Ooh, it's so great to get to read your thoughts on your reading too, thank you!
Elizabeth Acevedo: You read The Poet X, right? (I think you're even the person I first heard about it from!) That may still be my favorite of her three novels I've read, though that may be partly because of how with that book she came out of nowhere and bowled me over. But all her books are excellent, and I can't get over how she's been putting out one a YEAR. How.
Oh, interesting that you were also mixed on The Secret Commonwealth, since I remember discussing it briefly with you back when you read it – and the earlier, longer version of this post actually cited you! (Because I remember you saying how it stays engaging storytelling even though it's basically just a long parade of Lyra having conversations with different people.) I also will 99% certainly read the third book when it comes out, but I guess I wouldn't say I feel excited about it. Which is sad because I LOVE the original trilogy so much!
Six of Crows...same as you, I think, more or less. I actually found the first book highly page-turning – despite it being 500 pages and a heist story (so very much not my genre)! But, yes, from the way others had talked about the books, I'd expected Kaz to be this amazing, complex character, an "honor among thieves," outside the law but adheres even more strictly to his own moral code, and fiercely loyal and protective of his crew, kind of thing. Which he kind of is; but even more, he's just impossibly clever at being 10 steps ahead of everyone else at all times, and having backup plans within backup plans. I really felt for his struggles, and I was pleased with the point he and Inej reached by the end of the second book, but I never got that beloved antihero feeling that others seem to have.
One review I read of Six of Crows suggested the whole thing would work a lot better if the characters were in, say, their 30s instead of 17! And that's stuck in my head ever since. (Though Crooked Kingdom actually worked a bit better than Six of Crows as a book about teenagers, since there's such a theme of fathers in it.) They're all just so impossibly talented at skills that would surely take decades to acquire. I mean, I know the whole YA genre thing is that all characters basically have to be that YA-ideal age of 17, and yet act and think and handle things like adults, and also incidentally save the world. ;-) But for these characters especially, I could really see them making a lot more sense if they'd had a couple decades of acquiring the skills, but also the traumas, of Barrel life. Kaz and Inej especially, I think would work really well as two people who've been burned by life for so long, they thought they'd never be able to connect with anyone again. Rather than being (admittedly very and understandably traumatized, but) comparatively fresh-faced teenagers. :-)
My library has also reopened for holds pick-up! And of course I've already returned to my habits of placing way, way too many holds. :-)
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Elizabeth Acevedo: You read The Poet X, right? (I think you're even the person I first heard about it from!) That may still be my favorite of her three novels I've read, though that may be partly because of how with that book she came out of nowhere and bowled me over. But all her books are excellent, and I can't get over how she's been putting out one a YEAR. How.
Oh, interesting that you were also mixed on The Secret Commonwealth, since I remember discussing it briefly with you back when you read it – and the earlier, longer version of this post actually cited you! (Because I remember you saying how it stays engaging storytelling even though it's basically just a long parade of Lyra having conversations with different people.) I also will 99% certainly read the third book when it comes out, but I guess I wouldn't say I feel excited about it. Which is sad because I LOVE the original trilogy so much!
Six of Crows...same as you, I think, more or less. I actually found the first book highly page-turning – despite it being 500 pages and a heist story (so very much not my genre)! But, yes, from the way others had talked about the books, I'd expected Kaz to be this amazing, complex character, an "honor among thieves," outside the law but adheres even more strictly to his own moral code, and fiercely loyal and protective of his crew, kind of thing. Which he kind of is; but even more, he's just impossibly clever at being 10 steps ahead of everyone else at all times, and having backup plans within backup plans. I really felt for his struggles, and I was pleased with the point he and Inej reached by the end of the second book, but I never got that beloved antihero feeling that others seem to have.
One review I read of Six of Crows suggested the whole thing would work a lot better if the characters were in, say, their 30s instead of 17! And that's stuck in my head ever since. (Though Crooked Kingdom actually worked a bit better than Six of Crows as a book about teenagers, since there's such a theme of fathers in it.) They're all just so impossibly talented at skills that would surely take decades to acquire. I mean, I know the whole YA genre thing is that all characters basically have to be that YA-ideal age of 17, and yet act and think and handle things like adults, and also incidentally save the world. ;-) But for these characters especially, I could really see them making a lot more sense if they'd had a couple decades of acquiring the skills, but also the traumas, of Barrel life. Kaz and Inej especially, I think would work really well as two people who've been burned by life for so long, they thought they'd never be able to connect with anyone again. Rather than being (admittedly very and understandably traumatized, but) comparatively fresh-faced teenagers. :-)
My library has also reopened for holds pick-up! And of course I've already returned to my habits of placing way, way too many holds. :-)