strange and random happenstance

The Spellshop by Sarah Beth Durst
Published by: Bramble
Publication Date: July 9th, 2024
Format: Kindle, 384 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

When fleeing a revolution it's hard know to what books to pack. Kiela Orobidan is a librarian at the Great Library of Alyssium. She's spent the last eleven years safeguarding the spellbooks contained therein, third floor, east wing. Now that the emperor has been defenestrated and the flames are coming closer, Kiela, and her best friend Caz, a sentient spider plant, have to flee. She's been packing and repacking the library boats for about a week in case of this eventuality, constantly conflicted over which books are the most irreplaceable, and now that the day has arrived, well, she doesn't know what to do. If she's honest with herself she didn't think the day would arrive. Rulers come and go but libraries are eternal. She thought the library would be secured by the rebels not looted! After all who doesn't love books? Perhaps the revolutionaries when the knowledge has been hoarded and kept out of the hands of those who could use it.... Well Kiela and Caz have their hoard and given the destruction they've witnessed, they might possess the last of the greatest treasure of the Crescent Islands Empire. The books have to be protected, first and foremost, and after much contemplation a plan is formed. It might not be the best plan, but it's the only plan they've got. They are returning to Kiela's home island of Caltrey. Her parents left to live a better life and give Kiela more opportunities. She might have gained a calling in the library but she lost her family, her freckles, and gained a host of antisocial disorders. Coming back though will only be temporary. They'll protect the books and not think about the fact they could be charged with theft, and lay low until this whole revolution business is settled. Upon returning to Caltrey the plan is to hide out in the house where Kiela grew up in, which is technically hers she realizes. Pretty soon though it's clear that there will have to be some interaction with the islanders. She has to eat. Also, there's her neighbor, Larran Maver. He's cute and way too helpful. Years ago she was kind to him and now he wants to repay the favor. Only Caltrey is suffering. It used to be that the emperor would send his sorcerers out on a regular rotation to tend to the outer islands. They'd cast spells that balanced out whatever nonsense they'd done in the capital city to build their palaces and fuel their lavish lives while ordinary people suffered. This threw the weather out of whack but then sorcerers stopped coming and the problem continued. Fish began to get scarce, and the merhorses, which Larran breeds, have dwindled. Kiela feels a need to do something. But protecting the spellbooks is a whole different kettle of fish than using them. If she's caught it could be disastrous. But if she doesn't help all of Caltrey will suffer.

I have been trying to not buy as many books and utilize my local library more. But then I borrow a book like The Spellshop and my resolve is out the window. Before I even finished reading it I was trying to find out where to get a signed copy of it and it's "sequel," The Enchanted Greenhouse. The Ripped Bodice in Los Angles came through for me and I'm hoping they will again this year when Sea of Charms comes out. Because I had to have a signed book. When I go all in on a book it isn't by half measures. And this book is my jam, in more ways than one. As literally everyone I know has said, this book is like the hug you didn't know you needed. This book embraces you in a world of sentient plants and jam and merhorses and winged cats, I mean, come on, winged cats! I want a winged cat. I also want some jam too. Yes, you will get hungry reading this book but you will also be satiated. The Spellshop is about finding your home, found family, and realizing that the more friends you have the safer you are. It's about building a community and coming together when times are rough. And, well, times are very rough, so I think we could all use a little bit of compassion. I want to live in this world. I want some defenestration and good trouble. What I love about fantasy is that it is magical and wonderful but it also holds up a mirror to our world. Basically the Crescent Islands Empire is in the midst of their own French Revolution. They literally cannot take the corruption for one more minute. Sound familiar? But what I love is that Sarah Beth Durst shows how, in this world, climate change is happening because of magic. Caltrey and other islands are almost destroyed by these horrific storms and it's all because the emperor has stopped sending out sorcerer envoys to fix the problems. They keep doing what they're doing, fiddling while Rome burns, and they just say damn the consequences. Does this sound relevant? As I write this the EPA literally just said they no longer care about the cost of human lives. As long as the rich are getting richer why bother trying to save people who they really don't want to save in the first place? But that's why we form communities, that's why we help each other, that's why we need at least 3.5% of us to finally have had enough. On a more personal level though this book help up a mirror to myself. The awkward book nerd who just wants to sleep in the stacks and be left alone. Whose anxiety at interacting with others is occasionally off the charts. I am Kiela. So can someone point me towards my sexy merhorse breeder? I'd even settle for a sentient spider plant!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Caltrey, Caz, Climate Change, Community, Crescent Islands Empire, Defenestration, Flying Cats, Found Family, Kiela Orobidan, Larran Maver, Library, Magic, Merhorses, Revolution, Sarah Beth Durst, Spider Plant, The Spellshop, Top Ten

Redwall by Brian Jacques
Published by: Philomel Books
Publication Date: October 23rd, 1986
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

The festivities at Redwall Abbey are underway for Abbot Mortimer's Golden Jubilee. It is the Summer of the Late Rose and the abbey has been blessed with peace and abundance. As the inhabitants scurry about with last minute preparations there's Matthias, tumbling cowl over tail, scattering the hazelnuts. Oh how he longs to be graceful and brave like Martin the Warrior, the founder of Redwall Abbey, whose tales of derring-do have always transported him. But as the Abbot tells Matthias, we are now an order of peace. The time of Martin and his famous sword and shield are over. The Abbey is a place of happiness and refuge as all the denizens of Mossflower Woods arrive to celebrate the Abbot. But that night a horrific scene unfolds on the road outside the Abbey walls that Matthias and Constance the Badger witness. A large Portuguese water rat and his army are on the road. They were astride a demented horse and cart. A council is called that night. The rumors of Cluny the Scourge seem to be true. He is the worst kind of warlord and the Abbey has to be prepared because it doesn't look as if Cluny is just passing through. He has set up camp at the Church of St. Ninian's and has his eye on the Abbey. It would be the perfect seat for his empire, Cluny's Castle. Plus the mice will surely just hand it over to him without a fight. They're just little mice, he has a rat army! Little does Cluny know that while they are a peaceful order now they were founded by a true warrior and they will protect those who need protecting. When Cluny arrives at Redwall Abbey with the articles of surrender that all his conquests must abide by he is shocked by their iron will and then terrified by a tapestry of Martin the Warrior. Cluny is transfixed by the image of Martin as he is the shadowy figure that has been haunting the rat's dreams. Shaken, the rats leave the Abbey to regroup. And then Cluny attacks by stealth and steals the tapestry, at once capturing the object of his nightmares while trying to demoralize the mice by removing the effigy of their protector. He underestimated the mice, Redwall prepares to protect itself at any cost, even war. As Matthias bemoans to Brother Methuselah, if only they had Martin the Warrior's sword and shield they might stand a chance against the Scourge. But Methuselah tells Matthias that the young mouse is so like Martin that perhaps, given the clues built into the very Abbey walls, that these totems can be recovered and used to spur them on to victory. Though a sword is, in the end, just a sword, and it's the true warriors that will win the day.

