Sheri’s Comments (group member since Jul 25, 2016)

Sheri’s comments from the EPBOT Readers group.

It was actually in the Argenue vampire books, one book it was Maybel and DJ, later they appeared as Hazel and DJ. So not even close!

Hi all. It's been a tough week this week. Teddy had to go back to the hospital this week. He had another urinary block brought on by the stress from the surgery. In the process of the vet visit to deal with that, we also found out that the lump removed was definitely cancer, so that was a low blow too. We're probably going to have to consider more surgery to deal with the blockage issue too, which we were hoping to avoid, but we can't keep having these issues and diet is clearly not enough. My poor little boy! He doesn't deserve all these issues. But he came home this morning, and we cleared out the guest room to have a no climb zone. He managed to open up his surgery incision at the hospital so it had to be re-closed and start healing all over again. So now he's coned and on a strict no-climbing for 10 days confinement. Please send good vibes for my little Teddy Pickles <3

Anyhow, this week I finished:

Backpacking Through Bedlam - I love Seanan McGuire and InCryptid in general, but this one fell a bit flat for me. I felt like too much time was spent on filling out stuff that should probably have been part of the previous book or a short story, too much time was spent in flash backs, and it didn't leave enough time to deal with the actual story arc. By the time stuff started actually happening it was basically over and now most the actual plot will end up in the next book I guess. I did love the short story at the end though. I hope James gets a book of his own eventually.

I'm Glad My Mom Died - this was a heartbreaking listen. I don't LIKE saying it, but i'm kinda glad her mom is dead too. I was making horrified faces while listening to the things Jennette described her mom doing or saying.

Pandora's Jar: Women in the Greek Myths - I actually thought this was a fictional retelling when i bought this on a deal, but it's actually nonfiction. I ended up really liking it though. It was about digging into the earliest origins of the various women that appear in mythology and how their stories are often more complex and nuanced than the more popular versions that we're familiar with now. I had no idea Pandora used to be basically an Eve figure in Greek mythology, created by Zeus and gifted gifts from all the other gods before she was basically reduced to a box opener.

Currently reading:

Siren Queen - interesting book so far, about a Chinese American woman in the golden era of Hollywood trying to become a star, but in a world full of magic where doing so might be deadly. I like it better than The Chosen, The Beautiful so far.

Alanna: The First Adventure - audio book, never got into tamora pierce whenI was younger, poking at them here and there now. i like them so far!

QOTW:

I'll borrow from popsugar this week: Do grammar errors or mistakes in books bother you?

I tend to not notice/care TOO much if it's just a singular or couple errors. Everyone makes mistakes, things fall through the cracks. It only really bothers me if it affects the comprehension of the sentence, or if it feels like the entire book missed the editing stage.

Continuity errors bother me more, especially when they feel like something that should be caught by a good editor. I read a book once where the ENTIRE BOOK had a previously established character from another book called the wrong name. I feel like it wouldn't have been that difficult to look up what you named the character in the previous book. Surely authors have notes, have their manuscripts on their computers or in cloud storage, or keep copies of their books on their shelves, have relatives that do, could google their own books etc. Or a good editor would look it over and say "hey, this doesn't look right, didn't you call this character _____ in this other book?" And no it wasn't a plot point that they changed their name or anything like that.

Yeah, the Heralds rarely lived peaceful lives! I liked reading about them, not sure i really want to LIVE that life. Even if I got a telepathically bonded horse out of it.

Hi All,

Been a bit of a stressful week, my cat had to have surgery to remove a suspicious lump. Biopsy had returned a few possibly cancerous cells so we were removing it as precaution, it's being sent away for analysis. So he's got a funny hair cut and far too many stitches for a little guy. He's recovering well though and has a lot of energy, it's a challenge to get him to not leap and bound too much.

This week I finished:

Check, Please! Book 1: #Hockey, Check, Please! Book 2: Sticks & Scones - these were so charming! I am doing read harder so these were my completed web comic. I loved them so much.

