Published in 2015, A Court of Thorns and Roses started a short lived trend of “A Blank of Blank and Blank” that proliferated amongst the writing community on social media to refer to a relatively generic sounding book title. I was one of those participants. Quite honestly, I figured the writing would be pretty mediocre and decided I would never waste my time on it. This was also the season of editor’s burnout for me where everyone’s writing looked terrible. That has improved since reigning back on doing client work as hard and frequently.
So, I was stuck up at family’s house over a weekend with an absolutely terrible internet connection and no ability to get my phone to let me read my kindle books. In desperation, I popped down to the local grocer where the book shelf had A Court of Thorns and Roses on it, decided it was better than every Amish love story that was listed next to it, dropped the cash and took it back to the house.
Other than in the second sentence where the word parameter is used instead of perimeter – still not sure if that was on purpose, the editing was clean. So clean. Beautifully done.
It was nice, because I could just fall into a story and enjoy it. There were a couple points I wanted more fleshed out, and the ending felt rushed. Some of the logic points of the trial and what certain characters did needed more pages dedicated. I appreciated the commitment to the last trial – that the author didn’t just magically fix that one but had the character go through a full moral quandary AND THEN act on it. Often those types of scenes get a swooping in of some random hero who disrupts the moral quandary and then everything is rainbows and daffodils. This era’s authors are exploring further into these grey zones.
The spice…I was kinda meh on. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good spice scene. These ones just needed a bit more…ambience? mood? world build? setting? I’m not particularly sure, but the heat build up wasn’t quite there for me. Honestly, I figured with the writing style the way it was that the author was going to just go into a fade to black and it wouldn’t have felt off for doing so. It has rave reviews though with regard to the spice, so it’s somebody’s flavor.
I’m debating on if I’m going to read the rest. I sort of want to, but it’s not ‘drop my money on it right now’ reading. I keep flipping through Libby to see if it’s available, but it has a two month wait list through my library and I don’t live in a house where I can comfortably listen to the audiobook knowing the style of spicy scenes in it. I guess I could, but I hate dealing with turning off and on the earbuds. I like the idea of having the completed set on my shelf – but at the same time as a practicing minimalist, I would be just as happy just donating the physical book and renting the rest on Libby. Hard to read those at family’s though, as I learned the hard way.
It did feel like a beauty and the beast retelling. So if you’re looking for that kind of fantasy theme, this would fit pretty well.
Would I suggest it?
Yeah, sure. I think a lot of fantasy genre women would enjoy it. There might be a handful of men, as seen on TikTok, but for the most part, it is written for the adult female gaze – if you want to know who the market is.
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Released in 2018, Supergiant Games’s roguelike Hades is a deeply saturated fukinuki yatai style masterpiece. And I cannot get enough of it. The story follows the son of Hades, Zagreus as he battles through several levels of the underworld to get out of his dad’s house and learn about his mom. A vague coming of age story, a little bit of mystery, and a whole lot of mobs to slay.
I appreciate how much effort went into the audio production. I’m used to a great number of games not having much audio dialogue. It saves cost and timing in the code. This thing has depth. There is an amazing amount of dialogue from quite a few characters without much repetition – if it’s got an exclamation point, it’s going to be new dialogue.
The game play itself is roguelike. You die. You die a lot. You get used to it. And the rooms are variable. There’s a certain set that are randomly generated for each region with a certain set of mob types for each zone. You have weapon and ‘armor’ options that can make the game play different every time you go into the lands of the dead. I say armor. They are rings that give you different buffs.
I think, at this point, I’ve put in about 70 hours on it. I got a late heads up that putting on God-mode is a good thing (not like other games where that means expert mode, this one actually lets you work on your defenses and makes it easier to get through the levels over time). I was about 50 hours in when someone told me about that. That helped a lot. So, that would be my main hint for you if you take the game up.
If you like roguelikes or fukinuki yatai (blown off roof) perspective style, I’d point you at this game. It’s decent play mechanics. It’s got a good storyline. It lets you try new things. There’s a bit of rail-work to it, but that’s the nature of trying to ‘escape the dungeon’ so to speak.