I learned about Brian Jacques's Redwall series at Christmas in 1993. Friends of our family who always gave me and my brother books for Christmas got him Martin the Warrior. This was the first time I saw a sword wielding rodent on the cover of a book under Brian Jacques's name, but it would certainly not be the last. As my mother started as a grade school librarian at my old school when I started high school her job was to keep up with the trends, and the biggest trend was Redwall. Our local bookstore had a wall dedicated to Brian Jacques just as you entered on the left hand wall and that was usually the first stop when stocking up on books for the school library. The thing about each and every one of these books is they are just beautifully done, the covers, the chapter art, even if you've never read them or plan to read them, you covet them for your bookshelves. All twenty-two of them in the end. I finally got around to reading Redwall for the first time in 2000, my guess is that the added exposure from the the television series made me finally bite the bullet. I enjoyed it enough to read the second book, Mossflower, which, as I found out, was not the sequel. But if you're a fan of this series you know there are multiple flowcharts and timelines to study if you really want to do a deep dive. Picking this book up again a quarter century later I was enchanted by it. Sure, there's a lot of death, but there's this comradery, just a whole bunch of people coming together and defeating the baddie without dissension while also having amazing vegetarian cuisine. This was just the right book at the right time to make me feel good and cozy while also wanting to topple tyranny. Though I think I'm the exact audience for this book, it was written in the eighties and released when I was eight, so it fully embraces the traumatize your child vibe that us eighties kids know so well. It's The Secret of NIMH meet Cadfael meets The Name of the Rose, whose star-studded adaptation came out the same year in wonderful synchronicity. A comfort despite all the death and destruction, which I think anyone who has watched The NeverEnding Story ad infintum knows aren't mutually exclusive feels. Though this one has more of a human element than later volumes, which Jacques says was intentional. But I still would love a deep dive on where the hell the idea for Basil Stag Hare came from. Is he a time traveler from WWII? I mean, I love animals thinking they're secret agents and spies, the foxes in the Rivers of London series being the prime example, but for a pseudo medieval world this was just weird. But I like weird, so we're all good.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Brian Jacques, Cadfael, Christmas, Cluny the Scourge, Eighties, Library, Martin the Warrior, Matthias, Redwall, The Name of the Rose, The Neverending Story, The Secret of Nimh, Top Ten, Vegetarian Cuisine

A Bride's Story, Vol. 15 by Kaoru Mori
Published by: Yen Press
Publication Date: December 16th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 224 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

Henry Smith's time in Asia has come to an end, or so his family has decreed. He has been captivated by his study of the Silk Road and the people he has met along the way. But his family are worried about him, his sporadic correspondence might be to blame, and they have "requested" that he return home. His family friend in Ankara, Mr. Hawkins, has been asked to intercede on their behalf as he himself is leaving the conflicted region. The fact that Henry is still alive is a bit of a shock to Mr. Hawkins, but nothing to the shock he will receive. Henry had wished to retrace his steps and say a fond farewell to all those he had met along the way, to try to capture them forever in his mind and on film with a camera he was able to acquire. This would have been a long, parlous, and probably impossible journey with the movement of Russian troops, but Henry has an additional hitch. Awhile back he met a young widow, Talas. They had fallen in love but her duty to her mother-in-law made her say goodbye to the scholarly Englishman. Yet her love for him endured and she has followed him to Ankara. Mr. Smith now intends to take her on this journey as his wife. Not just through their abbreviated sojourn among his past acquaintances, but all the way back to England. Mr. Hawkins begs him to reconsider but Henry's mind is made up. Eventually Henry, Talas, and her beloved horse Chubar, make their way to the Port of Bombay. There they book passage back to England. But Henry's homecoming is anything but welcoming. His mother won't even meet Talas and will do anything to stop them from actually marrying. The scandal would ruin them. Or so she claims. Thankfully Mr. Hawkins comes to the rescue. His family have a disused hunter lodge that Henry and Talas can live while things settle down at home. Henry will work on assembling his copious notes for publication while Talas will keep sheep. English sheep might look different, but a sheep is a sheep and she knows what she's doing. She's a practical woman. She's even considering putting Chubar out to stud. Yet Henry is her opposite, a true dreamer. Which is why he decides that if he presents Talas and his marriage as a fait accompli his family will accept her. They set out for Scotland with his brother and Mr. Hawkins as co-conspirators. But will their plan work? Only time will tell.

