Alysa’s Comments (group member since Jun 27, 2015)

Alysa’s comments from the Nothing But Reading Challenges group.

I, too, am looking forward to some free time. I have been unusually silent on this thread... 😔

I keep wanting tomorrow to be 1 May, and then going “Nooooooo! One more week!”

DQs Day 6
Chapters 31-35

21. Soon after the violent action sequence that sees Cat infected by the spores... Auri takes a private moment with Kal to talk about their relationship. What did you think of this scene? Is there hope for them? Do you have any other last-minute reactions to the various romantic subplots in this book?

What with the whole Squad being in peril and Cat being on the verge of death, I didn't think that that moment was really the right time for Auri to bring up their feels, or more accurately her potential for developing mutual feels -- especially because she seems to understand how much she's asking him to take on good faith -- but hey, it's YA, and at least the whole touching-helmets thing was cute. It doesn't seem like there's much hope for them in any case, unless the squad survives being fugutives, and survives the Ra'haampocalypse.
The romantic subplots in this book -- surprise, surprise! -- generally annoyed me. We all thought the way Cat's love for Tyler was presented was a bit irritating, but let's not forget other problems. I mention in my review that this book is queerbaiting. I mean, Finian is bisexual or pansexual or whatever, and thinks both Tyler and Scar are hot, but seems to be headed for pairing off with Scar in the next book. Tyler and Cat had… whatever that was. Kal and Auri have the whole "Pull" thing. That scene where Tyler kisses Kal so as not to get caught doing what they were actually doing in the closet was only meant as light comic relief. Come on, K&K, I expected better queer representation.

22. "Ra'haam" turns out to be the name of the sentient collective plant life form, stumbled upon by the Octavia colonists. Auri is, somehow, the Trigger of a weapon against the Ra'haam that was put in place by the vanished Eshvaren long ago. What do you make of all this? Battle Leader de Stoy knew enough to want to keep Auri away from the GIA, so how much did she know? How deep in the Legion do you think this knowledge goes?

I am personally not digging the sentient hive-minded plant life. I'd have been happier with pretty much anything they could have found on Octavia other than sentient hive-minded plant life. I am just not really into it in general. I don't mind when deadly plants are an important sci-fi backdrop, like in The Book of Koli, but when they have sentient hive-minds, I get inexplicably bored. This exact sort of thing even annoyed me in The Nightmarchers, a horror novel where plants are a central element of the book from the start, FFS! *deep breath* Once I get over my disinterest in the Ra'haam as central villain, I can start to think about the Eshvaren, and de Stoy, and the Aurora Legion. So, de Stoy works for the AURORA Legion, and somehow knows that AURORA is an important part in the fight against the Ra'haam? Seems to be clearer than the Legion was named for this particular girl named Aurora, huh? It remains to be seen at what point the GIA was infiltrated by the Ra'haam, and if the GIA has infiltrated the Legion, but certainly the Legion has historically had some knowledge of the Ra'haam and the Eshvaren, and helped cover up the fate of Octavia for its own purposes, such as hiding Auri.
It's weird that multiple factions would want the fate of Octavia covered up though. Like, if you know what's there, why wouldn't you want to warn everybody, rather than hide the whole thing in order to hopefully better defeat it someday? Or am I missing something?

23. It turns out that Princeps is… Auri's dad! Kind of! Did you suspect this or were you completely surprised?

I'd actually started to suspect by Ch 30 that way more of the GIA agents were 200+year old, "infected" Octavia settlers, though not specifically that Princeps was Auri's dad, or using the body of Auri's dad. It's sort of a fun "woah" moment when an agent is revealed to be a dad-puppet (or dad-skin, as the book might say!?), but it actually doesn't serve any real narrative purpose that it was Princeps the entire time. Princeps could have been speaking via any puppet-person, and just chosen to switch to the dad-puppet at that moment to freak Auri out and/or try to appeal to her. It certainly doesn't seem like any tiny piece of Dad still exists in there.