I haven’t beaten the game yet. Yes, I know there’s a speed runner who blew through the whole thing in 30 minutes on a fresh save – I watched the commentary episode by the game designers over it. I’m just not that version of dedicated to developing that skill. Saying I haven’t finished it yet, I’m still excited about the second installment coming out soon.
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Published a full ten years after Vol 1 of The Sandman, The Dream Hunters by Neil Gaiman is a short story offshoot of Prince Morpheus, where he himself is not the main character, but instead a supporting role for a Fox in love with a Monk.
The. Illustrations. Are. Divine.
The woodblock unkiyo-e stylization of the landscapes with the ombre coloration. Chef’s kiss. And the texturization. Yes. Everything is good about it.
Also boobs.
Lots of boobs. So, if you find that startling to run across, or want to read this somewhere where people will be looking over your shoulder, there is your heads up.
Reading it did clue me into why I struggled with Graveyard Book. As mentioned in my writing on The Sandman, I have read a few of his other books before and had to wrap my mind around the fact that the stories didn’t follow a traditional Western plot line, but instead felt more like a Japanese/Chinese plot line and I wasn’t prepared for that going in. I walked in with expectations and was uncomfortable with a change to that.
Reading Dream Hunters, it is really obvious now how Neil Gaiman has learned to write his stories the way he does. I’m good with this.
I liked the portrayal of the characters and how he kept the authentic social sensibilites really close to many Japanese mythology tales while wrapping his Sandman into it.
The only thing that made me flinch was the mention of the villain’s wife (who was appropriately aged) and his concubine who was 17 and there was bare breasts present with that image. Gave me the creeps. More so than the older woman yokai with the row of eight breasts running down her abdomen. Anyways, there’s that heads up.
Setting, characters, dialogue? All within a context that fit to the story parameters and style. It was a nice offshoot from the main series and gorgeous. I rather liked Morpheus’s black and green robe and the fox’s robe. Those were interesting representations.
Anyways. Suggest it? Yes.
Probably not one I will go out and buy immediately, but if I find it while perusing, I would not protest it landing on my shelf.
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Published in September 2022, the Glass Library is a relatively new series by C.J. Archer, known best for her book The Watchmaker’s Daughter and an off shoot to the Glass and Steele series. I was drawn to the series while scrolling for historical mysteries on Libby and ran across the third installation The Untitled Books. Knowing myself and how I would be lost picking up a book midway through a series, I went and hunted down the first book. It was on a waiting list four people long. So, I hoped onto Amazon and picked up the first book so I could read the rest of the series.
I don’t know if I will be finishing the series.
I read the book in a day. That usually should be a good indicator of prose and a smooth flow, right?
But, thinking on it overnight, I can’t say that I am satisfied with it. The entire thing felt like a subplot. The romance was lingering, pining, unavailabe. The magic was never truly fleshed out. The characters were flat. The mystery was predictable. The stereotypes were stereotypes. And the #metoo movement was really blatant.
Maybe I should break all that down.
I didn’t read it for the romance. I was looking for a sexless mystery a la my regular Tony Hillerman fare. I’ve also been trying to find a decent library mystery because I am currently writing a library action-fantasy and wanted to see what other people were writing in the topic. The romance itself was…maybe not a romance? It’s that easy crush of girl liking handsome guy, but guy is engaged, so can’t have, but can’t stop feelings, but won’t act on feelings. Maybe I just have a switch I can flip where someone is pointed out as ‘off-limits’ and I just register that and go ‘alright, person is now acquaintance’. The fiancée also just showed up for one dinner scene, gave a blessing for the MC to be a guest in her fiancé’s house, then never really made an appearance again. He never talks about her. Never hints at her. She was some type of a trope point which could have honestly been ignored entirely. Either that, or provided with more time on screen interacting with the MC and the LI.
As it is, the characters were flat. There was no emotional development. The best friend was almost a copy pasta of Charlotte from The Princess and the Frog by Disney. 1920s. Bubbly. Chaotic mayhem. Well meaning. Not into taking responsibility for her actions.
The main character was definitely a self-insert wish fulfilment. Look, I get it, authors write to escape. I am an author. I write to escape. The heavy handed self insert I’m mucking with at the moment is in Life of a Librarian with Thaddeus Jaeger. I’m using his character to work some stuff out for myself, but at a certain point, I will have to step back and allow his character to mature and grow into whatever relationship he is getting into with coworkers, love interests, opposition. This was: I want a library, a romantic partner, and a bit of adventure – give me books and let me go to bed early.
