It was fine?? If you're a tween who's into horses I could see how you'd be into it...

http://www.frowl.org/worstbestsellers/episode-75-saddle-club/

This is just a reprint of such peak 90s nonsense but also I love it.

(read as single issues)

I think I finally understand what's happening?? Kind of?? There's definitely some moving stuff in here about like, tradition and authority and duty etc etc.

(if you are wondering why I keep reading this when it really doesn't seem to be my cup of tea:
1) I subscribed to it digitally and had all the issues downloaded for my recent flights
2) I WANT to like it??)

y'all know I love a collection of personal essays! (or maybe you don't know that about me, but whatever, I just TOLD you.)

This feels like half of a memoir? Many of her essays connect to each other and loosely tell the story of the author's upbringing as a 2nd-generation Indian-Canadian, while others are more recent and talk about ~internet culture~ etc. It wasn't exactly cohesive enough to be a straight-up memoir, but it was a little bit more than what I usually think of as an ~essay collection~? IDK, who cares what exactly it is, I enjoyed her insights and humor.

I read these all as a kid but reading it as an adult I was so struck by how well this walks the tightrope of depicting the horrors of slavery without being too graphic for children.

Also I cried like 3 times at it.

Anyway here's a podcast about it

http://www.frowl.org/worstbestsellers/episode-76-american-girl/

We didn't even talk about this one on the podcast and I re-read it just cuz. OH MOLLY your life is very chill compared to Addy's but I still love you.

http://www.frowl.org/worstbestsellers/episode-76-american-girl/

Way to save the day through ethically questionable behavior, Molly. Color War is hell.

http://www.frowl.org/worstbestsellers/episode-76-american-girl/

first of all, I read this a few weeks ago and could SWEAR I left a review of it already but there's no sign of it so...that might be out in the void somewhere, IDK.

Anyway, I read and loved Six of Crows, and I'd heard that it was set in the same ~world~ as the Grisha trilogy but I didn't need to read the Grisha trilogy to get SOC, so I didn't, just because people were *raving* about Six of Crows, and the general plot of it seemed more relevant to my interests than this trilogy.

Months later, I decided to check this trilogy out, since I did love Six of Crows & Crooked Kingdom so much! This was...good, but definitely less in my personal wheelhouse than SOC. There's a lot more worldbuilding and Grisha abilities here, so if that's your personal jam I'd definitely recommend this. I prefer the "ragtag found family heist crew" situation to the "dramatically fraught love triangle" situation here but if you're looking for some beautiful angst, ooh there's plenty of that. (If you're looking for the queer love present in SOC, not so much.)

Anyway, it's a great first fantasy novel that just doesn't happen to cater as much to my personal tastes as Six of Crows, YMMV.

yesss bring on the ragtag band of misfits! A highly welcome addition to the trilogy. It's kind of blurring together with the third one in my mind but I definitely liked these books more as the trilogy went on and things branched out a little bit from the high angst love triangle of the first one. (It's still here but just not as much in the forefront.)

I found this to be a very satisfying conclusion to this trilogy! lots of drama! lots of feels! lots of invented folk tales!