April Reading

[sultrybutdamaged]

I read 11 books in April. This wasn’t an exciting reading months, but there were a couple that are worth talking about.

Vanity and Valour by Mary Robinette Kowal: Fourth in the Glamourist Histories series. This series has really grown on me. It’s a Regency featuring a married couple and light magical elements. I started out in the first book not liking Jane much as a character and having no investment in her relationship with Vincent, and now I love them both as people and as a pair. Plus, this book has a heist. A thing to know about me is that I will always read/watch something if it is marketed as “X meets Ocean’s Eleven.” A heist hits every time. This heist involves the main couple teaming up with a convent of Italian nuns and Lord Byron, which is really what all heists need.

Magic Lost, Trouble Found by Lisa Shearin: First in the Raine Benares series. This is a low fantasy/urban fantasy series and it is very tropey - noir-ish detective heroine, sudden power acquisition, love triangle - but fun. It ends with the heroine and her friends infiltrating a fancy dress party, which is another great trope, like a cousin to heists.

Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux: I have loved Phantom of the Opera, the musical, since I was about ten, so I picked this as my classics read for the month. Unfortunately, I was looking for a gothic romance, and instead I got an epistolary… comedy, I think, in places? There were parts that were funny, parts that were eerie (especially the descriptions of the Paris Opera House) and parts that were extended lectures on how optical illusions work. I recommend watching the movie, it’s great.

Second Kiss, Double Exposure and Second Chance by Chelsea M. Cameron: These three make up the Violet Hill series, a sapphic romance novella series set around a small town cafe in Maine. The books are written for fans of coffee shop AUs. Each one is a quick, fluffy romance with just a touch of angst and smut for flavor. To be honest, these books aren’t really my kind of thing, but if you do like this type of story they are done well. I was mostly invested for the coffee shop itself; I like quirky small towns and the idea of one with a whole thriving queer community is just very nice to think about.

Fool’s Gold by Jaye Wells: This is a prequel novella to the Sabina Kane series. A funny thing about these books: I know I read all of them except this one back when I was really into urban fantasy, because my Kindle says I did. And once I picked this one up, I vaguely remembered the premise - half-vampire assassin realizes she’s on the wrong side of a supernatural war. But that is all I remember. I think I just read so many of these types of books back then that they all blurred together. But this one is fun. It’s set in 1979 and has that gritty, 70’s feel that walks the line between moody and showy. Sabina is a young, eager, raw character here and I liked her a lot. I was less crazy about the plot itself - so many pimps and references to “females” - but I’m pretty sure that’s just because of the time frame.

The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon: It feels a little silly talking about this book because it got a lot of attention when it came out so another person saying “no, but really, it’s good” is pointless… but I loved it. It’s a stand alone fantasy and it just does all the big fantasy book stuff really well. I think most of the attention it got was for being feminist, which is true, but mostly just in the way the majority of the active characters are women and they are all complex and flawed. It has themes, like how myths get twisted to fit the agendas of the people who tell them, but it felt more like a plot and character book than an ideas book. The characters are diverse, with all kinds of cultures and religious beliefs that aren’t just for flavor, they actually impact the story. There are some good relationships, including a queer one that I didn’t see coming. The book is worth it for that alone since it’s so rare to find queer romances in fantasy that feel organic and not like “now the designated gay pair will kiss.” Also, amazing dragons. Helpful dragons you can ride and evil dragons who blow shit up. Something for everyone.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame Smith (and Jane Austen) I try not to be negative on here, but I hated this book. It started out funny enough, but it was just a joke that went on for way too long. And it felt like the author knew that “Jane Austen, but with random outbreaks of zombie battles” wasn’t enough to sustain the whole book, so he tried to make other jokes, and they just… weren’t funny. I skimmed the last few chapters because there was one incredibly drawn out and horribly ableist bit that kept coming back. I wouldn’t have finished this but I needed the ”monster on the cover” points for Realmathon.

Afrotistic by Kala Allen Oneida: This was for my Autistic Reads book club. It’s an own voices book with a Black, autistic heroine who starts a support group to get leadership points for an academic competition. The writing of this took me a couple chapters to get used to, but it ended up really working; it’s a teenager’s voice stripped of any “writer” flourishes, so it comes across like just unfiltered inner monologue. The strength of the book is in the variety of the characters and the style.

