Something about the original Grisha trilogy has really stuck with me. At the time that I finished Ruin and Rising, the third book in that series, my passion and protectiveness of the main character Alina inspired a ranty, off-topic diatribe of a review about shipping wherein I was basically mad that other readers didn’t appreciate the book and the ending of the trilogy because they were mad their ship didn’t become canon. It’s a silly thing to become incensed about, but clearly something in the […]
Flirting over artifacts and forgeries
I’ve had Bound By Your Touch on my reading list for a long time, probably because at some point it was recommended by Malin or Mrs Julien or both. As per usual, a rec from these ladies turned out to be a pretty lovely romance. Heroine is Lydia Boyce, a spinster bluestocking (my favorite!) who works for her father in the trade of collectible Egyptian artifacts. Boyce Sr. is an academic archaeologist actively excavating, and Lydia is essentially his business manager back in Egypt. She […]
“For if the world treats you well, Sir, you come to believe you are deserving of it. ”
Alias Grace is Margaret Atwood’s imagining of the true story of Grace Marks, a convicted (and later pardoned) murderess… “Murderess is a strong word to have attached to you. It has a smell to it, that word—musky and oppressive, like dead flowers in a vase. Sometimes at night I whisper it over to myself: Murderess, Murderess. It rustles, like a taffeta skirt across the floor.” … in 19th century Canada whose sensationalistic trial left doubt as to the nature of her involvement in the double […]
A righteous defense of a difficult book
When an author of Courtney Milan’s caliber takes as much time as she (admittedly) does between books in her series, you often cope — as I did — by re-reading a bunch of her back catalog in between. Every re-read reminds you how she is working on another level from most other romance authors right now, between the articulation of the themes she explores and the maturity of the relationships she crafts. When her new book finally drops two years later, you hope, and expect, […]