The next book in the Butcher series has a pub date and the manuscript is done. The extraneous things that were in Butcher’s way appear to have been resolved and he says he is recommitted to the series.
I love this concept of just stopping something if you’re not digging it. When you said, “is this something I want to spend my time on earth reading this?” Struck me. I have been openly quitting what I don’t like and really allowing myself to pick what I’ll like and not what is popular! 🎉🎉🎉🎉
So, this may sound odd, but I feel like these videos (is this your second? third?) almost feel like a makeup declutter video. You test it out briefly (as in makeup declutter videos), decide what you like and don't like, and either keep or declutter. You know what you like in books, you refine your reading tastes in the different genres, and keep what you think is interesting. They are oddly satisfying and has inspired me to maybe try doing the same thing with my massive TBR. It is a different way to declutter/unhaul that I am enjoying. Keep them coming!
The Neapolitan saga (or however it's called) by Ferrante is one of my favourite stories ever and I would argue they are a very, very long book chopped in 4 for obvious reasons. I find it absolutely fascinating and it is one of the few books that I positively want to reread. (First read was in 2017). That said, if your motivation to keep reading is to get to know what happened to Lila, I don't even remember if it got resolved. Everything else was so interesting to me that by the second book I just forgot about the prologue. So maybe try to go on if you feel like it, but not for that.
I second this. If the mystery of Lila is the only thing you really care about there isn't really ONE clear reason for it; rather it's all of the elements that unfold throughout the quartet that tell us who Lila and Lenu are.
Malice was great & book 2, Valor, even better. The quartet gets better with each book and boy...the last book is an impactful doozie! Love the series. 😊
I love these videos. They remind me that I can purge books. Novels I purchased during early days lock down don’t match who I am and what I’m interested in today.
“I’m not as entertained by competent but generic fantasy” 🤯 That insight you had really spoke to me! I think you put into words something I’d never been able to pinpoint 🤯 What happens to me in that type of book that doesn’t grab me is that I just don’t care. A generic 3 star romance keeps me entertained because if I like the couple in question I care about them getting together. But in a generic 3 star fantasy, you have to make me care about SOMETHING for me to be entertained. (Characters, themes, prose...). If, like you said, it doesn’t have that extra something, why do I care that a bad guy is trying to take your throne? Make me care.
i feel like this was still successful! you still decreased your tbr by 10 books, so that is cool! also yes my brilliant friend is v hyped and i am still curious about it, but mostly because my work did it for a book club and they ended up making pasta for it based on the book, which was super fun.
Giiiirl this was stressful!!! Haha. I'm glad you were able to find something you enjoyed at the end! And hey at least you got a lot of books off your tbr!
I've read Malice and Valor, and I can confirm that they are large, generic epic fantasies. They are well written and enjoyable, but it takes an investment. I don't think that I'll be finishing the series. They were great for what they were, but you're right, there's no real enjoyable hook to keep me interested for 1000 plus more pages.
I read Death of the Party and loved it. I enjoyed most of the books in that series, but I admit I have DNF'd one or two even though I really love cozy mysteries, but I am trying to branch out my reading horizons. Monday I got "Everyone here is lying" the newest book by Shari Lepena at the library. You should try it, it is excellent so far! GIve your cats hugs from my cats and me!
I found Malice difficult to get into but if you are patient it’s gets better as the series goes along. Malice is a setup book for the series. I would proceed despite the first book
I committed to “The Name of the Wind” and am still pretty bitter about us maybe never seeing the next book - so I totally get the trepidation with starting the Jim Butcher book.
YES My Brilliant Friend has such a fantastic prologue!! I read that book several years ago and thought it was very good, but it's been years and I've finally realized I don't actually want to??
You articulated how I feel about needing to be invested in epic fantasy vs other genres. For me I'm also fighting my brain-- I won't remember details that I'm not interested in, and those books expect me to.
Loved this! The thing about Malice is that it does subvert the genre in some pretty interesting ways but it presents itself in its writing style and your introduction to the world as something fairly standard. With Abercrombie it’s clear from the outset that you’re getting something a little different! Totally understand the DNF. Would recommend reading a plot summary sometime though if you’re curious! Not sure you’d be satisfied by skipping to book 4 of the Neapolitan Novels unfortunately… very much a journey over destination kind of series (though one of my faves).
I love the idea of just trying something without needing to “commit” to it. Sometimes I have to remind myself that I don’t “owe it” to a book to keep going just in case it gets good later on. If I have to struggle through the first half just to start enjoying it, is it really worth my time? Probably not.
Read or unhaul videos make it normal for others to give up on a book thats not working for them vs. Pushing through just to finish it. I'm still working on this skill 😂
Death of the Party….cozy Yes….closed circle mystery…kind of….on an island off South Carolina…recurring characters…I became hooked on the series…think this would be a fast , palate cleanser read for you….if I remember there were 15ish books in the series …..
Great video, thanks! An congrats on the win at the end, those books just aligned perfectly for dramatugy ;) Always recommend jumping through series, skipping some or - my personal fave - starting on the second one. The skipped books will still be there later in case you fall in love with the series. Good luck with the journey through the brilliant friend series!
Fantasy is my preferred genre so I can read a 3 star no problem but for sure there are other genres where even a 3 star feels like a slog. It’s so interesting how that happens!
I'd love your opinion on The Auctioneer by Joan Samson. It was written in the 70's and just republished by Valancourt after being out of print for decades. I absolutely love it. It's a slow burn psychological thriller taking place in a small rural village in New Hampshire.
