oof there is a LOT going on here. I still love Celaena and these characters but I admit I was reading with slightly less enthusiasm than the first one... it was a little draggy for the first half and then the last few chapters were like, EVERYTHING IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW.

(BTW I cannot for the life of me keep these titles straight and every time I try to remember one it becomes a Mad Lib. Throne of... Midnight? Crown of... Darkness? Lady of... Glass? whatever)

anyway uh... yeah! it was still good! I'm on hold for the 3rd one!

I would read an entire volume that was just Jessica scamming J. Jonah Jameson, for the record, but the rest of the plot was killer also. <3

This was an engaging, well-researched look at a little-known part of history. These ladies were tough! I think the post-war chapter about how little care these women received is especially heartbreaking and might be especially resonant to read now, when stories about mental health services for veterans are in the news pretty often (although the US definitely still has a lot of work to do on that front, at least we've moved forward from a doctor telling a nurse who has spent 3 years in a POW camp "well, there's nothing wrong with your appetite!" ... we have, right?)

I did kind of wish the book had maybe followed a few nurses in particular rather than snippets about so many of them, but I understand there are very little records to go on here, and of course it does feel right to honor as many of these heroic nurses as possible. Maybe what I really want to read is good historical fiction about a WWII POW Army nurse based on the research from this book? Someone plz write that, kthx

also I'm thinking about booktalking this to junior high kids because it's an interesting topic and WWII books are usually popular. This book is interesting in how it casually dips on the fear women had of being raped, and there's one part where the head nurse writes how proud she is that none of the women in the POW camp were "selling favors"... overall I think it's a pretty light touch on the really horrific situation.

This is VERY cute and I think would be a good read-aloud for a family or maybe classroom--there's a lot of wordplay and savoring of words that I think would do well in that format.

For me as a grumpy adult reader it was a liiittle bit like, "god I GET IT, THE REAL MAGIC IS FAMILY" but I think the intended audience probably has not seen as many Hallmark movies as me and would likely find it much more moving ;)

This reminded me a bit of [b:Savvy|2133795|Savvy (Savvy, #1)|Ingrid Law|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1440107238s/2133795.jpg|2596626] for its quirky family, magic, and made-up words.

Best Bestsellers bonus episode: http://www.frowl.org/worstbestsellers/episode-38-hamilton/

Is this getting a bonus star because of inspiring Hamilton the musical? YES PROBABLY my reviews are all subject to personal WHIMSY.

Anyway, I never would have picked this up if it weren't for Hamilton the musical. But Hamilton the musical wouldn't exist if it weren't for this book!

Chernow does a great job of fleshing out Hamilton as a smart, scrappy, irritating human being (with an A++++ wife, also a human being) as opposed to just, you know, the $10 bill guy.

Also he does a lot of careful work explaining code duello and why, at the time, it did not seem totally bonkers to just be duelin' all the time. But also, does not just casually let the founding fathers off the hook for slavery, which is something SOME biographers do.

I'd definitely recommend this to any fans of Hamilton the musical* to just kind of flesh out the musical and make you further appreciate all the work LMM did. It's an enjoyable, informative read and it's really only like, 700 pages because the last 100 is endnotes.

*if you are not a fan of Hamilton the musical, literally what are you doing

OK so this is hard to rate because obviously I'm mentally comparing it to Chernow's [b:Alexander Hamilton|16130|Alexander Hamilton|Ron Chernow|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1436131915s/16130.jpg|1205304], and that is an 800-page biography for adults, and this is a 1oo-page biography for children. BUT, I still feel like it's fair for me to say that this is leaving out some of the most interesting parts. Like, obviously this isn't going to go into the kind of detail about dueling and the code duello that Chernow did, but I feel like it's pretty important to understand how dueling works, and also pretty cool and interesting? It seems like a no-brainer to talk about dueling in your children's biography of Alexander Hamilton. (To be fair: it does, but not enough.)

It also seems like it did not define a lot of terms that I don't think children would understand? Like "aide-de-camp" for example. On the other hand I thought it did a decent job addressing the Reynolds Pamphlet without going into too much detail, although kids might be confused why it was such a big problem for Hamilton to "see" Maria Reynolds.

