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

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

Nope, to early for this crap. I'm sitting here thinking about the fact that I turn 40 in less than a month and trying to process all of that. I don't want to say anxiety or dread but it's not a happy wonderful feeling either. Then my brain decided to drop the old one two punch on my and remind me that Christmas is also coming and all those "joyous" feelings. Bleh, just bleh. This is way to early to be starting the holiday blues.

I'm doing my weekly update a little early this week but I'm at a good point currently to have a clean break in the week. This week has been a lot of challenge books even though there were also a lot of manga.

-3 Stars
This was for a historical fiction challenge and it was a book. It's been nearly a week since I finished this and this was such a nothing book that I've nearly forgotten it entirely already. This was about a young boy living outside of Florence, Italy in 1944. As you can guess from the location and the year this involves WWII. A young boy wants to be a hero there are Nazis, Allies, Partisans, and things happen. This book wasn't bad in any way but it just didn't do anything at all for me. It was very middle of the road.

-3 Stars
This is the other historical challenge book I read this week, or I guess listened to, and this one has me very conflicted. This is another book in the female Sherlock Holmes genre (is it a genre? it feels like it) and this is a genre I have a bit of a soft spot for. It's not my most favorite genre of all time but it's something I can find entertaining and I've dabbled in more than a few times. I also have a bit of a fondness for Sherlock Holmes in general even though I haven't read them in years. Holmes was one of many in the genre that got me into mysteries as a young man and I've had a certain appreciation for them ever since. I had a few issues with this novel in general but my biggest source of conflict is that this just doesn't feel like a Sherlock Holmes story. For most of the book it actually felt like two different books that just got tossed together between the same covers. On one hand it was something like a Victorian era police procedural and on the other hand there was this Victorian era drama piece about a woman getting ostracized by society due to her immoral actions. Every once in a while these two different stories would meet up, exchange notes, and then wander off in their own directions again. This brings to my next issue with it not feeling right. The MC just wasn't involved in the case. She never visited the crime scenes, she never interviewed anyone, she never investigated anyone or anything. I don't even feel that she really solved the mystery itself. She was getting some big picture ideas about what happened but then basically the villain mailed her the solution. Which brings me to the final thing that didn't feel right for me and this is a lot of personal opinion here. For me Holmes always felt alien. He was wired in such a different way from a normal person that he just felt so alien to a normal person. This MC cared about fashion, her appearances, there was romance, she cared for her family, etc, etc, etc. She was clever but it never felt like a Holmes level of clever. She felt like a protege that had years of training and learning ahead of her before she got to that level of Holmes.

Outside of the comparison to Holmes this book was a bit slow at times. I get about a hour a day of listening time as I walk to work and after the first day I was absolutely baffled where the heck the story was going. I get that it was trying to do character set up but it just felt that it dragged on for a very long time. This wasn't the only slow moment in the book either. There is also the weird problem I have sometimes with Victorian era novels where everyone is a Lord or Lady. Names start blurring together as do the characters especially if they are minor or side characters. "Oh it Lord such-and-such who was with Lady whats-her-name, who were you again?" That being said there is an interesting foundation here and I've heard that the second book addresses a bunch of the issues I had so I do plan to continue on at some point.

Now for the manga

-3 Stars
This is the first two books of a trilogy and I love the idea behind it but I feel that the execution leaves a bit to be desired. Basically old dude drives around the apocalyptic wasteland in a food truck making food for customers that are never there. One day he finds a strange young girl on the side of road and takes her in. She is wanted by the military and shenanigans ensue. This is an interesting setup for a weird food based manga to have but instead of explaining anything it instead just defaults to fan service. Why did the old dude leave the military? Why does he drive a food truck around? What brought about the end of the world? What is so special about this girl? Etc, etc, etc, etc. With only one book left in this trilogy I feel that most of these questions are going to go unanswered and it leave me feeling rather frustrated.