The Cerulean by Amy Ewing: The first half of a fantasy (or possibly a sci-fi-disguised-as-fantasy) duology, about a girl from a city in space who falls to the planet below in what is supposed to be a self-sacrifice to save her people, but instead ends up surviving and being captured by a PT Barnum-type character who wants to display her in his theater. I enjoyed this, but it’s very much the first half of a story. When I went to log it in StoryGraph, I learned that there was apparently some controversy about it, because the city in the sky has an all-female population and a society built around sapphic triad relationships, so readers were expecting a lesbian utopia, but instead the main character goes through a storyline where she comes out as… straight. And yeah, honestly, that part felt a little silly, but it wasn’t that big a deal. There were other queer characters and enough interesting stuff going on that I wasn’t too worried about the one girl having a personal crisis because she saw boys for the first time.

Comments

[rogueslayer452]

I recommend watching the movie, it’s great.

I definitely agree with that. :) And watch/listen some of the recordings from the Broadway production, too, if you can, because the performance is fantastic in its own right. (Sad that it has officially closed.)

I haven't read the book for The Phantom of the Opera, but it's been on my list to.

I've only heard of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies from the trailer of the movie, which I haven't seen, nor have I read the book, and while I don't care for Pride and Prejudice as a story (I don't care much for Jane Austen in general, really), I do like the concept of mixing genres, especially with reimagining/retelling a known story and switching it up. But it's all about the execution.

[sultrybutdamaged]

I love the Phantom recordings! I had a CD that I got when I was thirteen and played until it got stuck in my old car. I just downloaded what I thought was the same thing, but it’s actually the original London cast. I think I liked the Broadway one a little better for the voices but this one has the full soundtrack, not just cut down to the major songs.

I only read Pride and Prejudice, non-zombie version, a few months ago and I liked it a bit more than I thought I would, though I’m also not really an Austen fan. (I do like Northanger Abbey though.) I wonder if I would have liked the zombie movie better. They probably got rid of the worst jokes.

[svgurl]

There are a lot of interesting books here! I'm going to have to make a note of your list to check out some of these on my next library visit. I love coffee shop AUs when it comes to fic but I don't think I've ever read a book like that. It sounds fun! :D

[sultrybutdamaged]

Check those out! They’re really short, so low commitment.

[facethestrange]

"I was mostly invested for the coffee shop itself; I like quirky small towns and the idea of one with a whole thriving queer community is just very nice to think about."
Damn, this sounds DIVINE, even when everything else about this book series seems like the opposite of what I would like to read.

I have indeed heard quite a few people talk about The Priory of the Orange Tree, but it's always nice to see more perspectives, and get the answer to the 'do I actually want to read this book myself' question. (Right now it's a tentative yes.)

"it’s a teenager’s voice stripped of any “writer” flourishes, so it comes across like just unfiltered inner monologue"
That's something that is instantly appealing to me! I'll see about the book itself. :)

[sultrybutdamaged]

Right? I didn’t necessarily want to read more books in that series, I just wanted to move there.

[author_by_night]

This heist involves the main couple teaming up with a convent of Italian nuns and Lord Byron, which is really what all heists need.

Well, that's intriguing.

I'm also intrigued by a regency romantic couple that seems somewhat complicated? Like they're not initially invested, but perhaps fall in love? That's the vibe I get, which also appeals to me. (Given that marriages were usually arranged or at least "encouraged" back then, and even if not, you didn't really get to "date". I imagine a lot of couples found themselves in a strange place.)

[sultrybutdamaged]

So the first book in the Glamourist Histories is very heavily Jane Austen inspired. The main couple do fall in love before they get married, but it’s extremely quick (like you said, they don’t “date” back then, so it’s basically, “I like you, you like me, we’ve known each other for a couple weeks, let’s commit to a lifetime together even though we’ve had about two private conversations.”) And the second book especially deals with how little they know about each other and then having to figure out what their relationship really is. I didn’t love the first book but I’ve liked the ones after because they are very much about what happens after the wedding in these types of very controlled historical romances.

[author_by_night]

Would you suggest skipping to the second? Or do you have to have read the first?

[sultrybutdamaged]

Hmm… I think you could skip the first one? At least as far as the relationship goes, the interesting stuff starts with the second book. You might miss some character/background information though.

None of them are very long.