Toast.x2

  ReReading- It's been 30-odd years since I read Stephen King's The Gunslinger. I remember reading the first several books in the series, never making it past The Wizard and the Glass because.. well, life. What a confusing half story The Gunslinger was. The story was loose and fragmented. Rowland (the Gunslinger himself) was haunted by his past, blinded by his desire to catch the Man in Black. He seems ti be knowledgable in some things, but his education seems to be incomplete, like a kid who left school in 6th grade to take on as a apprenticeship he hates less than the classes he was foced to sit through. Being purposefully obtuse- Half story or not, I enjoyed it. Rowland in the town with a mob of death and religion, crossing the desert, climbing mountain passes with a presumed deceased boy. All of it, including the loss of a decade to a long discussion about the future. Yes, my review is as fractured as the book. Looking forward to reading the Drawing of the Three again, and ...

  This was one of the hot new novels for christmas season 2024. All the tiktok and insta folks were a flutter, telling people how it was sooo good, and just the next good thing for the ladies. Sooo, copy attained and copy listened to. There were some things here that were great, others which were cringey, sticky, and I really should not have been surprised.. but I was. First- I really liked the narrator. he jobially introduced each chapter, actively broke the 4th wall and spoke to us as readers/listeners. All if it in rhyming prose. Second- I don't truely understand why everything in this novel is christmas related. It was a christmas town, dedicated to the xmas season, How anout the rest of the year? so confused. Third- The story was fun, I was feeling some holiday movie romcom vibes, then. BANG BANG BANG semen and other fluids everywhere. Things got uncomfortable fast. My wife and I had to shut a door so the kids wouldnt become privvy. This went on for something like 40 minutes a...

  My wife and I will sometimes zone out to some audiobooks while we play games together like The Sims4 and such. Lucinda Berry's The Best of Friends was one of these. I enjoyed it a lot, but have a hard time putting to words why. In this novel, three women, their husbands, and their sons are all entangled in a mystery. The boys have had some form of accident- one is dead, one is traumatized to muteness, and the third is in a coma. Each of the women take turns in the story breaking down details they expose as they investigate and tear apart their childrens personal lives. Meanwhile, we also get glimpses into their homelives and the stressors which mold them to their looming break points. I felt like the title did wonderfully at being ambiguous. is the story about the women or the boys? Didn't think that the ending was very culminating, we were left with several new questions, and only a few answers. We can speculate and make educated guesses.