I bet she could have, at that. Sigh.

Yes, Fantastic Mr Fox. A family favorite.

Well, you get a girl who’s got un-naturally high spying skills ingratiating herself with a noble family, and working at rebellion…. just… one has crows and is related to Tortall.

Other Jenny! YES! That is EXACTLY what I was thinking of. I knew it felt like a DWJ trick but the voices in my head (“Of course, dear!”) didn’t sound like DWJ characters. YES. It was Magic By the Lake, and I was also sort of thinking of the time in Half Magic when they fixed it so the mother agreed with everything the kids said. Solid call.

Oh wow, you take books off your TBR list after reading bad reviews? I almost never remember to do that. Then I see the book on my list later, remember someone whose opinion I trust didn’t like it, and never ever read it. But it just hangs out on my TBR list forever. :p

YES. Exactly what you just said. Hope springs eternal, and I keep trying with all these fairy tale adaptations, but the fact is that most of them are only so-so. Alas.

I didn’t sign up for any challenges this year because I failed so badly last year. My new thing is that I don’t formally sign up, with an announcement or anything, but I just participate in them if I happen to read something that fits. 🙂

You should absolutely start with her work for this challenge. Howl’s Moving Castle is a good place to start.

*laugh* It’s not that unusual a title, I’m not surprised you got confused.

Drat, bother, I missed yours too! I’ve added a link now.

A good reading experience can make a just-okay book seem really wonderful. There have been a lot of books that I read at just the right moment for me and that book, and when I tried to go back to them, the moment was gone. It’s a thing.