I Read What?!

i_read_what @ 2026-06-10T23:26:00

2026-06-11T03:27:04Z

Posted by: kalinara

Work trips are tiring and there always ends up being a lot to catch up on, so my next review is probably not going to be up until the weekend, sorry!

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i_read_what @ 2026-06-07T12:52:00

2026-06-07T16:52:40Z

Posted by: kalinara

There's going to be a bit of a delay on the next review because I'll be out of town for a few days for work reasons. I'm aiming to have it up on Wednesday or Thursday.

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Chronicles of Pern: First Fall - Verdict

2026-06-04T02:28:30Z

Posted by: kalinara

So that was my first short story collection for this blog. It's interesting. I definitely think, if I'm going to do this again (there are a lot of Vampire Files short stories worth reviewing), I'll need to refine my techniques. Some of these stories are much longer than individual chapters for one.

Overall, the book was enjoyable. I do have opinions about each story.

I'm going to cut for spoilers, particularly of Rescue Run.

( I have thoughts, surprise! )

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Chronicles of Pern: Rescue Run

2026-06-04T01:44:12Z

Posted by: kalinara

So we made it to the last short story in the bunch. "Rescue Run". I know a bit about this one, though I'm not actually sure if I've read it before. I know it's from the point of view of people who are not actually Pern settlers though, so I find that interesting.

It's been hinted to me that this might put some of the Pern colonists reactions into perspective, so I'm looking forward to that.

( It isn't that McCaffrey is a bad writer, but sometimes she seems to think what is obvious to her and her characters is obvious to the readers as well. And thus we never get some seemingly important context. )

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Castle of Deception - Chapter Six

2026-05-30T20:30:36Z

Posted by: kalinara

So last time, Kevin got a quest and met his party. And WE met our Drizzt equivalent. Our new friend Nate hasn't had much to say so far, but he does seem to hit a different vibe than Drizzt does, at least for now.

( Quest time! )

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Flight of the Raven - Part One - Chapter Eight

2026-05-27T22:46:07Z

Posted by: kalinara

Ugh, well, I did mention the month of May would be hectic, I think. I didn't plan to take a week off though. Oops.

Anyway, last time, we learned that Aidan has a brand new, never before seen power connected to his fake Irish side. He's also agreeing to get married, though, unlike his parents, he actually does get some say on who his spouse is. As long as it's one of his first cousins.

I'm really genuinely surprised Kellin doesn't end up with a Hapsburg jaw, that's all I'm saying.

( Inbreeding, schminbreeding. )

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i_read_what @ 2026-05-27T12:44:00

2026-05-27T16:45:17Z

Posted by: kalinara

Well, I ended up taking a full week off by accident. Sorry about that. Things got a little hectic. But I plan to have a new review up tonight.

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Chronicles of Pern: First Fall - Second Weyr

2026-05-20T01:58:00Z

Posted by: kalinara

Huh, we've made it to the second to last short story in the book. Short stories make an interesting reviewing experience, I think, because I'm really not sure how to pace them.

The Dolphins' Bell, for example, felt pretty long and I kind of thing I rushed through it just to be done. I may not have given it as fair a shake as I could have.

And I always want to be cautious with excerpts. It's one thing when you're going chapter-by-chapter (and even then, I suspect I abuse it), but when it's a short story, I feel like I run the risk of including far more than I should.

But it is an interesting experiment!

But now, "the Second Weyr"...

( We saw Lessa's family/kingdom's origin, I think. Will this give us F'lar's? )

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Castle of Deception - Chapter Five

2026-05-16T22:03:46Z

Posted by: kalinara

So...that turned into a week long break that I didn't entirely intend. Sorry about that.

Last time, our very teenaged protagonist got distracted from his job by a pretty girl (who might be an evil sorceress in disguise! Oops!) and the villains are scheming!

( Hey, remember how I said there was a dark elf in this... )

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Flight of the Raven - Part One, Chapter Seven

2026-05-07T23:34:42Z

Posted by: kalinara

Feels like it's been a minute since I reviewed this book. Sorry about that. As mentioned, end of April/early May is a bit hectic for personal reasons. But that will hopefully calm down soon.