I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself - I picked this randomly from the library because the title was so interesting. It was a very strange slow burn dystopia, with a very queer perspective. I liked it quite a bit.

The Cloisters - audio book read - this was just ok for me. Sort of mean girls meets the DaVinci Code. The atmosphere was really nice, but the characters felt pretty flat and I found the plot pretty predictable.

The Sentence - this was a bummer for me. I really loved the first part of it, where the set up was a haunted book store. then suddenly it nose dove into 2020, and was all the fear and uncertainty, and then all the protests, police violence, isolation, strain from being cooped up together. It just felt like a bait-and-switch. I re-read the back blurb and it was phrased "set from all hallows eve 2019 through the following all hallows eve". which did not immediately register as "oh this is going to be a 2020 book". It just felt disingenuous, I get some authors want to tell those stories. but put it out there, that this is what the book is about so readers can decide if that is what they want to read. This was a book club book so I probably would have read it anyhow, but I would have at least gone in braced, not suddenly slapped in the face with it in the middle of what I thought was just a ghost story. Honestly it felt like the author was writing one book, then 2020 happened, and rather than starting over with a new book to write out her feelings, she just re-directed them into what she was currently writing. and it just didn't work for me. It felt like the ghost story because a total afterthought and b the time it was resolved it was just like "..oh. ok." it took what might have been a 5 star book to just a 3 for me.

Currently reading:

I'm Glad My Mom Died - i'd had this on hold for a bit, not really familiar with Jeanette McCurdy but everyone kept talking about the book.

Backpacking Through Bedlam - Requested this from my library on a whim and they bought it the same day, woo!


QOTW:
What fictional school from books would you like to attend?

I'm not sure if I can think of any off hand. A lot of them seem to have a lot of down sides, like being pretty deadly, full of bad teachers, or not really kind to those who aren't top of the class.

Dani- It was all over Facebook/every book site I follow right before it debuted! To the point where when I saw it in an indie shop just after it dropped I had to buy it just to see the fuss. (I mean I also always try to buy something when I’m in an indie store)

I unfortunately did not go to the concert. Ended up being a full blizzard with thunder snow and lightning and a travel advisory. They didn’t cancel it but we didn’t feel safe going out, and the storm was due to continue all night. Considering we’ve been tag teaming the drive way for two hours now, I think we made the right call. I actually had gotten ticket insurance on it because it was the first event tickets I’d bought in ages and were so far in advance I’d been worried about if we’d get covid or something. So I filled out a claim, because extreme weather is supposed to be covered. We’ll see if I get my money back! She’s actually coming back to town later this month at a different venue, so maybe I’ll just try to get tickets to that instead.

Shel -

The main issue is the tickets are already bought, so we're out money if we don't go. I DID buy insurance on it, because back when they went on sale numbers were spiking so we were concerned we'd get sick. But unfortunately it only covers weather if it's actually declared a state of emergency and the venue does not cancel the show. Not just if we, personally, don't want to drive and don't want to risk it. So we're going to have to just keep an eye on the weather and see how it looks and make the decision as it gets closer.

We had the letter people in my classroom! They actually had little blow up things of them, i think. like inflatables. I remember being disappointed because S was just some sock guy because everyone got a special coloring page for their first initial and I wanted something cooler.

Hi all,

Sorry I dropped off again. It's been hectic at work, and returning back to life. Had an event every week the last several weeks, plus went to Raleigh for a week. It's been fun, but busy.

Supposed to go to a concert tomorrow, but we'll see if that actually happens. they're predicting 11-14 inches of snow starting in the afternoon, carrying on all evening. Not driving in that!

I lost track when I posted last. So a selection of what I've been reading:

The Terraformers - this was interesting, although I think a bit all over the place. There were bits I wish had gotten tightened up and explained more. I do really like Newitz's writing, they always come up with such fantastic ideas.

