Of Swords and Parasols

I haven't done the Wednesday reading Meme in ages, but I'm going to try to get back in the habit of doing it at least semi regularly.

What are you currently reading
Carlene O'Neil: One Foot in the Grape: First book in a mystery series about a photojournalist who takes over her family's winery. Dramatic neighbors abound. I'm only just to the murder, but I'm enjoying it so far.

What did you recently finish reading?

Neil Gaiman: American Gods: I remember this being a huge thing when it came out, and may have been pretty into it if I'd read it then, but I mostly found this to be an interesting idea told in a way that I didn't find interesting, with characters that mostly bored me. I also found Gaiman's detached recounting of incredibly awful things happening to people-mostly to women and POC- to be offputting. I mean, it wasn't bad, it just didn't work for me, aside from a few parts.

Rick Riordan: Blood of Olympus: The last of Riordan's Heroes of Olympus books and, as far as I know, the last in the Percy Jackson series? I was surprised by how low the body count was, but certainly not disappointed, and was glad Raina finally got a lot of page time. Riordan seems to forget that Jason was supposed to be the nominal lead (or colead with Percy, I guess) of this series, and that's ok. I did enjoy this series a lot, possibly more than the first, sdespite never developing an attachment to Jason.

Lauri Robinson: The Bootlegger's Daughter: A romance novel set in the prohibition era. A federal agent goes to a bootlegger's resport undercover to find a mobster, and falls for the bootlegger's daughter, who actually runs the resort. Entertaining, but I was thrown off by how 2/3 of the book take place over 2 days. It seems most romance novels I've read in recent years take place over a short period of time. I remember when most historical romances took place over the span of months or even years.

Noelle Stevenson: Nimona: Nimona is a graphic novel that was originally a webcomic about a young shapeshifter named Nimona, who is assigned as sidekick to Lord Ballister Blackheart, the kingdom's Official Villain, as his sidekick. Ballister was a hero in training until he lost an arm at the hands of his friend, Ambrosius Goldenloin, in a joust. Ambrosius says it was TOTALLY AN ACCIDENT and Ballister says it was done in a jealous rage. Add to this that Ambrosius is the kingdom's main Romantic Hero, and they don't talk much now, except for occasions when Ambrosius tries to arrest Ballister. Ballister is the most moral person in the book and really against random killing. Nimona is really REALLY into being a future supervillain, and prone to turning into various animals that and eat or trample guards, much to Ballister's dismay. It starts with LOLarious hijinks with the honorable and moral villain and his tiny murdering sociopath sidekick trying to expose an evil plot by the organization that runs the kingdom. Then it escalates into illegal experimentation, and legends with darker undertones, and possibly conspiracy theorist lady scientists, and ex-lovers working out epic misunderstandings and drama and trauma and destruction all over the place. I mean, it's great, but boy does it escalate.

Victoria Jamieson: Roller Girl: Graphic novel about a 12 year old girl named Astrid who has always done everything with her best friend, Nicole. When Astrid decides to enroll in Roller Derby Camp for the summer, she assumes Nicole will come with her. Instead, Nicole enrolls in Ballet Camp, and befriends Astrid's nemesis, Rachel. So Astrid lies to her mother that Nicole is going with her, and that Nicole's mother will be picking her up from camp every day (she walks home instead). At camp, Astrid has enthusiasm (sometimes, so much work!) but not much in the way of talent. The book is mostly about a 12 year old growing up and figuring out that life doesn't always going the way you want, but that that isn't always bad. And roller derby. Lots of roller derby.

Patrick Carman, The Land of Elyon series. MG series about a girl named Alex who spends her summers in a border city walled off from the wilderness, snd likes to spend hours and hours exploring the city's labyrinthine library. sadly, thre is little library exploration, but lots of having adventures in the lands beyond the city. Very enjoyable.

Joyce and Jim Lavene: Perilous Pranks, Murderous Matrimony, Bewitching Boots, Fatal Fairies: Up to the current book in a cozy mystery series set at a RenFaire that's open all year and has permanent residents. I really enjoy these books despite the main character having flares of internal misogyny at times (though she does finally seem to become aware of it in the latest book.) Perilous Pranks introduces supernatural elements into the series, which stayed and are becoming increasingly prominent. I don't object, I suppose, it just seems odd to so suddenly switch to that when earlier books made a point to contrast fantasy and reality.