So last time, Aidan made it back to Homana-Mujhar and had a vision of Carillon. He gave a pretty good showing, considering he didn't try to tell anyone to rape his daughter for her own good.

( It's funny that all the dead Mujhars are kind of terrible... )

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i_read_what @ 2026-05-05T11:14:00

2026-05-05T15:15:13Z

Posted by: kalinara

Yet another delay! But this time I have a medical excuse!

(Not really, a sprained ankle doesn't actually keep me from reading/writing. But laziness does!)

The next review should be up tomorrow or Thursday.

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Chronicles of Pern: First Fall - The Ford of Red Hanrahan

2026-05-02T03:08:46Z

Posted by: kalinara

Okay, so I'm going to be trying to include a lot fewer excerpts when reviewing short stories. I feel vaguely guilty about including so much of the original text when doing recaps of shorter things so I'm going to try to go with more summary here.

But we'll see how it goes.

I think this is going to be another longish one like Dolphin's Bell, and that has absolutely nothing to do with my decision, of course.

( Lazy is as Lazy does... )

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i_read_what @ 2026-04-29T22:18:00

2026-04-30T02:19:21Z

Posted by: kalinara

My own review will be a few days late (as mentioned, sporadic posting this week), but in the meantime, please enjoy Scales's Eragon review!

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Eragon: Chapter Twenty-Eight: Thieves in the Castle (Part II)

2026-04-27T19:48:15Z

Posted by: pangolin20

Chapter Twenty-Eight (Part I) | Table of Contents | Chapter Twenty-Nine (Part I)

Fumurti: A good day, everyone, and welcome back to Eragon! Last time, Eragon, Brom, and Jeod managed to get into the castle and copy the records concerning Seithr oil, due to very lax security. For the reader post:

( The book delivers something satisfying and engaging, at last! )

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Castle of Deception - Chapter Four and Interlude the Second

2026-04-25T19:30:27Z

Posted by: kalinara

So last time, the "castle of deception" lived up to its name as we got a peek into a conspiracy. We also learned that teenaged Kevin's very adolescent feelings of persecution actually do have a basis because the villains are legitimately fucking with him.

( Villains are like that. )

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Flight of the Raven - Part One, Chapter Six

2026-04-19T22:58:21Z

Posted by: kalinara

As mentioned in my last post, updates may be a bit more sporadic in the next few weeks. But hopefully it'll even out soon enough.

In the mean time!

Last time, Aidan met a shar tahl and got somewhat less than helpful advice. Alas.

( The only useful priest in the series is the Death-Harpist, sadly )

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i_read_what @ 2026-04-18T15:11:00

2026-04-18T19:11:42Z

Posted by: kalinara

Another day another late review. Honestly, I think this half of the month is probably going to be sporadic even for me. But I'm hoping to get back to a reliable routine soon. (high hopes).

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Chronicles of Pern: First Fall - The Dolphins' Bell

2026-04-15T04:26:36Z

Posted by: kalinara

So last time, we read the first story in the Chronicles of Pern. In it, we see the initial survey of Pern. Not a lot happened and the characters were more interesting concepts than fully developed, but it wasn't bad.

Let's see what "The Dolphins' Bell" gives us.

( We haven't seen Dolphins much yet, though there will be a book about them. Hopefully better than Renegades of Pern... )

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Castle of Deception - Interlude the First

2026-04-08T23:57:40Z

Posted by: kalinara

So last time, poor Kevin was a whiny teenager who isn't really having fun. And I don't really blame him. I've mentioned a few times that as a kid, I disliked Kevin (at least early on), but I actually feel pretty fond of the little idiot now.

( A big sign of getting old is that it's hard to blame stupid kids for being stupid kids... )

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Flight of the Raven - Part One, Chapter Five

2026-04-06T03:54:19Z

Posted by: kalinara

So last time, Aidan met an ancestor and maybe a god? Hard to say exactly, but getting a look at the Cheysuli religion more in depth is always welcome.

