megan’s Comments (group member since Jun 26, 2015)

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

I’m sure this is somewhere in here and I just can’t find it, but I want to make sure:
Are Tags the bookshelves the books have been added to?

Jessi wrote: "I think it looks different to every user 🤷‍♀️ I see a jackalope on there right now lol"

I thought it was based on your Google profile. It has you as a J from my view. Bummer.

Random question I've always wondered: When I'm in Google Sheets is my icon a very handsome doggy, or am I the only one who sees that?

I’ll read The Jetsetters as well

Wow, we have a huge team!

Hi everyone, I'm Megan. I live in Indianapolis with no other human beings. I lost my slobbery fur-baby to a brain tumor in March. Since then, fur baby No. 2 has become quite the diva.
I'm an engineer in the aerospace industry. My current work is centered around turbofans, which are the engines used in everyday commercial aircraft - think Boeing or Airbus.

My favorite vacation was spending the 2019 holiday season in Italy with my family. Sloshing through a flooded Venice in Wellies on Christmas morning will be hard to out do.
We too are slowly making our way to MLB stadiums across the country. My niece is a sixth generation Reds fan, and she has been asking why there hasn't been ball games on TV.

The place I would most like to visit at the moment would be Norway, specifically hiking the fjords.

My favorite author is Fredrik Backman.

challenge shelf

I love seeing notifications from this feed pop up in my app. With all that has been going on in 2020, I know I can’t be the only one who could use the distraction of a reading challenge. Especially when other social media feeds are clogged with so many drastically differing opinions and twice as much anger.
The scope of good reads is so wonderfully limited: no matter what genre, it’s simply a love of literature uniting us. My mental health will greatly benefit from a team challenge - and the time focused on reading and on others who love it as much as I do.
With that said my team is winning and you’re all going down :P

Paula wrote: "Megan wrote: "Aw I got excited seeing a notification for this thread!"

Me too! hahaha and as Mary C said, I've been checking for new team challenges too"

Me three!!!

Well done everyone. I'm glad we weren't penalized for reading more than we personally committed!

Sonia wrote: "From the Goodreads Choice Awards (2018) Reading Challenge

Rules/Explanation
◈You are not limited to Choice Award winners; runner ups and nominees in each category will also count.
◈You can read mo..."

I had no idea this challenge even existed.
But in the future, the Choice Award task in a non-Choice Award challenge wouldn't be hated. Or you could make it super specific and make it a pain.

I usually find that the real best book in each category is somewhere between the 2nd and 5th place books. The readers who voted for those actually read them. Though the winners are always pretty good, and yes, predictable.
With that, a new challenge task can be to read the runner-up books.
Can do a category over the years, or all from a specific year.
There you go Chipmunks! My holiday gift to you.

Added the Weight Brothers to the tt shelf. I wasn’t able to finish The Rule of One in time though.

I’m in my phone so I can’t do much on the spread sheet. I got one of the books done, but can’t add the book link

I might’ve able to get another book in. I’ll be in the back seat of a van for most of the morning tomorrow. I made it further into my biography book than I thought I would. I’ll update the spreadsheet in the morning if i can fit it in.

Ninth House
Day Three: Chapters 9 - 13

9. Well, these chapters definitely get exciting! Alex is attacked by a gluma, which seems like a Gray on steroids. She later recalls that they are messengers sometime used by the houses. Book & Snake are the ones that can "create" these messengers, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were behind the attack. Who do you think is trying to have Alex killed? Do you think it's because of her investigation or for some other sinister purpose?
It's whoever is behind Tara’s death. I don’t even think it’s one of the other societies. I’m thinking something much more sinister that’s using the societies naivety to get things done.

10. "But one thought returned again and again as he tossed and turned, fell in and out of dreams, morning light beginning its slow bleed through the high tower window: Alex Stern was not what she seemed."

We know that Alex is special because she can see Grays without the assistance of potions, but Darlington knows this, as well. What do you think that thought means? Is there something more to Alex that makes her "not what she seemed"? Why do you think she can see Grays in the first place?
In his eyes, Alex is this trashy high school drop out with track mark scars on her arms. There’s a stron stereotype behind that image that is hard to over look. Her ability to see Grays is not at all tied to her life choices, but maybe genetics? We know her grandmother was religious, a foreign language prayer mutterer, maybe she’s the reason.

11. A lot has been happening to the Lethe House Dante and Virgil: Darlington gets purposely drugged at the Manuscript party, he subsequently goes missing, and now someone is trying to off Alex. Do you think that these incidents are connected? Do you think someone has it out for not only Alex, but Lethe House in general? Any other theories about what might be happening?
I think they are connected, especially when it comes to the Gray bride-groom. Who ever really killed him and his bride likely has a link to whoever is behind the whole mess. Darlington got too close to solving the murders and needed to be taken out. But he had to go somewhere that human magic could not reach. But he must be needed for something, because I don’t think he is dead. If they needed him gone he would be dead and we’d know it.