This MC in Crooked Lane was very much neurodiverse, leaning into Autistic. Usually what would be considered ‘high functioning’/’level one’/’low needs’ whichever term is being used right now for folk who mask well in public demand settings but find it significantly easier to work on their own in a quiet environment and often don’t know they are neurodiverse – just that they feel bone tired and anxiously on edge if they’ve had to be ‘on’ all day. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s nice seeing neurodiversity expressed more frequently in literature. This one was just really obvious. An elderly housekeeper leaving notes on pillows about what the routine of the house and the MC being relieved about knowing the routine. The desire to not get involved in confrontations. The shutting down from multifaceted conversations. A desire to understand the social situation and protocols, but none of it working. Getting dragged along with events rather than making firm decisions because she can’t put her foot down in the moment unless she’s startled to action. A desire to hide in books.
Problem with that is how much time she spent not in the damn library. It was a bunch of time spent helping a ‘consultant’ for Scotland Yard figure out who stole a painting. But…it wasn’t really fleshed out as to the interactions between suspect and consultant. The conversations were relatively arbitrary. The ones that stick out were overly misogynistic, which to be fair, the 1920s wasn’t exactly great for women, but a lot of the particular dialogue reminded me word for word of Twitter conversations during the #metoo movement. It didn’t come off as genuine.
Angry younger guy is mad at women because he’s deformed from war.
The old men were either angry at women or perfectly harmless frail creatures.
The male artists were all flamboyantly liable to bed anything that moved.
The best friend was a ‘counterpoint’ extrovert trope.
The love interest seemed to always follow up the MC’s thinking paragraph with doing exactly what she needed to feel safe/secure/get a thing done – he was very flat and uninteresting.
The LI’s ?aunt? was portrayed as angry butch bi that never switched out of crass/overbearing/repugnant. She was just…angry. Except the one moment where she goes on a monologue, which was one of the longest in the book and very much against her character up to that point. It was displaced and needed several more pages of her getting more and more chatty rather than info-dumping to make it feel woven in appropriately.
And the person who stole the painting was so obvious it hurt. To which point, the whole reason the MC and LI met was overlooked for practically the entire book until the end when the LI half-heartedly admitted he could have told the MC about the person she was looking for but hadn’t felt like it?
It’s obvious she and he are both magicians. However, the world build for the magic was…shoddy. I would say shoddy. The guy’s parents pay for a library of books on magic and he doesn’t ‘know’ jack about it? How would you not know that, especially with your mother being a magician?
Anyways. The setting was supposed to be 1920s post war Britain. It was alright. There were a couple instances of slang words used to make it feel at home for that. It was an okay read. I just was sort of disappointed with it being lackluster in my opinion. It does have some high praise reviews on Goodreads and Amazon, so there are people who truly do enjoy the book. I wouldn’t discourage you from it if you wanted to read it. I just wish I had waited to rent it from the library rather than paying for the kindle version because the third book looked interesting and now I have a feeling I won’t get around to reading it. I want to know about her silver magic family, but I can honestly care less about all the other trivial things that are going to have to occur for a four book set to get to that point. Give me the cliff notes.
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The Sandman, Vol 1: Preludes and Nocturnes by Neil Gaiman hit store shelves at the start of 1989 and the subsequent series made Gaiman a household name within the graphic novel and comic book community.
My familiarity with graphic novels lies with manga, manhwa, donghua, scrolls, and very early woodblock graphic novels from before 1940. I honestly am not as familiar with post-WWII graphic novels, and I believe that is a failure on my part. Really, it has a lot to do with Marvel and DC comics just not being my jam. I don’t really care for superhero stuff. Metaphysical, mythological, fantasy, psych-horror, gritty, post-apocalyptic? Yeah, throw it my way.
I watched The Sandman on Netflix back when it was first released. That was my introduction to the story. It only took me a year to get around to actually reading the novel. I had read The Graveyard Book as my first introduction to Gaiman and though I loved the prose, setting, and characters, the very ending bothered me. It was strange, different from my expectation of a British writer. The ending is what I would expect out of manga and Japanese/Chinese story telling. Unresolved. Darker. Grimm’s Fairytales comes to mind, where it doesn’t end with everyone happily eating around a feast table being jovial. Not bad, but uncomfortable for my expectations.
