My last 5 books: Mostly fantasy

1. I Am Not Okay With This, by Charles Forsman. I watched the Netflix show years ago and I can’t remember it being like this. I recalled some things, but that ending was definitely changed in the show. I knew it was a comic and that I'd read through it in no time at all, but I didn’t expect the story to be both this disjointed and also make complete sense, at the same time. I've got the feeling I'd enjoy this a whole lot more if I was 20 years younger, but at the same time there’s so much in Syd's story that I recognise. The absolute despair and hardship of teenagehood.

2. The Devil's Whore, by Catherine Batty. She’s gotta stop. Like honestly, why are you in my head? There gotta be more pleasant places to be. I was so relieved in the beginning of this book. He lived T_T And then she goes and introduces Jack the Ripper and I get a massive flashback to a story I wrote in 2012 which included both Jack and Bathory as vampires... This plot didn’t head the same way as mine though lol. The multiple time skips in the middle ish were a bit jarring to read through, like whiplash from changing the setting too often, but other than that this was perfect. The lore is coming into its own, the story is settling into what it’s supposed to be, the introduction is over and now the fun begins. I'm less okay with this ending than I was with the previous one. Don’t you dare...

3. The Devil's Due, by Catherine Batty. Okay now I’m sad. Because it’s over. At least my favourite sorceror survived. I would’ve had some choice words if he hadn’t. I didn’t expect the twist with Leo tbh. After they had discovered he had the gene, albeit dormant, I figured there'd be something happening with that. I never expected he'd take the plunge. Throughout this whole trilogy I've enjoyed the scientific aspect of it all, attributing things to genes and DNA and a virus, it adds a modern feel to something that’s otherwise historic, gothic sometimes, even medieval fantasy tinged. From the moment I picked this book up I couldn’t put it down and finished it in 3 days (would’ve been faster if I didn’t have to work). Even shed some tears at the events towards the end. Only thing I didn’t love about this was the time skips at the very end, and I can’t really pinpoint why because I get why they’re there and what they’re doing, but I just... I don’t know. Fell flat because of all the action and emotion just before it? I went into this for the vampires, but now I want more gay sorcerors.

4. Fearful, by Lauren Roberts. This book just felt unnecessary. A bit of fluff about Blair and Lenny, otherwise this was just Fearless but from the perspective of a mostly silent spectator that's revoked a few times through Fearless, and also more deeply surrounding Kitt and his motives and feelings. Nothing that we couldn't live without and nothing that couldn't have been surmised from reading a bit between the lines in Fearless. It brings very little to the series and feels like an attempt to just capitalise on success. 

5. Beyond the Wand, by Tom Felton. Being a lifelong Potterhead I had heard most of all of these stories before from a great variety of different sources. Most of what I didn't know was the pre-Potter and post-Potter events. It wasn't a read I devoured exactly, but it was nice, and because it was such an easy read I finished it in basically two session. It's always heartwarming to read or hear the Potter cast members talk about one another because they always either love or respect one another so much, a big found family. The way Tom talked about himself as a kid gave off "I was a little shit" throughout and it was honestly such a joy to read, even though it was most likely annoying to deal with lol. When this book first dropped I read a lot of reviews talking about how he's too young for a memoir, some even saying that the book ended when it was just getting started because there was no more life left to cover, but in my opinion this book serves as an end to a chapter. This was everything that happened before, and now we're doing the rest. And in my opinion it works. It doesn't end before it starts, and there's a lot of living done. The ending, for me, really highlights how this book serves as a sort of closure to that period of his life. I liked it!

My last 5 books: TikTok made me read it (mostly)

1. Powerful, by Lauren Roberts. This Powerless sidestory tugged on all my heartstrings. Probably because I knew how it would end what with the ending of Powerless... Mak doesn't deserve all this T_T The contrast between Mak and Adena is delicious and I love how she brightens his day and his entire life. Knowing how it would end I tried to not get too invested but it's hard not to when Adena is the spring sun warming up the winter cold wastes that is Mak and making them both blossom. This was short but emotional. 

2. Reckless, by Lauren Roberts. The way the story went in this one was entirely predictable (except for Calum, wtf is he doing) but it was predictable in a way that still made me unable to stop reading. I wanted to read what happened next, wanted to see Pae and Kai struggle to ignore their emotions and fail miserably, crashing into one another. That scene in the sewers made me almost forget to get off my train and miss my connection on my commute, the second-hand adrenaline was real. I had figured out what Kitt intended to do with Pae way before it happened. It made too much sense, and there's a whole book left to go so obviously she isn't going to die. But Kai.... T_T Please let him get the girl in the end? Pretty please?

3. Fearless, by Lauren Roberts. This book tore my heart out, stomped on it, laughed at me, made me cry, and then put all my pieces back together again. Multiple times. The reveal what really happened to Edric's first wife seemed a cliché to me, but the intricate web of lies and secrets it rested on was not and I was gaping at the end. Paedyn's three trials were always interesting because they promised so many heart-wrenching moments. And Kai... I love him so much. Once I got to the third trial I found it physically difficult to put the book down. I didn't want to stop reading. I couldn't wait to find out what would happen. Unfortunately, I was reading on my commute and had to stop for work, yet I'd snag a chapter here or there, until I could finally read at my leisure again - and finished the entire book. I was reading the third trial on my way to work and I was trying really hard to not arrive there looking like I was crying, because I was. Those chapters broke me. Disbelief urging me to continue reading and then blatant relief followed. It didn't last long because a flurry of emotion surged at every new thing happening in the last quarter of this book. I smiled at the end. But before that there were so many tears. This was beautiful. 

4. American Sideshow, by Marc Hartzman. DNF'd at 60% ish. I picked this up because I've had a genuine interest in old time freakshows since childhood and this seemed like it would be by someone with the same fascination. He claims it is, but then the book is full of jokes that laugh AT them rather than WITH them. It got to the point where I had to look up when this book was published because this would not fly today. 2005? Alright, that tracks. I remember 2005. Humour was rough and at the expense of others. That shines through. Half the time I was sat cringing at what I had just read. This book is a collection of wikipedia blurbs sprinkled with borderline offensive jokes. This book caused a reading slump. 

