![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
schneefinkBooks books books books books! I have time to read now! Vienna's public libraries have expanded their ebook selection \o/
I think I want a Goodreads account. Oh no, picking usernames -.-
The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch, Gentleman Bastard series #1:
Slow start. I found the first 100+ pages boring because there were no stakes. They are conning a guy because they want to, there is no real obstacle so far, and the Locke backstory in the interludes worked well to give worldbuilding background but did not build suspense either. If I wasn't pretty sure I remembered people reccing the series I would have stopped more than once during the first part.
Fortunately it got a lot better after that! The Gray King made things a lot more exciting and we finally had actual stakes in a bigger plot, and by the point that Locke begged the Falconer not to kill his friends while being tortured I was already hooked. I didn't see Nazca's death coming, or later Calo and Galdo's and Bug's. (At least they got a magnificent death offering.) I very much enjoyed the Spider, and the mix of the A and B plots. (The Spider declaring the Salfadas her heirs makes little sense, they didn't seem that smart, but eh *shrugs*) The worldbuilding was good, great sense of a bigger, wider, and very much alive world out there. I was disappointed we didn't get to see Sabetha or even learn more about her, I know it'll happen in later books but still, she didn't even appear in the flashbacks.
Red Seas Under Red Skies, Gentleman Bastard series #2:
Pirates! Drakasha is cool. A mom as pirate captain, yess. Women and cats on ships :) I liked Ezri too, it sucked that she died for future plot convenience.
The flash-forward scene at the beginning, it worked in a way that even though I was sure Jean wasn't actually betraying Locke (I was thinking more along the lines of "what does Jean know that Locke doesn't" instead of "Locke just missed the signal") I looked extra closely at all of their arguments, and I enjoyed that. Then it turned out it was only a minor confrontation, so placing it in the beginning is way overstating its importance and the brief misunderstanding of Locke actually thinking Jean could betray him seems out of place. Oh well.
The paintings they stole were forged – tbh I'm mostly surprised that the concept of forging art seemed so foreign to Locke and Jean. How could it be so uncommon? Weird.
I wonder who Merrain was working for.
Locke got Jean to drink the antidote, of course he did. Martyrs, both of them, though in this case they're both being selfish because they don't want to watch the other one die. A common theme, the best way to threaten each of them is to threaten the other.
The Republic of Thieves, Gentleman Bastard series #3:
Finally we get to meet Sabetha. She's fantastic, I liked her much better than I'd anticipated. She's as smart as Locke, emotionally even smarter, and she takes no shit. I wish we'd gotten more background of her leaving five years ago, but seeing them get together was also lovely. I loved her pointing out to Locke how he "took over" the Gentleman Bastards in her absence without even noticing, for example, and that she's afraid her feelings for Locke, and his for her, are not solely their choice but part "inevitability." In that context her fleeing at the end sadly makes sense. In general I like that this series doesn't shy away from showing not only violence but also sex, I've seen it too often that it's only one.
Locke/Sabetha was the main focus of the book, but I still liked the Locke&Jean parts and it was good that there was at least one Jean&Sabetha scene.
I wasn't very invested, or even very interested, in either the election or the theater plot - with the exception of Sabetha sending Locke and Jean on a ship after their first meeting *g* That unfortunately made the book much less captivating. The hint of the war breaking out nearby and future complications were well done, the Bondsmagi conspiracies, eh. The Falconer getting his power back at the end and killing Patience with a murder of crows was chilling.
So according to Patience Locke is the spirit of a mage, with amnesia and in a body he stole. (I suspected from the beginning the magi would get Locke's name from Jean, not careful enough guys.) Weird story. It could be completely made up, but I'm not sure why Patience would do that. I'm not sure how much I like this yet, it'll depend on what'll come of it.
I enjoyed the series. I'm not feeling particularly fannish about it, but I'm looking forward to book 4.
DD and I agreed that we'd probably prefer to watch a series one episode a day: enough time to think about and discuss each episode, but a short wait until the next one. Unfortunately the TV schedule doesn't agree, and so it looks like we'll be meeting on Saturdays to watch The 100 for the foreseeable future.