I first discovered Kaoru Mori back in 2010 through her manga series Emma. I was so desperate to read this story that was out of print stateside that I ordered the first volume from England. Thankfully the proceeding six volumes were available through my local library. Though, if you are a fan of this manga about a Victorian maid finding love, you will perhaps notice that my library didn't have the final three volumes and I had to wait until they were rereleased in an omnibus format to finally read the ending. And that didn't happen until seven years later. All this is to say that when a Kaoru Mori book comes out you buy it. You do whatever you can to buy that book because before you know it you won't be able to get your hands on it ever again. Yes, I'm looking at you Shirley. You're the holy grail. When A Bride's Story first started getting released in English in 2011 we were spoiled in that twice we got two volumes in a single year. Now it's a volume about every other year. Not that I'm complaining. Kaoru Mori's art is so intricate and amazing, down to the finest detail of fabric or bread, that I can't believe she can even keep to a biannual schedule. From the day I picked up this series I have been captivated but this "slice-of-life tale that is at once wholly exotic, yet familiar." The stories of each and every character have captivated me. They are my friends. We readers have journeyed with Mr. Smith along the silk road and met nomadic tribesmen, overstimulated twins, skilled hunters, sister wives, and blunt bread makers. When he started to head towards Ankara in Vol. 10 it was wistful. Because as readers it felt that once his journey came to an end the series would come to an end. And as he traveled with Talas to Port Bombay it felt like a farewell tour. We weren't just saying goodbye to these characters but this way of life that Russia would soon destroy. Yet this volume showed how this story could continue outside of Asia. We see Talas and Henry struggling and succeeding to make a life. It's a different, solitary kind of life, but I can't help feeling that as long as they have each other they will survive and thrive. Though what touched me most was the quiet moments. Kaoru Mori always has these vignettes that don't tie into the rest of the story but show a moment in time in these characters' lives. Here it was how Chubar was struggling on the sea voyage and how the ship's cat came to befriend and therefore calm him. It was this moment of two animals living symbiotically that brought a smile to my face on the darkest of nights. This series just keeps me in it's thrall. The black and white line work, the characters, their stories, I never want it to end. I can't wait for Vol. 16, but it will be at least two years. Perhaps I should reread it all again? Or maybe reread Emma... You can never have enough Kaoru Mori in your life.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: A Bride's Story, A Bride's Story Vol. 15, Asia, Chubar, Emma, England, Horse, Kaoru Mori, Library, Manga, Marriage, Mr. Henry Smith, Russia, Ship's Cat, Shirley, Silk Road, Talas, Top Ten, Turkey, Widow

The Dagger in the Desk by Jonathan Stroud
Published by: Disney-Hyperion
Publication Date: October 31st, 2013
Format: Kindle, 46 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy

School is somewhere where you should feel safe. Many children haven't been afforded the luxury of school since the Problem. They are needed to protect society from the ghosts and ghouls and things that go bump in the night. They are the nation's first defense against the Problem. Therefore those lucky enough to receive an education deserve to feel safe. And the children attending St. Simeon’s Academy for Talented Youngsters have not been feeling safe. A ghost is stalking the halls and the headmaster is worried that the very sharp and very real dagger it wields might do harm to one of his students. Therefore he enlists the help of Lockwood and Co. After all they did get a big publicity bump after their handling of their perilous investigation of Combe Carey Hall. They agree to take the case and Lockwood, George, and Lucy show up at the Academy that same evening. They set up base in the library, which is a beautiful new structure, and fan out from there. They take in the classroom with the dagger but Lucy is being drawn to a closet. What could a janitor's closet have to do with the dagger? Soon they are under a supernatural attack, books are flying everywhere, and it's just another night's work for Lockwood and Co.

This short story was apparently conceived as a collaborative piece with The Guardian, where readers could decide the location and title. I have to say, I agree, schools are the perfect place for hauntings. It's not just all the trauma and hormones that give schools that creepy vibe, it's something extra. Something about them being empty when they are usually filled with life. My Mom was a school librarian, so I spent quite a lot of time in my old school after hours. It was always slightly disconcerting and unsettling, especially the number of janitors they went through because they refused to be in the building at night. Now I never saw anything spooky there, and I have been known to see spooky things. I was even there at the witching hour once or twice, but again, saw nothing, out it felt off. I really enjoyed how this short story tapped into this unease. What's more, school is a place where Lockwood, George, and Lucy, wouldn't be attending, because they are so good at their job. So it was wistful and creepy. Though the worst crime the ghost did was to harm all those books in that beautiful new library!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Anthony Lockwood, Collaboration, Combe Carey Hall, George Cubbins, Jonathan Stroud, Library, Lockwood & Co., London Calling, Lucy Carlyle, School, Short Story, The Dagger in the Desk, The Guardian, The Problem

The Secret of the Old Clock by Carolyn Keene
Published by: Grosset and Dunlap
Publication Date: 1930
Format: Hardcover, 180 Pages
To Buy

I will fully admit that until recently I was never really on board with Nancy Drew. As a kid I never read her adventures, though I do remember the spinning book rack in my middle school library, the one my mom worked at for many, many years, was larded with Nancy Drew books and I did pick up The Secret of the Old Clock one day and stopped about two pages in. The story just didn't grab me and at that time in my life I was a reluctant reader. I remember Northern Exposure's Nancy Drew parody with Maggie more than the books themselves! So while not being a Nancy Drew fan I still enabled my mom's addiction. She adored the books when little, checking them out from the library as summer reading. So needless to say when they started issuing reproductions of the original books my mom was over the moon. I helped her hunt them down in our local stores. From Borders to The University Bookstore for Kids, we anxiously awaited the new re-releases was scanning the shelves for any other books that might want to come home with us. I now have these reprints and can not wait to read them for the first time as I have become a Nancy Drew addict because of the new CW TV show. I didn't expect it. I only watched it at first because it was paired with Riverdale and was another "dark retelling" but this time the supernatural aspects were real. As time went on Nancy Drew quickly became my favorite show, and Riverdale fell by the wayside, though I did like their own take on "Nancy Drew," AKA Tracy True, this season. The only real regret I have is that my mom never got to see this adaptation and the resurgence in Nancy Drew's popularity. I think she would have been on board.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Bookstores, Borders, CW, Library, Nancy Drew, Northern Exposure, Reissues, Riverdale, Summer Reading, Supernatural, The Secret of the Old Clock, Theses Are a Few of My Favorite Things, Tracy True

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie
Published by: Everyman's Library
Publication Date: 1911
Format: Hardcover, 240 Pages
To Buy

When my mom was little Peter Pan was her favorite Disney movie. I have spent more time that I can count having to listen to innumerable stories about being taken to Disney films when I was little and freaking out so bad that I had to be taken home. In an ironic twist of fate my brother would do this to me with The Jungle Book and I never knew the ending until it was re-released into theaters when I was a teenager. There was literally only five minutes left! HE COULD HAVE WAITED! Usually my mom took out these stories as amusing anecdotes, after all she'd seen all the films when she was younger so my losing it on seeing the mice in Cinderella was funny. But she was different about Peter Pan. I remember when it was re-released as we took our seats at Westgate with her sister and niece she looked at me and told me point blank, there would be no "Cinderella" freak out. No matter what happened we were staying. While the movie isn't close to my favorite Disney movie it did spawn a love of the book in me. One year for Christmas my parents got me and my brother a HUGE set of Children's Classics and the plan was to have nightly readings in the library. This actually happened once, perhaps twice. But I do know that the only book we read was Peter Pan. I was the one reading it aloud at the beginning and I don't know at what point I became so involved in the story that I didn't notice that my audience had left but leave they did. But I didn't leave that big uncomfortable pink wingback chair until I finished the book. I think that was the first book I binged in one sitting.     