5. Judas Kiss, by Catherine Batty. I want to give this five stars but it took its sweet merry time to get going so that pulls it down to 4. I think I was around halfway before I started to feel like I didn’t want to put it down. But once it got going, holy hell did it get going. This book has pretty much every trope I enjoy, like to the point it’s almost embarrassing, another reason it should be a five star but there were too many instances of second-hand embarrassment and rolling eyes in the beginning chapters. But push through that and it becomes so good. I love Will. I am not okay.

My last 5 books: three flavours of fantasy and a bit of non-fiction on the side

1. The View from the Cheap Seats, by Neil Gaiman. I just got done reading 500 bittersweet pages. Sweet because they reminded me how much I used to love Gaiman's writings, bitter because everything is tainted now. I once wanted to collect everything he had ever written and I used to be so proud of how large my collection was getting. Now I'm considering to just throw it all away. I'm usually very good at separating the art from the artist, but I'm finding it exceedingly difficult this time.  Anyway, I rarely read non-fiction, which is why this book has been hanging around unread in my book shelf for around a decade. The beginning of this book is very sweet and as someone born in the 90s it reads a bit like a history lesson or a wise elder telling me stories of how things used to be. The middle rambles a bit. Especially the music section was a drag. The ending picks up and I almost shed a tear from the last three texts. I still love the way he writes, the way he tells a story, whether it's fiction or not. With the current state of things I want to rage at this, tear it apart piece by piece, scrutinise every detail, but dammit it's a good book. I really liked it. Begrudgingly. 

2. The Devils, by Joe Abercrombie. I can never say no to a new Abercrombie book, and why would I? They're always brilliant. And historical fantasy always tickles me, like "this happened, but what if..." and then this whole mess of magic and brilliance pours forth. I love Jakob and Rikard, unsurprisingly. We have a set of useful excommunicated supernatural misfits tasked with bringing a long lost princess to her home for coronation while her cousins who are all vying for the throne take turns to come at them with all manner of disastrous (and sometimes absolutely disgusting) magic. The frequent use of slaughterhouse and fish market as descriptors are not only telling but provides a 4D experience in reading that I wasn't anticipating. I could smell that sea battle. I'm very glad I lack a reference for a smell for the battle atop the mass grave. Arcadius deserved better, actually he deserved to be more than a footnote. There were three romantic (ish?) situations unfurling between the characters. One I adored and would've liked to see evolved, one was a lot of fun and it ended in absolute despair, and one where I simply didn't feel the chemistry - I would've been fine with them simply remaining fierce friends and not lovers. As usual with Abercrombie the plot is built upon lies upon lies upon lies and I'm very content with the fact that I for once had figured out who was behind it all before it was revealed. I am not okay with that ending, Vigga and Baptiste both deserve better. I hope the next one will still feature both Alex and Diaz and that they won't end up forgotten characters settled in their new offices. I'm all for more Jakob and Rikard, though!

3. Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, by V.E. Schwab. This was the first book in my new attempt to read audiobooks. It's an exercise in maintaining focus without visual stimuli, which automatically means I suck at it. It's also my first ever V.E. Schwab book and I chose this specifically because I had so much good about her writing from booktube. I had no idea this was a vampire book going in, but when Alice finds blood spots without seemingly a source my vampire obsessed mind starts wondering and I go looking for reviews. And sure enough, it's a vampire book. Soon after that discovery I'm predictably completely hooked. This book is beautiful I love the prose, how it's poetic at times, almost lyrical, but never fails to be modern. All the evocation of fruits and flowers throughout creates a powerful image of something beautiful but easily spoiled, and that's the whole idea I think. Maria was egotistical from the start, which then became borderline narcissistic. Charlotte just wants to be loved. All she really wants is to be happy and free. And I guess the same could be said for Maria, but they have entirely different approaches to it. Alice gets caught in the middle, collateral damage of a centuries old toxic relationship. More than anything this is a story about women chafing against society's expectations of their role in it. Wanting to be more than vessels for future generations, wanting to be more than somebody's wife, wanting the ability to live their lives as they choose and not just within a set template, wanting to see the road that is their life curve and bend rather than just continue in a straight line towards the end. All I really wish there was more of in this book is Matteo. I want to know what eventually became of him. 

4. Powerless, by Lauren Roberts. As soon as I started this book I was just sat there like "So this is like Red Queen meets Hunger Games? Okay, I'm game." And it really is. And I had so much fun with this. Especially the banter, and oh I love Kai. He's just the right amount of broken. Paedyn is equally broken to match. It becomes painfully obvious that nothing will happen between them in this book pretty early on. Paedyn will do everything in her power to keep them from crossing that line for as long as Kai doesn't know the truth about her. But I'm fully expecting that they'll cross that line eventually, in the next one or the one after that. For all her observational skills Paedyn is a little bit stupid, though. Like of course the Resistance wouldn't tell her every detail of the plan with how close she is to the princes, and of course the king would never get his own hands dirty by killing her father himself, and of course the Resistance's actual plan involves doing harm to the princes since it's the only thing the king actually cares about (barring his queen). With the way things ended in this book I'm very excited for the next one :3

5. Paperbacks from Hell, by Grady Hendrix. This book is insane. What the hell were people on in the 70s and 80s? *glance at modern fanfiction* nvm it's not that different. This book describes the height of pulp horror fiction and it's glorious. Just a few pages in I've already been exposed to nazi leprechauns that are actually malformed babies taken from their mothers' uteruses in concentration camps and they're telepathic. The further we go the weirder it gets. Superpowers, body horror, the devil in every shape and form you can imagine, rabid animals, and so so so much sex, and the author describes it all with a combination of mirth and despair that's both tongue-in-cheek and scathing at the same time and I eat it all up, chuckling to myself as I turn the pages. I understand this guy's sense of humour, the sometimes complaints are testaments to how much he loves this genre, not a way to belittle it. I love the craziness, the tackiness, the camp, how preposterous every described storyline is and as I read my TBR steadily grows longer. Favourite line in the entire book? "Rice gave vampires a voice. And then they wouldn't shut up." Perfection.

