I brave the scorn to say I really enjoyed the hell out of Carey's books. But I also read superfast, so boring parts aren't frustrating to me. But I really wasn't bored by a lot and I love the long multi-volume books, because they take me longer than a couple of hours to read. I thought they were fun.

Oh, me too. It was late in the second book before I really had all my de Somervilles and Trevalions and L'Enverses straight, but I totally enjoyed the ride. But few things make me happier than discovering a new long multivolume series that hits one of my sweet spots as a reader.

But few things make me happier than discovering a new long multivolume series that hits one of my sweet spots as a reader.

Yes, indeedy. It's like finding a new author.

Are the Jennifer Crusie books that were previously out of print and/or just plain hard to find now back in print? Because I bought Strange Bedfellows at Target.

Most of them are. There are two (three)? whose rights are still owned by the publishers. The Cinderella Deal is the most-regretted.

cross polinating:

More good news for me, in baby steps. Got a call from Book Passage (a really superb indy bookstore in toney Marin County); did I want to do a joint reading with another mystery writer on Saturday, 20 March?

Oh yes.

Deb, that's great! WHOOT!

Who's the other author?

(blink)

Java, good question; she told me at the beginning of the conversation, but my head was covered with goop and I was desperately trying to figure out how to get her promotional materials, before I remembered the readerville gallery page, and I was scrabbling for a pen and the salon's sound system was cranked up. Familiarish name from the mystery shelves, woman, I want to say Laura something. Has read at Book Passage before, I know that.

Yay for more deb readings! Was the other author Laura Lippman, perchance?

Brat Farrar is my favourite by Tey, but The Franchise Affair runs a close second. Oh, and Miss Pym Disposes!

sj, I liked The Reader , but I didn't feel particularly emotionally involved by it - and this at a time when (thanks to hormones) I cry at everything, including those Moveon.org commercials. OTOH, it could be that I'm just too woolly-headed from lack of sleep to appreciate a more demanding book right now.

Stupid things I have done this week thanks to sleep deprivation:
1. poured apple juice in my coffee.
2. tried to put two contacts in one eye (not admitting how long it took me to figure out what was wrong with my eyesight).

Dani, I adore all three of those - in fact I love everything she wrote - but I am The Daughter of Time's standard-bearer and cheerleadeer. Plus, damn near lifelong member of the Richard III anti-defamation corps, plus medieval historian, and between the two? I'm nuts for that novel.

Just read Donna Jo Napoli's Beast a retelling of Beaty and the beast. Really well done, and told more of the story before Belle. It was all from the Beast's perspective. Plus she is the head of the linguistics department at swathmore. Her last couple of pages on the language she used ( farsi ) and why she chose certain spellings was a lot of fun to read.

Beth, as the Typomeister supreme, may I say that I think Beatty and the Beast would make very interesting twisted RPF slash....