Fujiwara Cocoa: Youko x Boku SS Vol 1: Manga series about youkai and their bodyguards. I watched the anime based on it a few years ago, and based on my recollections, the first few episodes of the anime follow the first volume of the manga pretty faithfully, though I seem to recall the anime having more "cutesy" fanservice and fetishism. I put off reading it for so long because I know the current plot is actually a prologue to the main plot, and wasn't sure how I felt about getting there.


There are other books that I've read and not posted on since I last did this, but I'm too lazy to go through all my tags to see if I missed something I should comment on.

What do you think you'll read next?

I have a bunch of mysteries, romance novels and YA novels checked out from the library, so those, and I intend to do a lot of manga bingeing in the near future, since I haven't read much in recent months.

This is actually...what, 3 weeks of books?

What are you currently reading
Nothing, ATM. Finished my plane-reading book last night before bed.

What did you recently finish reading?

The Mark of Athena by Rick Riordan. I'm glad that this time, when Annabeth got a quest, it was actually about her. (IIRC, when she had an official quest in the first series, it still ended up being mostly about Percy. Really, it's a good thing I like Percy.) The humor is still there, not to mention the characterization and entertaining takes on mythology, and I'm glad that the series is considerably more diverse now, but I think Riordan may be starting to have a few too many things going at once now. I mean, I can't even remember if Jason orr Frank had any POV chapters. (Though, in Jason's case, I may just not have noticed them. There's nothing particularly wrong with Jason [aside from being named after a Greek hero i'm not exactly fond of], but there's nothing incredibly right with him, either, he's just kinda inoffensively but uninterestingly there.) And yet, I'm pretty sure we'll also be getting Nico chapters in the next book, and despite the potential overpopulation of narrators, I can't help but think Reyna is due some POV chapters, too.

The Demon Catchers of Milan by Kat Beyers. YA about Mia, a girl who, after being possessed by a demon, is carted off to Italy by her father's estranged relatives to learn to be a demon hunter. It takes a little while to get going and has a bit much family drama and "Oh look! Italy!" and not enough supernaturlal worldbuilding and demon hunting, but generally pretty solid and enjoyable, though it's very much a book meant to be the first in a series.

Personal Demon by Kelley Armstrong. I have no particular thoughts about the plot of this one, but i enjoyed it. This is the first (only?) book in the series where part of it was from a male character's POV. Which I raise an eyebrow at in a series titled "Women of the Otherworld," but at least it was Lucas, who at least is one of the few men in the series who I like. This is also the first (only?) book in the series with POC narrators (Lucas is Cuban and Hope, the other narrator, is Indian). I was disappointed to find the Hope/Karl relationship having some of the same issues as Elena/Clayton, though not nearly to the same degree, and in a much more palatable form.

Imaginary Girls by Nova Ren Suma: Two years ago, Chloe found a dead body floating in a boat in the reservoir near their hometown, at a sight where another town is said to be under the water, still intact, citizens and all. Chloe was promptly removed from her half-sister, Ruby's, care by her father, their mother having effectively abandoned them a while back. Ruby vows to return things to exactly the way the were before, and to bring Chloe back once she's done so. When she does bring Chloe back, she does so without Chloe's father's permission, and one of the first people Chloe encounters is the dead girl, London, who everyone believes has been in rehab for drug abuse. This is a wonderfully spooky and atmospheric YA gothic novel that is not only completely unconcerned about men and romantic plotlines, and completely absorbed with the relationship between Ruby (who is something like what I picture Allison DiLaurentis from Pretty Little Liars would be like if she were older and had a sister, or the titular Rebecca from Daphne DuMaurier's novel) and Chloe.