12. After reading the chapter about Darlington's past, my immediate thought was, "Does Sandow do all of his recruiting in the hospital?" Do you think that he preys on vulnerable kids? Why would he do so when there are thousands of freshman at Yale they could recruit to be Dante?
Hospitals are going to have medical history, including anything psychological. If there’s a kid who told stories of ghosts, then maybe mom and dad took them to see a shrink. Digging through those files would be easy with magic. And people are in hospitals at their most vulnerable points. Using magic to persuade answers and truths from sick people would be a way to get info. Maybe slip something magical into an IV. Darlington and Alex were both at their own rock bottoms when they were in the hospital. That’s when we are the most vulnerable and looking for reason.

Ninth House
Day Two - Chapters 5-8

5. In chapter 5, we meet Professor Marguerite Belbalm who Alex has a meeting with. What do you make of their meeting? Why is she proving help for Alex? Do you think she's just being a helpful teacher or that she has a sinister reason, like wanting to use Alex for something? How do you think this will influence Alex's behaviors and choices in the book?
I don’t think the meetings were sinister. The exact opposite even. Maybe Belbalm is in with the Lethe. Silent faculty advisor. If she wants Alex to succeed and her intentions aren’t good, she’s got to be something deeper and darker than anything Alex has encountered, both living and dead.


6. Whilst Alex is looking at the crime scene of Tara 'on the other side of the intersection', she has a sense of familiarity and then remembers Helllie and Len struggling in the apartment. Len asks her to let them out. What do think happened in that situation and why did she remember it? I feel like it is something important to the story. Do you think this memory will lead to a large reveal or is it just a small and not so important memory?
I think it’s the day that Hellie died and Alex miraculously lived. Those memories are fuzzy or not there at all. Maybe what happened to her and Hellie correlates to what is going on in New Haven. Hopefully Alex sticks with it. Returning to the crime scene would help. Or being put under a smell to cause memory return.


7. In chapter 7 we get a glimpse into Alex's past and what she had to go through to deal with the ghosts. I honestly wasn't expecting us to find out about her past until past halfway mark. She mentions a lot of issues she had to deal with like no one believing her, kids making fun of her and ostracizing her, her parents, that awful bathroom scene, her illicit drug abuse... Why do you think the Lethe society didn't reach out and help her through all that if they were watching her?
It's not Lethe’s job to babysit or push societal morals. They new they’d need here, so they made sure she didn’t die. And I assume they didn’t know about her abilities under a rumor of her made it to them. It could have been years before they took reports seriously.


8. I'm interested in what you guys think of the writing style so far. We have a chapter written in the present tense with Alex and a snippet of passages from books. Then we get Darlington's POV in the past. Are you in favor of this? What do you think of the snippets and are you paying much attention to what they say?
I love that it is a third person POV, even if the focus is switched between past and present and characters. I think that’s a big part of this story being full on adult fiction. There’s more sophistication to it. Versus the first person points of view that make some young adult books sound more juvenile. It makes conflict easier to develop and clichés explode. Like Twilight, Hunger Games, the Divergent series vs. Harry Potter and The Lunar Chronicles.

The Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo
Day 1 Questions

1. Our book starts out with a Prologue that leaves me understandably a bit lost and confused but wanting more, giving us minimal clues to our forthcoming story.
How do you feel about Prologues? Do you ever go back and Re-read them after you finish the book?
Only if the prologue is necessary to the story – like in crime fiction when the author writes the prologue from the perspective of the criminal or the victim. Or when it’s historical fiction and the prologue is present day. This one confused me too. I went back and reread it after the first chapter.

2. The setting of our story is the prestigious Ivy League school of Yale. The history runs deep and gives a gothic and dark feel to the book. Why else do you think the author may have chosen Yale as the setting?
Yale has always been known for secret societies. There are secret society stories for nearly every famous person who went there: George W Bush, John Ashcroft, John Kerry. Even without the supernatural aspect of the story, Yale’s internal workings are very interesting.

3. In Chapter 1 our Main Character, Alex Stern, is running late for the Prognostication. By definition Prognostication is the action of foretelling or prophesying future events. I'm curious as to what the Bonesmen final goal is by performing these ceremonies. Although it is still early in the book are there any guesses as to what the Bonesmen are seeking? Are they after glory ? Time travel? Immortality?
I looked at it as if they were reading tea leaves. So maybe an aspect of Divination? My guess is to predict the future or some outcome based on money.

4. The Grays! I love ghost stories and cannot wait to learn more about the Grays. Alex not only has the ability to see the Grays but is also able to see them in color. This is important and seems to be a key feature that got her this opportunity at the school. Darlington appears to be jealous of this ability of Alex because he needs to take an elixir at a great risk to do the same. How do you see the relationship between Alex and Darlington? Will they become friends, enemies or lovers?
I hope to see them as siblings, because the romance thing would be too predictable, and I will be mad at Leigh. It can happen later in the series (assuming this is more than one book) but I don’t want it a plot point now. Or he can turn against her and join the dark side.

PS: I love this cover!!!!

Ambi wrote: "Oh dang..."

Ambi can you add 9 from the Nine Worlds to your TT shelf please

Midu wrote: "Added my book."

Mindu, can you add The Ghost Brigades to your TT shelf please.

Finished my last book

I have it and am ready to read