Once I got that pattern through my head and expected the ending to be more tragedy/literature based, I went ahead and approached American Gods, seeing as everyone was on about it with me for some reason. Maybe the video had just come out? I haven’t watched it. Would like to, but certain members of my household aren’t quite in the right frame of mind to handle that kind of content. Sandman was fairly safe to watch around them (had to skip the restaurant).
I’ll do a review on American Gods later. That one was very worth while. And the ending was easier to bare because going into it, I just assumed everyone was going to die or not get an HEA. That helped.
So, turning back over to The Sandman.
Loved the TV series. That was right up my alley for story format, material, grey characters. The expansive setting and the questioning of social morals. Just. Yes. That is something I would love to communicate in my own stories. Where people get done with a chapter and they have to sit and actually think. Not to say it was overwhelmingly deep in what it had to say, but to see the far reaching hands that lead to decisions, circumstances, the what-ifs.
I rented The Sandman Vol 1. on Libby and gave it a read today. Was terribly sad when it ended. Was more surprised at just how closely the TV series follows the book. There was a bit of extra in regards to his castle, but otherwise most of the series is just within this first book.
I loved the fact it came in short stories, chapters, episodes – depends on what you want to call it. Often in manga, the books come in 4 chapters with 30 pages to each chapter. There might be a little wiggle room with those numbers, but not by very much. It’s similar to the comic format of 30 page leaflets for each ‘installment’. I liked having it all conglomerated like this rather than having to rent a bunch of smaller inserts.
If you are new to graphic novels, but have seen Heavy Metal, this is going to feel really similar to that short story format with the gritty art style and story material so quintessential to the Western comic book industry, especially from the 1980s. That might have more to do with the fashion of the time seeping into the pages, though.
I didn’t pay attention to the cover where it said something about DC, which would have saved my confusion when John Constantine and the Justice League make an appearance in the pages. Talk about a moment of confusion as to why there was a crossover for these anthropomorphised ideas and superheros. I rather loved the movie Constantine and have meant to read his comic books for a long time, so I was familiar with the character, and it is hard to escape basic pop culture knowledge of the Justice League, so it was easy enough to follow along with what was happening for not having read the material.
I can’t say that we learned a lot about Morpheus through the book in a deep character development way. But what was done with him did help establish him as a character primed for a series. Discovering he has siblings just makes it more interesting. In the TV series, there is a bit more time spent in bringing Morpheus into a more humanized frame of mind, a development of empathy and sympathy. In the book, he feels more relatable in his logical approach to situations and outcomes. I don’t think either are the ‘correct’ method of portrayal. I think it just works better for different aundiences. Those who might need to see a character as redeemable outside of justifiable revenge can get that through the TV series. Whereas, the comic book doesn’t dwell so much on providing an escape through social morals and instead focuses on establishing a creature possessing flaws and a different way of thinking from the social psychology of a Western culture.
I loved the artistic expression the illustrators utilized throughout. How there was a refinement as Morpheus emerged from the beginning to the end of the story. Some color work felt very DC superhero, where as others merged further into the muted grit style of some of the gothic graphic novels I’ve seen in passing.
There are quite a few instances within the book of nudity, blood, gore, trauma-material that aren’t for younger readers or those who might have bad flashback issues. The material covered felt par for the course for 1980s gritty noir where real atrocities blend truth and fiction, calling out the dark side of humanity.
This one. This felt like my comfort zone. The type of work that I enjoy interacting with and meditating on.
Yes. I will be reading the rest of the series. It’ll be money, but it’ll be a set on my shelf. I can see exactly how this launched Gaiman into the light. It speaks to dreams, nightmares, fiction, and reality – the human condition between hope and despair. It gave me Constantine, Dune, Highlander, Heavy Metal, Escape from New York. It gave me nostalgia and the familiarity of a social commentary I grew up on. The type where the world looks like it’s crumbling around you and you can’t tell if the light at the end of the tunnel will burn you up like a moth to a flame or lead you into an expansive view of the horizon. And it’s worth every ounce of your will to find out.
