I'm on a YA kick this week. I've read Matched, Crossed, and Reached and just started Graceling.

le nubian, I read it and liked it. The ending was more surprising than I anticipated. I did read it relatively slowly, though, which is unusual for me. Not as devoury. I liked it better than Casual Vacancy which I never finished.

I'm reading it now. I thought I would try to get it back before the due date (as I actually got 1 of the 2 copies the SFPL had before the deluge of holds, 540 and counting with 100+ copies ordered) but, like Kat, have been reading it slowly. Note: I will return it on time, however.

I agree it is not something one devours, but I'm liking it with 3/4 read.

Yeah. the pacing of the prose keeps me interested, but I only read for x amount of time. I'm not very far yet. I hope to get halfway or finish this weekend.

But it's funny because it's not plodding. It's not that it's painful or just genuinely a slow read. It's like a pot of soup that bubbles along but doesn't force you to eat it all right now.

That is possibly the worst analogy, but there you go.

I am currently also reading The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England which is also very enlightening, but certainly slow going.

It's like a pot of soup that bubbles along but doesn't force you to eat it all right now.

You're implying some pretty forceful, maybe even non-consensual soups out there. There are safe places for you, Kat. We can get you away from your problem.

Just..not soup kitchen. Too soon.

Okay, I inhaled Deadline and Blackout last night. Uh, wowza. Seanan definitely seems to be a scholar in the Whedon/Minear school of writing. Kept me guessing on who was going to live or die. I was torn between hoovering the story up and savoring it. I hoovered, so I'll have to go back and read more slowly.

Oh yeah, Seanan will kill everyone. But she does it well, and not gratuitously.

I hoovered Blackout even though I'd already read/edited it. So addictive.

I am re-reading Mary Stewart, starting with Madam, Will You Talk? and Wildfire at Midnight. I'd read them backwards and forwards twenty years ago, and I was a little anxious that they wouldn't bear up, but gosh, they do. Witty, suspenseful, beautifully crafted. and evem though they're Gothic romances, the relationships do develop somewhat reasonably, rather than "Oh, I'm in danger, oh, he's handsome, oh, we're getting married." There's generallly, "I'm in danger, he's handsome, darn it, I think he's the killer I'd better watch myself very carefully." Heroines with brains and a lick of self-preservation instinct. Generally.

I'm saving Crystal Cave and Hollow Hills and Last Enchantment for last.

Reading her books is a masterclass in setting up character and situation. With Mid-Century being the Next Big Thing, her books should get a renaissance, if all was fair.