24. To save the crew, Aurora and Cat both have to dig deep into their reserves of mental strength! Auri finally gains control over her psychic powers, and Cat is able to temporarily hold off the full effects of the Ra'haam as it's overtaking her. Did it make sense to you how they each responded to the situation, given their personal circumstances?

It made sense that Cat would push back on the Ra'haam's influence the way she did, and because her doing so saved the rest of the squad, she redeemed herself in my eyes a bit (BUT it's not like she intentionally sacrificed herself here; she just made the most of her bad ending -- which might not be a final ending, if a way is found to cure her in Book 2 or 3.)
Auri… not so much? I don't get how she suddenly mastered her power, and mastered it soooo well that she could mind-meld with Cat, when she spent the whole rest of the book not being able to consciously do jack. Way too convenient. It's imperative for the galactic good that she learn to user her powers, and I'll be glad for her as a person to recover from her trauma, but the timing was way too convenient.

25. Are you going to read the next book in the series? Why or why not?

So, I liked this book but didn't love it. It had a great set-up, some flashes of brilliance here and there, and my bar for world-building was pretty low. The characters were not all equally developed, but the ones that were (especially Fin and maybe Kal) definitely grew on me. But I often found them hard to distinguish from one another, except Zila. It was like several of them all shared one same character voice even though we were told constantly how different they were. I had to go back to chapter headings frequently, to figure out whose POV we were supposed to be in at any given time. If the writing had been better, this would not have been an issue regardless of the 7-person ensemble.
I will probably read the next book. I liked Fin so much, and I think we'll get some deeper world-building about Kal's and Fin's intriguing civilizations as well as answers about the Aurora Legion. It's not a high priority though. (Plus I will be super disappointed if there is more queerbaiting.)
I actually still need to finish Jay Kristoff's Nevernight and Lifelike trilogies, and probably should have done so before reading Aurora Rising, but I felt like joining y'all on this BOM :D
Since I haven't completed those trilogies I don't know if Kristoff typically sticks his landings. Perhaps it's Amie Kaufman's sensibilities that didn't work for me in this book, but I won't know for sure until I read more books by at least one of these two authors.

Hah! Look at me skiving off work to get this done! :D

DQs Day 6
Chapters 31-35

21. Soon after the violent action sequence that sees Cat infected by the spores... Auri takes a private moment with Kal to talk about their relationship. What did you think of this scene? Is there hope for them? Do you have any other last-minute reactions to the various romantic subplots in this book?

22. "Ra'haam" turns out to be the name of the sentient collective Borg plant lifeform, stumbled upon by the Octavia colonists. Auri is, somehow, the Trigger of a weapon against the Ra'haam that was put in place by the vanished Eshvaren long ago. What do you make of all this? Battle Leader de Stoy knew enough to want to keep Auri away from the GIA, so how much did she know? How deep in the Legion do you think this knowledge goes?

23. It turns out that Princeps is… Auri's dad! Kind of! Did you suspect this or were you completely surprised?

24. To save the crew, Aurora and Cat both have to dig deep into their reserves of mental strength! Auri finally gains control over her psychic powers, and Cat is able to temporarily hold off the full effects of the Ra'haam as it's overtaking her. Did it make sense to you how they each responded to the situation, given their personal circumstances?

25. Are you going to read the next book in the series? Why or why not?

Cat wrote: "Anyone want to do a set of questions before Friday, shout out! "

If you get no takers, I will try my damndest to get Day 6 DQs up late Thurs night (EST)!


DQs Day 5
Chapters 25-30

17. What do you think of "The Pull" as Kal puts it between him and Auri, at least from his viewpoint? With his ears and all, kind of reminds me of the Vulcan Pon farr that happens every seven years or so. Do you think Auri has feelings for Kal too?

Hahahaha, the Pon farr, I had forgotten about that! LOL.
"The Pull" in this book is kind of dumb, and I don't think Auri had feelings for Kal before Kal told her about his own, though the book is now trying hard to convince us that she's either developing some or they've been there all along. It's odd. I actually have trouble believing that Auri has romantic feelings toward anyone, because the writing has tended to slightly infantilize her, which also makes Kal's feelings mildly creepy.

