octavia_cade's Reviews (2.64k)

Really quite liked this. The "fight to the death" scenario isn't the most original but the character of Katniss elevated it, I think. I really liked her - pragmatic, self-reliant, unsentimental, willing to do what it takes and yet not a bitch.

It's just a shame she's stuck with a sap. Yeah, Peeta's a good guy but he is much less interesting to me than she is. I'm unspoiled for the rest of the books, but I've a feeling a love interest/love triangle storyline is coming and honestly, I don't see why this is such a omnipresent part of YA fiction. Well, no: I do see why, but I don't have to like it. How refreshing is it to have a girl with bigger concerns than romance? I'm hoping Katniss doesn't soften any, because I loved her in THG. Will definitely be reading the rest of the series to see what happens to her.

Oh, Rincewind. You're not my favourite Discworld character, and you're not even my favourite Discworld wizard (that would be the Bursar, who I find deeply, ridiculously hilarious) but on reread I do find myself warming to you. There you are, trying to make sense of the world in a non-magical way and it just doesn't have the good manners to cooperate.

Funnier than I remembered. Not Pratchett at his height but, as with "The Colour of Magic", you can see the signs of what's to come.

So. I've been a Pratchett fan for years. His books have been a staple present at birthdays and Xmas - Boxing Day with leftovers and the new Pratchett book are a happy tradition. And now he's dead. I am very sad.

Still, it's made me want to reread, and I've decided to work my way through the Discworld novels again. This is the first, and to be perfectly honest it's my least favourite. I'd have ranked it at two stars (ok) before this reread - and honestly, I think that holds up. But there's the odd image, the odd sentence, that shows the giant that Pratchett would become.

I'm really going to miss him.

So, this is where my Discworld reread really takes off. Rincewind has never been my favourite, but anything with Granny Weatherwax gets an automatic minimum of four stars. I love her. LOVE her.

Equal Rites also marks the point in Discworld where, for me, Pratchett starts to make his own stories a priority, whereas the previous two outings seemed to be there primarily to lampoon other fantasy literature. The jump in quality between ER and The Colour of Magic/The Light Fantastic is considerable, in my opinion. It's where humour starts to be in service to an individual point of view, rather than an end in itself.

A quick, enjoyable read. I think this is a topic that could be more extensively explored, but this works as an entertaining introduction. I got the impression, before Roberts ever referred in the text to posts, that this was a collection of blog posts and I believe this is the case. It's got that nice chatty blog vibe to it.

The chapter on Susan Sto Helit was my favourite, because it brought up some aspects of Susan that I hadn't considered before (like the fact that she's not ever the main character in her putative stories). Next time I reread Susan's stories I'll definitely be reading them through this lens.

Hilarious and heartbreaking and horrible all at once. My sister read it some years ago - it gave her nightmares and she refuses to read it again, but I dug my old copy out of the back of the bookshelf today because Mum wanted to borrow it. Read it again myself after she did - it's such a painful read. I never quite know, when I'm done with it, if I feel more gratitude or anger.

Those two main characters... they're such normal people. Inoffensive. It seems so unfair.

The first part of one of my all-time favourite books. I've just read it again and there's so much in it - and it's quite a simple story, really, Fellowship. It's the detail that gets me - the maps, the flora... the botanist in me is always pleased to read Tolkien. In another book, I'd whinge to myself about waffle and padding and the need for a red pen striking through entire passages, but the story's so wonderfully told I just don't care.

Lee's illustrations are lovely, too. He seems to have done a lot of art for the Tolkien books, which pleases me.

This is essentially an anthology, with an introductory essay and potted biographies of the various mystics before their own writings are introduced. As with all anthologies and collections, some of the writings were more interesting than others. I found the stand-out here to be the poetry of Hildegard of Bingen, but some of the others were pretty repetitive and, dare I say, even a little dull.

I did enjoy the introduction and mini-biographies of these women - frankly they were more readable, and more interesting, than the edited material/primary sources. It makes me wonder if Furlong has written a more substantial history on the same subject - I'd be interested in reading that, as long as I didn't have to wade through Julian of Norwich again.

Admittedly, this is pretty one-note, even if that note is my favourite black humour. I still laughed.

Another collection of stories concerning the Black Widower's club, a collection of greedy mates who are consistently made to look like mental midgets by their waiter, Henry. I swear, the biggest mystery of all is why Henry spends his days serving roast beef instead of running the world, but I tell myself we never see what he does in his off hours.

I'm not usually too good with mysteries, but for once I got the answer to one of the stories before Henry did - or at least before he said he did, which is close enough for me. I've forgotten the name of the story in question - it's the one about cults and astral planes and Mars.

An enjoyable collection, though it did stray sometimes into pedantry - as do some of the characters, although they at least acknowledge it so I'm taking it as a sly admission from the author, as some of the stories did occasionally get bogged down in technicalities.