Hello!
I managed five books in August, although one was a short story, and one was pretty short. Three of them are re-reads, and I’m audiobooking them all this time to keep my occupied at work.
Caelena is a skilled assassin who’s been sentenced to life in the salt mines. Found a year after being there, she’s offered a deal by the crown prince: compete in a tournament his father has had set up for a King’s Champion, or rot in the mines. Wisely, she chooses to compete. Even a year in the salt mines hasn’t dulled her skills too badly, and as the tournament progresses Caelena finds things aren’t as straight forward as they seem. What do a ghost, a princess of a recently conquered kingdom, and random killings in the palace have to do with the tournament, and the King’s need for a champion?
The advantage of re-reading these books is I can pick up on the little things I wouldn’t have noticed before, like her mentioning she’d been in the Red Desert in the past. I was also able to pick up on more of what each character is like. So I appreciated that. Caelena is a complicated character, and while it’s not as obvious in this book, there are bits you can pick up on.
Crown of Midnight – Sarah J Maas
In this, Caelena is the King’s Champion, while also trying to further her own agenda. Rumor has it a group of people are in rebellion against the king, and Caelena has been tasked with finding and executing them. When one of them turns out to be a friend of hers, possibly with his own plans, what will Caelena do?
I didn’t like this one as much, mostly because there’s a death in this book I really dislike. I realize it’s necessary, but I don’t like it. Knowing more about the series, I was able to pick up on more clues, including Caelena’s mention of an Asterian Mare from the past. I also think I don’t love this book as much as the first because at the end, Caelena gets sent to Wendlyn, and that book, book 3, is one I really didn’t care for.
Caelena is sent to Wendlyn, across the sea, to assassinate the king and crown prince. Only, she doesn’t. When she’s picked up by a Fae warrior, and sent to training to see if she’s good enough for her aunt, Maeve, she has to look inside herself and see if she has what it takes to be the person she was meant to be, or if she’s only worth being Caelena Sardothian, King’s Chmapion.
This book is complicated, which is good, but also slow, which isn’t. There’s a lot going on in the book. Caelena is dealing with Rowan, a Fae warrior, and life in a demi-fae settlement, as well as training, using magic, and shifting. Chaol has agreed to return to his home and learn to rule there, but he’s also dealing with the rebellion, and a surprising member of it. Dorian is battling with laten magic he didn’t know he had, and an interest in Sorcha, the healer who’s helping him. And, we get Aedion, who is one of the king’s generals, cousin to Caelena, and part of the rebellion.
So, very complicated, and Caelena’s training with Rowan felt like Groundhog day, or K-19. Over and over, she doesn’t want to use her magic or shift forms, and over and over they battle over it. It got old. The last 1/3 of the book is where it finally picks up, and that’s where I enjoyed most of it.
Life Sentence – J. Edward Wynia
This was an Amazon giveaway that I did not win, but I decided to pick the book up anyway. I’m glad I did, I enjoyed it quite a bit. Doyle is terraforming a moon to make it ready for settlers. Once he and the team he’s on finish it up, they enter the last phase of the project, where they’ll be citizens of the colony. For Doyle and the team, this is great, as they were all prisoners before coming to set up the colony.
This one messed with my mind. When the story opens, there’s only 2 of the team of 5 left, the others having died in accidents during the setup phase. Doyle is passing the time by counting steps and motions and other things, while he goes about his daily routine. By the end of the story, the colony is ready for settlers, and Doyle gets his information, but it’s not really what he expected. And there was the mindscrew.
The one thing I didn’t like in the book, and that threw me off, was the counting. Doyle starts off counting, and it feels unnecessary. Then it’s explained he does it to pass the time and keep himself normal, and all that. Then it’s never mentioned again.
The counting pulled me out of the story until it was explained, and then never picked up, and that really annoyed me. Annoyed me enough that 3 weeks after finishing the story, I still remember it. Aside from that, the story was very interesting and I enjoyed it.
How to Write Short Stories And Use Them to Further Your Writing Career – James Scott Bell
This was recommended by the author of Life Sentence, above, so I checked it out. I was not super impressed with it. Bell points out that all fiction has a “shattering moment” and that was something I hadn’t considered. But. He doesn’t go into a lot of what makes good short stories. It was more the shattering moment, and a few things I’ve heard before, and then the second half of the book was some short stories he’d suggested for reading, including one of his own. I didn’t find most of them that interesting really.