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Author: Jenny Hamilton

Reading the End Bookcast, Ep.25; Half-Year in Review, Sarah Lotz’s The Three, and a Wedding Game

Back from hiatus, the Jennys review the reading year thus far: What disappointed us, what thrilled us, and what are we looking forward to in the second half? We review Sarah Lotz’s book The Three, we play a game of Whiskey Jenny’s invention, and we answer a piece of listener mail about binge-reading. You can listen to the podcast in the embedded player below or download the file directly to take with you on the go. Episode 25 Or if you wish, you can find us on iTunes (and if you enjoy the podcast, give us a good rating! We…

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Review: My Real Children, Jo Walton

Jo Walton has carved out a very nice niche of deniably speculative fiction, in which supernatural elements are so lightly present that you could blink and miss them. Among Others caps off a full book of uncertainty about the reality of magic (by the reader — Mori believes it all along) with a legitimately otherworld fight that puts paid to any doubts you might have had. My Real Children (affiliate links: Amazon, B&N, Book Depository) goes even lighter on the magic; when Patricia makes her decision at the end, she might as easily be senile as brave. Patricia Cowan is…

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Review: Skim, by Mariko and Jillian Tamaki

“Being sixteen is officially the worst thing I’ve ever been,” says Kimberly Keiko Cameron at one point in the comic Skim. And the book certainly reminds you of all the things about being sixteen that were garbage — if not Kim’s particular problems, then certainly the general experience of being sixteen. Called “Skim” as an unkind joke — she isn’t slender, white, and blonde like the popular girls — Kim is an outsider at her private high school. She’s not an outsider in a Carrie way, but more in the sense that high school makes so many people outsiders: that…

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Review: Legend and Prodigy, Marie Lu

Here’s what I did that was foolish. I read Legend (affiliate links: Amazon, B&N, Book Depository), liked it, and considered writing my review of it right then. But my computer was kind of far away, and The Raven Boys was right next to my chair. So I read The Raven Boys. Now I can’t think about anything except for The Raven Boys. I’m going to do my best by Legend and the sequel, Prodigy, which I read on the Fourth of July. After failing the exams that would have given him a place in society, Day fled his home and…

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Gin Jenny Becomes a Cog in the Maggie Stiefvater Propaganda Machine (a review of The Raven Boys)

One time a while ago, Anastasia tweeted at me “OMG THE QUEEN OF ATTOLIA IS SO GOOD SEND HELP” (The Queen of Attolia is indeed so good you will definitely need help to be sent). While I was reading The Raven Boys, I wanted to take that whole tweet, substitute The Raven Boys for the title, and tweet it approximately every twenty pages. After a rocky start in which I engaged in some cranky grumbling about all the times Ana and Memory and Anastasia and Jill had been simultaneously wrong about a book (NB this has never happened), around page…

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An ongoing argument

Superego: Return your library’s ebook copy of The Dream Thieves straight away. Id: No. I want it. Superego: Yes, I know. But remember? You own it now! In hardback. You impulse-bought it at the store. Id: Because I wanted it. Superego: Yes, because you wanted it, and you didn’t run that purchase order by me before making it, but that’s all water under the bridge. Now you have it! Hooray! You have it in hardback. Return the library ebook copy so somebody else can read it. Id: But I want it. Superego: YOU WILL STILL HAVE IT. Id: Might want…

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Review: On Sal Mal Lane, Ru Freeman

I confess to being seduced into reading On Sal Mal Lane (affiliate links: Amazon, B&N, Book Depository) by its cover. I am helpless in the face of vibrant blue with bronze highlights. And with the stylized children on the bottom. I couldn’t resist. Look at this here: The Herath family moves into Sal Mal Lane before civil war breaks out in Sri Lanka. Their beauty and kindness to one and all bewilders and attracts the families in the lane: Old Mr. Niles, confined to his bed and dreadfully bored before Nihil Herath begins coming to talk to him; slow, careful Raju, who is devoted to…

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Not a dumb American: Afghanistan edition

Before I went to England to study abroad, in the interests of not being a dumb American, I memorized all the kings and queens of England in chronological order from William the Conqueror to now. As it turns out I should not have worried about this, because my flatmates were uninterested in history and world events and moreover did not know off the top of their heads what year the Magna Carta was signed (I do! 1215! And I have seen it live, in Salisbury!) So my power of reciting all the kings and queens of England in chronological order…

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Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn

Nothing I want to say about Gone Girl can be said without spoilers, so on the off chance that anybody reading this post has been slower than me to read Gone Girl, and cares about spoilers, begone with you! (Instead of reading this post, you should go read Ana’s post about books where The Twist dominates conversations about the book. Not apropos of anything! Not being pointed! Just an interesting read!) Okay! If you didn’t want to be spoiled, I hope you have stopped reading! I am going to say spoilers now! Now I’m going to say them. Right now.…

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