My last 5 books: fantasy and mythology

1. Hell Bent, by Leigh Bardugo. I remember I loved the first book in this series when I read it 5 years ago, but I genuinely struggle to remember the plot of it now. As I read this second instalment the broad strokes of the first book's plot came back to me. This book took me a while. I was at the initial descent before I got to a point where I didn't want to put it down and still I struggled to pick it back up once I did. I adore Darlington and Pam, but I'm really not a fan of Alex and it always creates issues when the main character consistently makes me disinterested. The overarching plot is interesting and I do love the trope of magic being real, Alex just keeps pushing me away, which I guess is par for the course where she's concerned... She thinks she's broken, but honestly she's just traumatized and stuck in survival mode. Darlington, please, just tell her you love her. She needs it. You need it. 

2. The Familiar, by Leigh Bardugo. I'm still reeling from that ending. So sad, so romantic, and so very perfect. I spent the first 90 pages or so being bored, but I usually try to give a book 100 pages before I give up, and this book had Bardugo's name on it, and despite my boredom it kept begging to be read, so I did. To nobody's surprise I absolutely adore Santángel. Luzia grew on me, but generally she was unremarkable. This is a historical fantasy set in 16th century Spain, and as much as I was intrigued by the magic, I wish there'd been more. More of it and more on it and more to it. Where does it come from? What makes it tick? How does it function? The main character's disinterest is the reader's frustration. I don't care that Luzia doesn't care, I want to know. I love how the inquisition think magic is the devil, but tiny miracles (milagritos) are god, it's actually hilarious how they think there's a difference and that they can see the difference. As far as history goes it makes sense though. Like of course magic would be good if it suited them and equally it would be evil if it suited them. While the ending made me all sorts of sad, it was also absolutely perfect and oh so fitting. All the characters got exactly what they deserved and there was a real sense of satisfaction in reading the last few pages. As slow as this book was at the start it all came together beautifully. Also Monty Python have completely ruined the word "inquisition" for me...

3. InterWorld, by Neil Gaiman & Michael Reaves. This book wants to be a lot all at once. The first half is a classic "ordinary kid discovers powers". Then we're off into a world that's a bit like an acid trip and a bit like a Disney movie (particularly that section in Dumbo, you know the one). This book uses that expression way too many times. "It was a bit like this and also a bit like this". I can't decide whether the action sequences feel like Spy Kids or Maze Runner. But the main character just conveniently knows things when it suits the plot. He's consistently called the strongest Walker in a decade, but we see no proof of this at all in the story. He stumbles more than his peers, he misses the mark more than they do. Hell, when he stumbles into the enemy headquarters it doesn't seem particularly urgent to use him for their own means, when that has been important earlier on in the book. He's banished and all his memories removed along with his ability to Walk, yet when the memories return so conveniently does his ability to Walk, and this is when we find out that all Walkers have a signature. Something not previously mentioned, and something that will make it possible for the enemies to find their way to Joey's home planet. This plot point is never touched on again, even though Joey spends literal pages agonising over the fact that he might lead enemies straight to his home if he Walks to save his friends. I know this book is for kids. I went in with that mindset, yet it's doing less than Percy Jackson or Skulduggery Pleasant while wanting to be more than both of those. It's definitely an interesting premise. It just feels so half-baked. 

4. Lucifer, Book One, by Mike Carey. I knew this character was based on Lucifer from The Sandman before I picked it up. I knew the Lucifer TV show was (loosely) based on this comic, which is what made me decide to pick it up. I expected to enjoy it, but I enjoyed it a bit more than I had expected. I adore media that plays with the whole Christian mythology thing and this comic does it so well. I especially enjoyed the story arch with the girl who could see ghosts (I forget her name). I also really enjoyed Lucifer's meeting with part of the Japanese pantheon and how he handles himself there. Really nicely handled both by Lucifer and the writer. This version of Lucifer is far removed from the TV show. He's cold-hearted, snarky, and only looking out for himself. Sometimes he saves people when it benefits him or when it makes things difficult for Heaven, because he really doesn't like Heaven. Amenadiel is hugely different and disappointingly a pretty one-note character, but honestly Lucifer himself makes up for that. There are several references to The Endless and to Dream - a constant nod to The Sandman comics. The introductory chapters have a different illustrator than the rest of the book and while I don't really pay attention to art style, I do pay attention to words, and I was very grateful that they decided to drop the different-font-for-every-character thing they had going in the introductory chapters. It provides character, yes, but it also makes it a very distracting read. All of the angels have agendas and it's really interesting to see Lucifer navigate the whims of his brothers and the demands of a Heaven which he'd prefer to not have anything at all to do with. But behind all of these angels and demons shenanigans there are some really, really dark stuff happening. A gay man being sodomized with a broken beer bottle in a back alley by a guy he had a crush on and his Neo-nazi friends, a woman who's denied death by her gods and cursed to relive the same circumstances every day, so she suffers the same miscarriage every day for 4000 years, a girl who is pushed into traffic by her teacher because he believes she can identify him as a drug dealer, etc. It was a very memorable read to me and I'll be on the lookout for the second volume!

5. Norse Mythology, by Neil Gaiman. I've had this book for ages but never read it until now. Having read it I can say that I already knew all the stories in it, but it was a nice little compilation of some of the most well-known myths of the Norse mythology. One interesting thing that I haven't noticed before is how Loki evolves from a mischievous trickster to a malicious villain as the myths progress towards Ragnarök. I love how Freya never backs down from fighting for her independence and rights. I enjoyed Frey's lovestory and as always I had a lot of fun with the story where Thor crossdresses. It was a very simplistic read and because he was telling somebody else's story while using somebody else's words it didn't feel like Gaiman. I had fun with it, I just came away from if with slight disappointment as if I had been expecting more than what this book gave me. 

My last 4 books

1. The Running Grave, by Robert Galbraith. I've been on a Strike binge for a few weeks. I watched all of the TV show and finished it up by reading the latest novel. I can't get enough of Cormoran and Robin! I love their relationship despite how much their slow burn frustrates me. This book had me on the edge of my seat throughout. I struggled to put it down and really didn't want to go to bed and sleep when the book was demanding to be read. Cormoran does a lot of personal growing in this book and Robin takes a lot of personal risks. I really can't wait for the next one! In this book they're investigating a cult and Robin goes deep undercover within it, while Cormoran and their contractors deal with smaller jobs as well as finding everyone who ever got out of the cult. What starts as a job to get the client's son out of the cult ends as a job with the goal to tear down the cult from its foundation. The character portrayals are so good and their actions always convincing and within the scope of their personalities. She does a great job describing trauma and how different people may choose to deal with their trauma in different ways. Just a really amazing read!