3x06 The Bitter Harvest:
Lexa <3 Apparently, if I understood correctly, Lexa told Arkadia that there would be no retribution and then simply left? Uh-oh… she should at least have tried to make sure that there's no future threat. Which there very much is.
I really loved how Lexa, when Clarke said she wanted to see Emerson dead, pointed out that "blood must not have blood" apparently only applies when it's Lexa's people dying. Lexa respects and admires Clarke a lot, and she thinks more highly of Clarke and her wisdom than Clarke deserves. Titus realizes that, but he can't really do anything. I wonder how Lexa would have reacted if Clarke had killed Emerson.
DD wondered why Lexa let Clarke change her mind about taking revenge so quickly. I think it's partly because she admires Clarke so much, and has a crush on her; and partly because she knows a war would cost many lives and she wants to see as many of her people live as possible. She wanted that before she met Clarke, but didn't see a way to do it or didn't think it was possible. But if there are further attacks from Arkadia she won't have any choice but to act. And there already were, as she'll probably find out soon.
Lexa is in such a difficult position and doing the best she can and I love her a lot.
Octavia too: caught between many lines, trying to do the best she can. She's great.
Monty and Monroe joined Pike, I was surprised about Monty. It's his mom, and Bellamy who he admires, but still, I expected/hoped for better. Monty has said he's not okay, it's possible he just wants to be able to trust someone else to make the decisions. That's imo a major reason why Bellamy is following Pike, he wants someone he can follow and when he followed Kane people died.
I was surprised that Monroe died, it seemed like a bit of a waste: she's one of the few people we know from the 100 in the beginning, and I don't see how her death here is more impactful than any random guy's. Maybe it will be.
Kane blamed himself because he called for the election that Pike won; he should blame himself for doing such a crap job as a politician that Pike won. Wasn't he a politician on the Ark? He should know better.
The City of Light gets creepier all the time. Good on Abby to suspect something is up.
Poor Murphy, this is the, what, third time he's been captured and tortured by grounders? I wonder why he doesn't tell them all he knows about Jaha – maybe too afraid Jaha will find people to help with his crazy nuclear plans.
I think I want a Goodreads account. Oh no, picking usernames -.-
The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch, Gentleman Bastard series #1:
Slow start. I found the first 100+ pages boring because there were no stakes. They are conning a guy because they want to, there is no real obstacle so far, and the Locke backstory in the interludes worked well to give worldbuilding background but did not build suspense either. If I wasn't pretty sure I remembered people reccing the series I would have stopped more than once during the first part.
Fortunately it got a lot better after that! The Gray King made things a lot more exciting and we finally had actual stakes in a bigger plot, and by the point that Locke begged the Falconer not to kill his friends while being tortured I was already hooked. I didn't see Nazca's death coming, or later Calo and Galdo's and Bug's. (At least they got a magnificent death offering.) I very much enjoyed the Spider, and the mix of the A and B plots. (The Spider declaring the Salfadas her heirs makes little sense, they didn't seem that smart, but eh *shrugs*) The worldbuilding was good, great sense of a bigger, wider, and very much alive world out there. I was disappointed we didn't get to see Sabetha or even learn more about her, I know it'll happen in later books but still, she didn't even appear in the flashbacks.
Red Seas Under Red Skies, Gentleman Bastard series #2:
Pirates! Drakasha is cool. A mom as pirate captain, yess. Women and cats on ships :) I liked Ezri too, it sucked that she died for future plot convenience.
The flash-forward scene at the beginning, it worked in a way that even though I was sure Jean wasn't actually betraying Locke (I was thinking more along the lines of "what does Jean know that Locke doesn't" instead of "Locke just missed the signal") I looked extra closely at all of their arguments, and I enjoyed that. Then it turned out it was only a minor confrontation, so placing it in the beginning is way overstating its importance and the brief misunderstanding of Locke actually thinking Jean could betray him seems out of place. Oh well.
The paintings they stole were forged – tbh I'm mostly surprised that the concept of forging art seemed so foreign to Locke and Jean. How could it be so uncommon? Weird.
I wonder who Merrain was working for.
