"Easy peasy easy peasy easy peasy easy peasy."

[brilligspoons]

Vacation was glorious. I had a hard time last night, both because I knew I had to go into work today and because my niece had an emotional breakdown over me leaving, but it's also nice to be back in Boston and in my apartment, so. Yeah. Am adjusting back to life with mass transportation and no car (sort of strange how quickly I got used to driving again). I went to the beach twice and am tan/sunburned. We also went to Jenkinson's on Friday night, and I have bruises in weird places from going on rides that were not made for adults. Ahh, the things I do for my nephew. (Look, there is even pictorial evidence that I had fun.)

Mostly I spent the week reading/sleeping/watching TV/playing Wii sports with the kids. Mom was in the hospital for several days with a heart problem (she's fine now!), so we had dinner on Wednesday at Julia's instead of the parents' and went to fireworks after that. I saw Spider-man on Tuesday with Ashley and hung out with Loretta and Jay on Saturday night. Did some writing but not much. Cathy and I saw Moonrise Kingdom and loved it. Basically all was well in my world.

And I feel like I need another vacation to recover from it. *flops*

I managed to read 4 books and start a 5th this week! It's the most I've read in quite a while. I enjoyed all of them in varying degrees, so have a quick overview:

1. Touch of Frost (Jennifer Estep) - There are 2 strikes against this novel, one being the overuse of epithets, the other being the main character's tendency to slut-shame every couple of pages. Uh, other than those, I really enjoyed it? Like, it's a really awesome idea for a story, and I liked Gwen a lot when she wasn't judging these 2 or 3 other girls who happened to have slept with a couple boys. If you're able to ignore these things, I recommend at least trying it. I've put the second story on hold - we'll see if the author tones the stupid shit down at all.

2. After Midnight (Teresa Madeiros) - Basically this is a typical period romance novel but with vampires and vampire hunters. It was enjoyable, and the heroine was pretty awesome. Ta-da!

3. The Night Tourist (Katherine Marsh) - sky_was_green recommended this to me, and it only took me until the end of the fourth page to understand why she liked it (Jack, the main character, agonizes over which meaning of the word occidit to use in his translation of Book Ten of the Metamorphoses). Overall it was super charming! I think it dragged a bit in places, and it waited too long to reveal some plot points, but I liked it a lot.

4. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake (Aimee Bender) - I. Love. This. Book. It's beautifully written, and the concept is SO interesting. I highly recommend it. Love love love love love. :D

I started reading Angelmaker (Nick Harkaway), but it's boring, so I'm probably going to drop it soon. Also started Joy for Beginners (Erica Bauermeister), but I haven't read enough to form an opinion yet.

Anyway. How are you, friends? Do anything exciting last week? :D?

Comments

[la-petite-singe.livejournal.com]

Yay Moonrise Kingdom! I liked it quite a lot too. And yay, glad to see someone else liking The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake--I've seen a lot of people who weren't into it, but I found it really striking. I kinda wasn't quite expecting that sort of magical realism or whatever, but it really worked. Sounds like a fun vacay. ;)

[brilligspoons.livejournal.com]

You know, it's funny you say that about Particular Sadness, because a friend of mine told me this morning that she's only seen good reviews about it. Interesting. But yes! I liked it a lot! I was expecting it to be a bit more fantasy than it was, but I agree, it was really well done.

[quatredeathlady.livejournal.com]

A co-worker I am slowly becoming friends with recommended this book to me (although I haven't started it yet because my reading list is VERY LONG RIGHT NOW), so I'm glad to see your positive review of it. Now I'm looking forward to it even more!

[brilligspoons.livejournal.com]

Yay! Yes, it's very good, and I hope you get to it soon!

[max-n-leo.livejournal.com]

Now we must hang out!

[brilligspoons.livejournal.com]

That's RIGHT, you're up here now! How's the job working out? and everything else?

[max-n-leo.livejournal.com]

Job's going good, living at home's not too bad yet but I'm definitely ramping up the apartment search because there's no way I'm lasting past August.

[brilligspoons.livejournal.com]

I can imagine it's a bit of a shock after living on your own for three years. Whereabouts are you looking to live? Closer to work, I assume?

[max-n-leo.livejournal.com]

I'll probably end up in Marlboro or Maynard, because that's what I can afford.

[1-rhiannon-1.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you had a nice vacation! Reading, sleeping, & watching TV sounds aces to me right about now! :D

[brilligspoons.livejournal.com]

It was SO NICE. I haven't taken a real vacation since, um, ever. XD

[barbed-whispers.livejournal.com]

lemon cake! i also really liked An Invisible Sign of My Own by bender, although it's pretty different.

[brilligspoons.livejournal.com]

Ooo, I'll have to look that one up! After Lemon Cake, I'm pretty much willing to read anything she's ever written.

[barbed-whispers.livejournal.com]

i need to get my hands on more of her stuff! i think my library has two more of her books, but i'm so swamped with other reading stuff that i keep forgetting about them :/