August Reading

71. Fables. Vol 15: Rose Red
Fables has sort of lost momentum for me, but I'm not giving up on it yet. In their favor someone did apparently hear me cussing about Rose Red turning into Sleeping Beauty...

72. The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen
Another frothy tale from Sara Addison Allen, sweet and a bit chick lit. but with so very much heart. Also addresses how living in a small town can make it hard to grow out of your former selves.


73. The Sweetness a the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley (re)
Re-read this to help out at a book group. I thought being a mystery I might not enjoy the re-read as much as the first reading, but it held up very well. & Flavia the 11-year-old, poison obsessed sleuth is still absolutely fabulous. (Although YA appropriate, don't count this book out post-YA-ers.)

74. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
Historical fiction biography of Thomas Cromwell. Mostly my reading on Henry VIII's court has been decidedly queen-centric, this was an interesting shift in point of view.

75. The Stories of Ibis by Hiroshi Yamamoto 
For me this was very sci-fi, I tend more toward fantasy. Set in the future when humans are nomadic tribes & the dominate civilization is that of robots. But this is so much more than a human vs. robots plot; this was some of the most thought-provoking futuristic fiction I've read in a few years. The short stories told within the plot line of the novel were extremely well-crafted in their own right, any one of them was outstanding on it's own, but they built on each other...  I was impressed by the portrayal of  how cultures are informed through their stories, possibly one of the best examples of this I've read. (So good I made my library buy it just so I could Staff Pick it.)

76. Beastly by Alex Flinn
Audio-booked. Sweet, YA rewrite of Beauty & the Beast. I did try to read it first but got bogged down in the open scene in a chat room with way too much webspeak for my poor little brain to handle, luckily this does not carry on for the majority of the book. Mostly I picked this up because of all the nice teens who are reading it...

77. The Virgin Project by Kevin Boze & Stasia Kato (now Stasia Burrington)
I picked this up because I came across the art of Stasia Burrington (& the lady herself) at Seattle Art Walk in Occidental Park a few months ago. I have since become a raving fan of her illustration. Raving. (& she has an Etsy shop.)
....And this was an interesting project. Admittedly the art was less amazing than I had expected, but it is much earlier work & there are crumbs of the charm & heart that she has so greatly developed now. The stories are amazing, strange, tragic, wonderful and so many other things. I highly recommend it.

78. The Virgin Project 2 by Kevin Boze & Stasia Kato

79. Tokyo on Foot: Travels in the City's Most Colorful Neighborhoods by Florent Chavouet
This was a bright, fun little travel journal. It is exactly a beautiful sketch book of a guy in Tokyo. If you will be disappointed by a lack of plot arc this is not for you, but if you like little details & noticing them & the kind of people that do notice them, than it is.

80. A Very Long Engagement by Sebastien Japrisot (re)
I realized I did not remember this well enough to reference in conversation & was shamed. It held up extremely well to re-reading. If there is a great long list somewhere amazing war novels then this should be on it, because of what has to say about the pettiness of humans and the astounding lengths we go for love.