Locke got Jean to drink the antidote, of course he did. Martyrs, both of them, though in this case they're both being selfish because they don't want to watch the other one die. A common theme, the best way to threaten each of them is to threaten the other.
The Republic of Thieves, Gentleman Bastard series #3:
Finally we get to meet Sabetha. She's fantastic, I liked her much better than I'd anticipated. She's as smart as Locke, emotionally even smarter, and she takes no shit. I wish we'd gotten more background of her leaving five years ago, but seeing them get together was also lovely. I loved her pointing out to Locke how he "took over" the Gentleman Bastards in her absence without even noticing, for example, and that she's afraid her feelings for Locke, and his for her, are not solely their choice but part "inevitability." In that context her fleeing at the end sadly makes sense. In general I like that this series doesn't shy away from showing not only violence but also sex, I've seen it too often that it's only one.
Locke/Sabetha was the main focus of the book, but I still liked the Locke&Jean parts and it was good that there was at least one Jean&Sabetha scene.
I wasn't very invested, or even very interested, in either the election or the theater plot - with the exception of Sabetha sending Locke and Jean on a ship after their first meeting *g* That unfortunately made the book much less captivating. The hint of the war breaking out nearby and future complications were well done, the Bondsmagi conspiracies, eh. The Falconer getting his power back at the end and killing Patience with a murder of crows was chilling.
So according to Patience Locke is the spirit of a mage, with amnesia and in a body he stole. (I suspected from the beginning the magi would get Locke's name from Jean, not careful enough guys.) Weird story. It could be completely made up, but I'm not sure why Patience would do that. I'm not sure how much I like this yet, it'll depend on what'll come of it.
I enjoyed the series. I'm not feeling particularly fannish about it, but I'm looking forward to book 4.
DD and I agreed that we'd probably prefer to watch a series one episode a day: enough time to think about and discuss each episode, but a short wait until the next one. Unfortunately the TV schedule doesn't agree, and so it looks like we'll be meeting on Saturdays to watch The 100 for the foreseeable future.
3x06 The Bitter Harvest:
Lexa <3 Apparently, if I understood correctly, Lexa told Arkadia that there would be no retribution and then simply left? Uh-oh… she should at least have tried to make sure that there's no future threat. Which there very much is.
I really loved how Lexa, when Clarke said she wanted to see Emerson dead, pointed out that "blood must not have blood" apparently only applies when it's Lexa's people dying. Lexa respects and admires Clarke a lot, and she thinks more highly of Clarke and her wisdom than Clarke deserves. Titus realizes that, but he can't really do anything. I wonder how Lexa would have reacted if Clarke had killed Emerson.
DD wondered why Lexa let Clarke change her mind about taking revenge so quickly. I think it's partly because she admires Clarke so much, and has a crush on her; and partly because she knows a war would cost many lives and she wants to see as many of her people live as possible. She wanted that before she met Clarke, but didn't see a way to do it or didn't think it was possible. But if there are further attacks from Arkadia she won't have any choice but to act. And there already were, as she'll probably find out soon.
Lexa is in such a difficult position and doing the best she can and I love her a lot.
Octavia too: caught between many lines, trying to do the best she can. She's great.
Monty and Monroe joined Pike, I was surprised about Monty. It's his mom, and Bellamy who he admires, but still, I expected/hoped for better. Monty has said he's not okay, it's possible he just wants to be able to trust someone else to make the decisions. That's imo a major reason why Bellamy is following Pike, he wants someone he can follow and when he followed Kane people died.
I was surprised that Monroe died, it seemed like a bit of a waste: she's one of the few people we know from the 100 in the beginning, and I don't see how her death here is more impactful than any random guy's. Maybe it will be.
Kane blamed himself because he called for the election that Pike won; he should blame himself for doing such a crap job as a politician that Pike won. Wasn't he a politician on the Ark? He should know better.
The City of Light gets creepier all the time. Good on Abby to suspect something is up.
Poor Murphy, this is the, what, third time he's been captured and tortured by grounders? I wonder why he doesn't tell them all he knows about Jaha – maybe too afraid Jaha will find people to help with his crazy nuclear plans.