Feel similar to you about epic fantasy, no one compares to Tolkein on the basic. I was finally persuaded to try Robin Hobb and I am enjoying her. Knocking 10 off the list must feel great!
Love these videos, I love the instant satisfaction of seeing someone weed their TBR in a big chunk lol. You're not missing out on anything with the Extraordinaries - it's very much a YA rom-com (heavy on the com) with a little superhero final scene. I'm planning to continue but only when I need like. super head-empty reading candy.
I've also heard John Gwynne does TONS of fight scenes, which I find incredibly boring, so that was one of the things that took him off my TBR! I think a lot of generic fantasy think they're doing what LotR, for example, does - but even though the setting of LotR is very common, I feel like the themes and characters ARE something special / just so well-done that it doesn't make the book feel basic, you know? also I DNFed a different Jim Butcher book because we literally only saw a female character described and I was like "absolutely not" lol
Your journey is how I'm feeling about reading in the past year. I feel like I don't have the same attention span for books, or I've picked some lemons. The same thing is happening with the movies I watch. Boooored. I'm surprised that you ended up liking My Brilliant Friend. It's literary fiction which I thought wasn't really your thing. Good for you that you unhauled 9 and read 1 book!
C. Hart is definitely cozy (she was my mystery gateway which I am forever grateful) with Death of Demand the first from the 90’s…but I am thinking the series, particularly later ones are not for you.
I find it funny that Aeronaut's Windlass seems to be getting its sequel this autumn 😂 I am looking forward to any (non-grim dark) fantasy book about sky pirates, but the binge reader that I am, I will wait for the series to be done before I pick it up so that I can then just binge it, if I end up liking it. Oh! Btw, do you plan on reading the next book in Mr Darcy & Miss Tilney series - The Late Mrs. Willoughby - by Claudia Grey? I just listened it on the audio and I liked it even more than the first one. The relationship between the two I liked much more than in the first one, and the "love triangle" that happens in this one isn't really there to add destructive drama but instead makes sense and is handled with care and thoughtfulness, imo at least, which I really appreciated ☺ Also the slow and sweet slow burn is chef's kiss 💖
I, too, rated My Brilliant Friend 4 stars and I am also not really feeling interested in doing four more books like this. Maybe watch the TV series? I might do that to have the catharsis :P They were shooting the 4th season at the beginning of the year, so maybe it will come out late 2023, early 2024
Pieces of Her is my least favorite Karin Slaughter book. Of the two in that series, I did prefer Girl Forgotten as it brought in more of the procedural elements that she does well in Grant County, Will Trent etc. I hope you’ve had some better book luck since this set!
The Slaughter books are more enjoyable read in order (there are ten others) as the characters progress and they overlap with the characters in her Grant County books.
I just recently did a highly controversial DNF. I could not finish The Fifth Season by NK Jemison. The on page child abuse was just too much for me. I read a lot of non-fiction about abuse dynamics and survivors, but I struggle with it in a fictional setting because.. like... why?
Malice is based on Celtic mythology, nit Viking, from what I understand. I struggled with Malice because there were so many.characters and allegiances. However, I really enjoyed Valor, and that us kind of the feel thar I get from other booktubers.
The first book of MBF is more of an introduction, really, and it is really quite boring compared to the second and third one (I'm still halfway through the 4th one because it's really so emotionally intense). I can tell you the story really picks up in the second one with all the other characters as well. And they're honestly just as great as characters (not as people, most of them -Lila and Lenù included - suck), but oh boy. And, like, you tend to forget that Lila has disappeared at all during the whole story? I think you find out what happened to her at the end of the last book (I've not finished, as I told), but, like, reading her story you're just like "yeah makes sense she's disappeared anyway". And also, like, this series is kind of the story of post war Italy, if it makes sense-- the classism, social "climbing" through studying and culture and also in far more unsavory ways, turning into one's parents, the mysoginy and sexism and casual violence on women, running away from one's origins and breaking free of them or remaining stuck in them without any other prospects, feminism... how Italy was yes built with industriousness and ingenuity and hard work, but also by stepping on people, by crime, by abuse. I don't know, being Italian, to me this series is more than just "Lila and Lenù's friendship". There's also a tv show, by the way! Three seasons out and I think the last one has just been or is being filmed.
Girl Forgotten (and a little bit with Pieces of Her) has some really problematic stuff in it--why on earth did the Witness Protection Program allow that guy to continue to be the mom's caseworker when he was dating the daughter? Why does he have a freaking job still? It's just gross on so many levels considering this guy knew/knew of the daughter since she was *little*. GAG. I find that there are lots of problematic stuff in all of Slaughter's series books that I've read to the point that I've decided I'll just stick with her standalones, those are really good and not full of just crap. Girl Forgotten is one of the very few books I actively regret finishing.
An enthusiastic second from me. I have really positive memories of starting that series years ago as I was backpacking across Canada. And scouring bookshops as I travelled to find the next one. Such a good reading memory
I have way too many books I want to read to read anything I don't like! If I give it a fair shot.. that may be slightly different depending on the book.. and I'm just not into it.. adíos! ☺
I have no interest in high fantasy anymore. There are just too many great books out there to read and not enough time to read another high fantasy novel. I've also never read Tolkein. He's been quoted too many times by obnoxious conservative christian dudes to interest me at this point in my reading life.
Knowing that the Jim Butcher book starts with a female POV kind of makes me not want to read it at all. I don't particularly like the way he writes women in his books in general.
