December 7 - 13

The Country of Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett
Well, I finally finished this! And... it continued in largely the same vein. We learn about the characters when they tell us stories. The narrator left and then it ended. I wish we had had class to discuss this because I'm still not feeling like I got much from it. Discussing it with a group of intelligent people would have helped.

Cultural Anthropology: A Toolkit for a Global Age by Kenneth J. Guest
Its finals week, and I have re-read several chapters of this in-depth now. I have mentioned it before, and it's still holding up okay...for a textbook.

Victory of Eagles: A Novel of Temeraire (#5)  by Naomi Novik
This book is so exciting! I love hearing from Temeraire's perspective. Also, I was totally right: he led a rebellion of epic proportions and became a ranking officer! HA! I guess the joke is on them now! Anyway, it's just fantastic. After trying to kill all the dragons in the world, those officers deserve such an appropriate kind of embarrassment. I'm still suspicious of Iskierka, though she's acting all obedient and such now. I just don't see it lasting. Temeraire and some of the others are headed off to the front to keep Napoleon at bay, so we're getting to the exciting ending, I'm guessing!

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas
This was one of the books I found by browsing through books that were available as an e-book through my library at home. What a find! While it wasn't anything insane or totally new, it was enough to draw me in and keep me in until I finished it. I almost let myself be late for a dinner date so that I could finish it! I managed to put it down for a few hours though, and finished it in about a day. So, definitely a solid book. An 18-year-old female assassin of incredible renown is taken from a slave labor camp and entered into the king's competition for royal assassin, basically. There's some magic sprinkled in, and of course a love story with a handsome prince. **SPOILER UPCOMING** LUCKILY, their love story was ended before the end, thank GOODNESS, because I didn't really like that direction. It ended as well as it could, but the prince was all dramatic and "I could never be with someone else now that I know her!" so we'll see how he does with it, I guess. I'm glad she's going for the guard instead. He's more real, and I suspect he has ties to magic somehow...maybe he can see it too? He also has a way cooler name. **END SPOILERS*

Anyway, I'm currently waiting for a copy of the next one in the series. It made for a nice day's light read in a time of turmoil (so much work for finals!!).