A Court of Thorns and Roses - decided to finally check out all the hype over Sarah J Maas, and I think i can say I don't really get it. It was....fine. I didn't hate it. But I've read plenty of far better Beauty and the Beast retellings. Feyra was pigheaded, but not really in a fun way. More just in a ..."they literally told you not to do that, what did you expect to happen?" way. I also thought she had way better chemistry with both Lucian and ..Rhys? so I found the Tamlin romance part kind of a bore. I doubt I'll continue the series because i'd just be rooting for her to go ditch Tamlin and end up with someone else and be disappointed.

When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir - another TBR challenge read, this was hard to get through but powerful. I admit I only really knew about the movement from what was in the media, so it was good to learn more from one of the actual founders.

House of Hunger - had this on hold for months, finally came up. I wanted to like it more than I did. It had so much promise, and started off really strong, but ended up falling a bit flat. It was pretty short, only around 250 pages I think. If it had been fleshed out a bit more, i think it would have been stronger. It had some pacing issues, starting off at a nice clip, but then dragging in the middle. But then ended really abruptly and in a way that didn't really feel like it resolved a whole lot.

Keeper of Enchanted Rooms - Another TBR challenge pick. I'd gotten it from amazon first reads. This was a delightfully cozy book, I recommend it for people looking for a good cozy read! It's the first in a series, but i think it's resolved enough in the end that you won't feel like you HAVE to run out and read a second.

The Raven Tower - Yet another TBR challenge pick. I love the Ancillary Justice series, so had been looking forward to reading more of her work outside of that. I didn't really end up liking this as much. It wasn't bad, but I got really distracted by the writing style. A lot of it was written from an outside perspective being narrated towards one of the other characters. so "You did this, and then you did that". It was confusing and I kept trying to figure out who was talking. Also the time kept jumping around and i had trouble keeping track of what was happening when. Some of that could just be me problems, not necessarily problems with the book.

House of Earth and Blood - So while i wasn't exactly thrilled to read another Maas, there's another digital book club i'm in that had selected this for the March pick. A lot people were having trouble getting it/were worried about finishing it. I have access to a library that both has a huge selection and not very may people seem to use digitally, so I was able to get it in less than 2 weeks. So I felt obligated to give it a try so at least SOMEONE would participate in next month's discussion. I actually liked this one much better than a Court of Thorns. Not enough to say I'm a converted Maas fan, but I would possibly, maybe, consider reading the second one. If I felt like another 800 page read. Maybe later in the year. There were some genuinely moving parts in it. My biggest beef with it was that i don't think it NEEDED to be 800 pages. Around the 400 mark i was going "how on earth are there 400 pages left? how has the plot moved so little?" If you're racking up that kind of page count, I should be so lost in it, I'm not even noticing. That being said, it did pick up a lot in the second half. So...I don't know. Like i said, maybe if i hit a lull later in the year I'll give the next one a try, if only to wrap it up.

The Wedding Date - I'd hoped for some nice easy fluff after that big tome. I guess this served for that, but man this was a mess. It was a nanowrimo book, and I think a debut, and it really felt it. I feel like the author couldn't really decide on the steamy level of her book. So the dialogue and action would be ramping up...and then all of a sudden they'd be in the aftermath gasping for breath. I actually went back like "did my eyes glitch on the page?" It's not that I NEED explicit details. It's just...you write differently if you're not going to put them in. You fade to black. You gracefully exit the scene and re-enter later. This felt like she wrote out a whole steamy scene, got mortified, deleted the explicit bits and then didn't edit the scene any further. It was like a glitch every time they got intimate. So in my mind it means no type of reader would be happy. If you want NO steamy bits, the dialogue/scenes leading up to those parts are probably far too raunchy. If you DO want the steamy parts, it's not satisfying at all. Or if you're like me where you can take it or leave it, it just is annoying because it's in a weird awkward middle place. Also it's got my least favorite tropes of "drama based on just not communicating properly", and I don't really think Drew is nearly as nice of a guy as everyone keeps saying he is based on any of his actual actions. I wasn't really rooting for their relationship to work out.