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Children's Classics, Cinderella, Disney, J.M. Barrie, Library, Mice, Movies, Peter Pan, The Jungle Book, Theses Are a Few of My Favorite Things

The Borrowers by Mary Norton
Published by: Harcourt, Brace and Company
Publication Date: 1952
Format: Hardcover, 180 Pages
To Buy

In our library we had a few volumes of books that were my mom's treasures from when she was little. There were many random volumes of sets cribbed from her siblings, but there was one whole set, Mary Norton's The Borrowers. This was easily my mother's favorite. One of my first bookstore memories is going to Pooh Corner on Monroe Street when The Borrowers Avenged was released. The memory is so vivid in my mind it's amazing that looking up the publication date that I was only four years old at the time! But I remember my mom's joy at a new volume in this beloved series published almost twenty years after the previous volume. I know at some point I read The Borrowers for school because our much loved copy has the outlines of a book report in it, but my biggest memory of this book is the fact that I totally thought it was real. I BELIEVED that Pod, Homily, and Arrietty lived in our walls. We had an old laundry shoot that had been closed off so when you opened the door in the downstairs bathroom there was a little platform, or as I thought, a little room just perfectly sized for the Clock family. My mom indulged me and let me build them furniture and even put food in there. I was so amazed that the food was always gone in the morning and my parents insisted they never took it. Of course that meant we had some really well fed mice for awhile, but I will always have this memory whereas those mice are long gone.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Arrietty, Bookstore, Homily, Library, Mary Norton, Mice, Pod, Pooh Corner, Siblings, Stolen, The Borrowers, The Borrowers Avenged, These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern
Published by: Doubleday
Publication Date: November 5th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 512 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

When he was young Zachary Ezra Rawlins found a door. Graffitied on the side of his home. Appearing overnight and painted over by the end of the day. He did not go through it and did not tell anyone about it but over the years wondered what would have happened. Therefore it comes as a shock when perusing the stacks of his school's library during winter break that there is a book with his story in it. This impossibility leads him on a hunt that will forever change his life. A hunt for a bee, a key, and a sword. A hunt that leads him into the cross-hairs of warring parties. At a literary themed masquerade at the Algonquin Hotel in New York he meets the players who will lead him down his path. Mirabel, the painter, and Dorian, the storyteller. But this path doesn't come without dangers. Far beneath the Earth there are tunnels and rooms and each and every one of them is filled with books and stories and adventures to be had. But they are all in danger. This subterranean world was once alive and vibrant and here Zachary Ezra Rawlins has finally stepped through the door into a magical world in it's death throes. What would have happened if he had arrived earlier? What will happen now that he's here? Can he save the library with his new companions or is it all lost before his adventure has really begun?

The Starless Sea is an ode to books and book lovers and all forms of stories. The plot twists and turns and is a complex puzzle waiting to be solved. A quest for the reader and for Zachary Ezra Rawlins. When you reach the end it becomes a beginning and it almost feels necessary to turn back to the first page and relive all the adventure and heartache. There's something nostalgic about it, it harkens back to well loved movies and books and even video games. There's more than a dash of The Neverending Story, and Labyrinth, and The Magicians, and and and a million other books and adventures I loved as a kid and adult. Though I have noted the discontent in some readers who were expecting a new iteration of The Night Circus. At first I to was hoping for that and while The Starless Sea is definitely not that it's so unique, so it's own thing, that I love it for what it is and the work you put in to understand and follow what is happening is justly rewarded. Books shouldn't be easy. Books should make us think, challenge us in ways we didn't expect, take us on an epic adventure that makes us realize why we fell in love with stories in the first place. I fell into The Starless Sea and don't care to be rescued.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Erin Morgenstern, Labyrinth, Library, New York, Nostalgia, Storytelling, The Algonquin, The Magicians, The Neverending Story, The Night Circus, The Starless Sea, Zachary Ezra Rawlins

Bookstore: Westfield Comics

Location: West Side Madison, Wisconsin

Why I Love Them: I have been a fan of Westfield Comics long before I was a fan of comics or even books for that matter... Yes, it seems like an odd thing to frequent a comic store and not be there for the comics, but I went through a hard core trading card addiction in my late teens and early twenties and their old location on South Whitney Way sure supplied me with the goods. That little island in the center of the store was four sides of trading card heaven, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer to Farscape to The Avengers (Emma Peel obviously), if there was a show or movie I loved I HAD to have the trading cards and there was always that elusive chance of finding a signed one or even better a pieceworks one (AKA a bit of fabric from a costume)! This addiction was helped along by the fact that Westfield Comics was right next to Marshalls and my mom went there literally every day, so I'd tag along and see what was happening next door. Eventually my interest started to shift into British Science Fiction magazines that you could only get there and which I desperately needed to feed my Red Dwarf addiction. But when Joss Whedon started writing comics, that was the beginning of my shift to full on Westfield Comics addict. For a short while their new location was right next to Frugal Muse and I was living the dream. Sadly Frugal Muse moved but by this point I was a goner. I now even have a pull list. Reserved. In fact Giant Days issue number thirty-seven is out this coming Wednesday! Can't wait to see what else they've gotten in!

Best Buy: Now because this blog and these posts are all about books, ostensibly, I'm going to talk about my favorite book I've gotten at Westfield Comics. And yes, this could include a trade paperback or hardcover release of comics, but in this case it doesn't. Because my spending habits in regards to graphic novels got kind of out of control I instated a rule for myself, I wasn't allowed to buy a graphic novel unless I had previously read it. This is where my local library and their amazing graphic novel selection comes in. Under the advice of my friend Janice I started to read the Fables comics by Bill Willingham back in 2012. The modern take on Fairy Tales was right up my alley. Over the course of the next three years I devoured all of them, even the offshoots from the atrocious Jack of Fables to the hit or miss Fairest. During my first initial binge catching up on all the back issues I'd missed over the years I noticed that there was one prose volume, Peter and Max: A Fables Novel. I was expecting pretty much more of the same, but I was in for a surprise. I didn't check the book out from the library, I am literally only there for the graphic novels, so off I went to Westfield Comics and there it was on the shelf under "F" and up to the counter I went and when I got home I just fell completely in love with this book. The complex story of the two brothers Peter and Max became my third most favorite book I read that year and by best buy that might never be top from Westfield Comics.   