18. That was some gunfight between the Aurora Crew and the GIA bomber. I was sure the crew were gonners, until that other race showed up. Why do you think they were there? Why do you think the GIA is so intent on hiding Octavia III?

That was so weird when the others showed up. Way too convenient. They came because The Plot Says So, by making Bianchi somewhat inexplicably blame the GIA for his missing sculpture and respond with brute force.
But in any case, I'm still convinced that the GIA is covering up something that they bear some culpability for on Octavia. Like some bioengineering experiment gone awry.

19. So that blue-green stuff is all over the planet as well. The stuff they found growing in the operatives eyes (one of which was Patrice). Do you think the plant has intelligence?

Maybe! I've seen that kind of thing in other books -- and was equally disappointed in those other books (though none of them were space operas). Something about "It's the plants! It was the plants all along!" always leaves me cold when I didn't go into a book forewarned that plants would be a major element.

20. A chimp! Racing out of the forest to attack the crew!! How do you think the chimp survived this long, and do you think there may be other survivors on the planet?

Again with the *facepalm* because this was dumb. I don't mind that the chimp exists in this time and place, but I minded how badly the authors had to labor to get in the Princess Bride R.O.U.S. reference. Once I manage to ignore that part of it, I can theorize [like others here] that the chimps are infected by the plant stuff, which gives them long life. Either that, or chimps are immune to the plant stuff and have been livin' large in the jungle ever since the humans ostensibly disappeared.

I'll finish reading through Ch 30 today, and hopefully finish the book by tomorrow night, which means I'm not likely to get Day 6 DQs up until Friday, if that's cool. I don't mind if y'all have a burning need to wrap this all up and someone else wants to write those DQs faster than I can, though!

DQs Day 4
Chapters 17-24


13. After reading this section, did your opinion about Cat change? (She saved Auri from the mafia leader's pet (ultrasaur)). When the Terrans offered her a deal, did you expect her to betray the crew to the GIA/Terrans? After that episode do you think she will be nicer now with the crew and Auri in particular ?

I certainly liked that Cat didn't actually betray her crew, that it was all a set-up to help them pull off the heist. But it remains to be seen whether the way she's written will improve now that we've firmly established trust. I mean, trust was never actually the problem. Being kind of one-note was the problem, and that may persist unless Cat and Tyler have a real heart-to-heart, or unless Cat falls for somebody else.

14. For the moment our crew is on the run from the GIA but what do you think of the Starslayer (leader of the Unbroken)? Is he still a threat ? And do you think we haven't seen the last of him ?

I think he's still a threat, though I don't know if there's enough time to see him again in this book. He'll probably show up in the next installment.

15. We learn that the "Trigger" is in fact a three-fingered statue with a diamond in its chest and has in the right eye a gleaming pearl. Auri has been having visions about this "Trigger". Do you have any theories about this Trigger and what it represents? Do you think the resemblance with Auri is significant in any way ?

This whole vision-statue thing is kind of silly, really. Auri has powers like whatever being is represented by the statue, probably, but TBH I'm starting to lose interest a little bit. Before I was like "Government cover-up! Interdicted planet Octavia! Yay!" and now I'm like "Magical statue, meh, this is dumb." There better be some good connections and/or twists coming.

16. Ty mentions at the end of chapter 24 that the Legion/Academy knows about Auri and what it all means. If that's true, how far is the Academy's involvement in all this?
And it's the second time our crew of misfits successfully escapes the GIA. Where do you think they are going now ?

Well the Academy is just an offshoot of the Legion, so IDK if their involvement goes being just towing the line. I hope they'll go to Octavia next, but wherever they end up, I hope they don't have more extended alien-beast-monster scenes like the stuff with the ultrasaur, which I found boring somehow. It was meant to be so exciting, but it just dragged on and on for me.

