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

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

NOTE:
I'm gonna say upfront right now that I'll probably be on the late side with Day 3 DQs.

I only just finished the second section, as this global remote work/remote school/overall lockdown situation has decreased my reading time. You'd think I'd be able to read MORE, but nope. Not without my usual commute. :(

DQs Day 2: Part 2

5. There is LOT of action in this section, but possibly not much more world/plot building. Do you like the balance and pace of the book?

I do like the balance and pace. And I do think that this section has had plenty of world- and plot-building actually! I'm having somewhat of a slow go, due to my own personal time issues, but if that weren't the case I'd probably have sped through the whole book already.

6. Nathaniel has advanced summoning skills, but hasn't gained the practical ability to respond to changing events. Do you think this is going to end well for him, or is Simon and/or Bartimaeus going to bring him to a sticky end?

Well, it's ostensibly a Middle Grade book, so I doubt anything too terrible will happen to Nathaniel/John. I think he'll need to grow up a lot, since he doesn't yet have the emotional maturity to deal with… life, basically.

7. Whilst the scope has expanded a bit, with the trip to Parliament, there remains very few female characters in the book (even for a pre #MeToo publication). Is this deliberate, to set up the unhealthy societal structures of the world, or just bad judgement on the author's part?

I've been hoping it's the former, but it's more likely the latter. I mentioned in my Day 1 answers that I had some problems with sexism in this book. And rather than being deliberate, it often feels completely casual, as if the author doesn't even realize how deep it goes.

8. What do you think is going to happen in the last part?

Reappearance of the street gang, Bartimaeus sticking it to Lovelace and his spirits, Nathaniel and Bartimaeus forming an alliance of sorts. Maybe to save Ms Lutyens, because so far it's been that kind of book.

I haven't read Artemis Fowl in many years (the first book, that is, which I liked a lot -- I read the second more recently and didn't like it) but I can see the comparison. The Amulet of Samarkand was published a couple of years after AF, but I would place it within the same "publishing wave" of post-Harry Potter YA fantasy novels with certain similarities. They're different enough, however, that I wouldn't make to many one-on-one comparisons besides the superficial ones.

Katherine wrote: "I have the eARC of this. Just started. It has been a while since I did a BOM."

Hope you'll like it!

I'm in the middle of Chapter 14 now. I'm also trying to finish the YA BOM because I'm super far behind and I'm supposed to write the last Discussion Questions, but I still quite like The Women's War.

The introduction of one male POV (so far) has been an interesting choice, because the guy is such a jerk. And the scene where he comes to the abbey with his goons is pretty brutal.

DQs Day 1: Part 1

1. What was the reason you decided to read this book? Was the cover interesting to you? Did someone recommend this and you finally are reading this?

LOL, it is my BOM Takeover! The YA category was basically a bunch of stuff on my old TBR that “everybody’s read but me” :)
I bought this book on Kindle in 2013 when it was on sale for $0.99 because it looked like fun, and I was buying up a lot of YA and MG books at the time, in various formats. I just never got around to reading them all — including this one.

2. I’ve enjoyed how the universe has been set up so far with the entities and magicians? Are there any major flaws or changes you would fix?

I’m enjoying the social and magic systems. I mean, it’s all kind of terrible for most of the characters, but enjoyable for the reader!
I am detecting an undercurrent of casual sexism in this book though. Apart from any quibbles over how the adult women have been depicted thus far, I also found Bartimaeus’ joke about appearing to Nathaniel as a naked woman troubling, not necessarily because it wouldn’t be funny to do that to a teenage boy (because it kind of would!) but because it was in regards to a particular woman. That is normalizing, like, sharing private nude photos, albeit in “fantasy novel” form. How would that woman feel about having her naked image used by a stranger to fluster a teenage boy?
Anyway, not to be a Debbie Downer. I just think this book is showing its age, as a pre #metoo novel. Or something. Overall, I do mainly like the book!

3. Bartimaeus has such a witty and fabulous personality and his remarks and sarcasm is well written. Are there any other characters you’ve really enjoyed so far? Have you had a favorite comment from Bartimaeus so far?

I have actually preferred the Nathaniel sections to the Bartimaeus sections. Perhaps I have more of an affinity with Nathaniel, or perhaps I am just in the mood for grimness. It’s interesting how the tone of the book shifts so dramatically when it shifts between the two POVs. The Bartimaeus sections are funny, though maybe trying a little bit too hard. For example, although footnotes can be hilarious in books like this, here I don’t like them all that much. They’re distracting, not particularly funny, and don’t really add much.
I really liked the scene where Bartimaeus appears as the teenage Ptolemy and riles up Nathaniel’s nerves!

4. So far the pentacles have been a cool part of the magical process. How well do you think you could draw a pentacle? And how do you think magicians first developed pentacles? Did they just draw random shapes to summon spirits?