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Bill Willingham, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Comics, Emma Peel, Fables, Fairest, Farscape, Jack of Fables, Joss Whedon, Library, Peter and Max, Red Dwarf, Support Your Brick and Mortar, The Avengers, Westfield Comics

"I never really liked sunny days.
When the skies were gloomy with heavy dark clouds... that's when I felt the happiest.
Mom never allowed me to dress in black, and I knew that that was the protection I needed.
Father always yelled at me to put down the volume, but I needed loud rock and roll.
I was sheltered for most of my life.

But then, The Sandman came.

My cousin, who I really admired (still do), would draw these very goth and interesting looking characters and I loved them! She then handed me DEATH: THE HIGH COST OF LIVING, and it changed everything. I was 13. I didn't know someone could write like that. I didn't know there was someone out there who thought like I did.

It sounds melodic and over the top, but I was a very sheltered child, 13 years old, living in a 3rd world country, in a city that did not have a single library. It was very hard, but one by one, I started reading all of his works that I could find throughout the years. But definitely, The Sandman series are special to me.

Neil Gaiman's writing touches that delicate line in between life and death with such gracefulness that the reader barely notices how fragile existence is. That is what I enjoy the most in his works. There's no death for the mind - that's what his work taught me.

I briefly "met" him once and got my books signed. He looked into my eyes and smiled. Little he knew how far I traveled to be there that day and smile back at him.

My "estranged" friend... soul as gloomy as mine, mind as endless as the sky.

Cheers!" - Flávia

Flávia and I met at MATC. For many semesters I'd seen this amazing work credited to a "Fly" and then one semester there was this girl in the back of my two classes named Flávia, easy to remember because I'd just read The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie for the first time, and I realized she was the "Fly" I'd been admiring for so long. Since then we've remained friends, getting to meet Neil Gaiman together, talking over books once a month a book club. I'm forever in awe of her talent as an artist and a mother, and after this toast, as a writer too.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Book Clubs, Death: The High Cost of Living, Flavia, Fly, Gaiman Gala, Gaiman Toast, Library, Neil Gaiman, Sandman, School, The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater
Published by: Scholastic Press
Publication Date: April 26th, 2016
Format: Hardcover, 400 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"All her life, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love's death. She doesn't believe in true love and never thought this would be a problem, but as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she's not so sure anymore."

I seriously have all the previous books signed and yet I have yet to read them, while everyone I know tells me I have to read them... perhaps I should read them?

Murder the the 42nd Street Library by Con Lehane
Published by: Minotaur Books
Publication Date: April 26th, 2016
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"This first book in an irresistible new series introduces librarian and reluctant sleuth Raymond Ambler, a doggedly curious fellow who uncovers murderous secrets hidden behind the majestic marble façade of New York City’s landmark 42nd Street Library.

Murder at the 42nd Street Library follows Ambler and his partners in crime-solving as they track down a killer, shining a light on the dark deeds and secret relationships that are hidden deep inside the famous flagship building at the corner of 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue.

In their search for the reasons behind the murder, Ambler and his crew uncover sinister, and profoundly disturbing, relationships among the scholars studying in the iconic library. Included among the players are a celebrated mystery writer who has donated his papers to the library’s crime fiction collection; that writer’s long-missing daughter, a prominent New York society woman with a hidden past, and more than one of Ambler’s colleagues at the library. Shocking revelations lead inexorably to the traumatic events that follow―the reading room will never be the same."

OK, yes, part of this is my love of NY, part of this is my love of a good murder mystery. But combining the two? Yeah, totally for me! PS, adore this library!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Con Lehane, Library, Maggie Stiefvater, Murder at the 42nd Street Library, Mystery, New York, New York Public Library, The Raven Cycle, The Raven King, Tuesday Tomorrow

When I was little I didn't know what a bookstore was, being only familiar with libraries. When my family was on vacation in Door County, a good six hour drive from my home, we went to a bookstore and my parents bought me a Babar book. We were getting ready to go home and we were taking the book with us. I was so confused. I was so worried about how we'd get it back to the "library" on time, being convinced that no one could own a book outright. The revelation that you could have books that you kept obviously changed my life. So therefore I will now present to you "libraries" where you get to keep the books!

If you're anything like me you can't be content just looking at sights when visiting a new city, you need to add to your bookshelf. Not only is it a new world to explore locked between a front and back cover, but it is a souvenir of your time away from home. I know this need to own more books is a condition that is almost worthy of professional help, but I've decided to embrace it, because it's not like I have any other vices! New York has one of the most famous bookstores in the world, The Strand. Located a few blocks northeast of Washington Square Park at 828 Broadway, on the corner of Broadway and East 12th Street is this hallowed bookstore.

The Strand literally boasts miles and miles of books.While I personally have no way to confirm or deny the exact mileage of the books being eighteen, I can guess it is pretty accurate. The first time I saw The Strand I was down at Union Square Park and my friend Orelia and I were hungry and we wandered into a restaurant that happened to be right across the street from the bookstore. I don't know what reason prevented me from going in, but it wasn't until later that year when I returned to New York that I finally made the pilgrimage.

What I remember most about The Strand is that on entering there was this lovely pillar and around it was where they displayed their more reasonably priced collector's edition. Needless to say I kind of hovered there and this is where most of my purchases were made. Signed editions of books, like Alistair Cooke's autobiography, which was actually a present for my father, made their way into my shopping cart. And yes, I do remember where I bought books almost a decade ago, don't you?