2. Malice, by John Gwynne. It took me a really long while to get into this book. I think it was well over halfway before I even felt invested in the story, yet every time I put it down there was this nagging feeling that I wanted to know what would happen next. So I couldn't DNF it even though it took me months to get through it. The main thing that bugged me is that the character tropes are so obvious. The author tries to make it seem like Nathair is the fated champion of all things good, yet it's obvious he's set up to be the villain. It's obvious Corban is set up to be the hero. The Ben-Elim call Nathair "kin-slayer" in front of Veradis, yet Veradis is too dumb to put two and two together and realise Nathair killed his father. The deaths at the end of this book would have been more shocking if the characters had been more than just marginally utilised until the last few chapters before their untimely deaths. Cywen is my favourite character, unsurprisingly. Will I read the continuation? Yeah, probably. I enjoy the world, and I hope this book was just a build-up and things will get properly interesting in the following three books of the series. 

3. The Last Temptation, by Neil Gaiman. I've been wanting to read this for years, but it's surprisingly hard to come by both in physical shops and online. When I finally found it in an online bookstore I immediately pounced on it. I've been a fan of Alice Cooper since I was sixteen and I'm intimately familiar with the album this visual novel portrays. This comic has all the telltale signs of Gaiman: a little bit dark, a little bit twisted, a little bit dreamy, and it works so perfectly with Alice as the Showman trying to entice and trap the boy Steven. Steven shows up in multiple of Cooper's concept albums portraying twisted innocence, innocence trying to endure even as the encroaching darkness of the real world attempts to crush it. This is a really short read, but I enjoyed it very much. 

4. Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier. This book made me sad. I had of course heard of it before but never read it. I ended up loving it. It hits all the points of cosiness, melodrama and mystery that I enjoy. Max's torment both appealed to me and exasperated me, and I could relate to how he both wanted to reach out to somebody while at the same time not wanting to trouble anybody and knowing that telling somebody at all would lead to trouble. His new young wife is perfectly portrayed. Deeply in love with her older husband and way out of her depth stepping into the everyday workings of his life, and unable to step out from under the shadow of his previous late wife. She inherits a mystery alongside the day-to-day of Manderley, a mystery which slowly unravels until it ends in catastrophe. The book starts at the end and then tells the story to explain how we got there, and when I finished the book it was with an overwhelming sense of sadness. Because this book is about grief of many different stripes, with a thin furnish of love placed over it. Gorgeous writing. Instant favourite. 

My last 5 books: Blood and magic

1. The Forgotten Beasts of Eld, by Patricia A. McKillip. I have never ever heard of this book, yet it's marketed as a classic. It read like an old tale, sort of stilted and very proper language. The characters felt unfinished to me like their motivations and personalities weren't properly executed. They were more like embodiments of tropes or storytelling stereotypes rather than people, and I didn't actually care for any of them. The ending seemed like a fairytale ending; after the climax of the story and all that fighting and the conflicts people were just happy together again. This book didn't make me feel anything.

2. The Sea of Monsters, by Rick Riordan. This second Percy Jackson book was really cool and promises even more cool things to come! I like how he made use of the mythology surrounding the Bermuda Triangle in this book, as well as introducing Cyclopses and Hippocampi. If they weren't just kids I'd totally ship Percy with Annabeth. Tyson is really, really sweet and I liked how Percy finally accepted him and took him fully under his wing rather than treating him like some useful but annoying appendix. And omg I want to punch Clarisse. She's so stupid she makes me inwardly groan. I'm excited for the next one!

3. Broken Homes, by Ben Aaronovitch. The fourth Rivers of London book and I feel like barely anything at all happened until the last few pages. Most of the book was speculation and surveillance without much coming from it until the very last minute and then we get a revelation of a traitor, with the traitor having had a huge signpost above their head since around the middle of the book. There was no surprise involved in the revelation. Part of me wants to drop this series, but another part of me clings to it because I find it funny with the modern references to well-known fantasy and sci-fi books, although there's getting to be less of that with each installment. 

4. Konferensen, av Mats Strandberg. Det är alldeles för länge sen jag läste nånting på svenska. Jag gillade Färjan skarpt, men Hemmet var en besvikelse, så jag började läsa Konferensen med blandade förväntningar. Den visade sig dock bli en bok som jag hade svårt att lägga ifrån mig och läste ut på två dagar. Under flera scener i boken satt jag och halvblundade mot alla blodiga beskrivningar som om jag såg på en skräckfilm. Under scenerna där Jonas blir halvt skalperad och senare får skalpen helt avsliten fick jag tvinga mig att inte gny högt. Alla karaktärerna gjorde mig smått förbannad samtidigt som de var otroligt igenkänningsbara och så fruktansvärt svenska. För tio år sen hade jag inte känt igen mig lika mycket men nu satt jag där och kände att jag personligen hade träffat variationer av alla dessa karaktärer på riktigt i arbetssammanhang genom åren. Denna bok blev helt klart en av höjdpunkterna det här året.

5. The Uninvited, by Dorothy Macardle. After having had a bit of success with gothic ghost stories I was looking forward to reading another one. I had previously watched the old black and white movie based on this book and enjoyed it so I was hoping to enjoy the book as well. It starts off good enough and I was excited for the plot to really get going, except it didn't. Not really. There were some ghostly things going on and then some piecing together of the story, while the male main character was infuriatingly logical about the whole thing because forbid a man to act emotionally even when faced with proof of the supernatural. Also the whole lovestory grossed me out. Roderick calls Stella a child throughout the entire book, even after halfway when he suddenly decides he's in love with her, he keeps calling her child. I suppose it acts as an old-time endearment, but why keep using it after they find out Stella isn't as young as her grandfather wants her to appear. Stop calling the woman you love a child. The book started off great, seemed to lose the plot halfway through, and never really recovered. 

