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

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

From my understanding the poison that is used here in the building is the kind that dehydrates the corpse. No smell, no mess, just a little piece of mouse jerky hidden in the walls, behind something, etc. I'm sure the mouse is dead or gone at this point. I heard him Friday night and Saturday morning being active. After I moved my stove and scared him I didn't hear him for a long time. I heard him last night a little bit and nothing at all today.

As for the library, I did it. Half the walk wasn't bad and the other half was unpleasant. If I had the wind at my back it wasn't bad out there. When I had to walk into the wind it was not a fun time at all. The library haul was a bunch of comics and the Knives Out movie I've been hearing all about.

Another slower week of reading for me. Work is still crazy busy and my hobbies are really keeping me busy right now. Missing most of a Saturday kind of threw off my schedule to say the least.

-3 Stars
I begrudgingly gave this book a three stars only because I didn't hate it enough to give it a two stars. The book did give it the old college try though. The book started out innocently enough and I was on board. She was an innocent women who loves food and cooking. He was a weird geeky kind of guy who had social anxiety. There was a spark and they became friends. Even the idea for the story line wasn't a bad one. What really started to kill it for me was the characters and their massive inconsistencies. I went from liking the female lead to actively being annoyed. Her character would swing from this borderline mousey and meek woman scared of her own shadow to a sultry seductress. I didn't like the clearly stupid decisions she made through out the book. Then we get to the male lead. Oh boy do I have a lot to say here. I realize that romance novels are escapists fantasies. The bad boy, the billionaire, etc. The guy that most people would not meet or not want to meet in real life. This male lead felt like the author was trying to cram as many archetypes into one character as possible. He was naive, geeky, a gentleman, stupid rich, ripped, a god in bed, etc, etc, etc. This caused so many wild swings in his character it was jarring. It opens up with him having social anxiety and hating to go out shopping/to eat/etc. One shopping trip later and that he is all cured. Social anxiety is all gone and all thanks to our brave female lead. Our main man hates parties and doesn't know how to interact with people. Cut to a few scenes later at a nightclub where he is able to smooth talk his way past the bouncers, smooth talk management, spend the night dancing with multiple women, and having a great time. Where the hell did the social anxiety go? The guy scared to interact with others? Then we get to the sex. Oh boy this scene. So our main male lead has had sex once in his life and that was when he was taken advantage of by a call girl in Vegas. Not exactly a great history with sex. From that one traumatic experience he was able to become the god of sex able to give his partner the greatest sex ever and go multiple times in one night. This gave him the confidence to not only openly talk dirty in a later scene but to then do the nasty outside on a golf course. You starting to see this weird disconnect between what we are told and what we are presented? Another one that bugged me from an early moment. Our male lead is presented as this person who never leaves his apartment unless he absolutely has to. The one exception is going to the golf course because he loves golfing. We are also told that he is lean and shredded. Lean, maybe, but I just don't see someone getting shredded from playing golf. It might be some exercise if you are walking and not taking a cart. That being said I don't see many golf players ripping their shirts off revealing heavily greased muscles because they play 18 holes a day. One final character moment I want to touch on. The female lead irked me pretty early on when she referred to the male lead as a "project" to her sister. I loathe this kind of statement. If you are viewing someone as a fixer upper that might not be the greatest start to the relationship. You might not actually like the person if you got to change who they are before you are happy with them.

Outside of the character issues the book just felt generic. A romance novel needs this trope here, so here you go. Oh a misunderstanding needs to happen here, well here you go. It just felt like it was going through the motions and trying to cram as much generic and expected stuff into one book as possible. For a challenge book this was an easy enough read but not something I would highly recommend to others.

-4 Stars
Once again I return to the emotional damage series with it's cast of broken and messed up characters. I'm so glad I picked this series up because of a buddy read as this has been a great experience. A little traumatizing at times but a great read. This book revolves around a case of a young girl who was discovered buried near town. It's quickly determined that she was buried alive and so the case begins. This book is also about our broken and flawed main characters. To the point where it feels more like the book is more about them then the mystery at times. Not that I'm complaining about that. The story between Jeff and Sarah is getting a little frustrating though as it feels like it's just a lot of back and forth with nothing really going forward. There was a plot line introduced in this book early on that felt like it was simply introduced to create more drama and tension between these characters. Especially considering how quickly it got dropped once the book needed to focus on the case itself. Then there is Lena. The human train wreck. The dumpster fire behind the shady store in the seedy part of town. Book after book in this series has this character making the worst decisions possible. Taking any situation and finding the absolute worst outcome for herself and flinging herself into it with no hesitation. This is normally not a character that I would care about but for some weird reason I find myself rooting for her. I know she won't make the right decision but I keep hoping that she will. I keep this little flame going that she will pick herself up, dust herself off, and get her life sorted out. She never does but I keep rooting for her and I'm not really sure why.

