February, March, April

Well, this is awkward.  Its been three months.  Here are some books:

The Good Wife, Steward O'Nan
The Traveler, John Twelve Hawks
Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell
Pathfinder, Orson Scott Card (again)
Heart of Gold, Sharon Shinn
Mr. Penubra's 24-hour Bookstore, Robin Sloan
Ruins, Orson Scott Card
I am the Messenger, Markus Zusak

Lets get this out of the way first, I've already read Pathfinder since I've been keeping this blog.  You can read what I thought of it here.  I had slightly different opinions this time.  I re-read it because the sequel FINALLY came out, its called Ruins.  Pathfinder was definitely better than Ruins, which almost reads like fanfic.  It just keeps going and going and don't get me wrong, its good, but every turn of events had me thinking "really?  You're just farting around with your characters."

The Good Wife reminded me of Room, and maybe one other book who's name isn't coming to me just now.  It was OK, it kept me hooked, but only really because I wanted to know how it ended.  Thus, beach read.

Cloud Atlas and Heart of Gold were both OK scifi.  Cloud Atlas was slightly more literary (or trying to be literary) whereas Heart of Gold was quite scifi-ish.  Both were interesting and I got through them, but neither were amazing or stood out in any way.

Mr. Penubra's 24-hour Bookstore on the other hand WAS amazing.  Great adventure, great characters, great plot, well written, kept me engaged... On the back it said it was similar to The Night Circus which I totally disagree with because that was SO MUCH BETTER even than this book, but I do agree that both have a charm.  I highly recommend this book.

Lastly I am the Messenger was a huge letdown.  Zusak also wrote The Book Thief which was truly fantastic and witty and powerful.  I am the Messenger was bumbling, random, undriven in plot, unlogical, and the end in particular stank of "Oh shit how do I get my character out of this mess?  Let me pull some metaphysical strings which may not be metaphysical"  The entire time I expected that the ending would make me understand the motives behind the main character's actions throughout the entire book.  Instead it made everything even less clear, and not in a 'The Giver' kind of way.  Don't read it.

More books coming soon, you can be sure.

In other news I am departing on a 2 month journey soon and won't be able to take books with me so I will experiment with e-books.  If I have anything interesting to say I'll post it here.  Its mostly notable now because I have been quite opposed to e-readers, and still would be if there were any possibility of packing books or having library access while I'm travelling.

December

Here we go, the last bit of 2012!

Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss
Elantris by Brandon Sanderson
Pure by Julianna Baggott

Alright first of all, I think everyone would enjoy Name of the Wind.  It tilts towards fantasy, but the writing is so vividly luscious and the story is so pulling that I think almost anyone would enjoy it.  Its not a super fast read, but in this case that is a good thing.  You can luxuriate slowly in the masterpiece of a book.

The Wise Man's fear is similar, but its just a tad less well written, in my opinion.  Likely you will have been caught by Name of the Wind and that won't matter, but just a forewarning that the first book is better.

Elantris is a good book an interesting story, but seriously fantasy.  Don't pick it up if you don't like fantasy.  Its also not fantastically written, but if you enjoy good stories that are a little out of the ordinary, you'll probably like this book.

Pure is trash.  Futuristic fantasy that reminded me of Hunger Games trash, but YA trash all the same.  Get it for a plane ride or a beach trip, don't bother otherwise.  Its a trilogy and I'm not going to bother getting the other books, I'm just going to read the synopsis on Wikipedia to assuage my curiosity.  Also the pseudo-science just rubbed me the wrong way.  Overall, not a horrible book, but definitely not something I'll pick up again any time soon.


And now, invisible ladies and gentleman, what you have all been waiting for, the final 2012 tallies!

I read 32 books in 2012 (~60% of a book each week), putting me a solid 12 books behind last year's 44.  I embarked on several reading 'journeys' which took me far more time than I would have otherwise spent on books.  The longest was my expedition of re-reading Harry Potter.  I'm glad I did, but I won't be doing it again soon.  I also re-read many Ender's Game books, but looking back those actually didn't take much time.  I just read a lot of slow books, and read more slowly in general.  

I've already finished my first 2013 book and I have a slew more on the agenda, so stay tuned for more good books!