My last 5 books: Mostly YA!

1. Eliza and Her Monsters, by Francesca Zappia. Only reason I decided to pick this book up several years ago is because Hannah of A Clockwork Reader kept gushing about it on Booktube. I went in with absolutely no expectations, but I was hooked almost immediately. I resonate so hard with both Eliza and Wallace, being that socially awkward person in every context. When Eliza described herself in one of the first few chapters saying she should've grown out of it I knew I was hooked. And then Wallace's stepdad saying those absolutely parent things about his writing is so close to everything I've been told myself. And finally Eliza's parents refusing to understand what's going on despite it being clear as day if they made even the smallest effort. Even her parents have brushed her off as "She's weird, we don't understand" and then still claim that they're trying. News flash: you're not, stop lying. This book made me cry on the commuter train. 

2. The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue, by Mackenzi Lee. This is another book that Hannah of A Clockwork Reader talked about on Booktube. It came highly recommended by her which is why I picked it up. As much as I enjoy historical fiction and as much fun the plot of this book was, it didn't wow me. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad, it just was. As much as I tried to relate to Monty, he mostly just exasperated me and I found myself wishing for more Felicity and less Monty. Percy was genuinely the best character in the book. I did enjoy the alchemy stuff, though, as I find alchemy to be an incredibly interesting subject. I might give the sequel a try since it'll be about Felicity. This is one of few books that actually had me read the author's notes at the end. 

3. The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern. I went into this book expecting YA so it was very jarring to realise that this book read like Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. It's absolutely beautifully crafted and the characters are immensly interesting, but the plot took its sweet time to get going. I think I was around 200 pages in when I finally got to a place where I found the book hard to put down, instead of just remaining mildly interested in where this story would take me. I'm not a fan of the ending. I don't like Isobel. I wish Hector and Alexander were given more room and didn't just amount to "father-figure the young people complain about", because their backgrounds and motivations and personalities are all there, just below the surface, being teased but never properly utilised. There were two shocking moments in the book that had me actually pause and then reread the page. I can't decide if I like this book or not. It definitely has its strengths, but at the same time it just feels very very long. Sometimes unnecessarily so. And getting to the end was very unrewarding. But I really like Celia. In the end I think I liked it more than I didn't like it, but it definitely requires a specific mood to be enjoyed. 

4. Den Tusende Följaren, av Jenny Milewski. Ni vet den där känslan när en vuxen person som inte har en aning har försökt sätta sig in i en grej för att relatera med kidsen och framstå som modern? Den känslan är hela den här boken. Stella är sjutton år och småkändis på Youtube men hon råkar få en stalker/troll på halsen och hennes småtrevliga celebritet blir plötsligt en mardröm. Tycker det är grymt fascinerande att Stella har haft en närvaro online sen hon var tretton år, men aldrig fått en dickpic skickad till sig innan det här trollet kom in i bilden. Hela boken känns som skrämselpropaganda för unga människor att "kolla hur farligt internet är!" Samtidigt ska det här vara en ungdomsbok och huvudpersonen är sjutton, så det skär sig lite med en detaljerad sexscen mitt i alltihop. Dialogen är glättig och uppstyltad. Och på något vänster kommer det fram att storyn egentligen inte ens handlar om huvudpersonen. Den tvisten var mindre uppskattad av mig i alla fall. Milewski's författarskap har hittills varit väldigt hit or miss för mig. Jag har tidigare läst Yuko och Skalpelldansen. 

5. Vita Tigern, av Christin Ljungqvist. Okej så den här boken tilltalade mig inte alls till att börja med. Avalon var en bråkig skitunge, texten kändes hackig med alldeles för många korta meningar efter varandra, och world-buildingen var minimal. Men efter att jag hade lyckats ta mig ungefär halvvägs så blev förbättrades storyn radikalt. Avalon insåg att hon hade varit en bråkig skitunge och tog sig i kragen och blev därmed spännande och intressant att läsa om, man fick veta mer om världen och det blev färre korta meningar och bättre flow i texten. Slutet störde mig dock. Det kändes för plötsligt med så många obesvarade frågor. Och hur dum är Avalon som totalt dumpar Teodor efter att hon får veta att han är "in on it". Borde inte det vara något som för dem närmre varandra?! Ja, han kanske var utsänd att hålla ett öga på henne, men allvarligt? Alla hans intima gester och känslomässiga snedsteg hade knappast med det att göra och Avalon är så dum jag orkar inte. Jag vill ha en uppföljare.

My last 5 books: Thriller and adventure

1. Troubled Blood, by Robert Galbraith. This book was brilliant in so many ways. Exploring Strike's feelings for his family, but also for Robin, and Robin exploring her feelings towards her job, her future and for Strike, as well as dealing with a nasty divorce from Matthew. The agency is doing great and they're handed their first cold case: the disappearance of Margot Bamborough back in 1974. This book takes place in 2013-2014 and it's almost 40 years since she disappeared. Strike and Robin are given a year to try to find out what happened to Margot, and it becomes a case that has them delving deep into astrology and psychopathy, with lots of unsavoury men and women who aren't what they seem. There are so many plot points, so many side plots and all of them come together brilliantly in the end. It's extremely satisfying to see the author tie together everything in a way that makes complete sense. The only thing that brings the overall rating down is the fact that it sometimes gets a bit too preachy with the feminist stuff.

2. Varney the Vampire; or, The Feast of Blood, by James Malcolm Rymer. This is a compilation of a penny dreadful, so it's trash literature, but it's trash literature that has somehow lasted almost 200 years so that's got to count for something. This penny dreadful predates Dracula by half a century and I was so excited to get into another gothic vampire tale. But penny dreadful authors were paid by the word and damn it shows. After 210 pages I just couldn't anymore. In those 210 pages we've had the initial vampire attack and then just 200 pages of reiterated dialogue and back-and-forth actions that didn't lead anywhere. 200 pages in and we're still in the same situation we were 200 pages ago. And it isn't even halfway. As to not completely kill my reading mood I decided to DNF this and potentially come back to it at a later time. There are glimpses of a complicated and interesting character in Varney, but it's all so densely buried in all the useless dialogue and non-actions. The editor's footnotes in this edition are a highlight though, as it seems they might've been a bit passive-aggressive towards Rymer and the Victorian society overall. It's so frustrating because I can see there's a story underneath all the useless words, it just takes an age to get through all the words to find the story. 