DQs Day 3
Chapters 13-16

9. Aurora does a lot of interesting things that she doesn't remember doing in this section. Any theories on what a Trigger is and why she calls herself one? Why do you think is the GIA so fixated on capturing her that they post her picture and offer a reward all over the World Ship?

I thought she was trying to say that she was being triggered -- like as some kind of tool -- but wasn't able to get many words out through the mental fog. What with later information revealed, I still think this. Auri is being used as a tool of the Eshvaren, or someone working on behalf of the Eshvaren, or someone who mistakenly believes in the Eshvaren. IDK but something something Eshvaren something!
I think the GIA is part of a conspiracy to cover up something about what happened to Auri's original ship, though that in itself now seems to have been part of something even bigger. The crew needs to get to Octavia and find out, and the GIA absolutely does not want that.

10. We get more insight into Betraskan people in this section. There seems to be a large contrast with Finian negotiating with his cousin for help and reluctantly offering to owe a Favor and his belief that "family seals your den" and that Dariel won't cross them because of their family relationship. How do the interactions between Finian and Dariel and the bit of Finian's history explained so far shape your understanding of the Betraskans?

The Betraskans, as portrayed in this part, reminded me a little bit of the Ferengi in Star Trek due to the latter's tendency towards greed and dealmaking, but I'm not being entirely fair here, as there's more to both species than that. The Betraskan respect for family, even quite distant family, is interesting to me. It's complex, and seems pretty human!

11. Anyone else annoyed by group's refusal to listen to Aurora and Kal? She tries to explain that she was headed to Octavia III, and they think the Fold must have messed up her mind. He tries to explain that his people have information/stories about the Eshvaren, and they dismiss it as mere fictional tales despite the fact that his race is acknowledged to be older than the Terrans. How much more information would they have if they simply listened without dismissing what they hear immediately?

So annoying, yeah. I mean, why not consider listening to her!? Why just assume that what you've been taught is right, especially when you've just had your mind blown by the GIA blowing up a ship of refugees? I don't understand why no one is willing to even entertain the idea that Auri is of sound mind when it comes to her memories about Octavia.

12. Now that we're about halfway through the book, How do you feel about the various characters? Any strong likes or dislikes? Thoughts on the chances of them ever making a cohesive team?

I agree with others that Cat is a problem. To a certain extent I understand why she is the way she is (and it's sad for her that she and Tyler did actually have a drunken hook-up that one time…) but I think the authors could have done a much better job with this character.
I'd like to learn more about Zila. She's been made intentionally inscrutable so far, and it works, but halfway through the book we know a lot more about the others and it's Zila's turn.
Fin has grown on me, as have the others. I found Scarlet the least memorable through the first ⅓ or so of the book, but that started to change once they got to the World Ship.
They're already making a fairly cohesive team! I think it just remains to be seen whether that's only due to their current insane circumstances, or if they'll develop enough personal rapport to sustain their cohesion over time. And again I think Cat might be the biggest problem on that count. (And Auri, who is not technically on the team, so we'll see what happens there.)

Jessi wrote: "A Single book can only be used for one thing between the 3 mini games."

Ah, well in that case we may want to strategize re whether to concentrate on Tasks (esp the high-value groupings), Bingo, or Jackanory. I mean, obviously we can have stuff for all three and people can read anything they want, but it'd be great to maximize points.

ETA: I'm not trying to backseat-captain, BTW.
I just wanna set myself up to be a successful team player, while I'm still on a 3-day-weekend and have time to [over]think about it :D

*slinks off*

DQs Day 2
Chapters 7-12

5. We launched into the action in this section! Did you enjoy it? Or do you prefer a bit more world building?

Enjoyed! TBH, my bar for world building in YA sci fi/fantasy novels tends to be a lot lower than my bar for more Adult stuff. And also, I don't think this kind of book really requires all that much world building. That's gravy. They are in space, with spaceships, and a spaceforce, and there is some friction with a few different humanoid alien species, and… by now we've all got enough genre and pop culture references to get it. Boom.

