doesn't sit well with me. This is going into full on spoiler territory and I'm not hiding anything. Over the course of the series a relationship between Will and Alice has developed. Alice was getting built into this interesting character that as an excellent partner for Will and his adventures. At the very end of the Lost Stories novel Will and Alice got married in a very short off handed blur which I didn't really like. In this book Alice got the whole Women in Refrigerators trope treatment and I just did not like it. Shortly before the beginning of this novel Alice is killed off page in this horrible event. She is returning for her Courier duties and is staying at this inn where this bad guy shows up. In an attempt to escape the law on his heels the bad guy lights the inn on fire. Alice initially escapes but goes back into the fire to save some children where she is killed when the inn collapses on her shortly after helping the children escape. This horrible off page death is the motivator for Will to set off on this dark path of revenge and self destruction that he needs to be saved from. I'm not saying that Alice didn't have to die but the way that this went down was something that just didn't right with me. It could have been a separate book unto itself where Will and Alice are on an adventure and the book ends with the tragic death of Alice. This would give the reader a chance to see these characters as adults, a chance to reconnect with them, you could have established the villains, etc. Basically there could have been this whole story arc showing Will progress to where he is at in the beginning of this novel. This whole thing called character growth. Instead we just get tossed in with this dark and brooding Will.

Alright now that I have that out of my system I can actually get to the novel. As much as I hated how things started and the motivation behind everything that happened I rather enjoyed this novel. Maddie is the daughter of Cassandra and Horace and is the god daughter of Will. She is essentially a spoiled bratty princess. She initially thinks that this whole apprenticeship will be a fun little adventure with her uncle Will who is always nice to her. Seeing her coming face to face with reality and her growth from spoiled brat to a Rangers apprentice is an interesting trip. She of course has some natural talent but it needs to be honed. Where the growth comes in is just in her personal growth. Seeing what life is like outside of the castle, the pampered and easy life she had. Maddie is an interesting character with flaws that makes mistakes. I'm now back to really wanting to see where this series goes and how much more development we will get with Maddie. I just really wish the beginning of the novel was handled differently.

Pablo Escobar: My Father -4 Stars
I initially was going to read this for a challenge but I didn't read the fine print of the challenge and it doesn't actually work. I am able to use this for other things though. Outside of that though I was rather curious about this book. Pablo Escobar is just a name that I am aware of through pop culture and real world things. Every once in a while his name will pop up in the news once again. Not that long ago I remember hearing something about his hippos on his estate and the problems they were causing for the local ecosystem. That being said I don't really know a lot about the actual story of Pablo. This was written by his son and a part of me was worried about a certain level of bias because of his relationship to Pablo but I think he did a good job with this book. He didn't shy away from the absolutely horrible things that Pablo did but there were also these very human moments as well. Things like a memory of a birthday or Christmas with his father that just created these personal human moments. It just added this different feel to things. That being said this book was a wild ride. Seeing Pablo coming up, how opulent things were when he was at his peak, and then the inevitable downfall. Columbia sounded like a horrible place in the late 80's into the 90's. Everyone, including the government, were doing what ever they wanted and there was violence everywhere. It really shows the cycle of violence and how self destructive it is. There were moments in the beginning where things could have gone differently but when everyone's response to everything is just a never ending escalation of violence things have a rather inevitable outcome. Since this was from the son it also gave us a glimpse into the life of those around Pablo and how his actions affected them. This was especially evident in the first couple of chapters and the epilogue that dealt with life after Pablo's death. There was the one moment where the author was at an airport when he was 16 or 17 and couldn't calm down. He was constantly on the look for threats, for someone coming to kill them or kidnap them and it was just a built in instinct after living a life where he was almost always on the run. This was just an interesting read.


Zombie Tramp: Year One Hardcover Risque Variant -3 Stars
Yup, you're seeing that right. This was a snag from the library after I saw it on my timeline and discovering that my library had it. Yup the library had the risque version and that warning bar is most definitely not there. I was intrigued by this after reading through the reviews and seeing a constant flow of "this is trash", "this is nothing but gore and nudity", etc, etc, etc. After reading this they're not necessarily wrong but our reactions are a bit different to it. I thought that this was a rather run read. Yes, it was incredibly gory and yes, it tons of nudity but it's a book called Zombie Tramp. What else would you expect from this book. This book was essentially a few stories from this universe. It gave you the Cole's note version of her origin story then threw you into it. This comic really gave me strong Hack/Slash vibes which is a huge plus. I love Hack/Slash and it's been difficult, near impossible, to find similar comics that had the same vibes. This had the sexiness, the humor, the gore, the stupid over the top action. Now I would love to read more but from some poking around and they are not easy to find. The library has no more of these which I can't say I'm surprised on. Print ones seem to be hard to find. You can buy them online but it's $6 for a single volume and I'm not sure I'm willing to pony up that kind of cash for this. There are over 70 volumes out so that is a fair chunk of change.