Currently reading:

The Cloisters - current audiobook, not too far into it but liking it so far

I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself - randomly grabbed this from the library. interesting, don't know what to think so far

Check, Please! Book 1: #Hockey - quick comic read, cute so far

QOTW: Do you remember learning to read? What do you remember?

Memories are weird, so it's hard to to know what i actually remember vs what I remember people telling me. I mostly know that I hard time learning to read in kindergarten. I have a fall birthday, and I started early when I was still 4, turned 5 in September rather than being held back a year. I started first grade in the lowest reading level, but apparently something clicked in that year, I ended first grade in the highest reading level. I don't know how much of that is "remembering" vs being what my mom telling me. I do remember reading a lot, and my mom reading to me every night. And in second grade my teacher LOVING Clifford the big red dog and having a contest that the any kid who read every single Clifford book got to take the giant stuffed clifford home for a night. I was the first to do it, I think within the first month of school. (it helped that my mom taught second grade so we had a good chunk of the books at home, I didn't have to borrow them from the classroom, I was plowing through ten a night ),

haha I feel you Jen. I DID try Tolkien when I was younger. I read the Hobbit in middle school and I thought it was ok. I read the Two Towers for a book report in middle school too and i just....felt no desire to finish the rest of the series. I think they sat on my shelf for a decade before i finally got rid of them acknowledging that after watching the movies, I just...don't like the Lord of the Rings. There weren't enough women in the series for me. Sorry, if you don't have a girl protagonist in there actively participating in a significant portion of the book, you're not keeping young me's attention.

I forgot to mention, The Strange Case of the Alchemists Daughter by Theodora Goss was picked for the next book club read! There’s a pre read thread as well as a final thoughts thread with reading questions over in the book club folder.

Hi everyone,

Been a busy start to the year, extremely busy at work. Had a really rough week last week, had trouble sleeping and was really stressed out, lot of stuff going on every night.

Finally have a little breather!

I finished:

Exhalation - normally i don't go for short stories much. I tend to find them either leaving me wanting more, or they just don't make an impression. But this one i actually liked all the the stories in it! Probably the highest I've ever rated a book of short stories. one of my TBR picks.

Baking with Kim-Joy: Cute and Creative Bakes to Make You Smile - read harder had a read a cook book cover to cover prompt. usually i try to pick one with actual content for prompts like that, but i wanted to just pick something I owned, and I've had this since it came out without ever really cracking it open. I'm glad I did, everything in it was super cute! Not much actual reading content. but I have several vegan friends and i'm always looking for stuff to make them, and being frustrated trying to find good dessert recipes that arent' just "how about a fruit cup with some whipped cocounut cream?" or involve a bunch of weird ingredients like xantham gum or agar agar. This involves mostly stuff like aquafaba (which we eat plenty of garbanzo beans so isn't a big deal) and vegetable shortening, or coconut oil.

The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires - i generally really enjoy Grady Hendrix's books. I don't know if it's because i was in such a bad headspace last week, or if this one is genuinely darker than the rest of his books. Not saying it wasn't well written, just it didn't seem to have the same humor breaking up the horror that his other books have. Maybe i just missed it because i was in such a bad mood. I had a hard time finishing it. It really did a good job highlighting how the work of housewives gets overlooked and dismissed, and that women who are housewives are often seen as lesser, or weak, or unable to do anything but clean and pack lunches. And it called out the racism and sexism that was (and still is) rampant in that era. but it just wasn't...enjoyable like some of his other books. but I'm willing to accept that it could have been my mood too. Was another TBR pick.

Sorrowland - Book riot audio book by a PoC read by a PoC. I liked the book, but again a pretty heavy book for when I wasn't really in a good headspace for it. Still good, just was a stressful listen.