Would I suggest it? For those who like gritty noir blended into urban fantasy, hell yes.
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With most of his stories published between the 1920s and his death in 1937, H.P. Lovecraft’s works are well known within the nerd and geek communities for Cthulu and Arkham. Also his insane level of racism. Good lord, the man was phobic. Not even sure if xenophobic is right. Just, anyone that wasn’t a New Englander white male.
Yes. I read his works. It’s nice that my money isn’t going to his estate. That made reading the works a bit more palatable on my moral conscience.
I’m trying to work through classics to better understand the point of view that many people are coming out against authors for being various types of phobics and -isms, because I want to know for myself and not just take someone’s word for a thing only to find out that they were reading bits and pieces out of context.
People were right. This man is racist. It was quite jarring.
The stories outside of the racism?
That man can write. His syntactic structure is loquacious and intoxicating. His ability to write horror isn’t in the same vein as R.L. Stein or Bram Stoker. It’s a different shade that doesn’t sound terrifying in the reading, but more of a 1950s sci-fi flick grotesque that makes you ponder later.
I can see why the Lovecraft mythos was commandeered by the geeky, save for the racism. There’s much in it to play with.
The one that has ended up sticking with me is Colour Out of Space. It felt like one of the short videos I would have experienced in the old cartoon Heavy Metal. A meteor that hits earth and an unknown force that slowly but surely sucks the life out of a five acre area and scientists can’t explain it.
Would I suggest anyone read this stuff? Uh…no, probably not, because jeeze the guy had major prejudices. At the very least, I wouldn’t suggest it for impressionable children who don’t yet have a firm grasp on what prejudice is and how to read past it rather than internalize it as something they should emulate. To be honest, I’m surprised anyone is still printing modern copies of it. I picked mine up at Barnes & Nobles in their little atrium area on a BOGO deal, so I’m only out $5 for the collection. If you really want to see just how good his writing style is and how bad his -isms are, see if you can rent a copy from your library first.
Otherwise, kindle is always an option.
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Published in 1996, Tony Hillerman’s western murder mystery The Fallen Man is the 12th novel out of 26 in his Leaphorn and Chee series. I promise, one of these days I will take the time to actually read this series in order. For the most part, each story is relatively stand alone if you are invested in the mystery and not necessarily the daily lives of the characters outside of the detective work. I was a bit lost in this one because I think I had been reading more towards the end of the series recently and was having trouble placing some of the character drama, but that was entirely my fault.
I’ve read about eight of Hillerman’s stories at this point and decided to work on collecting the whole of the hardback set. This was one I found at a used bookstore for a couple dollars and I think it’s actually one of the more lackluster of the set. I don’t buy books very often that I’m not keen on, and this one is specifically because I love a lot of the rest of the series. I wouldn’t say this is the one to start off with if you want to take up reading the series, though. The mystery in it feels a bit more predictive than usual. Sometimes that’s not a bad thing.
I loved the setting in it. I grew up out in New Mexico for a handful of my childhood years, so there’s something special to the arroyo canyons and sedge grasses, the smell of snow on a desert landscape, the climbing plateaus that just call to me. I live where I no longer see the mountains along the skyline and I miss that dearly. So, I find, when I’m craving the desert highlands, myself reaching for Hillerman books. Either that, or waiting impatiently for August hatch chili season to roll around at my grocery store where I stockpile on more than a healthy number of pounds of food product with the smokey pepper added in.
The characters are consistent. Hillerman does an excellent job of keeping their voices and body language unique to each character across the series. The syntactic structure doesn’t shift into literature territory, instead staying solidly in mass market mystery. Some days that’s all you want. Something easy to digest with just enough mystery to give you a puzzle to chew on while you escape into a location and some drama.
Doing reviews of mysteries can be a bit challenging, because I don’t want to give away the story at all, so I try to focus on the setting, prose, world build, and character more than giving you a book review. To me, Hillerman’s Leaphorn and Chee series solidly fills out the rubric every time in regards to those elements. I just wish I knew of more people who enjoyed his work like I do.
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Pom Poko, produced in 1994 is my favorite of the Ghibli movies. It’s a bit lesser known compared to Spirited Away and Kiki’s Delivery Service – also great movies.
