I’ve taken more than two weeks off! And technically I have time to take more time off, because when the deadline is next spring, well, not like it’s going to be an effort to get this project in on time.
I hope.
Anyway! I have read a lot of books in the past couple weeks and I have started to get to the point where I’m okay with turning my back on the TBR shelves for a while. I am even almost sort of looking forward to starting this revision! (That won’t last.)
I don’t know that I’m in the mood to write anything extensive about the books I’ve read most recently, but:
I like the Kushiel’s Dart series better than the Naamah’s Kiss series. I think I just prefer a spy-courtesan to a Girl With A Destiny, but there were also stylistic things about the Naamah series that bugged me a little that I don’t remember from the Kushiel trilogy. Maybe I was not such a critical reader when I read the latter, I don’t know. Plus, wow, are we re-arranging the entire world or what? China AND Russia AND Central America, among others. Wow. Maybe that was a little much of a muchness for me. I did like Moirin’s kinder, gentler sex life better than Phaedre’s S&M thing, though.
I like Bansh from The Range of Ghosts better than Kasimir from All the Windwracked Stars. They are not really comparable, though, since Bansh is a horse who is only subtly magical, whereas Kasimir is a character in his own right — an angel shaped like a horse. Or something. I had some trouble visualizing him. Antlers AND horns? (He has two heads.)(Apparently both heads are the heads of horses, but one has antlers and one horns?) What is that based on, anybody know, and I will try to google up an image.
I also liked Range of Ghosts better just overall. To me, Muire, in All the Windwracked Stars, is too ineffectual and weak and too stuck in self-loathing to really appeal to me, until the second half of the book. In contrast I truly loved all the pov characters in Range of Ghosts.
I really am enjoying Margaret Maron’s mystery series, which starts with Slow Dollar. I needed something contemporary to intersperse with those big fantasy novels, and these were perfect. I like the protagonist, Deborah, and I particularly like the second book of the series, where she admits to herself that she has fallen in love with the guy she thought she was marrying just as a convenience. (He was already in love with her, though he was trying not to let on.) I love the setting and characters and so far I don’t think I’ve ever found the murderer super obvious, either.
However, I’m switching to nonfiction for a few weeks or a month. Gotta knock this ms into shape so I can send it to my agent without being embarrassed.
To get into the mood for revision, this, from Terrible Minds.
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