LRRC Week 47
Oh god, I really picked a time to overhaul my website, huh? In my defence, I thought it would be simpler than it actually was. Oops.
In the meantime, let’s get into some books! That I am uncertain of when you will actually get to hear about!!
#93: SHADOWS AND BONE by Leigh Bardugo
So…I don’t think I’ve made any great secret of the fact that I didn’t care for Six of Crows.
I thought it was way way overhyped and kind of boring, in such a way that kind of put me off reading any of Bardugo’s other things.
I picked this up from the library with a half-thought of reading it before they made a tv show, and was shocked to find that I was actually?? Pretty invested in it???
I expected to dislike this book. I didn’t have a good experience previously, and everything I’ve heard pointed to it being the kind of thing that Kylo Ren fangirls are really into. Which, no shade to them at all, that’s just not usually MY THING. And yet! I found myself not only putting up with those elements but enjoying them!
There were some elements that annoyed me about it, but they annoyed me in a way that was so familiar it almost made me nostalgic for the YA fantasy books I read as a teen (ie, most of the female characters are one-note bitches, and the only one who isn’t is a COMPLEX bitch).
I feel as though my enjoyment of this book may be somewhat doomed, as my most favourite elements were 1) the palace drama and 2) the main character’s relationship with the mysterious and ethically ambiguous (trying not to go into too spoilery a territory) Darkling
Everything else I really could have taken or left, and given the end of this book, this may be a bit of a flash in the pan for me. Still, I was interested enough to actually want to pick up the next book, and to think about going back to Six of Crows with additional context, so there’s that!
#94: WE SHALL BE MONSTERS ed. Derek Newman-Stille
I’m not sure that I’ve ever read an anthology that was SO singular in its focus, and it makes for a fascinating read, though I’m a bit on the fence of if that helps or hinders. Perhaps both at times!
“We Shall Be Monsters” is an anthology of stories that are overwhelmingly, though not uniformly, about Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, in some way, shape, or form. I would love to see the call for this one because some veer VERY SHARPLY off theme while others stick to it.
I don’t think it’s a secret that I love explorations of monstrousness, so I was really excited about this one, and it was interesting to see laid out many different authors’ interpretations of the theme.
As with any anthology, some stories worked better for me than others. My favourites of this collection were “Excerpts From The Personal Journal of Dr Frankenstein[…]” by Alex Acks, “Enough” by Jennifer Lee Rossman, “Famous Monsters” by Arianna Verbree, and “More” by Kaitlin Tremblay.
Also, obligatory shout out to “The Last Confession of Dottore Geppetto” for its truly wild Frankenstein/Pinocchio crossover.
NEXT WEEK’S AGENDA
#95: The Tower of Nero by Rick Riordan
#96: The Hollow Places by T Kingfisher