This one deals with a pack of Tanuki living in Tama Hills and how their lives change as developers come into the forest to create neighborhoods for people. There was some popularity back in the 80s and 90s with making morality cartoons that asked people to consider how animals were doing with the drastic changes industrialization was having on habitats or the lives of animals. The Secret of NIMH comes to mind, another of my favorite movies. That is probably a part of why the story appeals to me.
It is a longer video and is well worth the time, but not something you want to start too late into the evening if you don’t plan on staying up.
One of the reasons I have for liking it so much is the incorporation of ukiyo-e yokai during the night parade and the mythology surrounding the transformative ability of the tanuki and foxes. I love the transitional art where the tanuki go from extremely cartoonized to realistic and back again to help convey mood. I enjoy the playfulness they exhibit in challenging mankind’s coming to the forest. The setting is lush and deep. The characters are fleshed out and exhibit a wide range of emotions. The story is easy to follow along and engaging.
To me, this is a fall favorite. It covers all four seasons, but it is a fall favorite to me. I think it has much to do with the ending of an age, and that tends to be what autumn represents.
I would say, if you haven’t had a chance to watch this Studio Ghibli movie, that it is well worth the time. Might see if you can borrow a copy through your library before dropping a chunk of change on the disc to make sure you like it. Some people get weirded out by the tanuki’s use of their scrotal tissue for creating flying parachutes and such what have you’s but that’s part of the tanuki mythos and culutral background to the story – so….
Anyways, give this one a try. I need more people who also like Pom Poko.
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Originally published back in 1997, Janell Cannon’s super colorful, wonderfully saturated picture book Verdi is something I’ve loved since running into it when volunteering at my local library back in high school. It’s one I bought to keep on my shelf because of the color and quirky little story.
For people who don’t like snakes, this one isn’t for you, but for me, I think pythons are cute, so I loved the characters. I like that the plot isn’t terribly deep and the setting doesn’t shift too much, which keeps the focus on the snake learning to enjoy life in the foreground.
The vocabulary and syntactic structure might be more appropriate to slightly more advanced young readers (first grade level +) in regards to children’s read alouds. It’s perfect for adults to read to children.
Would I suggest this one? I would highly recommend seeing if you can borrow it from the library first and seeing if your kids like it before buying. That tends to be my standard with most picture books, though. For me, my copy will be living on my shelves for years to come.
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Released in 2018, Flight of the Hawk: The River by W. Michael Gear truly revealed to me how much I do not know about the War of 1812, or much of the goings on around that time period. I’m on a western kick at the moment, but finding ones that aren’t modern cowboy romance or modern western murder mysteries is a bit of a stretch for me to find. One of those things where it’s still a genre I’m working my way into.
The writer and editing department did their job with this. The setting was beautifully rendered, the characters have depth, the pacing feels a bit slow, but not in a bad way. The syntactic structure, though. That one is golden. The variability of vocabulary and sentence pattern just sings. Sorry, I’m a pattern snob and most mass produced novels are fairly predictable, this one surprised me at it’s eloquence without coming across stuffy.
I’m not sure that I would add it to my shelf. I rather like my Tony Hillerman collection, and W. Michael Gear’s collection would need to be accounted for. I think it would work well in my Kindle shelves instead. I borrowed my copy from the library, and it looked practically brand new because not a lot of people read Westerns.
I enjoy writing accents. Some authors can pull off written accent, and some can’t. Gear’s work has some accents in it that read well, and other’s that were a touch odd. I found the Scotsman came across more like Jamaican in my head than Scottish. I think it was the use of ‘mon’ for ‘man’ that gave me Jamaican. The French and Spanish accents I had an easier time following. I think that was really my only issue with the workings of the book.
Oh, and Native American names. I find it stupid that people will translate Native American names, rather than just use their names. Like ‘red bird’ rather than the name. It’s like saying “From the Oak Tree Settlement (Acton) and Blessed Ruler (Aidric) have gone to town to visit with Elf Ruler (Alfred).” You don’t do it with English names, don’t do it with Native American names. It’s reductive.
Would I suggest it? If you’re into Westerns, I think you might get something out of this. It will definitely test you on your knowledge of a particular time and place.