The thing you have to realize on going into The Strand is that you are going into a maze. Plan ahead, bring provisions (aka lists of books you're looking for) or you might easily be overwhelmed. I am very lucky in that Madison is a veritable book haven, with amazing used stores such as Frugal Muse. This means that I have very high standards in my bookstores. Aside from the collector's section I was actually a little underwhelmed by the store. Perhaps this is more because I didn't find any of the rare books I often hunt for. One hopes upon going to the mecca of bookstores that you will find that one book you can never find anywhere else, but alas it wasn't to be. Yet a used bookstore isn't entirely to blame for this. They are at the mercy of what people bring in to sell. So I blame the New Yorkers who hold onto all their cool books and don't let bookish tourists like me get them for their own collections!

The most interesting thing I found at The Strand was their rare book room. Having the room isn't strange, this is one of the biggest bookstores in the world, what I found strange was the rules. I had to check all my belongings, sign a waiver that if I did anything to any book I would pay for it. I was so scared at this point that I basically walked around the upper room with my hands tightly behind my back for fear of damaging something. The room felt too much like a library where you knew the librarian would never let you check out a book no matter how sweetly you asked, and yes, I had one such librarian at my grade school growing up, and yes, she was a nun, a very scary nun. As for the books on display on various tables? Traps to lure you into staying! Seeing as at this time I was applying for grad school I couldn't afford anything there, in fact even if I won the lottery I probably couldn't afford anything there, so I calmly backed out, made my more reasonable purchases and moved a few doors down to the comic shop, and yes, they do have a Forbidden Planet in New York!

If you think that the store itself might be too tempting or overwhelming, or dare I say, too Downtown (note to self, stop typing Downton), there's a stall for you! The Strand operates a book kiosk on 5th Avenue on the Central Park side across from The Pierre Hotel (which has an awesome afternoon tea FYI, get their house blend and don't be afraid to ask for more sandwiches). So for those feint of heart or those easily tempted, make your way to 5th Avenue and East 60th Street, open 10AM to Dusk, weather permitting of course. But don't forget, that The Strand is just one of many bookstores, and I mean many. I had planned on checking out a great many of these, but, alas, it wasn't to be. But the joy of New York is just stumbling on a store and walking in, you can find the best places this way, places you never knew existed. Of course if you are more organized, as I obviously am to a psychotic degree, just google New York Bookstores and you will get an amazing array of places throughout the city, places that I hope you and me will one day visit.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Alistair Cooke, Babar, Bookstores, Door County, Downton Abbey, Frugal Muse, Library, Literary New York, New York, The Pierre, The Strand, Used Bookstores, Washington Square

I promised swans and libraries today… and yes, I do deliver, but with an added bonus of Monopoly! Perhaps a tad more random then the color centric part yesterday, I hope it will be equally entertaining… enough of me, you want more of Jasper, and that’s what this post is all about.

Elizabeth: Do you view the lack of a stocked library[1] the most nightmarish aspect of East Carmine, where all they have is the vague memories of what was once there?

Jasper: It’s pretty chilling really, it’s more because they’re worn out than someone’s… oh hang on, they removed them, yes someone’s removing them, haven’t they. Yeah it is a bit chilling and a bit worrying. But I kind of like the idea. Because in my previous books, in the Thursday Next Series, I have a library that contains every single book there is and here I’ve got a library that contains just empty shelves. I was kind of doing a sort of complete turn around there. But I do like the idea of a library, not only without books, but the people still in it. I think this is very telling, for the kind of way in which this society is really breaking down, that they remember the function of the library and that’s what they’re celebrating. Where everything used to be, and what the titles are, but not the form. So they’re not saying, well the books used to say this, they’re saying, the books used to be here. And I think that was maybe a very subtle way in which the society is kind of rotting, and that maybe 200 years ago they used to discuss the books and now they just discuss where they used to be. It’s just another way of adding to the kind of slightly, sort of insidious, kind of nasty, this society is going in a very very bad direction and no one in particular seems to realize.

Elizabeth: Would the librarians kind of being non-functionary, but still having their job, reflect almost what’s happening today with reference librarians being phased out with the internet?

Jasper: Yes, they do seem to be. The whole library issue is a very interesting point and certainly it will be interesting to see where the internet goes as regards reference libraries. But I think the traditional library with librarians and things, that does seem to be slowing down, and I think it does seem to be on the way out. The internet is such easy access to more and more people, the libraries do seem to have perhaps a bit of trouble competing. Unfortunately that adds to the difficulties where people who don’t have internet access and will actually make the whole unonline, the unconnected underclass, even worse, which is a worry, I must say. But the way I look at the internet is one huge library, and I can just log in wherever I want.

Elizabeth: Yeah, I mean, you can even log into remote libraries themselves and see what books they have and everything.

Jasper: Yeah, it’s terrific, libraries are great too, that’s the thing. I love my local library and the librarians and everything. But one does see that it looks like days could be numbered. Who knows how the future is going to turn out?

Elizabeth: Yeah, my mom’s a librarian and they’re trying to decide whether they are even going to upgrade their school, do they want to try to outmode themselves faster?

Jasper: Yeah, I know it’s a hard one. And budgets are tight and libraries have been giving over more and more space to computer terminals for the last ten, fifteen years, and will probably continue to do so. But, I mean, how they evolve, and stay necessary and useful within the next twenty or thirty years is vital. But I think, certainly, that they will have to change in some form if they are to survive.

Elizabeth: Did you conceive of leapbacks[2] as a way to not only keep the people in line but also to make it so your book is not outdated by true future technology? As you said with Bladerunner it depicts the future so well but didn't prefigure cell phones.

Jasper: Yeah, it was. I’m very much of the opinion that the way we run our lives at the moment is based on sort of habit. And really the way that we think, and the way we discuss things, and the way that we look forward to things is very much a sort of fashion, the clothes we wear. And I thought, the way of thinking about things could change dramatically as well in 700 years, and these days we are always looking forward to new technology, you know, we have an expectation of new technology. In Eddie’s world they have an expectation of loosing technology. And how they deal with this is by trying to loophole a way of keeping the technology or taking the technology so you can use it within the parameters of the leapback compliance certificate. So in many ways, the way that they react to technology, is as innovative as the way that we do, and it was just really taking this idea of this endless increase in technology that we have and saying, ok, let’s turn it on it’s head and have a decrease in technology and actually see how people deal with that instead. And it was just a little sort of little fun thing, but again, also, I think, it’s to keep people in check and to keep everyone very localized and not moving around and really trying to keep a lid on society and make it sustain.

Elizabeth: Did you ever have a bad experience with swans?

