Daniel Shellenbarger > Recent Status Updates

Look, I know WH40k is grimdark, but do we have to keep repeating the "evil psychotic guy within the regiment who can get away with murder whenever he wants as an excuse to shamelessly kill off beloved characters" subplot, it was bad enough with Lijah Cuh, but now we've got Meryn and his band of whiny self-pitying jerks. Come on Abnett, get a new subplot!

The biggest problem I have with this series is misapplied geographic terms. For instance, this chapter started stating it was in Brzesc, Western Sardinia, but it quickly became clear that they meant Western Sarmatia (aka modern Belarus/Ukraine) and if I had a nickel for every time the author has mixed up the Horn of Africa and Cape of Good Hope...

Great book, don't know why it didn't get more hype

ish, I really need to start noting the page numbers better, but I have been reading this

It occurs to me that V's entire plan hinged on Harry not having access to a member of the Order. Sure, they knew D had fled but did they know McG had been taken out? If so who told them and how with the Ministry carefully watching the floos and owls and (presumably) desperate not to let it be generally known that they'd near-murdered a teacher? Yet that's the only thing which would explain the timing of their ploy.

One of the disturbing questions that's never really addressed in Harry Potter is the moving paintings and photographs. It really seems like the people in these things have the personalities, intelligences, etc. of whoever they're based on, so... are they somehow stealing a part of a person's soul when they make this "art" and trapping it forever. Call me crazy but this seems like a bad thing to me.

Hooray, Mr. Weasley has been attacked! That means we're away from Hogwarts and Malfoy (seriously, he is so awful in this book, little jerk should've been expelled) and Umbridge for a couple chapters!

ish. I've been interested in this book since I first saw its cover, which just screams "old school fantasy" to me, and I love that. Now that I've finished Strength of the Few (and have decided to ignore Wind and Truth and A Deepness in the Sky for another month or season or year or decade), I'm finally getting around to reading it.

eugh, detention with Dolores, always a low point in the series