Stealing from Wizards Volume 1: Pickpocketing Stealing from Wizards: Volume 2: Burglary. Needed to re-read these as a mental break after those others.

currently reading:
Klara and the Sun - liking it so far, although the world building is very strange. Klara keeps mentioning things moving in and out of boxes. I can't quite figure out what is meant by that. She's a robot, maybe her vision is separated by boxes? It's not explained well, but it's presented like it should just make sense.

You Should See Me in a Crown -audio re read for books & brews

QOTW:

Are there authors you’ve read but just couldn’t “get Into”? Who and why?

there's a few i can think of off hand. Stephen king I just...can't. I know he's immensely popular, but I've read three books of his and don't really want to read more. The Shining was at least tolerable, i Thought The Stand was unbearable, and the Gunslinger was as well. I have zero desire to attempt any more. The stand was 800 pages and I thought the first 400 could have been summed up in 1 sentence. Just not my style.

Stephen Graham Jones is really popular, and maybe I just started with the wrong selections of his but the two i've read I just...couldn't get into. They were weird and disjointed and I had a hard time getting into them and finished just feeling confused.

Colton Whitehead. I feel bad about this one because everyone RAVES about The Underground Railroad in particular, and I just found it...forgettable. Literally, I know I read it. I couldn't tell you anything about it now, other than that the railroad was literal. I read Zone One for book club, and I really disliked that one too. I have just come to the conclusion that something about his style just does not gel with me.

This is the space for your final thoughts for the Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter.

Spoilers are allowed here, so don't check this thread out until finished! I'll post some reading questions here as well. I picked a few i found most interesting. Feel free to answer as many or as few as you like!

1. The book begins with the epigraph “Here be monsters,” followed by an argument between Mary and Catherine as to its appropriateness. In what way is this a fitting introduction to the themes presented in the book? Discuss the different examples of monstrosity in the story. Who are the real monsters?

2. Catherine decides to leave the other women’s comments in the narrative so that the reader “will be able to see how annoying and nonsensical most of them are, while offering the occasional flash of insight into character.” Do the interruptions afford you a better understanding of the characters? Are they nonsensical? How would the story have been different without these interruptions? If Goss had formatted them differently—as footnotes, for example—would they have had the same effect?

3. Dr. Rappaccini believed that “the forces of natural selection are no longer acting on man. So it has become [the scientist’s] duty to direct evolution, to create the higher forms that man can become.” Do the other members of the Alchemical Society believe this is true? Do you think there is any truth to his belief? How successful is Dr. Rappaccini in “directing evolution”? Do any of the other scientists succeed?

4. Why do the scientists of the society feel that women are the best subjects for their experiments? How does this play into or work against the prevailing attitudes toward women at the time? Do Mary and the other characters fit Victorian society’s ideas of womanhood? Are there any instances where the general expectations of women help them in their work?

5.When he is injured, Justine holds Watson “as tenderly as though he were a young bird in a nest. It is the way she holds everything—when you are as strong as Justine, the world is terribly fragile.” Is Justine as strong emotionally as she is physically? How has she learned to deal with her “monstrosity”?

6. In many ways, Catherine is the most independent of the women. How much is this due to her essential nature as a wild creature, and how much can be attributed to all that she went through during and since her transformation?

7. Victor Frankenstein, Dr. Jekyll, Dr. Rappaccini, Dr. Moreau, Mr. Hyde: Did any of these men love their daughters? Which man has the most to atone for? What lasting effects do their actions have on their daughters? Can you think of any reasons these women could feel gratitude toward their fathers?

I got this for my book flood in the main facebook group a few years ago. I really liked it, the second book was good as well. I'll have to give it a bit of a re-read before posting some questions. Hope everyone enjoys it!

This is the space to talk about your initial thoughts about the Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter. Are you excited to read it? Dreading it? No spoilers here please!

Hi Everyone,

The poll for the next selection is here https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/2...