Jasper: Swans? No, but it’s very funny though because there is always this thing with mothers, I don’t know what it’s like in the states, but here, it’s always “don’t go near a swan, it will break your arm” and I’ve never, ever, heard of anyone having a swan that broke my arm or anyone else’s. I was even on a tour in America, and during the tour I used to say, “Oh, can I just ask a question here, is there anyone here who has either been attacked by a swan or knows anyone who was attacked by a swan?” And of course no one, absolutely not at all. But it is one of those childhood fears that you have, and I thought I’ll use this because we have, in my book, basically four fears which are being stoked up to keep everyone in check. Swans, you know, big danger, and then there’s the night, which is also very frightening if you’re a child, there’s lightning[3], you know, which can come and get you, and that’s very dangerous too, and then there’s the Mildew[4] of course, always hanging around, disease, ready to get you, and the Riffraff, the unknown, sort of lower classes, who clearly don’t know how to brush their hair properly. So, it’s all this sort of manufactured ill, manufactured fears, in which everyone can sort of talk about and say, “oh yes, it’s terrible” without actually really coming into contact with them or understanding exactly what it is. And it’s just a form of social control I think.

Elizabeth: I was actually once attacked by a goose.

Jasper: Oh really! Well, geese, yeah, yeah, I think I’ve been attacked by a goose, yeah.

Elizabeth: Yeah, my friends don’t let me live it down, I was feeding it and it got violent[5]

Jasper: Yeah, they do that, they’ve got a bad temper geese.

Elizabeth: With reference to Monopoly, with Laden Parke Laine[6], and the only map left in existence after the "Something That Happened" being a RISK game board, how have board games, in particular Parker Brothers, influenced you?

Jasper: Well, Monoploy influenced me quite a lot when I was younger, cause we used to play a lot. I had two older brothers, and they used to play Monopoly, and I used to come along to make up the numbers and to have someone for them to beat. So I remember beating my brother at Monopoly once, and of course it was one of those wonderful moments in one’s childhood, where suddenly everything’s right with the world and it was wonderful[7]. Course he was a very bad looser, so he took it very very badly and I was starting to win very slowly at first, but then I got, more and more and more and more, until there was this point when he realized that he would never be able to claw back the money I’d earned off of him. And in the end, he just sort of threw the board in the air and scattered all the pieces everywhere and stormed out of the room. But it was a very good moment for me I must say, and it was the same with RISK actually. Beating him at RISK was quite good as well. But, yeah, board games, great fun, cause they’re very family orientated you see, and we used to not watch too much tv and play board games and play cards and stuff. I have great fondness for board games. Scrabble, we play a huge amount of Scrabble in my family. So, you know, we like it.

Elizabeth: Yeah, Scrabble was never a favorite, I’m not very good at spelling[8].

Jasper: Yeah no? Oh, ok.

Elizabeth: Thursday Next is very obviously a kind of parallel world to ours, but is Shades of Grey maybe a possible future?

Jasper:Yes, I think that was very much the case, I was really trying to get away from the Thursday world as much as possible so I didn’t want it to be a parallel world. I thought, let’s actually create one that was maybe seven or eight hundred years in the future, or a possible a future. So yes, I was really trying to distance myself from Thursday and everything.

Elizabeth: When writing Eddie, did you try to visualize the world as he'd see it with only shades of red?

Jasper: Yeah, there’s a sequence where he’s looking out of the window and he’s looking at the red flowers cause he’s bored of staring at the grey, cause it just becomes a grey mass as it moves past, and he’s looking for these little tiny little flecks of red, and then I think I describe how he moves through the summer on a sort of seasonal bloom and you take the early bloomers in the beginning of the season, and you’d watch them, and then slowly you’d go through the poppies and the sorrels and the pink campions, until season end, when you didn’t really get much at all. So every now and again I’d think how does Eddie see this, but it’s a hard one to visualize I have to say. But it’s much easier when you get a photograph and then actually desaturate all the colors apart from red and then you get a very clear idea. It also makes you realize that grass is actually yellow, which I never realized until I started mucking around with it. Grass is not really green at all, it’s mostly yellow.

Elizabeth: At least the yellows[9] will be happy then.

Jasper: Yeah, absolutely. They will, they certainly will.

Elizabeth: While several of the more menacing inhabitants are more conventional, with, evil plants, killer swans, and the lightning, I think the most sinister thing is Perpetulite Roads[10]. What made you decide to take something so mundane and make it so menacing?

Jasper: Well, I think that’s the fun of drama, and that’s always the chance of good drama, when you take something very very mundane, and then you make that frightening, or you make it a point of reference. And I just like Perpetulite, I think it’s brilliant. And I was sort of sitting down about six months before the book was finished and I was trying to think up future technologies, and that’s a hard one, cause you really have to think of things which are really not thought about at all, and your self cleaning windows, you know, that’s fine, someone could figure that out, I’m sure they have already, but I thought a building material that was made of a sort of organic plastoid, that actually just sucked all the nutrients out of the surrounding soil that it needs to maintain itself. And I thought this would be a fantastic building material. And really it would start as like a little brickette, wouldn’t it, and you’d just sort of add some water to it and it would start to grow. But the notion that roads are still dangerous, even when there’s no cars or people, I think also has a little sort of satirical edge to it, that you can be killed on the road by the road itself. Not just by a car or driving too fast or a drunken driver or anything else, the road itself will actually kill you. But it’s just a nice, sort of, slightly horrible notion, being eaten alive by something that really has no personality at all, it just wants to be a road.

Elizabeth: Plus, it would just be so useful, even if it was dangerous. I mean, cause we had 18” of snow here last week.

Jasper: Yeah, there you are, you should have some Perpetulite! Cause, you see, Perpetulaite actually generates heat. You can set how warm you want it and there’s never any ice on the road. When people still lived in Eddie’s world and had cars[11], or what might have passed for a car, Perpetulite would have been fantastically useful, never an icy road, the white lines would have illuminated themselves, and it would also have transmitted the power to your car. So it would have been fantastic and perfectly smooth, perfectly flat, no road works, nothing, it would have been great.

Elizabeth: Probably cut down on deer running across your path too, cause it would just eat them.

