Monthly Musings – October 2016

This is a where I look back at what I read (or tried to read) during the past month. I also plan on highlighting my experiences in any book club reads I from the month as well. I will always start with any books I would label as a surprise find/under-read books so if anyone missed my reviews for them, and don’t make it to the end of this post, they’ll be easy to find.

Again …. these months fly by. I have had a couple of slower reading months, and between losing my computer for over a week and also being sick, I have also fallen a bit behind on writing reviews for books I have read. I am hoping to start playing catch up with all of that!! I have so many November books I really, really want to read, plus all the ones I missed from the summer! (Do these TBR piles ever get smaller!! Mine seems to only grow exponentially no matter what I do.

Highlighted Read from October

Review Summary 

• [4 Oct] Review: The Apartment by S. L. Grey ★★★★
• [7 Oct] The Family Plot by Cherie Priest ★★★★
• [13 Oct] Nevernight by Jay Kristoff ★★★½
• [24 Oct] Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood ★★★½
• [28 Oct] Nine Princes in Amber by Roger Zelazny ★★★★

Guest Post/Giveaway

• An Import of Intrigue Blog Tour – Guest Post, Q&A and Giveaway

What I Read

• The Family Plot by Cherie Priest – Highly recommend this one for anyone looking for a creepy haunted house tale. I loved the scavenging aspect of going into old homes and salvage what can be saved. Plus it was a great haunted house story. I’ve not read anything by Priest before, but I am sure I will read more by her in the future.
• Like a River Glorious by Rae Carson – I continue to love the voice of the protagonist in this series as well as the gold rush setting. Look forward to the next one.
• Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood – This was very good, but I have to confess I didn’t love it as much as I had hoped. Perhaps its because I am not as familiar with The Tempest (this is a retelling). I also found Felix to be a very questionable narrator. I really wasn’t sure how much to trust his version of the story. Which can make the story more interesting, tbh, as you start to get curious about how other characters may explain events. This book did have a synopsis for The Tempest, but I wish it had been at the beginning so I could have known/read it before reading Hag-Seed.
• Admiral by Sean Danker – This was a fun SF adventure story. It starts with a character awakening with amnesia, which is something I have had issues with in other books, but it worked really well in this one.
• Conspiracy of Ravens by Lila Bowen – There’s really no sugar coating this one. I didn’t really like it and don’t plan to continue the series. I found the main character would get on my nerves more than interest me in this book which was a real disappointment as I loved Wake of Vultures.
• The Dispatcher by John Scalzi – This was a short (and free) novella audiobook. The premise is that people who are murdered miraculously wake in their bed minus the injuries that caused their death. This creates an interesting business model of having people “dispatch” people who are at deaths door (maybe from a high risk thrill seeking activity or a risky operation). I found it to be a fun story, and could see it easily made into a full length novel or series.
• An Import of Intrigue by Marshall Ryan Maresca – Overall this one was good, but I did struggle a little in the beginning to keep track/differentiate the different factions/cultures involved in the city politics. I definitely plan on completing the series, and really, really want to know more about the main character.

Backlist Burndown

So I am participating in the Reddit Fantasy 2016 Book Bingo, and they forced me to read a book from the 1970s to fill the Decade You Were Born Square (yeah, I’m old, anyway…). Considering I rarely read anything more than a couple years old, this was definitely out of my typical set of books and a great chance to pull double duty for Backlist Burndown and a Bingo Square with one book. Based on recommendations, I chose Nine Princes in Amber by Robert Zelazny and was incredibly impressed by how well it aged.

Here’s what other people read and burned off their backlist this month! It makes me happy to see other people joining in with this, so thanks to all of you! 🙂 Anyone else that posted a backlist review this month, feel free to link up!

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Looking Forward to November 2016