Lauren > Recent Status Updates

I mean. It’s fine. It’s so fluffy it nearly floats away in my hands and the characters seem to fall in love merely because they are the main characters. Gwen talks about how “funny” Beth is and I wish they’d demonstrate that rather than just tell me, because I don’t recall a single funny thing Beth has said or done. I feel no chemistry between these paper dolls. But I’ll probably finish it.

Reverse misogyny is agonizing. I *know* that the species is not human, it’s not even vertebrate, and that the evolution of mental capacity and empathy is externally imposed on a species never destined for it naturally. I know this. I know they are spiders, and therefore have much to overcome. It’s still depressing to read, especially as the males demonstrate no reduced capacity for thought or feeling.

I probably shouldn’t have rushed through three books so quickly, after finding the first so sweet. Probably I’m gorging myself beyond the point where the flavors still stand out, probably I’ve blunted myself to the unique charms.

I’m just *terribly* bored by stories of kings and princes and high class nobility born to their position. I find myself skipping through pages, trying to get to the center.

I started it last night and can’t put it down. Barely slept. A timely book for the moment.

"Dark leaves shiny as tongues" what are you talking about? Tongues are very specifically not shiny, they are highly textured and do not reflect light well

Uh oh. These metaphors don't make sense to me. "the melody [was] so fragile and heart-achingly beautiful it seemed to be made of silence itself." Uh, what? What are you trying to say?

darn, didn't realize it was a series....

After the disappointment of Ship of Theseus, this is a refreshing book to dig into. Beautifully written (and translated) so far

I have one compliment I can pay this book: using "lapine" as an adjective is fun.

I hate this book. I don't think I have ever experienced such unnatural, inhuman dialogue. If it wasn't a gift I would stop reading it. I am at a point where I am skipping any conversation between the two main leads, or any of the detritus that is just about their personal lives. These people are uncanny valley unreal.

This book is way too smart for me. This status update represents the moment I had to stop and check the Wikipedia plot summary to figure out what the hell was going on. Going to try and push through and enjoy the vibes.

I can't remember the last time I hated a protagonist like this. She's beyond spineless and bordering into entirely boneless. She's young and powerless, but also insufferably acquiescent. I suppose there is a reason the narration doesn't even bother to name her.

Now this is a Ruby book. This is the refresher I needed.

This dovetails nicely with Contrapoints's latest essay on Twilight and the nature of desire. Wish I remembered who told me to read this book.

Picked it off of a shelf at random, mildly disappointed that over half of the stories so far take place in the US, or some version of it. I almost never read short stories, enjoying it so far.

It's so boring. I'm so bored. I don't know if I'm going to finish this one. There are so many problems with this narrative.

I wonder how fully considered second books are. In book 1, Nahri's first foray into scholarship was regarding economics, but in this book they are beyond her and of no interest. Book one ended with her feeling triumphant, looking on the king as a "mark", but this book sees her utterly defeated and cowed. It's also annoying that both she and Dara are obsessed with one another after TWO MONTHS TOGETHER FIVE YEARS AGO.

.....hang on, the reset makes cops....good people? Are we sure this whole thing is a bad idea???

"She was just the shuffling present, the cog in the machine, spinning and gnashing its metal teeth until that one gear wore down, until the slivers of her self broke loose and did more damage, until she needed to be pulled, cast off, and replaced with another."

This book contains zero of the problems I had with the show. This is way better!

Coming off of Bella Canto (or whatever it was called) and into this book was like remembering why I enjoy reading to begin with. Weird and beautiful so far.

I am not enjoying this book at all.

I love Aubrey and I love this book (so far). I'm noting down these studies for my own future reading.

chapter 14 and we are hitting the part of the book where it's going to be difficult to put this down and get some sleep

My degree is in mathematics, not history or English, but his applications of baysean theory sometimes make this a painful, eye-rolling slog. His use of grammar and his tendency to begin sentences with conjunctions or prepositions when the thought would have been better served with a comma attached to the previous sentence also makes me want to scream. It also edges into condescension more often than one would hope.

His flinch was almost subliminal.
"Please, can we not refer to the secretary general as 'the bobble-head'?"
"Why not? He knows I do. I say it to his face, and he doesn't mind."
"He thinks you're joking."
"That's because he's a fucking bobble-head."

It was fine.

These books are an incredibly quick read. Love to pick them up and dip into the adventure for a few dozen pages before getting back to work. About a fourth of the way through, disappointed Death isn't around more but Poons is a delight in this book, and I am sympathetic to the fact that he may have not known what he was doing when he was touching women inappropriately in the past. The people around him knew, tho

He reached out his hand.
"You will give it to me," he said.
Granny twitched aside the blanket in her arms and looked down at a small face, wrapped in sleep.
She looked up.
"No," she said, on general principles.

dang this book is good