6. Kal's interactions with his fellow elves (I'm never going to be able to think of them as Slyvadilvathans (sic), or whatever. They are elves!) are interesting - a take on prejudice seemingly built on both historic actions and genetic abilities. What do you think of the glimpse of their society, and how that reflects on your thoughts about Kal?

Their culture seems interesting. I hope we get to know more about the Waywalkers and whatever other factions(?) they may have. One would think that a people as developed as they seem to be would not have so much in-fighting.
About Kal, I agree with E and Audrey Jane -- I like him! He's got issues but with his background, that makes sense. And still waters run deep. It also does not hurt that I picture him super hot.
I appreciate Auri's 21st century sensibilities a lot in her interactions with him, as without her there wouldn't be hilarious Legolas references.

7. And despite the elves being bigoted, humans are inevitably even bigger a$*holes than them! Did you expect these misfits to pick up on the eeeeevilness of the men in black so quickly? Have they made a successful break out or are we into a chase sequence?

I didn't expect them to pick up on the evilness quite so fast, no. It seemed to quick a turnaround for Golden Boy Tyler in particular. But Zila is super scary smart. I don't agree with E that Zila's smartness smells of something more re her knowing secret stuff about the GIA. I think she's just got incredible deductive reasoning to go with her lack of social skills. She is Sherlock!

That's funny about humans being the biggest a-holes. This is a recurring theme in space operas -- I can think of at least two I've read in the past year or so where this featured prominently: Starsight and The Last Human.

8. Auri... Hallucinations are future visions, not from the past! And she has psy-powers! Is this because of her time in the Fold? Or something else? And it seems like we have cross-species instalove with Kal - with the elves having some sort of bond with their soul mate (or did I misinterpret that? ). Do we predict more complex love geometry now? Not just Auri-Ty- Cat??

Okay, so, future visions. Or still could be alternate realities, perhaps. I'm tellin' ya, Auri is River Tam! It's like what E said too: MirandaOctavia is off limits due to some weird experiment and the subsequent government cover-up!
The Kai--> Auri instalove was a bit weird but whatever. It's a YA novel. Could be a more complex love geometry coming down the pike. I do agree with others that I do not want a triangle with Cat, Tyler and Auri. But there seems to be some LGBTQ representation in this book too, which I hope comes into play. Fin (I think it was Fin?) did imply it would be hot if Tyler and Kal would just kiss already!


I see Deanna's posted Day 3 DQs already... I'd better catch up! :D

And for color covers -
Are we using TinEye Color Extractor or are we eyeballing it like we ended up doing during TT7?

@Tina and Jessi
I have some questions, because

Looking at tasks and such -
I'm assuming a single book can be used for a task, a BINGO square, and Jackanory, as long as it's only used once for each?

Like let's say a book has Romance MPG (tasks), mentions a "bag of coffee beans" (Bingo B7), and its title is used in the Jackanory. All good, right?
Or can a single book only be used for one thing between those 3? Like, we pick "bag of coffee beans" (Bingo B7) and that's the only thing it can be used for, full stop.


For Jackanory:
It says "A completed story (minimum 8 books) gets 80 bonus points" -- is that a one-time bonus? Or is it 80 points for every story and we can write as many stories as we want?
Either way, I hope we have at least one person on the team who is good at creating stories for this kind of stuff. I know I'm TERRIBLE at it, haha!

Tina ❣ wrote: "Yes there's a tracking spreadsheet! I'm just editing it and getting it clear for us to use and will send it out when we're done fixing it up :)"

Yay, thanks Tina!

Stacey wrote: "I'll have The Foundling from my library (well actually The Lost Orphan since it must be the US version). So that will likely be one of my first books."

Same!
(I was like “Dammit how do my libraries not have this?!” and then realized it has an alternate title and felt pretty stupid, because I am a librarian in real life and should have figured that out faster. 🙃)

Night Shine by Tessa Gratton

An orphan girl must face untold danger and an ancient evil to save her kingdom’s prince in this lush, romantic fantasy perfect for fans of Girls of Paper and Fire and Tess of the Road.

How can you live without your heart?

