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Familiar Diversions

I'm a librarian who loves anime, manga, and reading a wide variety of genres.

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Reading Challenge 2024

1523 BOOKS

Currently reading

How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, Vol. 1
Dojyomaru, Fuyuyuki, Sean McCann
Progress: 103/374 pages
Darkly Dreaming Dexter
Jeff Lindsay
Progress: 424/470 minutes
Wait Till Helen Comes: A Ghost Story
Mary Downing Hahn
Progress: 184/184 pages
Parental Guidance
Avery Flynn
Progress: 40 %
An Offer From a Gentleman
Julia Quinn
Progress: 102/358 pages
The Twisted Ones
T. Kingfisher
Progress: 385/385 pages
Educated
Tara Westover
Progress: 315/730 minutes
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!, Vol. 2
Satoru Yamaguchi, Nami Hidaka
Progress: 24/171 pages
Graphic Medicine Manifesto
MK Czerwiec, Kimberly R. Myers, Scott T. Smith, Michael J. Green, Susan Merrill Squier, Ian Williams
Progress: 26/172 pages
Ao Oni: Mutation
Kenji Kuroda, Karin Suzuragi, Alexander Keller-Nelson
Progress: 30/152 pages

Recently added

How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, Vol. 1 - Dojyomaru, Fuyuyuki, Sean McCann
Heart Change - Robin D. Owens
The Saga of Tanya the Evil, Vol. 1 - Carlo Collodi, Emily Balistrieri, Kevin Steinbach

Reading progress update: I've read 250 out of 250 pages.

1:28 pm 29 May 2015
Shadow of the Knife - Jane Fletcher

Well. I've finished this, and I am now very angry. So very angry. All of Fletcher's other books that I've read have been sci-fi (or, more accurately, sci-fi that feels more like fantasy) with romantic aspects. This...was not that.

 

I don't know how spoilery my review is going to be, but I need to rant right now, and it will contain spoilers. So here goes.

 

 

Fletcher tried really hard to redeem Hal. Hal was nice to Ellen, she set her free, she didn't tell her the lies she was supposed to tell her, etc. I don't care. I don't consider her to be redeemable. Ellen may have forgiven her, but I couldn't bring myself to do the same. She gave an old woman, a relative of hers, brain damage. Yes, it was on accident, but it was while she was trying to hurt her on purpose. She murdered someone in cold blood. She stood by and watched as Ellen was tortured. And I don't care if the Butcher was her cousin - the Butcher was a monster, Hal knew it, and Hal's decision to stand by her was in no way a good thing.

 

Hal and Ellen's sex scene (scenes? I can't remember, I'm trying to blank it all out) while Ellen was being held captive made my gorge rise. It was painful to watch Ellen going from "I still want her, and hate myself for wanting her" to "I know she did awful things, but I love her and don't want her to die." It was more the Butcher than Hal holding Ellen captive, but I wonder, could this be called Stockholm syndrome?

 

And the bit where the partially healed wounds from Ellen's recent torture were just "sensitive areas" during sex? OMG.

 

The ending felt like an attempt to heighten the "tragic romance" feel, which just made me angrier. According to one review I read, another one of Fletcher's books refers to the events in this one and gives the full conclusion. Although I've read all the other books in the series, I can't for the life of me remember any other mentions of the characters in this book, so I'm going to need to do some searching. Hopefully one of them tells me that Hal was killed and Ellen eventually came to terms with her death and found love and happiness elsewhere.

(show spoiler)

 

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