winter reading

It's a short list this time but not short on pages. Mostly I slogged through the last four books of The Song Of Ice And Fire.

A Clash Of Kings by George R. R. Martin – book 2 of The Song Of Ice And Fire. The king is dead and five proclaimed kings battle for control of Westeros while another contender on another continent runs for her life with her hatchlings. Battle after battle, list of names after list of names and their colors and sigils, who fought for which king in which battle, people switching sides back and forth. Some characters continue, some die. My sister told me when I started reading these not to get too attached to any of the characters. I found this one to be a little tedious, too many battles and descriptions, the people of this land are cruel and brutal. I skipped over a lot of the lists of names, families and sigils. I enjoyed the sections where he actually progressed the story.

A Storm Of Swords by George R. R. Martin – book 3 of The Song Of Ice And Fire. Magic is returning to the world, the 10 year winter is coming, and the wildlings are pressing at the Wall, the northernmost border of the seven kingdoms. The game of thrones is still under way in Westeros with betrayal after betrayal while the last dragonking across the sea gathers her people and army.

A Feast For Crows by George R. R. Martin – book 4 of The Song Of Ice And Fire. Less focus on the battles as the wars are winding down, a lot of advancement of the story focused mostly on the southern half of Westeros and the struggles for supremacy and control, the 'game of thrones'. This world is populated with a cruel and violent people; a murderous, hacking, dismembering, raping, mutilating bunch, and they love to cut people's heads off and stick them on a pike. New characters are introduced. The ultra-religious rise and stir the pot. Some characters' story lines progress while others are seemingly forgotten. I stayed up late more than one night reading this one.

A Dance With Dragons by George R. R. Martin – finally finished the fifth book and he hasn't even begun to start to tie things up. Well, maybe started. New characters introduced, long standing characters killed off (wtf?), new characters introduced and killed off. And after five books, I find certain things repetitive...like describing every friggin' person's clothing every time they enter a room, like repeating an internal thought of a character over and over and over and over, like repeating the prayers of one of the religions every time they have a ritual. The dragon queen has gotten bogged down. It's almost like three separate stories that are only loosely related with a forth story line that I have yet to see how it is necessary since it hasn't really impacted any of the other three major ones. Well, I'm glad to be done with these and it's sort of a let down that after 5,000+ pages the story is still open and unending. And as near as I can tell, he isn't even writing the last 2 yet.

T Is For Trespass by Sue Grafton – after all that heavy reading for most of the quarter, I thoroughly enjoyed this light thriller. Main character and private eye Kinsey Millhone is asked to do a background check on a caregiver for her elderly neighbor who fell and couldn't get up. The woman gets a clean referral but she's actually a predator using a stolen identity. Suspicions mount up as Kinsey strives to find out what's going on before her neighbor comes to a bad end.

Mama Ruby by Mary Monroe – a quick grab off the new acquisitions shelf at the library, I didn't want to spend a long time looking for something to read, it's the story of two black teenaged girls in Louisiana during WWII, one a preacher's daughter, the other the daughter of a whore. They become unlikely friends and this is the story of their friendship. They leave home at 15 and go to New Orleans to find their fortunes and husbands.