In the vast palace of the empress lives an orphan girl called Nothing. She slips within the shadows of the Court, unseen except by the Great Demon of the palace and her true friend, Prince Kirin, heir to the throne. When Kirin is kidnapped, only Nothing and the prince’s bodyguard suspect that Kirin may have been taken by the Sorceress Who Eats Girls, a powerful woman who has plagued the land for decades. The sorceress has never bothered with boys before, but Nothing has uncovered many secrets in her sixteen years in the palace, including a few about the prince.

As the empress’s army searches fruitlessly, Nothing and the bodyguard set out on a rescue mission, through demon-filled rain forests and past crossroads guarded by spirits. Their journey takes them to the gates of the Fifth Mountain, where the sorceress wields her power. There, Nothing will discover that all magic is a bargain, and she may be more powerful than she ever imagined. But the price the Sorceress demands for Kirin may very well cost Nothing her heart.

The Hollow Places by T. Kingfisher

A young woman discovers a strange portal in her uncle’s house, leading to madness and terror in this gripping new novel.

Pray they are hungry.

Kara finds these words in the mysterious bunker that she’s discovered behind a hole in the wall of her uncle’s house. Freshly divorced and living back at home, Kara now becomes obsessed with these cryptic words and starts exploring the peculiar bunker—only to discover that it holds portals to countless alternate realities. But these places are haunted by creatures that seem to hear thoughts…and the more you fear them, the stronger they become.

Kimber✌ wrote: "I dont see the tasks list? :( can u send a link"

It’s on the Team spreadsheet (Message #1)

Are we going to have a separate spreadsheet we can all edit? I’ve had that in all or most previous challenges and find it helpful, but I’m happy to go with whatever tracking method(s) cap and co-cap want to use 🙂

Also, hello Captain Tina!
(Stupid broken notifications, *grumbles* , I did not see your Welcome post)

Anybody else going through that thing where you want to start reading a new book, but feel like you should wait and save it for TT ?!

I’m reading the current April YA BOM but otherwise I will try to read mostly random “worthless” stuff, like graphic novels and single short stories and such, until TT starts. 🤗

DQs Day 1
Chapters 1-6

1. We have met the crew. And what a crew it is. I couldn't help bursting out laughing when Tyler was introduced to the last one and simply burst out "Nooooo". Loved it!
What do you make of the set-up of the crew? Ty, Scar, Cat, Zila, Fin, Kal?

It's a really fun set-up. I love how Tyler was all "I am going to miss the draft" over and over, and this crew was who he ended up with. I agree with Cat that they're not really the dregs though, in terms of their abilities. Just difficult to get along with. I love these kinds of stories wherein a rag-tag bunch is forced to come together for a greater goal, as I'm sure will happen here to some degree or another.
Also could have done without the "Cat secretly loves Tyler" thing, but we'll see what happens.

2. There is a lot of mystery surrounding our other important character, Aurora. Do you think the hallucinations she's having are due to her overly long exposure to the Fold or are they maybe visions of something that may come in the future? How do you think she's holding up?

I didn't get a sense that Auri's having outright hallucinations, but rather having fractured memories return to her consciousness. Whether her memories were forcibly removed or altered is another question...

3. We have learnt very little about the actual setting of the world as of yet. Bits and bobs here and there that let us piece together quite a bit of it but not all that much detail. Do you like what you've seen and heard so far?

I like the way that the world-building is coming in drips, and in a show-don't-tell kind of way, for the most part. I do find it slightly hard to picture stuff so far, but in my experience of Kristoff's writing (Kaufman is new to me; dunno who has greater authorial presence here!) that will change.

4. The question with the obvious answer, I'd assume: what is their precious cargo? And following off of that one: What could possibly be go wrong with their mission?

Haha, it's so obviously Aurora. But why, we can't possibly guess at this point. SO MUCH can go wrong, least of all the potentially shifting loyalties of the crew members.
I am having a weird flashback to Jayne Cobb selling out the Tam siblings on Firefly for some reason, considering this crew is more like Alliance than like Browncoats!