The thing about Bleak House is it looks intimidating, but it's just a soap opera. In my experience, it also benefits from breaks -- it was originally a serial, after all.

Thank you Calli! I needed lyrics. And the Gillian Anderson version was one of my draws for reading it, I heard that was good when it came out. I think I saw the Great Expectations with her as Miss Havisham and that was...I don't know. I never really got the hang of Great Expectations.

sj, I would love to talk about Witness for the Dead

If anyone has finished Witness for the Dead (the Goblin Emperor sequel) and wants to discuss it, I need to talks about it with someone.

Oh, yes! I read it last weekend (or the weekend before, time is still pretty freaking elastic). Enjoyed it although didn't adore it the way I loved GE. I think I would appreciate Thara being more open with his emotions, at least to himself?

But I really enjoyed the world-building and the day-to-day ness of it all. This is life in this city for ordinary people, unlike life in the capital as Emperor. Liked that a lot.

-t and Consuela, I really really wanted to love WftD. I couldn't put it down, but I was very unsatisfied at the end. I kept expecting the different cases to somehow come together more satisfyingly in the end, but the serial killer was no one we knew and there was no final twist with the dead opera singer. She was a horrible person who went too far in blackmailing someone? Really, that's all we get? I did love the narrator though.

Oh, I really liked that he just had all these different things to deal with - the murder and the other murder and the authentic will question and the ghouls and the politics among the prelates and the fire and probably some other things I've forgotten and none of them really tidy. I don't know, that really worked for me. I can't remember if I said this already, but that aspect reminded me of Judge Dee stories. Also, I suspect I will forgive a lot if you give me a riot at the opera.

I hope there will be more. If Katherine Addison just wants to carve out a niche of detective fiction set in fantasy worlds I am here for it [I also really liked Angel of the Crows]

-t, I think I could get behind all the daily stories if I felt I got some sort of emotional catharsis at the end, but I didn't feel like any of the stories gave me a good pay off. Although, the opera riot was fun. I wanted to know more about the opera itself. I do love a good fantasy detective story, and would likely read it if she wrote another one because I really liked the narrator.

Yes, I want more Thara stories in particular. I love his combination of emotional damage and sincere desire to be of help wherever he can.

I was disappointed, now that I think about it, with not finding out what Tura’s secret was, but if the characters are content with that I suppose I should try to be as well. Or something.

Mary Robinette Kowal's "The Calculating Stars" is on sale on Amazon for $2.99. It's good ... I haven't read the sequels, but I enjoyed this.

I loved that whole series, but the first one was definitely the best.

I tried The Calculating Stars earlier this year. The pilot/airplane/operations/maintenance/airshow/flying stuff was so badly done, I rage quit about a third of the way through, never made it to space.