Jasper: Perpetulite, in it’s proper state would actually sense a deer or something that was actually on the road and then it would put white warning signs up ahead to drivers. Or it could even slow your car down ahead of time. Perpetulite would be the most brilliant of road surfaces ever. There would be hardly any accidents at all. But I love the sort of unintended consequences of wonderful technology and the fact that it’s still there and you can’t get ride of it and it’s seven hundred years later and now it’s starting to eat the inhabitants cause it’s getting hungry. I think it’s wonderful how humans leave their technology around and it starts doing nasty things in a hundred years time, like all those nuclear reactors which have been dumped in the Baring Sea and all that sort of stuff. It’s wonderful technology, but, years from now it’s just going to cause trouble. So I think it’s a bit of that.

Elizabeth: Is this going to be a set trilogy? Or are you thinking of going beyond the three books?

Jasper: Um, I don’t know. I mean it will be interesting to see how we go with number two. I mean, certainly there’s a good number two in it, whether I can stretch that to three or four our more, I’m not sure. The world is still quite large and unexplored, we’ve only really seen two inhabited villages[12] and two uninhabited villages[13], and we haven’t really seen what happened at High Saffron, and we know there’s a huge library[14] at High Saffron, which will have, one presumes, a lot of answers. So there’s an awful lot to be explored and there’s an awful lot of unexplained stuff and a lot for Eddie and Jane to do, even if they can do it in their own lifetime. So yes, but it really depends on how it’s received, and how number two looks and what else I’m writing at the time.

Elizabeth: Well, I hope its received well cause I really enjoyed it a lot.

Jasper: Oh, good.

Elizabeth: Have you actually started working on the next one or…

Jasper: No, I’m working on Thursday Next six[15] at the moment.

Jasper: Well a year’s time.

Elizabeth: Well thank you so much for this interview, I don’t want to take any more of your time.

Jasper: Oh, no, that’s quite alright.

Elizabeth: I’m actually going to be coming to your Skokie event[16].

Jasper:Oh good.

Elizabeth: And have you ever been to the Midwest in winter?

Jasper: Midwest in winter? No, I don’t… think I, hang on, Midwest in winter, well, no, what do you call the Midwest? Minneapolis isn’t the Midwest is it?

Elizabeth: Technically it is I think.

Jasper: Oh, ok, then I have. With, all your like heaps of snow and stuff. I think the first three books I did I was on a winter tour.

Elizabeth: Yeah, we get lots of snow. We’re getting more than what was expected[17].

Jasper: Yeah, I know, I love it. And it’s wonderful, cause we don’t have snow in the UK like that.

Elizabeth: Yeah, it was quite shocking to have last week where all of a sudden we had, you know, two feet of snow and no power.

Jasper: Oh, well ok, no, that snow’s not so much fun.

Elizabeth: Thank you so much and I’ll see you in January.

Jasper: Ok, brilliant.

Elizabeth:Thanks.

Jasper: Right, thanks, bye.

Well, there you have it! I'm obviously indebted to Jasper for doing the interview, but also thanks go out to Sonya Cheuse at Viking for sending me the book and offering me the chance of an interview. Really big thanks go out to Meredith Burks who set up the interview and was there to answer any questions I had in advance. And a final shout out to whichwaydidshego, a Fforde friend, who had the wonderful idea of footnotes, to aid the reader and also to add that little bit of Nextian logic to the interview. I hope you all enjoyed it and I hope to see some of you in Skokie in a week!

[1] In Eddie’s world books are no longer around, hence the lure of High Saffron, because of the rumors of a grand library, despite the whole, no one’s ever come back...

[2] Leapbacks are edicts from the Colortocracy where every year there is a list of technologies that are removed. Books, trains, phones, televisions, etc, have all been banned. The only way to keep technology is to find a loophole. For example, they outlawed trains, not a train. So, since the singular is different from the plural, Chromotacia has A Train.
[3] Ball lightning that seems to have uncanny homing abilities.
[4] The only real health risk in Eddie’s world, once you get it you’re a goner, only hours left culminating in a violent death.
[5] This happened over 13 years ago and still they can’t let it go!
[6] Park Lane being Boardwalk to us Americans, so it’s to “Land On Boardwalk.”
[7] I could tell in his voice what a happy memory defeating his brother was. Sibling rivalry, never out of fashion or out of mind!
[8] You have spell-check to thank for the legibility of this blog! Ironically I can easily see spelling errors…
[9] The more pugnacious of the colors, the yellows are authoritarian asses, especially in East Carmine.
[10] An Organoplastoid self-maintaining building compound, used mostly for roads before the “Something that Happened”, and now, although barely used, is still there. Intelligent and with a powerful memory, Perpetulite draws organic nutrients from the air and soil to maintain its rigid agenda, even if that nutrient source happens to be you.
[11] Cars were eliminated in previous leapback years, so most towns have one or two cars for emergencies.
[12] Vermillion, home of the last rabbit, and East Carmine, home of the Chair census.
[13] Rusty Hill, where everyone died of the Mildew, and High Saffron, where no one has ever returned from.
[14] See 1.
[15] One of Our Thursday’s is Missing, "...Continuing the story from where "First Among Sequels" left off, Jurisfiction has serious problems: With a Serial Killer on the loose, Speedy Muffler declaring all-out Genre war and aggressive book-pulpers threatening to turn entire libraries into MDF self-assembly furniture, only ace book-jumper Thursday Next can save the day. But where is she? Last seen investigating the theoretical Dark Reading Matter, the place - where it is conjectured - erased and forgotten books end up, Thursday is nowhere to be found. With time running out, Jurisfiction decides that you need a Thursday to find a Thursday, so they persuade Thursday5, comfortably getting to grips with the hastily rewritten TN series, to look for the real Thursday in the one region she fears more than anything else - A place of chaos, unpredictability and unresolved plot lines: The Real World...."
[16] I know I’m the real reason you’d be going to the event right? No… ok… but email me if you are thinking of going because I’d love to see you there!
[17] And note, this was BEFORE the really bad blizzard of last week!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 4 comments  

Labels: Bladerunner, East Carmine, Geese, Internet, Jasper Fforde, Laden Parke Laine, Leapbacks, Librarians, Library, Lightning, Mildew, Monopoly, Perpetulite, RISK, Scrabble, Shades of Grey, Swans