The Friday Society by Adrienne Kress: Note: this is the book I read flying home from WisCon while half-dead. This is an Edwardian Steampunk book about 3 assistants who band together to become a super-heroine team. No, really, there's a scene where they all sit down to choose their super hero code names and, had I not been in the middle of a crowded plane and thus expected to act like a mature adult, my inner 13-year-old would have taken over, clutched my fists to my mouth, and let out a high-pitched girlish squeal of delight. So, anyway, Cora, and inventor's assistant, Michiko, a fight-instructor's assistant, and Nellie, a magician's assistant, all stumble across a dead body one night after a ball they all performed at. HIJINKS ENSUE. Hijinks unfortunately often consisting of boys, but also consisting of getting drunk, confronting "mad scientists," creative B&E, fights, inventions, superheroine costumes, investigations, fights, and bonding. There are a lot of groany orientalism cliches with Michiko (though fewer than I'd braced myself for) and the book sometimes thinks it's cleverer than it actually is, but overall, I thought it was a lot of fun.

Discord's Apple by Carrie Vaugh: Note: This is the book that I was reading at WisCon when hibernating/everything but my eyes was dead. This book somehow manages to successfully combine Greek Mythology (and especially the Trojan War), the apocalypse, and Arthuriana into a story about a comic book writer who goes home after learning her father is dying and discovers that he and her ancestors have been the keepers of a storeroom that hold all of history and mythology's magic artifact. (Yes, her basement is Warehouse 13. It was published in 2010, so Vaughn and SyFy probably had the idea around the same time.) World War III is gearing up (wreaking havoc on Our Heroine, Evie's, plotlines) various immortals and mythic figures, lead by Hera, the only surviving member of the Greek Pantheon, is trying to gain access to the storeroom, along with Sinon, (the Greek warrior from The Aeneid, who pretended to be a defector to convince the Trojans to take the wooden horse inside the city walls) who was snatched from Troy by Apollo and made Apollo's immortal sex slave (literally) and hopes the storeroom has a weapon that can kill him. Somewhere along the way, Arthur and Merlin show up and effectively declare themselves Evie's sidekicks as part of team Save The Storeroom. (Well, Arthur does, Merlin is more dragged along, grumping the whole way.) Lots and lots of stuff going on, but Vaughn pulls it all together pretty well, and I enjoyed it a lot. Warnings, though, for off-page m/m slave rape that goes on for decades inbetween flashbacks.

What do you think you'll read next?

Not sure. I have some books that I got at WisCon that I really want to get to, but also have some books from the library that I renewed just before leaving for WisCon.

These are the first two books of Riordan's "Kane Chronicles" which is Riordan's take on modern kids and Egyptian mythology. Riordan relies heavily on what worked for the "Percy Jackson" books here, but not so much that he's copying himself.


Carter and Sadie Kane are siblings who only see each other two days a year because of a custody battle between their father and maternal grandparents after their mother's death. Carter travels the world with their archeologist father, and Sadie lives with their grandparents in England. Except, as it turns out, they're descended from pharaohs on both sides of the family tree, and are powerful magicians, which they learn after their father accidentally frees Set, gets possessed by Osiris, and then booted to the underworld in a magic coffin.


The narrative is split fairly equally between Carter and Sadie's POVs (Riordan formats this as the two making records and telling different parts of the story. I...think this doesn't work as well as it could because they both say things on the recording that I just can't see them saying in something that they expect a lot of people to eventually hear. Both voices are entertaining and distinctive enough, but both read a bit like Percy-lite.


As much as I like the Percy Jackson books and their mythology, I think I may like the integration a bit more here. In this series, the gods use humans as avatars, and so tend to be a bit more involved in the main action. (My favorite of the gods so far is Bast. Of course, she's also been around the most, so it's easier to get invested in her.) In addition, instead of the various teens having superpowers specific to godly parents, they have the ability to use magic and are able to choose what type of magic they'll learn. There's also considerably more racial diversity, and both leads are biracial (Sadie and Carter's father is black and their mother white, though Sadie looks exactly like a miniature version of their mother). So far, while we're told Carter is the Epic Destined Hero, the metaplot and action have revolved a lot more around Sadie. We'll see.


Incidentally, I suspect there are conversations in the underworld like this going on all the time:


( spoilers )
So, anyway, so far they're fun, though I wish the narrators sounded a bit less like Percy. My one real beef so far is that sometimes the books seem to be going "If only that darned Isis had left things (which is to say, powerful men) alone and not tried to have her own power and interfere with things!" It makes me want to imitate Bast and have my hair turn into a bristly poof.