3. The Ink Black Heart, by Robert Galbraith. These two characters has to be the slowest slow-burn in the history of slow-burns. I need them to stop being so goddamn polite and considerate and just talk to one another! The story in this one revolves around the dark side of fandom, and it's eerily accurate sometimes. Honestly, the most unbelievable thing is that Robin didn't know tumblr or Twitter before she started working on this case. It's 2015, she just turned 30, which makes her only five years older than me, she would've known about both of those sites. Or it's just implied she has spent the last 12 or so years living under a rock while social media evolved online. I get Strike not knowing, but not Robin. I had all sorts of theories throughout reading this as to who the killer was, and once or twice those theories touched upon the truth, but I could always find reasons why someone else was more probable. As someone who spends a great amount of time chatting online while staying mostly anonymous, this was a great and pretty chilling story. One of the best ones in the series!

4. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger. A few years ago everybody talked about this book so I decided to read it. It started out interesting enough, but within 100 pages it was getting obvious that this was all there was to it. This is the story of their lives which are absolutely ordinary aside from the little thing that Henry is so-called chrono-impaired, meaning he sometimes just time travels for no reason at all. Sometimes just for minutes, sometimes for days. It never becomes a conflict and the only major issue it presents is that it makes it difficult for them to have a baby. Throughout the story there's this looming shadow of something that's going to happen when Henry is 43, but when it does happen it's completely underwhelming and I just face-palmed when I read it. It was a very disappointing end to an otherwise bland book. Not my thing.

5.Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, by Rick Riordan. I've been meaning to read this series for years. I love Greek mythology. This book was just as fun as I expected, albeit a bit predictable. I didn't expect Percy to be twelve though, I thought he'd be at least fifteen, but it ended up not being such a big deal. Despite the book being a lot of me figuring things out way ahead of time and me just waiting for the characters to catch up, I had a lot of fun reading it and I'm excited to keep going with this series. Despite having heard of this series I knew nothing about it going in. I knew there was Greek mythology and that was about it, really. I figured out Percy's father long before the rest of the characters. I figured out who was going to betray Percy as soon as the Oracle told him the prophecy. I figured out who the ultimate bad guy was long before they started speculating, but it's a kids book so it was fine. I love all the characters and the story was fast-paced and fun. I'm into it. 

My last 5 books: Vampires and fangirls

1. Guilty Pleasures, by Laurell K. Hamilton. Interestingly I found out about this book series from a Buzzfeed list over the best literary vampires. It's the first book in the Anita Blake series and she feels sort of like a female Harry Dresden, but with less magic and more guns and not as much brains. I like it. Not sure I really like the mind control thing the vampires can do, but I really like Jean-Claude so far. As for the investigative element there really wasn't much going for Anita, she went down all the wrong avenues and only discovered who the killer was by having him literally reveal himself to her when he tried to kill her. So just dumb luck (or dumb bad luck?) Anita complains a lot, is scared a lot and just goes 'fuck it all' a lot. The best characters in this story were Phillip and Jean-Claude, and they're mostly absent. The reading is fun and fast-paced, but comes off as very shallow and without much substance. It's sexy and bloody, but also an action movie in book format. Did I have fun reading this? Yes. Will the story or characters stay with me? Probably not.

2. The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening & The Struggle, by L.J. Smith. I love the TV show and wanted to read the books after the show finished. It took me a while to get into it, mainly because Elena is extremely unlikeable for the first half of the first book. She only wants Stefan because he's the only boy at the high school who doesn't fall over himself to be with her. Like come on. There are some glaring differences between the books and the show. Aunt Jenna is called Judith and she has a fiancé named Robert who doesn't exist in the show. Jeremy doesn't exist in the books, instead Elena has a baby sister of four years old called Margaret. Caroline is a bitch throughout the books and Elena's main antagonist, instead of one of the girl trio as she is in the show. Instead there's a fourth girl called Meredith who's friends with Elena and Bonnie. Bonnie is still a witch and the most innocent and childlike of the bunch and she's infatuated with both Alaric and Damon. Katherine is stone-cold dead in the books and doesn't show up as an antagonist. The whole doppelganger thing isn't in the books. Stefan and Damon are five hundred years old and from Renaissance era Italy and not from Civil War era US. The books take place in the 90s and Elena fussing for a call from Stefan means she has to stay put at home where there's a phone. Stefan doesn't live at the ancestral home of the Salvatores (they are not a founding family), instead he lives at a boarding house. As for the events in the story they play out pretty much the same as in the show. Elena's parents are dead. Stefan shows up hoping to find a place among the humans of a small town. Damon follows him and weird things start to happen in the town. Stefan gets blamed. Everybody is enamoured with Damon because he compels everybody he meets. Teacher gets killed, Alaric shows up. Everything comes to a point at the Founder's Day celebration. Stefan and Elena both seem to think that Damon is behind everything weird that's been going on, but with the way the book ended dare I say... there's an Original lurking? Also the town is called Fell's Church and not Mystic Falls. I'm actually excited to read the continuation. 

3. The Ouroboros Cycle Book 1: A Monster's Coming of Age Story, by G.D. Falksen. This book starts out intriguing but then falls into sort of a lull until Babette meets Iosef, which is about halfway. The prologue, while being intriguing, has almost no bearing on the story until the very end. The story starts when Babette is sixteen and she is about to be introduced into the Society of high-socety 19th century France. She hates it and would rather read than dance. She meets Korbinian, a German officer of noble blood, and they quickly fall in love and although they have to jump through some hoops to be together their path seems plainly laid out before them. That doesn't go according to plan. Fast-forward a few years and Babette ends up having to flee from France. Her friend Iosef Shashavani agrees to help her under the pretense that they are to be married and he takes her to Georgia. This is when the interesting things start to happen and the book comes into its own as a vampire story. As the first part of a quintology this book leaves a lot of questions unanswered, but I really like many of the characters. Babette is badass. Iosef is dreamy. Korbinian is so sweet, and the hidden world which is only partially glimpsed in this book promises to be very interesting, so I'm excited to keep reading this series. 

