48:120 The 'Z' Word by Faye Larson

Ben's day started out pretty normal, on his way to the bookstore to check things out, when a group of people started falling in on him and Great Coat Guy just outside the store.  They were able to fend the group off and get inside but the group is continuing to beat at the windows and moan. Ben can't help but think that a few massive pots of coffee might help them but he's not willing to risk a confrontation with the...protesters? That doesn't seem like quite the right word for them but the one word that does fit, and begins with z, is completely irrational and not to be thought.  Now if only he and stranger of the great coat, can figure out how to get out of this alive...

Short but fairly humorous tale of what you could most likely expect to happen to a person with moder sensibilities confronted by a moaning, shambling group of people.  Fun, quick read. For the record, I know the author and was given a copy with no expectation of review or payment.

Page count: 34p/9,9368p ytd/283,987p lifetime

47:120 The Water that Falls on You From Nowhere by John Chu

Matt lives in a world where when you lie, rain comes out of nowhere. It can be a simple shower for a half-truth to torrential downpour for something huge that you are denying even to yourself. On the flip side, telling big truths produces warmth that tingles and can dry everything out.  So when Gus tells Matt how much he loves him and there is warmth and not the slightest hint of humidity, Matt lies about his feelings and the rains come tumbling down. It's not so much about his feelings for Gus that cause Matt to deny it, but rather how it will affect his traditional Chinese parents who have been telling him his whole life how he must get married and have kids to pass down the family name. What will they say?! But at the same time, how much longer can he keep ducking this question before the rains tell them everything he wants to keep hidden?

A beautifully told tale of love and family and obligation in an interesting world building exercise.


Page count: 22p/9,934p ytd/283,953p lifetime

46:120 The Recitation of the Most Holy and Harrowing Pilgrimage of Mindy and Also Mork by Seanan McGuire

The events in this story take place immediately after Magic for Nothing.  Sam has promised Annie that he would get Mork and Mindy, the Aeslin mice, safely to the airport so they can make their way back to her family and let them know what she has learned on her travels since she feels she must disappear to keep the Covenant from finding them.  Sam has done so but he continues to worry about Annie but now her ghost aunt, Mary, has taken to haunting him occasionally and filling him in and he is trying to make peace with that.  We get to watch that journey as well as follow Mork and Mindy on their travels through the airport and trying to get on a plane to get them back to Portland safely.

In all, this was a nice way to wrap up some of the loose ends that were left after Magic for Nothing but I could see not fitting well into the next book.  I'm so very thankful that Ms. McGuire does these short stories and puts them out there for her fans.  It helps with the withdrawal symptoms between books.


Page count: 68p/9,912p ytd/283,931p lifetime

45:120 Darth Vader and Son by Jeffrey Brown

A cute series of single page comics showing Darth Vader being an actual parent to Luke and all that entails from taking him to the zoo to teaching him how to use the force to get his cereal to making sure he knows that Darth Maul and evil are who to cheer on.  You know, typical parenting things and definitely the sort that geek parents everywhere can relate to. :)


Page count: 64p/9,844p ytd/283,863p lifetime

44:120 Walkaway by Cory Doctorow

We are in a possible (probable future) where we can manufacture things so simply and easily that there should be no need for people to go without the basic necessities but the uber rich (zottas) have continued to try and keep things as the status quo (default).  Now there are parties where people find abandoned warehouses with manufacturing capability, play the music, drink, and make the stuff that people need for them to come take for free.  It is at one of these parties that Seth has dragged Etc. and they meet with a zotta girl, Natalie.  The party is broken up by drones and death which leaves them back at Natalie's house feeling very despondent when the idea gets floated about to go Walkaway, to join with those who have eschewed the Default society to try and create a more egalitarian society without want of basics and without money and zottas.  The three new friends go and find more than they ever thought they would but life is not easy as even among the Walkaways, there are those who want to impose their will upon others and there are those doing research that the zottas from default will stop at nothing to try and get their hands on.  Besides, Walkaway shows others from Default that the zottas are not needed to run things and challenges their whole way of life and sense of self, something they just cannot allow to continue.

I enjoyed the beginning of the book immensely and the end was good but the middle was much more of a slog and there were several jumps of many years that was quiet disorientating.  The book itself was definitely dystopian and scary in how easily I could see our world heading that direction.


Page count: 384p/9,780p ytd/283,799p lifetime

43:120 The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher

Carrie Fisher recently found her old journals written during the filming of Star Wars: A New Hope and that wash of memory led her to write this, an intimate look at her thoughts during that time and what was happening behind the scenes.  It includes many excerpts from her diaries during that time which offers an incredible look at her thoughts in an uncensored way.  She writes with wit and humor about her naivete but with candor about her relationship with her co-star, Harrison Ford (ok, a lot of naivete there as well) and all of that when writing about how being Leia changed her life and what those changes meant.  Having grown up with Star Wars (I was 2 when it came out in theaters) and looking up to Princess Leia as my role model through my childhood, I loved hearing from her directly about her thoughts on the experience.


Page count: 267p/9,396p ytd/283,799p lifetime

42:120 Magic for Nothing by Seanan McGuire

The 6th book in the Incryptid series.  Now that Verity has told the Covenant that there are still Prices in North America and all but declared war on them, the family is scrambling trying to figure out how to handle the crisis they know is coming. This means not only pooling all available resources but figuring out how to gain the intel they will need to try and plan. Unfortunately all their allies are the Incryptids they are trying to protect and their family genealogy is well known to the Covenant and they all tend to favor each other, except for the youngest Price child, Antimony. She has the look of a farther back ancestor, one known to the Covenant but not so clearly marked as being easily identifiable as a Price. As her family's only hope of finding out the Covenant's plans, she reluctantly agrees to go undercover and become a recruit for the enemy. As luck would have it, she doesn't even complete her training period before they send her into the field, a traveling carnival in North America as matter of fact, which if she can survive the assignment will make it that much easier to get home alive and intact. But when it comes out that the carnival needs protecting,things get a lot more complicated.

I really enjoyed the story and starting to know Antimony but I feel like her voice is the weakest of the Price kids so far so I'm really hoping that changes in the future. Right now it seemed like she spent too much time being the whining youngest child who was trying to figure out where she fit into everything but that left her with little of herself to show through. Hearing about her through Verity, it seemed like she would be maybe not better or above that but definitely more of her own person than this tale gave us. I do look forward to more books from her point of view though.


Page count: 352p/9,129p ytd/283,532p lifetime