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1. Finished reading Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens.
I enjoyed this book, but I can't say I loved it. Delia Owens is a very good naturalist writer or nature writer. Her prose is poetic, and she captures the marshlands and the setting quite well. Also, her characters are for the most part captivating.
Unfortunately she's not the best at plotting a murder mystery. The mystery doesn't quite work -- particularly if you know a lot about criminal procedure, and have read a lot of mystery novels -- by accomplished mystery novelists. And there are various items revealed at the very end of the novel that do not track. This novel is told principally through Kya, the heroine's point of view, yet -- for the reveal to work at the end, certain items should have been revealed far earlier or handled differently. I found the last fifty pages of the book to be a bit jarring.
The book would have worked far better if it had ended about twenty or thirty pages earlier than it did.Endings are hard for fictional writers -- because writers can err in one of too ways, saying too much or too little. If you say too little, it's unsatisfying, if you say too much -- it can be jarring and the suspension of disbelief is gone. (ie. It's too neat.)
( Spoilers )
2. Finished Binge-Watching Stranger Things S3 -- it's only eight episodes, so relatively short to binge.
I liked it better than S2, in some respects. Better paced. But there's way too much time spent on romantic banter that doesn't really go anywhere. ( vague spoilers )There is no sexual content in this season by the way. ( spoilers )
The Duffer Brothers may be good at horror, but romantic comedy and romance is not their forte.
What worked was the suspense, the friendships, and the feeling of urgency. What did not work was the endless bickering. There's an art to writing good romantic banter and the Duffer's don't have it. We're watching a monster come after these characters or other characters are in jeopardy, and people are wasting time bickering over whether or not they want to date or various romantic misunderstandings.
It's sort of reassuring when other characters who are looking on feel the need to smack them upside the head or inform them to get their shit together.
The monster is rather HP Lovecraftian this go around. Although it always was.
It's also rather gross. And there's definitely an Invasion of the Body Snatchers meets government conspiracy and Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming Communist Threat. The references to 1980s fears and horrors abound. Not to mention the movies. From a pure level of nostalgia, it's a lot of fun. At one point, a rather climatic point, we get a duet of the theme song from The Neverending Story.
( plot spoilers )
It's good in places, but grating in others. So, I'd give it about a B. I found it entertaining for the most part. I wouldn't say it was that scary -- no more scary than Buffy or Angel.
3. Finally had a thunderstorm today. And looks like we may have another. Although doesn't feel like it. The air pressure leading up to the first one was making me ill. So very happy it's over now. I had the migraine from hell. Barometric pressure and sinus pressure plus hormonal fluctuations do not make for fun times. Took meds before the vertigo came on -- Tynenol Sinus + Pressure works beautifully, as does a cold pack on the diaphragm. (ETA: It's Shark Week aka period from hell.)
4. I hope the people in California are okay? The news reports a string of severe earthquakes in the area. The latest was a 7.5 somewhere in the Mojave Desert of all places. No one appears to be injured, just very shaken. This is the reason my brother and his wife left California in the 1990s, they couldn't handle the crazy earthquakes.
Truth is you can sort of get that anywhere. The East Coast is on a major fault line, it's just a little more stable at the moment.
I enjoyed this book, but I can't say I loved it. Delia Owens is a very good naturalist writer or nature writer. Her prose is poetic, and she captures the marshlands and the setting quite well. Also, her characters are for the most part captivating.
Unfortunately she's not the best at plotting a murder mystery. The mystery doesn't quite work -- particularly if you know a lot about criminal procedure, and have read a lot of mystery novels -- by accomplished mystery novelists. And there are various items revealed at the very end of the novel that do not track. This novel is told principally through Kya, the heroine's point of view, yet -- for the reveal to work at the end, certain items should have been revealed far earlier or handled differently. I found the last fifty pages of the book to be a bit jarring.
The book would have worked far better if it had ended about twenty or thirty pages earlier than it did.Endings are hard for fictional writers -- because writers can err in one of too ways, saying too much or too little. If you say too little, it's unsatisfying, if you say too much -- it can be jarring and the suspension of disbelief is gone. (ie. It's too neat.)
( Spoilers )
2. Finished Binge-Watching Stranger Things S3 -- it's only eight episodes, so relatively short to binge.
I liked it better than S2, in some respects. Better paced. But there's way too much time spent on romantic banter that doesn't really go anywhere. ( vague spoilers )There is no sexual content in this season by the way. ( spoilers )
The Duffer Brothers may be good at horror, but romantic comedy and romance is not their forte.
What worked was the suspense, the friendships, and the feeling of urgency. What did not work was the endless bickering. There's an art to writing good romantic banter and the Duffer's don't have it. We're watching a monster come after these characters or other characters are in jeopardy, and people are wasting time bickering over whether or not they want to date or various romantic misunderstandings.
It's sort of reassuring when other characters who are looking on feel the need to smack them upside the head or inform them to get their shit together.
The monster is rather HP Lovecraftian this go around. Although it always was.
It's also rather gross. And there's definitely an Invasion of the Body Snatchers meets government conspiracy and Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming Communist Threat. The references to 1980s fears and horrors abound. Not to mention the movies. From a pure level of nostalgia, it's a lot of fun. At one point, a rather climatic point, we get a duet of the theme song from The Neverending Story.
( plot spoilers )
It's good in places, but grating in others. So, I'd give it about a B. I found it entertaining for the most part. I wouldn't say it was that scary -- no more scary than Buffy or Angel.
3. Finally had a thunderstorm today. And looks like we may have another. Although doesn't feel like it. The air pressure leading up to the first one was making me ill. So very happy it's over now. I had the migraine from hell. Barometric pressure and sinus pressure plus hormonal fluctuations do not make for fun times. Took meds before the vertigo came on -- Tynenol Sinus + Pressure works beautifully, as does a cold pack on the diaphragm. (ETA: It's Shark Week aka period from hell.)
4. I hope the people in California are okay? The news reports a string of severe earthquakes in the area. The latest was a 7.5 somewhere in the Mojave Desert of all places. No one appears to be injured, just very shaken. This is the reason my brother and his wife left California in the 1990s, they couldn't handle the crazy earthquakes.
Truth is you can sort of get that anywhere. The East Coast is on a major fault line, it's just a little more stable at the moment.