WHATEVER, it's fine. If a kid needs to write a report about Hamilton this would do it. If a kid is obsessed with a Broadway musical about Hamilton and wants the full story they are going to have to rise up to the challenge and read the Chernow.

Mmm, I mean, I like Jesse Eisenberg and I've been generally amused by his stories in McSweeney's. So I'd already read about half this stuff. (Note: that New Yorker story where various men of different cultures don't want to dance is in here and "squaw" has been changed to "woman" so... that's good?)

He's very good at capturing feelings of anxiety and discomfort but sometimes I was just like, why. Like there's a set of stories in here from a very unhappy, judgmental college freshman girl that I hadn't read before, and they just felt very mean-spirited and I wasn't too sure what the point of the endeavor was, as opposed to the restaurant reviews from the anxious 9-year-old (most of which I had already read online), which are also unhappy and uncomfortable but also function as a pretty cutting depiction of a certain lifestyle/parenting style?

I mean, it's fine, read it if you like Jesse Eisenberg like I do, but I wouldn't really recommend going out of your way for it.

This was a lot of fun! I listened to it on audiobook and it made my drive tolerable. (I listened to it at 1.5 speed to cram it all into a 10-hour roundtrip.) The narrator was good (even at higher speed, which for some reason made him sound more Canadian).

I've only read the first few Percy Jackson books, and the first Kane Chronicles book--I enjoyed them but just never got around to finishing either series? I think I liked this the best of all those... it helps that Norse mythology is just SO WEIRD. Not that Greek and Egyptian mythology isn't weird, but Norse mythology is just truly next-level bonkers. I really like Magnus, and pretty much all the other characters, especially Hearth and Blitzen, his misfit adopted parental figures <3

I've read concerns about Sam the hijabi Valkyrie and Hearth the Deaf elf character and I don't know enough to say how sensitively they were handled, but overall I loved them both as characters! Hopefully we will see them develop in further books.

I really enjoyed this! The art is very cute and it really shows how tough and smart these 3 women were in their pursuits of science.

The end casually and vaguely mention's how Dian Fossey's death was a tragedy so I looked her up later and apparently she was MURDERED? The panel shows her writing "Digit Digit Digit" (the name of a gorilla she loved, who was killed by poachers) in a notebook with a shaky hand and so I thought maybe she had a stroke or something? but she was MURDERED WITH A MACHETE. IDK, I'm guessing it was left out of the book for fear of being upsetting to a MG audience. Or maybe it's common knowledge? But I didn't know so I have to imagine most children don't know. Anyway, I think it's very interesting that DIAN FOSSEY WAS MURDERED, possibly by a former student, and maybe that could be included in her biography. in my experience KIDS LOVE MURDER.

It also glosses over some of the racism/cultural appropriation of white ladies in Africa... to some extent I can see just wanting to highlight their accomplishments but then it is kind of assuming a white audience??

mmm well probably I should just read some adult nonfiction if that's what I want, overall it's a very fun and interesting introduction to these scientists and to the importance of their findings on different primates. Great for animal lovers and young scientists!

I started reading this with an eye toward maybe booktalking it to junior high kids. After the first few chapters I was pretty sure it wasn't quite appropriate for most kids at that grade level, but tragically I was hooked and had to keep reading! It was such a page-turner and such an interesting use of the mixed-media format. It reminded me a little bit of [b:Chopsticks|10710392|Chopsticks|Jessica Anthony|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1364073067s/10710392.jpg|15620818] in that way. And also, like [b:Paper Towns|6442769|Paper Towns|John Green|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1349013610s/6442769.jpg|3364505], it felt a bit like an investigation into the "manic pixie dream girl" trope and what that means for the dream girl in question. Also like [b:I Am Princess X|17408897|I Am Princess X|Cherie Priest|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1415300641s/17408897.jpg|24250459] it's a mixed media mystery with important friendships! ALSO it's a little bit paranormal... or is it?!

I think a lot of tweens & teens looking for a mystery would really get into this. There's some non-explicit sex and some partying and just, well, adult behavior that made me reluctant to booktalk to a whole group of junior high kids but I don't think it's more than the kind of stuff in, say, John Green's books, which a lot of junior high kids have already read.