Fantasy Buddy Reads discussion

Beneath the Sugar Sky - Seanan McGuire

January 18, 2020.
Requested by Charlie.

Parts 1 and 2 complete. (view spoiler)[ I'm not enjoying this one as much. It's a shame since I really loved books 1 and 2. I think there's a few reasons why.

I think it's because I don't really like the character of Sumo's daughter. Whose name I've already forgotten. I find her annoying. Though it's sad she's disappearing, I don't have any connection to her.

Seanan McGuire is also really laying it on thick withe the whole, 'the new girl in insecure because she's fat' thing. Like I get it, she's self conscious and all she thinks about is how fat she is, stop going on about it. The girl (whose name I've also forgotten) says she wants people to know her for who she is and not how fat she is, but then all she does is talk about how fat she is, at every opportunity. I'm over it.

I did like the trip to the Underworld, it was really cool to meet the Lord and Lady of the underworld. (hide spoiler)]

I haven't had time to start yet. Hopefully tomorrow.

Just finished part 1. I'm not really sure what I think yet.(view spoiler)[ I'm glad I'll see Nancy again though since they're going to the halls of the dead. (hide spoiler)]

In chapter 5 and I just had a thought (view spoiler)[ So Rini mentions the one boy that disappeared from her world and found a door. Do you think any doors from other worlds came to our world as where they belonged? Where would our world fall on the compass? (hide spoiler)]

@Elizabeth (view spoiler)[ good question! I think it's entirely possible and I think our wild would be a mix of good and wicked and maybe mid logic. (hide spoiler)]

I finished this yesterday and while it was okay, I didn't love it. I really enjoyed the first two but this just didn't connect for me.

I think it was (view spoiler)[ a combination of the world wasn't to my liking, I like the darker world's better I think, and Rini annoyed me. So did Cora and her obsession with how fat she was. She was very two dimensional and had nothing else to really define her as a character, she just whined a lot.

I'm really hoping book 4 will be better. (hide spoiler)]

Just finished! I felt all the things you described, Charlie! =D Hahaha

Cons: (view spoiler)[

- Sledgehammer of Social Politics - So much emphasis on that you lose sight of the cool things Cora thinks/does. The way she loves to run & swim. You can look "large" and be an awesome athlete. I know that's the image McGuire meant to convey but it didn't quite ever make it that far. I also got stuck on how often the negatives about body shaming was mentioned over the "cool things about Cora."

- Overall story felt rushed, needed more to make it solid and filling. You can't read this one by itself and think it's a whole story because there's hardly any context/recall of the elements that make the characters real & interesting just by what was given here.

Like how can you appreciate the Underworld and visiting Nancy without reading the first book? Or how creepy and awful Jill was in order to fulfill her desires? The rigidity of rules that happened in the Moors? That world that was made of violence and logic?
(hide spoiler)]

Pros: (view spoiler)[
- The whole story felt EXACTLY like it should for a setting being in Nonsense. Haha! It was so annoying and bouncy.

- Rini is far from my fav character but she's a cool representation of what could be between a Nonsense man and Sumi, the whirlwind. She was presented in a certain way and stayed true to her character from start to finish. I really loved the way Sumi woke up was due to Rini telling her all about the adventures she had to give her mother life again.

- Cool contrasts of how there's a soda sea and you can't drown in it cause it's soda but a logic person would sink & flail like a rock.

- I liked the creations story of the Nonsense world and how it's still being created when we meet the baker.

- Narrator was great! I liked her for this one.
(hide spoiler)]

Like the other books, you have to go with the core idea presented in this particular segment of the story. I know it's asking a lot of the reader to figure out what to take or not but that's what we deal with each time we open up a new story to explore.

I rated this one four stars because I responded to the story like it was stuff of nonsense. The fairy tale lyrical phrases are still there. The obvious politics & stereotypes. The book felt like it represented the world of Nonsense. Plus the narration was good. So, I put 4 stars even if it's the weakest book of the three thus far.

Leap Frog Thought: (view spoiler)[A few times, I imagined that each of the characters in this odd series are slices of McGuire in reality & imagination. All of the potential What Ifs in dreams, goals, physicality & fears. It's a cool way to explore your inner self if my random musings are anywhere near the truth. lol (hide spoiler)]

Soo wrote: "Just finished! I felt all the things you described, Charlie! =D Hahaha

Cons:

- Sledgehammer of Social Politics - So much emphasis on that you lose sight of the cool things Cora thinks/does. The ..."

I actually really like this story as well... but as soon as you guys started talking about the social politics, it became glaring, to me, despite glossing over it before...

I think the counter=fat shaming might be something Seanan has dealt with... I don't actually think she looks much like her GR profile pics... I think they're over a decade old, at this point... I've seen more recent video of her in youtube library Q&As and a couple Patreon videos from 2018...

I definitely like the information about Confection, even if living there would be rough for me...

I love the blurb for book 5, and I'm glad we're fast approaching it... Elinor' West's "no quest" rule is about to be broken. Again.

The next one is slated to be a story that precedes the first book. Curious to see where that'll go! Kade's story? =)

I personally want to have Elinor's story and more of the twins. I purposely haven't read the blurbs for the next two books as I don't want to be spoiled.

I'm in chapter 10. Kade is kinda answering my questions from earlier.

Maybe Elinor can be book 6... Lundy is #4

Argh, I'm not really enjoying this one...

Part 1 and 2 (Chapters 1-6): I agree with all Charlie said. (view spoiler)[

Rini mildly annoys me. However, she's supposed to, being from a Nonsense world. I'm more of a logical person, of course she annoys me!

But Cora... She is so irritating! Being the primary vector by which the author dumps the social commentary, she feels like a ball of negativity and obsession about fat-shaming. The message itself is good:

"That's why people shouldn't get too hung up on labels. Sometimes, I think that's part of what we do wrong. We try to make things make sense, even when they are never going to!"

There's no need, however, to remind us of it every other paragraph. (hide spoiler)]

Cora feels like a replacement to Nancy, to me... I kinda wish Seanan had just gone in Kade's head, or someone else we already knew...

Yup. It's social politics with a sledgehammer. lol

Yup, I think it would have been better if Cora never existed and instead we got Kade's perspective.

Soo wrote: "Yup. It's social politics with a sledgehammer. lol"

Haha. Who needs subtlety when you can have a character shout out your opinions, right? :p

So guys, work today made me think of this book. I work in the lab at a place that makes soap, shampoo, conditioner....that type of thing. We get a new soap today that has a name of 'Cotton Candy Skies'.

Ooh that's fab! That sounds delicious actually. As someone who is a big fan of Lush products, I'm sometimes tempted to taste them!