4. Ship It, by Britta Lundin. I went into this book not sure if I'd like it. I was expecting it to be too much. Too girly. Too stupid and simpy and mushy. But instead I found something super relatable. Claire is me at sixteen. The fangirl experience of reading and writing fics and just gushing all over the internet for your OTPs and the fandom and the content and the actors and just having so many feels for things that aren't technically real. I fell in love with the book at the description of Claire at the first convention panel: "There's a girl in the front row who is all-out bawling, and I know how she feels. Emotions are, like, leaking out of my pores. Crying actually seems like a pretty minor reaction. All things considered, I might literally explode. 'Local girl explodes at Boise Comics Convention. Doctors mystified, but witnesses suspect she had too many feels. Details at eleven.'" And that's just page 64. Everything in this book is relatable. Trying to explain fandom to people outside of it. Trying to explain slash or ships or OTPs... It's such a struggle and I've been there. I'm there, still. How the book attempts to explore sexuality and sexual awakenings as well as just the feeling of belonging you get when you're in a place like a convention where everybody there just gets you because they're there for the same reason... It made my heart swell because I feel it. I'm one of you. And I never had the online presence Claire does because I never dared publish my fics. But oh, I feel it. The end had me straight up crying. Feels. 

5. Fangirl, by Rainbow Rowell. When I started this book I really wasn't sure if this would be a book I would end up finishing. But I endeavoured to give it 100 pages like I usually do. I didn't even notice the 100 page mark. At that point I was so pulled into the story that I had trouble putting the book down. I deeply relate to Cath and this is her coming of age story, her growing up experience, and she does some serious growing in the course of the novel. She's shy and quiet and anti-social and insecure in the beginning, but she ends up more outgoing towards the end. She's still shy and insecure, but less withdrawn about it and she dares to lean on others and learns to trust the people around her. Link is wonderful. Reagan is just what Cath needs to push her out of her shell. And throughout it all there's Cath's fangirling experience with Simon Snow which just resonates with me. The scene where they go to the midnight release of the last book had me drowning in memories of my own. The only fourth wall break in this book that probably should've been edited out is when Link mentions Harry Potter once, when the entire book is about Cath fangirling over Simon Snow, which is set up as a substitute for Harry Potter. Why even mention Potter at all?!?!? My favourite quote, because it explains why I love the Internet, is: "There are other people on the Internet. It's awesome. You get all the benefits of 'other people' without the body odour and the eye contact." This book is relatable to the extreme.

My last 5 books: Ghost stories

1. The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson. I've seen four or five screen adaptations for this book without ever reading the book until now. I love gothic horror and haunted houses and this book brilliantly fits both criteria. I like how the story builds it up as the house being haunted, but as time goes on it starts to hint that maybe there's something else going on, only to leave it entirely up in the air whether the house is doing it or one of them is severely slipping mentally. Arthur is embodies toxic masculinity. Dr Montague is old-fashioned af behind is jovial manner (probably due to the times, but ffs having a wife just to take care of you? Grow up, dude). Theodora is a fake bitch. Mrs Montague is exhausting. Eleanor is a mouse. The only person I actually liked in this story was Luke. I'm very happy it didn't turn out the way the 1999 movie adaptation did, even though that movie is a favourite of mine. Favourite scene from the book is when Eleanor is clutching to a hand out of fear for the things that go bump in the night at Hill House, thinking it's Theodora, only to discover it isn't. Chills!

2. The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James. I've seen two screen adaptations of this book and each time I've expected more than I've been given. The same goes for this book. I expected more. I knew the outline of the story before I started to read, thanks to The Innocents and Netflix's The Haunting of Bly Manor. Possessed children should be creepy and yet it failed spectacularly at being creepy. The main character was incredibly vapid, stupid even, and kept trying to ignore things hoping that they'd go away on their own instead of trying to do something until it was basically too late. She gave way too much freedom to Miles just because he was male (wtf he's still a child), which probably is just a sign of the time it was written. It is over a century old after all. Close to 130 years old :0 When I finished the book I was simultaneously disappointed that it was over, and also glad it was done. It was a bit of a drag. But just as in The Innocents it leaves off at a cliffhanger that I remember I appreciated in the movie, but which I'm not entirely sure I appreciate in the novel. 

3. The Woman in Black, by Susan Hill. I've seen the 2012 movie so I had a general idea of the plot of this book, yet it proved to have a very different feel from the movie. It wasn't scary or chilling, but it was all the right kinds of sad and creepy. After the confusion of the first chapter where the author goes through the entire timeline of Arthur Kipps post everything that happened in Eel Marsh House and how he came to the decision to tell his story, the book became very engaging almost immediately and I found it very hard to put down. I had a lot of fun trying to figure out in what time the story was set, but I was inclined on 1920s. If it was any further into the 20th century then Arthur wouldn't refer to the Woman's dress and bonnet as "not modern" but straight up historical. Yet he makes a reference to Victorian times so clearly we're in the 20th century. But they have both cars (referred to as motor cars) and carriage drivers (pony and trap), but the trains are iron and steam and coal. Arthur has a wrist watch, which places it post-pocket watches. And all the farmers are wearing tweed and corduroy. Google can't make up its mind either. Most accounts I've found says it's Edwardian (so max 1910), but some sources even said 1860s which just seems blatantly wrong... Unless they meant that the time period in which the Woman lived then Arthur keeps referring to that as sixty years ago, which places the main story in the 1920s... Aaaaaanyway, I loved the story. Couldn't put it down. The writing drew me in, the story was engaging and just the right amount of sad and creepy. I'd read this again.

4. Dark Matter, by Michelle Paver. This is a ghost story that takes place in the 30s during an Arctic expedition and I read this in the dead of night during the quiet hours of working the night shift, while it was snowing outside and I hadn't seen daylight for five days due to working nights and I sleep during the six hours of daylight we do get this time of year. It hit different. Even from the very start there's a clear hint that something's very wrong. It proceeds to build tension throughout the whole book and the tension doesn't really let go until the last few pages. It's brilliantly chilling and creepy. "Something opened the doghouse door. It can open doors. It can get in." I enjoyed the friendship dynamic between the guys at the camp, and the way the main character tried to justify his own actions and decision to himself felt very real. Dogs are a gift and the main character gets to understand this on his own terms. I like how the class differences are all but obliterated when faced with nothing but snow and ice and darkness and survival. The tale of what happened to the lonely trapper leaves a lot unsaid, but says so much without the use of words about the cruelty of man when he knows he won't get caught. It's sad and horrifying and creepy and chilling. 