I would be TERRIBLE at it. Maybe if I’d started young, like the magicians in this book, I’d have been okay though?! Could be that magicians developed pentacles back in prehistoric times, either through trial and error or through ancient humans’ different relationships with the spirits. I doubt this book will get into the origins of its own magic system though.

Laurie wrote: "Lily wrote: "Side question: are you allowed to answer your own DMs once others have answered?"

I’m not an admin, but I’ve participated before and the question writers all answered their own questions. It adds to the discussion. :)"

Yes, this :)

The pace is pretty good. Hopefully it'll keep up like that, since that's not always the case w/long books.

I haven't read more yet but I will later today.

I'm just over halfway through Part 1, so theoretically on track for the DQ schedule ;)

It's fun so far, but I'm not like "Wow." There's some stuff that's bothering me.

I hope everybody is well! Strange times!

I've managed to read the first 5 chapters! I like it so far.
When I did the recent Buddy Read of The Grace Year, I had this to say:
"I tend to have a bone to pick with books that show extremely ... misogynistic societies for the sole purpose of having female characters potentially undermining them. I mean, it is 2020. Why are we still only just here, especially in YA fantasy?"

But while The Women's War is guilty of showing a sexist society so that it can be undermined (this is, in fact, the POINT, of the book), it's really well done so far. It's decidedly not YA, helps, as the world building and characters are far more complex and mature, respectively.

And it's unusual to have High Fantasy with multiple POVs that are *all* women, as has been the case here so far.

I'm into it!

sophia wrote: "Hi! Looking forward to it too 😊
This is my first buddy read and hope it gets me out of my funk."

Happy to help. :)
I have been sitting on this book for waaaaaay too long anyway!

Hi! I am looking forward to starting this BR :)
Just a heads up though: I won't be able to read as much per day as I had planned, because normally I do most of my reading on the subway and at lunchtime etc, but now I'm going to be teleworking and my kid will be remote-learning. So, nowhere near as much reading/alone time for me as usual, stuck at home for the next few weeks at least!

I hope everyone else on this thread is doing well!

Finished reading this one, from 2013!



Had it sitting around waiting until my kid got old enough for me to read it to her, since I didn't think I'd want to read it twice. She's way past old enough, but we just didn't get around to it (and we were reading other stuff together).

It had a lot of morbidly funny bits, and the writing overall was good. But I wanted... more from it, somehow?
(And at the very least, it would have been good if there had been a SINGLE FEMALE CHARACTER. o_O)

We only had 3 sets for this month’s Adult BOM too, but I think everybody had a lot of fun reading and answering! I’m sure it’ll be the same with this one 🙂

We can haz DQ chapter breakdown pleez? :)

Cat wrote: "I just finished Lady of Devices
Gotta love a female engineer character, with double bonus for poker skills :)"

Ooh, I love that book! Lucky you, just reading it for the first time :)

Jessica wrote: "(Is this how this goes?)"

More or less, yeah.
But IMO, for this patriarchy, pitting women against each other is almost like a beneficial side-effect, while the main point of the “myth of magic” is the ability to blame women for men’s own worst qualities. The men actually seem to believe the magic is real. Self-delusion is how they absolve themselves of their poor treatment of women, and of their sexual attraction to teenage girls. To me that’s one of the few things this otherwise not-great book does fairly well: Self-delusion is how real world people absolve themselves of sexism, and this book’s world parallels that, just to an extreme degree.

DQs Day 3: Chapter 43 - end

10. There are lots of reveals in this section, from the relatively light David & Birdie being hypocrites to the very grim sexual abuse. How do you feel about Henry's solution for their escape? Do you believe his protestations of innocent intent?

It's really hard to say, because he's such an unreliable narrator! He admits to being a dark person, but not to having willfully killed anyone (depending on one's interpretation of whether or not he actually induced his mother's miscarriage, and whether or not that should be considered murder in any case, which I… am not going to even get into here!), but he's just so messed up. I don't think it's possible that he'd have intended to kill David but not kill his own parents -- I think if any murder was intentional, it was an all or nothing thing. He would have written his parents off as lost causes by then.
I was sort of coming 'round to the idea that he's not all bad and didn't intentionally kill, but after the flash-forward revealing how obsessive and manipulative he still is, I'm not so sure. If there's a sliding scale where 0 is is innocent and 10 is twisted psychopath, I'd say Henry is like a 6 or 7 maybe?

11. Great thrillers depend on readers being completely immersed in the story, and not noticing points where our assumptions of how the world works are challenged. This story is all predicated on no one from outside the cult of David investigating what's going on in the house. Do you find this aspect believable? Were you able to suspend all disbelief, or was there any particular plot point that snagged your attention?

