What Are You Reading Wednesday (May 19, 2021)

It’s time again to ask ourselves the three W’s:
What if an alien race was threatening humanity?
Would you stand and fight for your people?
Would you run from the Architects?

Wait, no, that’s not right. We ask these three W’s:
What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
Which books will you read next?

WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Sam @ Taking on a World of Words.

School is finally over, so hopefully I can get back to updating weekly! Not that every two weeks is bad, per se, but I miss being able to talk about what I’m reading each week and being able to see what everyone else is reading.

               

Swordheart by T. Kingfisher

★★★★★ || Goodreads
All right, that’s it. After reading two T. Kingfisher books, I’m ready to officially name her one of my new favorite authors! Her humor is on point, and her stories are still fun and adventurous and packed with action. All while making me laugh. What could be better than that? I was sold on this one as a talking sword, and that’s only sort of, kind of true if you squint at it. Really, it’s a man stuck in a sword. Who talks. So I’m still definitely counting it. This is also a romance between older protagonists, which is something I love. Though, in this case, being historical fiction, “older” means the female is 36, which is only slightly older than I am, and I’m not sure how I feel about this. This book is part of The World of the White Rabbit series, which also includes The Clockwork Boys series and The Saint of Steel series. So probably I’m going to pick up The Clockwork Boys next and work my way through this series!

Things to Do Before the End of the World by Emily Barr

★★☆☆☆ || Goodreads
This was really just a case of the book not being for me. This is really a contemporary coming-of-age story that’s very character driven, and if I’d known that going in, I probably wouldn’t have picked it up, simply because I could’ve told you that’s just not the type of story I enjoy. I had thought there would be more of a sci-fi element to it, but the end of the world is really just a setting. Sure, it raises some big philosophical questions, which I did enjoy, but it just wasn’t enough for me and I found the story slow and boring. Again, not a genre I tend to read for that very reason! Barr is a phenomenal writer, though, and she absolutely caught me off guard and swept me away with some of her prose, which was so quotable and lovely. If coming-of-age contemporary is your jam, I’d recommend this book.

Have Sword, Will Travel by Garth Nix

★★★★☆ || Goodreads
More talking swords! Huzzah! Audiobook is definitely the way to read this one. It’s filled with dragons and knights and talking swords (yes, plural!) and all sorts of goodness. Also dragons. Really, it’s got all the requisite things for a great book. I did really enjoy this, and the narrator did a fantastic job on the voices and bringing the story to life. As soon as I finished it, I dove into book two, since I enjoyed this one so much. The only thing that really annoyed me was Eleanor and her selfishness, which goes largely ignored throughout the entire book. She existed only to put them in danger over and over again simply because she dreamed of being a knight, which is something she used to justify her poor behavior each time without anyone calling her on it. Given, she’s only 12, but I was really hoping there would be someone, even Odo, who called BS eventually and Eleanor realized her mistakes, but that didn’t happen. It’s such a small thing, though, and it probably was just a me thing.

The House of Always by Jenn Lyons

★★★★★ || Goodreads
This series, guys. I don’t know how else to say how much I love it. The form for this book was different than the others and one I would’ve have believed would work for a book, but it did. Most of it is set in one location, with the rest of the story told through flashbacks. The battlefield is almost literally one of the mind, where enemies are trapped together and forced, begrudgingly, to work together. Except that no memory is sacrosanct and their enemy has the ability to pull their worst memories and secrets from their mind and share with everyone. Not the most fun show and tell ever. I thought this one would break my feels, and it did, but not quite how I expected. I hurt for these characters, who have been kicked and beaten down and abused and struggled for survival. And survive they have. But now they’re being asked to confront all the things they’ve conveniently shoved behind walls and erected barriers to seal away and not have to deal with. As you can imagine, it’s emotional and messy and dramatic and just so *chef’s kiss*.

The Firebird Song by Arnée Flores

★★★★★ || Goodreads
This is such a charming, uplifting middle grade read! This is a fairly dark fantasy, which includes death and child abuse/mentions of child death, so it’s maybe for upper middle grade readers. However, the story is really about the triumph of hope over darkness, so it’s not unnecessarily dark just to be gritty or something. The main character is a girl who has to overcome the odds, and the story really pushes the idea of sisterhood and the strength of girls, which I loved. The phrase “just a girl” comes up several times as an excuse why Calliope can’t or shouldn’t try to do something, and characters challenge this idea. That despite the odds, she’s a girl, in a world where girls her age have been killed. It’s something to be proud of! It’s such a nice message in middle grade. Plus, girls supporting each other is always a win in my book.