I'll leave it up for a week or so to give people time to vote

Rebecca, yeah I DNFed it hard. I watched the movie of life of pi and thought it was just ok, it didn’t make me want to read the book at all. So maybe I’ll leave the reading list as a book I loved but not as a reading list I agree with haha.

House of leaves gave me nightmares about my house trying to eat me. I had to have a different book to read before bed, haha.

Hi everyone,

Happy new year!

Busy start to the new year at work, after a quiet last week. Everyone apparently wants to get going all at once.

Looking very forward to vacation at the end of the month! Also many live entertainment things coming up in february. Seeing Beetlejuice the Musical, the DSO doing the score of Princess Bride while the movie plays, seeing Jagged Little Pill the musical, then in march seeing Elle King, april seeing Welcome to Nightvale live. I missed live entertainment, it's nice to get back into it. (still masked, myself!)

This week I finished:

Network Effect - i do try to start the year clean with no ongoing books, but I still has 5 hours left on my audiobook re-read on New Years eve and I just didn't have the bandwidth to be listening to it all day trying to finish it. But considering the rest of Murderbot is novellas that are about 4 hours, i don't feel TOO bad about that. It's like i just had a fresh novella to start the year.

The Grief of Stones - I was all raring to go for my TBR challenge, so of course the library hold that i'd been waiting on for about 6 months dropped like 3 days before the end of the year. It was pretty short at least! It's no Goblin Emperor, but I enjoy the series. More a series of connected mysteries than the big complicated plot. Looking forward to the next one. I'm only casually doing book nerds, but I slotted this in as "bureaucracy in action". It fit several, but that sounded like a harder prompt to fill, and this certainly worked for it. Lots of stuff involved with his position and where he might end up and how he ended up with an apprentice and such.

Fugitive Telemetry - figured i might as well finish the murderbot listen-through. Still good as ever <3

Bunny - JUST finished this. So very weird. Kind of if you took say mean girls or heathers and then added some horror based magical realism. I keep hearing "I love you bunny" in a really cloying voice and it's creepy. I'd probably make a good, creepy movie that i don't know if I'd actually watch. This was the first book off my IRL book club's tbr challenge that someone had picked for me. so 1/22 down!

Currently reading:
Sorrowland - doing the audiobook, will be for read harder's audio book both written and narrated by a PoC.

QOTW:

I always put in a number for goodreads. I think I've settled on 150 as a sweet spot of not blowing by the number, but I don't constantly get told that I'm behind if I get in a little bit of a slump. I do a lot of comic book trades, and I often have an audio book going so that inflates my numbers a lot.

I am for sure doing Read Harder, I really liked the prompt list this year with the exception of reading a book I DNFed. I'll have to think on that one. Although I DID dnf the Kite Runner which featured heavily in The Reading List. So maybe I should try that one again. I don't know. I'll think on it. I do have some other ones I just set aside because I wasn't in the right mood.

I'm casually doing book nerds. I'm in the popsugar groups on facebook/discord/goodreads, but i don't really like the prompts this year. Not that they're bad in and of themselves, just I've done the challenges for so many years, they're very repetitive. So i'll probably just kind of see how i did on that one without trying again, like I did last year.

And as i mentioned I'm doing the mount TBR challenge in my book club to just read books that i already own, and i have my list. I think some of those I can easily apply to other challenges.

I have read a Memory Called Empire and enjoyed it a lot, I also read The Strange Case of The Alchemists Daughter and enjoyed. That doesn’t mean not to pick either! If anything it it just means I get questions up faster because I don’t have to wait for a library hold and to read it 😂

I'd like to suggest The Genesis of Misery. I picked it up from The Strand when I was there, and it looks fascinating! It's a retelling of Joan of Arc, but in space with giant mecha. Some blurbs are describing it as queer Joan of arc meets Gdeon the Ninth with Pacific Rim thrown in, which just sounds fun to me.