-4 Stars
Ahhh, good old Junji Ito and his horrifying art style. This was a collection of four short stories by Ito and it's what one would expect from an Junji Ito manga collection. Weirdness, horrifying art, vague story telling, etc, and I loved every minute of it. There was a particular image in this novel that was seared into my brain for days after I finished reading it. Every time I closed my eyes that image was the first thing that popped into my head which is not very helpful when you are trying to sleep and this abomination is staring into your soul.

-4 Stars
After the emotional story telling of the last volume this one felt a bit flat. This was the big fight arc that went on for a while. It was nice to see Kenshin step back and let others fight instead of him trying to deal with all of it. Spoilers for an old manga but it went for the fake ending and I'm not the biggest fan of that but it did take the story in an interesting direction I guess. I have one more volume left of these omnibuses and then I'm done with this series. I'm not sure if I want to read more or not.

-4 Stars
I never expected to like this series as much as I am. As I mentioned before my knowledge of this series was pretty limited and what I knew was from pop culture. What I found though was this absolutely bonkers story that is not afraid of going bigger or crazier at every turn. I also feel that this is a great example of an author figuring out what he was creating as he was writing it. In the beginning the card game was barely even a part of the series and now the entire story is essentially about that card game. It's also interesting to see how rapidly this game is evolving. It started out as a simple card game played with paper cards to this fully 3D holographic madness. This brings up a question though and maybe a fan of the series could explain this. How do the old paper cards contain the microchips needed for them to work with this new tech? Is this just a story point we are not supposed to think about and just accept? I have a ways to go before the end of this series and I'm curious where the heck this is going to go.

-5 Stars
At long, long, long last I can finally return to this series. I had to wait for the library to buy this book and then I had to wait for everyone else and their dog to get a chance with it before me. It felt so good to return to this story. Especially as this was the start of a massive growth for the characters and it just felt so good to return to this series. Hopefully my wait for the next book wont be as long.

Now for what is next. On audio I am getting to some Tamora Pierce that I have not read before with . For regular books I need to read this week so I can get it back to the library at the end of next week. I won't lie I'm rather excited for both books honestly.

Sweet, sweet vindication. I won't get into any details but there has been this nagging issue at work (no not the usual stuff) and we just got the ammo to not only put the final nail in the coffin but to bury that coffin 6' deep and then seal that sucker in concrete.

Drudge

(I'm in a mood today)

Taxes

It's Friday

Death

Tomorrow is going to be a rough day. I'm looking at having to hand bomb hundreds of pounds of steel. A certain individual needs "help" because they are "to busy". As a result we are getting this wonderful tasks passed on to us. I know this is going to sound weird but we are using it as an opportunity to set an example. We are going to show how it should be done properly and not the way it's being done now.

Whips

left

The easy answer is that a winding is the copper wires wrapped around the magnetic pack inside your motor.

Wrong

Had to give myself a crash course in motor windings today. Starting with what the hell a motor winding is. I'm not going to say I know everything or that I even know what I am doing but that was something interesting to help pass the time. I feel like I learned some new stuff today which is a good thing.

gunshot

Well it's cold this morning, as expected, but it's not as cold as it was supposed to be so there's that I guess. Still need to bundle up for my adventure outside. As for snow we got some as well but it was the crappy kind. I love the big soft fluffy flakes that gently fall from the sky. It's super easy to walk through as it's nice and dry and it's just nice to look at. What we got was basically sleet. It was snow, kind of, that coated everything in a hard crusty layer. Mix in a stiff wind and you either have ankle deep crusty drifts or bare polished ice.

Bleh, see my post about work yesterday and you will know how I feel this morning.

*rattles the bars at work* let me go home and read already

Today is going to be one of those super slow days at work again. 30 minutes tops worth of work and I'm looking at 10 hours of being away from home.

Icarus

Seems like the world is basically waiting to see what comes next while Russia denies everything.

Well this can't be good

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/russia-...