colleen the convivial curmudgeon > Recent Status Updates

12% in and I'm already thinking about bailing. The writing is bad.

Also, why do some authors feel the need to describe, in detail, what people are wearing? "A long sleeve black shirt, brown long skirt, black choker, brown lipstick, and a crystal bracelet". No one cares.

And THEN two pages later, "I know what he sees when he looks at me. A black shirt, brown skirt, black choker... and my PURPLE EYES!"

"To be human was to continually dumb the world down into an understandable story to keep things simple."

"A person was like a city. You couldn't let a few less desirable parts put you off the whole. There may be bits you don't like, a few dodgy side streets and suburbs, but the good stuff makes it worthwhile."

"It is a very terrible thing to be far smaller than one's rage."

"Peace comes to you, if you're lucky. Happy you grab and make with your own two hands."

Doing an audio re-read of this one. Forgot how slow it was in the beginning. I mean, we're past a quarter of the way in, and I feel like the real story is just getting started. Lots of set up.

I also forgot how icky the marriage between Vasya's dad and step-mother is. I mean, I'm sure it's "historically accurate" and all, but still ick.

"... I'm an adult who does adult things, like taxes and laundry and being sad for no reason."

Unfazed, the conductor said, "How wonderful! I, too, am filled with an encroaching dread of my own mortality."

"If I let loose the tenuous hold I have on my feelings, there will be blood. And it won't be mine."

I have a little under an hour left of this, and literally cannot wait for it to be over. I know I'm in the minority for this one, but I'm honestly just bored...

"Now it was just filled with ghosts and memories. Which are really the same thing, when you think about it."

"The spirit is willing, but the body is middle aged."

*spoilers*spoilers*spoilers*spoilers*spoilers*spoilers*

Violet is looking for Marianne. Penelope also wants to find Marianne. But Penelope has given instructions to people to not help Violet, and punishes them ruthlessly for helping... But why? Doesn't Penelope *want* Violet to succeed, because she wants Marianne? So why is she trying to hinder Violet instead of help, aside from being EVIL? Make it make sense!

"Love has made you terribly soft, you know," I say to him without looking.
"I do," he replies. "Isn't it grand?"

I thought I had read this before, but I can't find it marked read anywhere... which doesn't necessarily mean I haven't read it, but I guess we'll see. The opening was familiar - but I think there might have also been a preview at the end of the previous book. :o

"I don't pretend to know much about people... but one thing I've noticed over the years is that some people are nice and some people are kind... Niceness is good manners, and stopping to give someone directions, and smiling at the overworked cashier at the supermarket... Niceness is all about what we do when other people are looking. Kindness, otoh, runs deep. Kindness is what happens when no one's looking."

"... all things built with tax money are beautiful: so we must think or go mad."

Got to the point shortly after Machiavelli takes over the narration, and I just have no desire to continue. This could be a good book, but the writing and dialogue is so unnatural, and just *snore*. I literally keep falling asleep trying to read this book.

Interesting premise, but the execution left me cold. DNFing

"Being polite is all well and good, right up until it's a trap..."

I was definitely not expecting that particular King-work tie-in for this book...

"With pockets, women could conquer the world!"

Just started Part 2, and I'm finding the PoV shift somewhat jarring after being immersed in Strange's story in Part 1. I know the stories will merge, but the first few pages have me feeling like I randomly picked up a different book...

"Granny's soap was like her advice: strong and sharp and it stung a bit at the time, but it worked."

" I think all young women are cursed with a streak of unrelenting foolishness, and all young men are cursed with a streak of absolute stupidity."

"But remember that good intentions pave many roads. Not all of them lead to hell."

Finally getting to a place where I care about what happens...

This one's very slow going...

"She had, it seemed, peeked through a crack and caught a glimpse of Truth down there in the tunnels... Truth wasn't something you went out and found. It was wide and vast and deep and unending, and all you could hope to see was a tiny part of it. And to see that part and to mistake it for the whole was to make of Truth a lie."

"There was an awkward pause, as conversation scrabbled to find a crack through which it could enter."