Now what is next

The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax
I was poking around for a niche challenge and stumbled across this oddity and I just had to check it out. It's about a 60+ year old granny who is a spy for the CIA during the cold war. I think you can see why I was hooked in.

Dark in Death
Working my way through this now and it just feels good to return to this series.

After that I am back to my never ending pile of comics and manga from the library.

Good job Michigan

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windso...

and good job Japan
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-6...

In regards to the age of consent it is bringing the federal age in line with the prefectures. Prefectures have had their own laws in place for years now making the age of consent 16, or 18 if in Tokyo.

I don't want to jinx myself here but today is looking pretty promising. We are a small team consisting of two techs and two sales people. Both of our sales people or off today for whatever reason meaning that there are no new orders dropping on our heads. The icing on the cake though is that one of our sales team is also our direct boss as well. No sales team and no boss! Things are looking to be nice and quiet.

Talk about weird chapter lengths. I'm reading a biography on Pablo Escobar, which has been interesting, and I'm a little under halfway through the book. Here is the kicker though, I'm on chapter 11 of 14. These last 3-4 chapters are crazy long. Each chapter is well over a hour in length.

That would be such a stressful situation and good job on handling it so well. It's sad that you even have to deal with it in the first place, especially those land mine questions. Hopefully your Friday is easy and you can get to the weekend issue free.

My usual, a green onion cake and the vegetarian spring roll vermicelli bowl where I swap the fish oil for chili paste and soy sauce.

They do make rain pants but heavy rains like this are just not that common really. As for the shoes I don't need them to be steel toed as it's not for work, I work inside for the most part, and I could find something but again it's just not that common. I should stop being so stubborn/lazy and get myself the right gear honestly. I just don't normally have to deal with rain like this and if I do I have options (like getting a ride from my coworker) but things went a little pear shaped this week. Like so many things have this month honestly.

Well the rain jacket worked well and everything under the jacket stayed dry. Not much else did and it feels like I've got a pool in my shoes and lead weights on my pants. My favorite Vietnamese place is back after being closed for a month for vacation so I am treating myself for lunch.

Time for rainy walk part four of this week. I'm breaking out the rain jacket this morning for sure. The rain should be letting up this by lunch but there will be more over the weekend and some more next week if the forecast is accurate.

Congrats!

That was not a nice walk. Everything but my underwear is soaked through and I'm a lot colder than I thought. I also broke my umbrella which is a bummer. Luckily it was right as I got home so it wasn't the whole walk.

Time for the part of the day that I am dreading. Normally quitting time is a happy time but not today. My coworker is off for the rest of the week which means I am walking. Not a bad thing by itself but it's cold, pouring down rain, some how smoky, and with winds 40-60 kmh (or 25-37 mph). The only good thing is that the wind is going to kind of be from behind me. I'm not sure my umbrella will be much help today.

How does each day of this week seem to get worse than the last? The work just keeps piling in and the surprises don't stop.

That is what I do with the local anime convention. I'm off the week of the event and then I take the Monday after the event to just decompress before returning to normal life.

I know that feeling right now.

I've now caught back up to where I was initially on Friday morning before everything exploded. Now to somehow make up for the last three days that I spent working on other things.

Time for that walk home. I'm tired, it's 28c/82f with basically no wind, oh and it's smoky out there thanks to everything being on fire again. The only upside is that I have my audiobook and that I have a frozen pizza waiting at home.

Sorry for being negative. Things have been crazy busy for a while and it has just been wearing me down. I knew this week was going to be rough but man today did not start the week well.

Must cling to positivity. It's to early in the week to slip over the edge into grumpy old man mode. Never mind, that was a lost cause.

Just tons of stress, more work than can be done in the time frame allotted with even more coming in. I have to walk home this evening as well which should be tons of fun. Just to much stuff going on and no end in sight.

My next real break is the middle of July for my anime convention. There is the three day weekend for Canada day but I'm ready for a break break not just an extra day off.