5. Gösta Berlings Saga, av Selma Lagerlöf. Att den här boken existerar har väl ingen undgått att lägga märke till. Min mamma rekommenderade den som rolig efter att jag beklagade mig över att svensk klassisk litteratur alltid var så himla präktig. Och visst är den kul, men den är också så extremt dramatisk och överdriven att jag inte orkar. Halvvägs igenom hade alla berömt Gösta som en himmelsk man men samtidigt var han så otroligt lynnig att han förälskade sig i tre kvinnor på en månad och kastade bort deras kärlek på småsaker den ena efter den andra. Alla förälskelser kom från ingenstans och ledde ingenvart och allt är sååååå dramatiskt och jag orkar inte. Allt intressant som hände i boken involverade antingen Sintram eller majorskan och dessa dök upp väldigt sällan. Det tog mig fem timmar att läsa hundra sidor istället för de vanliga en till två beroende på typsnitt och teckenstorlek. Halvvägs igenom gav jag upp. Dramatiken, teatralismen, de oändliga kärlekshistorierna, och alla ologiska karaktärshandlingarna gav upphov till så mycket suckande och stönande från mitt håll att jag bara inte kan med den mer. Sorry, Selma. 

My last 5 books: Mostly fantastical stuff

1. Fool Moon, by Jim Butcher. So I don't enjoy the werewolf schtick and I don't understand the world's obsession with them. What I did enjoy was how Butcher took every version of the werewolf legend and made them all valid for his own universe. I like that. I also really liked how Murphy held her own even though I wanted to scream at her for being and idiot when she decided to not trust Harry again. And was that a hint towards a juict family mystery on Harry's part? I'm gonna eat that right up. If the previous book did a lot of world building, this book did a lot of relationship building (and thank you to Harry's subconscious for pointing out the absolute obvious chemistry between Harry and Murph). The crime in this book was fairly obvious with Butcher adding in several layers just to make it complicated but it ends up just being convoluted. That said I had a lot of fun reading this book. Butcher's brand of humour is right up my alley and I'm excited to dive deeper into this series. 

2. This is How You Lose the Time War, by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone. Everyone was talking about this book a couple years ago and so I decided to read it. I was so confused when I first started reading it. The narrative just throws you straight into a finished world, no introduction, nothing, but the world-building happens as you go along and by the end you have a pretty solid idea of how it works. It's half-epistulary, half-narrative and it just works. And it's so beautiful! And that final in-your-face is so satisfying! When I first started out I did not expect to come away thinking this was one of the best books I read this year, but damn. It's perfect. Two quotes that really spoke to me: "A desire to be apart, sometimes, to understand who I am without the rest. And what I return to the me-ness that I know as pure, inescapable self... is hunger. Desire. Longing, this longing to possess, to become, to break like a wave on a rock and reform, and break again, and wash away." And also: "But when I think of you, I want to be alone together. I want to strive against and for. I want to live in contact. I want to be a context for you, and you for me." This book is a love story; a tragic, impossible love story in a sci-fi setting in a far-flung future. And it's amazing. 

3. Lethal White, by Robert Galbraith. In acknowledgements at the end the author states that this was a hard book to write, and it’s noticeable throughout. The first hundred pages draaaaaaaag. The prologue picks up exactly where the last book left off and everything seems amazing, but then there is a timeskip in which the two main characters create a divide between themselves by not communicating and while it’s definitely realistic it’s also very hard to read. Strike and Robin get called upon to investigate the source of blackmailing that's targeting a Minister and while it’s interesting and things just entangle themselves more and everything keeps getting more complicated, it doesn’t feel like the plot really starts moving forward until halfway through when the murder happens. The murder is related to the blackmail which is somehow related to the mentally ill person who barged into Strike's office at the very beginning. There are so many plotlines going on at the same time, so many seemingly disparate threads that somehow connect to each other and I love seeing them come together. I have never figured out a Strike novel before the conclusion and that just makes them all wonderfully engaging reads. I just wish it didn’t drag so much for the first third to half. I'm really excited to read more now and I have the next two books on my shelf.

4. Everyone's an alien when you're an alien too, by Jonny Sun. This was a very quick but also very cute and heart-warming read. The books is a cross between a comic and a picture-book, but it has some valuable lessons about belonging, happiness and death. The story is about an alien who's sent to Earth to study humans. As the story goes on the alien meets and befriends everything but humans and learns a lot over the course of just over 100 days. The book is full of intentional spelling mistakes that gives the book character and even for a grammar nerd like myself it’s so well done that I hardly even notice it. My favourite quote from this book is: "Look. Life is bad. Everyone's sad. We're all gonna die. But I already bought this inflatable bouncy castle so are you gonna take your shoes off or what?" I also really liked: "Treat every day on Earth as if it's your last day on Earth because it is, until you spend another day on Earth." This book is a perfect example on how to say a lot with very few words. 

5. Skalpelldansen, av Jenny Milewski. När jag läste Yuko som min första introduktion till Jenny Milewskis skrivande så var jag inte övertygad. Yuko kändes taskigt researchad och som om den red på succén från The Grudge. Men att en svensk ens brydde sig om att skriva om något så väldigt japanskt gav tillräckligt med cred för att jag skulle vilja utforska mera. Skalpelldansen är betydligt mycket bättre. Den var seg i starten, men blev sen svår att lägga ifrån sig. Genom första halvan av boken undrade jag om hon skulle köra på "huvudkaraktär som får liv" eller "extrem-fan som utför alla dåd i författarens böcker". I slutändan gjorde hon inget av det och körde på en vinkel som är så kliché att det inte ens kom för mig att hon skulle välja den. Men hon får det att funka! Riktigt bra dessutom! Jag är imponerad.