-4 Stars
I feel like the author had a blast writing this volume. This felt kind of like a bridge between two story arcs and it was a lot of what one would expect from this series while also having some peak comedy. Rin and Nadeshiko have returned from their Ooi outing and are catching up with their friends while the ground work is being laid for their next trip. Nadeshiko learns what the other members of the outdoor club were up to while she was in Ooi. This is told through a series of flashbacks where the author just cuts loose. You have Nadeshiko watching the events from a little box in the corner of the panel. She tries to crawl out of the box to interact with the characters and the characters try crawling into the box with her when something bad happens. Random characters just pop in and out for gags. It was just a humorous and relaxed read.

-3 Stars
This was a random snag from the library and I feel super dumb that I never made the connection to Peter Pan from that title. It starts out in our world with a group of homeless children who are living in a junkyard. They bring in a new kid who has a secret. He is the last of the Lost Boys and is there looking for help. They are taken back to Neverland and they are at war with evil adult pirates, not Hook though. Overall I thought it was alright and had some interesting ideas but I kind of wished it was a bit more fleshed out. It was really flirting with more mature and adult themes. For instance Tinkerbell was this warrior fairy wearing face paint and body armor who swore constantly. None of her swearing was ever printed though and was censored with the comic default of skulls, mushroom clouds, #, !, and so on. It might have been interesting to see it take a route like I Hate Fairyland and really into the crude and mature.

Now for what is next.

On audiobook I'm listening to to help with some challenge stuff.

As for what else, I have stacks of manga and comics beside my computer that I need to finish and get back to the library soon. I think this week will be focused on trying to knock down that pile a little.

I finished this one and it wasn't bad. I'm kind of proud of Lena using her underhanded ways at the end of the book for something kind of good for her. I kind of the feeling that these have become less about the mystery and more about the three main characters. I kind of wish I had the third book right now so I can see how this series comes to an end.

It's been so nice this month and then a cold front moved in yesterday. I have to go to the library today and it's hard finding that motivation when it's -17/1f with a strong northerly wind blowing. I have to go today as I have things expiring today so I guess it's time to bundle up.

Oh and I have a mouse. Not the smartest thing in the world as it's hiding in the poison box that the landlord has placed out. Or at least that's where he darted when I moved the stove. I don't think he has long for this world.

I don't know why I continue cheering on Lena. Sure, life has thrown her some crap cards but she made them a thousand times worse. I just want her to have something nice and good that she doesn't totally screw up.

I'm about 60% of the way into the book and I have three separate thoughts.

1. I'm rather enjoying the mystery aspect of the book and I'm genuinely curious about where things are going to go. I was wondering early on if the religious group might have been a big red herring but I think at this point it's not and I'm now ready for the series signature dive in depravity.

2. I'm growing a little tired of Sara and Jeffery. Their constant back and forth about everything is just growing tiring. The whole hepatitis story line just felt like it was there to introduce more drama between the two of them and then there just wasn't any real pay off. It was this big deal and then it was just gone. I'm just tired of the drama factory that is their life.

3. This last one is going to defy all logic but Lena. I know I shouldn't, I know the pattern, I know it's bad for me but I've got that little flicker of hope that this might just be the moment for Lena to realize how messed her life is and to turn things around for the better. Well better for Lena, not to sure about for normal standards. I know I shouldn't have this hope as I'm sure Lena will do something utterly asinine and mess up everything but I can't help myself. There is still 40ish% of this book left and one more book after this for her to pick herself up and turn things around. I won't be surprised if it doesn't happen but maybe we can get something nice without her utterly messing it up.

Cast iron

Oatmeal

Rum

The Brave

Belles, I saw the Veronica Mars book just you completed and had a question. Is that a series I can just jump into if I know nothing of the TV show at all?

Nope, no sir, not me. That is not the life for me. I believe the term used to describe is "grumpy old man" or "surly". Not the kind of person to put in your promotional video for your company.

For American units that is 0.23" x 0.31". That is such a tiny little capsule and it could be any where.

Well this is not terrifying in the slightest.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-austra...

It's Friday! It feels like a lifetime since my last weekend and there is a long way to go until the end of the day. Work is just busy right now and then we also have to get ready for a video team to come in on Monday to shoot footage of our warehouse for a promotional video. I'll be stepping out of the warehouse when they are shooting for sure.

That sucks. Hopefully you get well soon Belles.

Book

The romance novel I'm reading is probably the most fantastical thing I've read and I've seen wizards riding zombie t-rex's, helicopter fights with ancient dragons, eldritch horrors, etc. It's not a good fantastical, or a funny fantastical, or even an interesting fantastical. It's definitely a fantasy though.

Chapter five and my thoughts are:

Oh goody, Lena is an awkward social situation. Lets see how long it takes before she spins this in the worst possible way and makes this into a raging dumpster fire. I'd like to think this is the start of a redemption arc but this is Lena and those thoughts are long dead and buried.

I made it to the end of the day without murdering anyone. I'll take that as a win. Now to get snacks, watch anime, and try to forget today ever happened.