My sister, mother and husband all read James by Percival Everett before I did. It’s an interesting retelling of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of Jim. It’s been long enough since I read Twain’s book that I didn’t have any struggle with story line dissonance. (There may not be any.) It was much easier to read James’s code switching than Twain’s phonetics.

I reread the Murderbot series in the midst of watching it on Apple. I love Murderbot. It is soooooooooooooo sarcastic.

I read The Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen after watching Dept. Q on Netflix. I liked it.  It’s enough different from the show that I had a little dissonance until I was about 2/3 in.  Set in Denmark and it kind of has that Scandinavian darkness. I expect to read The Absent One before the end of the month.

The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman was fun look at the Arthurian legends. I was not appalled by some of the liberties he took. But, I can imagine that some purists would be.

I really liked Someone You Can Build a Nest In by John Wiswell. the descriptions of Shesheshen’s shapechanging are a little uncomfortable. But, that’s kind of the point. She is a magnificant monster and the story didn’t particularly go where I expected it to. It has a most satisfying ending.

I have A Song to Wake a Thousand Sorrows by Michelle Manus in my queue. (I’ve read all of her Nyx Fortuna books and I’m waiting on another one.) Along with that are Blob: A Love Story by Maggie Su, and Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V. E. Schwab.

But, first, I’m going to relisten to The Stardust Thief by Chelsea Abdullah. I really liked it and was excited to get the sequel. But, I found that I need a refresher before jumping into The Ashfire King. I think the problem is my memory, not Abdullah’s writing.