Stephen Polner > Recent Status Updates

This might be the perfect book for me. A murder mystery / detective fantasy book?! It’s even funnier than the last book, the new characters are great, and I’m loving the development on the original characters.

So you’re telling me it’s a pilgrimage with one character who has a divine mission and is physically fragile but spiritually pure, one who is a disinherited, cynical fighter who is actually good at his core, and one who is a disgraced official that suffers from earthly vices? And they go around in episodically fighting monsters? Wu’Cheng’en speaks on this.

Not bad so far. Seems like it’s about to pick up.

- The little plot this book has is incohesive and nonsensical.
- The pacing is terribly inconsistent.
- The author does not respect the reader; the text is filled with redundancy and over-explanation.
- I still detest the worldbuilding.
- The use of futuristic tech is jarring.
- The 180 on Takeru's character is unconvincing and unearned
- You could not get me to care about these side characters if you paid me

Throughly enjoying this book! I love all the characters. The humor is often very clever and I’ve had many laugh-out-loud moments. Beyond it being funny, it’s an above average fantasy plot with fantastic, naturally integrated worldbuilding! My only negatives are that Pratchett is sometimes trying way to hard to show he’s intelligent, and not EVERYTHING he throws at the wall sticks. The audiobook is amazing too.

The Slog of Kaigen

Shaping up to be another Agatha classic. I'm not as immediately engrossed as I was in Nile or Orient Express (maybe because it's a more mundane setting), but the seeds of interest are definitely planted. Agatha has been exceptionally funny in this book, which I've been enjoying. My completely unfounded soul-read is that the doctor did it and he's an unreliable narrator.

Not enjoying this book, but I will power through it. The combat descriptions are well-written, but I find it hard to care when all they're fighting is nameless, faceless goons. I don't care about ANY of the protagonists. The worldbuilding has not met my expectations and the made-up words are needlessly bogging down the text. If Wang reminds me one more time about how many children Misaki has birthed I might DNF.

The Mid of Mid so far