Recent Reading
Jan. 31st, 2026 11:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sanguinityDavid Macaulay, Ship (1993)
Lengthy (96 pages!) illustrated for-older-readers children's book detailing an underwater archaeology expedition to investigate the wreck of a fifteenth-century caravel, finishing with a builder's journal documenting the caravel's construction. Lots of information about archaeological planning, research, and methods, followed by a similarly detailed section on historic ship construction. The illustrations and diagrams are as information-rich as the text. (When reading this aloud togrrlpup, I often stopped to elaborate further on some detail in the drawings.) For a fully-illustrated picture book, the reading level is fairly advanced (verbose and with lots of specialized vocabulary), providing lots of opportunity for an older child to nerd out undisturbed. (An older child -- or me!)
Lois McMaster Bujold, The Paladin of Souls (2003)
Immediate sequel to The Curse of Chalion, plus a few years. Our point-of-view character is someone who was mostly dismissed in the first novel for alleged madness -- and in fact, her early motivations are wholly about getting out from under the "protection" of people who think she's mad.
Of course, once she does get out, adventures start being had. And she's mad about it, because she wasn't planning on having adventures, she just wanted to have a nice life being left alone on her own terms. Alas.
Ripping yarn, I liveblogged most of it tophoenixfalls as I read it, things kept snowballing in that classically Bujold way, and much like in The Curse of Chalion we were a good ways into it before figuring out what the larger plot ultimately even was. There were a number of moments that made me laugh out loud. (When she experimentally kisses the literally too-handsome-for-his-own-good guy to see if it will break a spell, and he isn't fazed in the least, just kisses her back as if this happens every so often and he considers it "impolite to duck".) Ista reminds me more than a little bit of Cordelia, and I wouldn't call that a bad thing.
Charlotte McConaghy, Wild Dark Shore (2025) -- DNF
I don't usually post about my DNFs (Did Not Finish), because why bother, but I did read about half of this, and was hugely conflicted.
( Did Not Finish )
Anyway, it's a month overdue and four hundred people are waiting for it at the library, and I keep thinking about other books on my tbr list that I want to read but I "have to" read this one first. Boo. I hate it when I can see the book I would have found compelling around the margins of the book the author actually chose to write.
Lengthy (96 pages!) illustrated for-older-readers children's book detailing an underwater archaeology expedition to investigate the wreck of a fifteenth-century caravel, finishing with a builder's journal documenting the caravel's construction. Lots of information about archaeological planning, research, and methods, followed by a similarly detailed section on historic ship construction. The illustrations and diagrams are as information-rich as the text. (When reading this aloud to
grrlpup, I often stopped to elaborate further on some detail in the drawings.) For a fully-illustrated picture book, the reading level is fairly advanced (verbose and with lots of specialized vocabulary), providing lots of opportunity for an older child to nerd out undisturbed. (An older child -- or me!)Lois McMaster Bujold, The Paladin of Souls (2003)
Immediate sequel to The Curse of Chalion, plus a few years. Our point-of-view character is someone who was mostly dismissed in the first novel for alleged madness -- and in fact, her early motivations are wholly about getting out from under the "protection" of people who think she's mad.
Of course, once she does get out, adventures start being had. And she's mad about it, because she wasn't planning on having adventures, she just wanted to have a nice life being left alone on her own terms. Alas.
Ripping yarn, I liveblogged most of it to
phoenixfalls as I read it, things kept snowballing in that classically Bujold way, and much like in The Curse of Chalion we were a good ways into it before figuring out what the larger plot ultimately even was. There were a number of moments that made me laugh out loud. (When she experimentally kisses the literally too-handsome-for-his-own-good guy to see if it will break a spell, and he isn't fazed in the least, just kisses her back as if this happens every so often and he considers it "impolite to duck".) Ista reminds me more than a little bit of Cordelia, and I wouldn't call that a bad thing.Charlotte McConaghy, Wild Dark Shore (2025) -- DNF
I don't usually post about my DNFs (Did Not Finish), because why bother, but I did read about half of this, and was hugely conflicted.
( Did Not Finish )
Anyway, it's a month overdue and four hundred people are waiting for it at the library, and I keep thinking about other books on my tbr list that I want to read but I "have to" read this one first. Boo. I hate it when I can see the book I would have found compelling around the margins of the book the author actually chose to write.
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Though I am a bougie bitch, there’s nothing quite like a mug full of Swiss Miss hot chocolate. I am an especially big fan of their Marshmallow flavor, so you can imagine my shock when I learned about their Marshmallow Lovers flavor that comes with even more dehydrated white chalk block marshmallows.