Shards of Earth by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Status: 20%

The war is over. Its heroes forgotten. Until one chance discovery . . .

Idris has neither aged nor slept since they remade him in the war. And one of humanity’s heroes now scrapes by on a freelance salvage vessel, to avoid the attention of greater powers.

After earth was destroyed, mankind created a fighting elite to save their species, enhanced humans such as Idris. In the silence of space they could communicate, mind-to-mind, with the enemy. Then their alien aggressors, the Architects, simply disappeared – and Idris and his kind became obsolete.

Now, fifty years later, Idris and his crew have discovered something strange abandoned in space. It’s clearly the work of the Architects – but are they returning? And if so, why? Hunted by gangsters, cults and governments, Idris and his crew race across the galaxy hunting for answers. For they now possess something of incalculable value, that many would kill to obtain.

Space operas have been a mostly miss category for me, but after reading a few last year and loving them, I’ve decided to give them another go. Unfortunately, the beginning of this book seems to fall into a lot of the things I really don’t like about sci-fi (which is why I tend to be picky about which ones I read). I’ve heard some people say the beginning is really slow but it picks up, and I think I’m just hitting the point where it does so, given what just happened in what I read last night!

The beginning is definitely slow, though, and I spent most of the time absolutely lost and confused, which is a problem I tend to have with sci-fi worlds. I’m not a tech person, and I have trouble picturing things, so I really don’t tend to like books that hinge on a lot of technical jargon and aliens and a bunch of weird names of things I don’t know. That’s definitely a me thing and not the book, though.

So unfortunately, I don’t have a whole lot to say about this book yet, even though I’ve got a good chunk under my belt. It’s been slow, but not so bad that I want to just DNF it and be done with it. I’m enjoying it, but I’m not exactly dying to keep reading it. It’s a pretty solid middle of the road so far, but from what I’ve read in reviews, that might be about to change soon!

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Let Sleeping Dragons Lie by Garth Nix
Status: 16%

Sir Odo and Sir Eleanor still think of themselves as unlikely knights. But when their kingdom is threatened by forces of signifant nefariousness, they and their talking swords join a bold quest to rescue a monarch, vanquish deadly beasts, confound a prophecy, and (if they’re lucky) avoid stepping on the tail of a very powerful dragon.

I had fun with the first book, so when I was looking for another audiobook, I figured I’d just go ahead and grab this one. Seemed like a natural progression to me. I’ve got a couple holds out for audiobooks in the future, but none of them have come in yet and this was just available, so it was obviously fate. Plus, it has talking swords and a dragon. So yeah. No-brainer there.

I haven’t gotten very far into this book yet, but I’m enjoying it so far. It picks up exactly where the last book ended, which is right in the middle of some action. It’s a bit darker than the first book already, I think, but I like how that will probably push our protagonists to new heights. I’m interested to see what new trouble they find themselves in!

   

I’m gonna be honest … I have absolutely no idea what comes next. I have books I should have read already that I still need to read and just an overwhelm of books and things right now. I’ve had some good intentions to knuckle down and knock out some books, but my grandfather’s very sick lately, so now that school is over, my free time has gone there. It’s been interesting. So I’m going to list some books here and I have no idea if I’ll even have time to get to them or not. Cross your fingers?

The Shadow of the Gods

I should’ve read this already, but I just haven’t had the chance. So here we are. I actually did read the first chapter, and I’m really excited to dive into the rest of it. Sounds like it’s going to be an absolutely fantastic book, as one might expect from John Gwynne. I’ve also been hearing wonderful things about it! Oh, and you see that fierceness on the cover there? Yup, dragons are involved!

The Swimmers

I’m about halfway through this, and it was put on hold so that I could get through some blog tour reads. I just haven’t had a chance to pick it up again. Before I move on to new books, though, I really want to finish the books I already started and get them done.

What are you reading this week? Share in the comments below!

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