To the question of no one from outside the house investigating its inner goings-on… I'd say it was believable. And it was the late 80s/early 90s, when people could keep themselves to themselves more, right? I'm not English and don't live in England, but in knowledge of English sociological history, there tended (or tends?) to be an element of Don't Get Involved In Other People's Problems. I feel like there have been a number of books and movies, more recently, that take place in the 20th century that examine this topic, or look at the lingering effects on yesterday's children/today's adults (much like this book, in fact).
As to my own suspension of disbelief in this book more broadly, I actually had a much harder time with Lucy's situation in France. I can get how she (and Phin) ended up there illegally, but not all of the legal ramifications of what happened to Lucy after that. France has a very formal marriage process, for instance, so I don't get how she could have been legally married AND legally divorced from Michael without anyone ever realizing that she didn't have proper documents. There's a mention of her being "known only as Lucy" in an article about Michael's death. But there would have to have been a surname -- even a fake one -- in various legal docs pertaining to their marriage and divorce, so I don't buy that at all.
And when she finally made it back to the UK, with her two kids, she got them enrolled in schools somehow without any legal identities since the fake ones they got from Michael (which all had different last names)? Or would she have reclaimed her birth identity by then, off-page, with no questions at all from any gov agency? I'd have liked more about that process, to assuage my curiosity.

12. The last chapter is a flash-forward. Did you like this last snippet? Do you like how the story was resolved?

Yes and no. I was happy for most of the characters because I'd grown fond of them, but I found the ending a little pat. "Yay great big happy family! And we all have money now! And Phin (now spelled with an F) really did become a safari guide in Africa, LOL!" seemed a bit much.
I think I might have liked it better if it was revealed that Henry had killed Phin -- maybe left him locked up and let him die, or something else that would have let Henry carry on with his sketchy protestations of innocent intent.

13. Overall, did you enjoy this book? Will you be reading more Lisa Jewell and/or this genre?

I enjoyed it. It's my 3rd Lisa Jewell book and I have rated all of them as 4 stars. From my review of The Girls in the Garden:
"This is my second book by Lisa Jewell, and the second time I've been pulled into caring about characters and families that feel quite real, for all that the novels' plots rely on unusual domestic situations."
From my review of The House We Grew Up In:
"By the time you get to the sort-of 'big reveal' near the end of the book, to find out more about a certain pivotal moment that happened in the past, it doesn't mean nearly as much as the rest of the journey."
I have more or less the same feelings about this book. I think Jewell's endings have tended to be… I guess, not as dark as they could be, because she's going more for an audience that wants... well, not a *happy* happy ending, but at least a *happy as possible given the tragic circumstances* ending.

I do wish that ending had been a bit darker instead. Maybe Lucy and Libby inherit the house after finding out that Henry killed Phin, and then Henry falls down some stairs or accidentally poisons himself or something. Or hey, let's go full-on Gothic and have Henry burn the house down in a fire so that the women can never discover Phin's remains in a trunk in the basement!
As it stands, I do NOT want to think about F/Phin's reaction if not only Lucy & Libby but HENRY show up on safari, what with Henry's decades of obsessively Single-White-Femaling him.

I should probably read thrillers/suspense a little more often, but I'm usually disappointed in them -- mainly by sexist crap if the author is male -- and there are just so many great Spec Fic books out there that my attention is diverted! I will probably read a few more Lisa Jewell books, depending on the specifics, and I did just pick up a random woman-authored Scandi-noir paperback from a book swap shelf. So, we'll see.

BONUS ANSWER: I think I figured out why I thought Lucy's phone received a text rather than her own calendar alert re "The Baby is 25" -- and why I (and many others) thought that Lucy might secretly be Clemency!
The book's MP on Goodreads shows a user question regarding an early description of the book, like way back when it was still in rewrites:
"Anyone else puzzled by this blurb up top?: Gifted musician Clemency Thompson is playing for tourists on the streets of southern France when she receives an urgent text message. Her childhood friend, Lucy, is demanding her immediate return to London. It’s happening, says the message. The baby is back."

I must have scrolled past that and subliminally lodged it in the ol' brainpan. :)

Lexi wrote: "Another one that everyone but me already read: World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War (3 stars). Not my favorite either - it just felt dated and overly long to me."

Good to know. I haven’t read it either, but maybe now I won’t...

Thanks! But I think I will just wait until my 2 things going on the following week — YA BOM The Amulet of Samarkand and BR The Women's War both start on 3/16.
I don’t think I will have much time before that anyway. #busyatwork

Jessi wrote: "Alysa wrote: "Jessi wrote: "Louise wrote: "I never thought about Lucy being Clemency! I just assumed she was the sister of Henry... interesting!"

Anything is possible!! I didn't think of that poss..."

Oh yeah, you're right -- it says it's a notification from her calendar. My copy is an eARC but I assume that's not been changed.
My bad! Could have sworn it was a text!