( Also it's interesting to see a more human, though still pretty evil, version of our very first villain... )

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Chronicles of Pern: First Fall - Introduction and Survey: PERN(c)

2026-04-01T23:49:05Z

Posted by: kalinara

So I figured I've taken a long enough break from Pern that it might be fun to get back to it. Also I realized that Masterharper of Pern is happily not the next one on the list. A reprieve!

Chronicles of Pern is actually a collection of short stories though and I've never actually tried to review one of those on this blog. Not really sure how it's going to work. But we can give it a shot.

I haven't actually read any of these stories before. Some of them may have been published earlier but I feel like if I tried to weave in all of the short stories by publication date I'd lose my mind. So we're going by the book publication date instead. Woo.

On the plus side, no standard intro for this book!

( Let's get started! )

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Castle of Deception - Chapter Three

2026-03-28T02:43:23Z

Posted by: kalinara

So last time, Kevin decided to be an annoying teenager and strike out on his own. He immediately ends up embarrassing himself and courting disaster. I'm sure things will be fine now though.

( We're still very early in the book... )

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Flight of the Raven - Part One, Chapter Four

2026-03-23T23:36:56Z

Posted by: kalinara

So last time, we caught up with Brennan and then Aidan got knocked off his horse.

You'd think, at some point, Niall would stop sending his descendants to Clankeep. Bad things always seem to happen to them on the way...

( Lots of people get knocked off horses in this series... )

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In Sylvan Shadows - Verdict

2026-03-20T01:52:40Z

Posted by: kalinara

So that one was basically a giant meh, to me.

It's disappointing, really. After a really strong start like Canticle, I had pretty high hopes for this book. But it really didn't deliver for me.

Plot:

The plot was fine, I suppose. Serviceable. We had recognizable stakes and a decent amount of excitement. But I spent most of my time wondering why I should care.

I mean, yes, of course, I want to see the invaders defeated and the innocent defenders win. But there were no real personal stakes involved in any of this. Cadderly, Danica, the dwarves, they could have been replaced by Drizzt, Wulfgar, and Bruenor and had the same emotional tie to Shillmista. Which is none.

And the one character who had an emotional tie to the events, the one who SHOULD have made us emotionally invested in the outcome, was too busy being a petty dick and a bully. Maybe a little reflection could have saved it - if Elbereth admitted that he was lashing out at the nearest target because he felt so powerless over what was happening with his home and people, it might have worked.

As it is, I didn't care as much as I should have. And I'm sad about that.

So let's talk about the Characters:

I liked Cadderly. I thought his post-Barjin trauma was really well-written. I like that he's overwhelmed and freaked out by the way his world has suddenly changed from a sheltered existence where he basically got to play the sitcom mischief maker to something more real and scary. I liked that he wanted to, and tried to, show mercy to even "monsters". And I dislike that the narrative seems to think he's in the wrong for that.

But the problem is, there's only so long you can watch a guy get kicked while he's down. We spent god knows how long watching him get bullied by Elbereth. His friends are completely unsupportive. He spends three quarters of the book feeling useless. And while he gets a few genuinely triumphant moments toward the end, we see them get immediately forgotten about.

He ends the book alone and honestly, I'm not sure that's a bad thing. I'm not sure I want him to meet up with these assholes again.

As for the others, well...they're just awful.

I really liked Danica and Cadderly as a couple in Canticle. But here, Danica spends all her time feeling this battle kinship with Elbereth, which could be fine and compelling, if she wasn't watching Elbereth bully the guy she's supposed to be in love with, CONSTANTLY. What the fuck is that? She's also completely unsupportive whenever Cadderly has a crisis, and I'm supposed to buy them as lovers?

I'm not saying a girl can't have her own friends, or that she has to drop everything when her boyfriend needs her, but SOME kind of consideration is basic fucking courtesy. These two are supposed to be in love, and I barely get the sense that Danica even likes him. There's no indication at all of any kind of respect.

I talked about Elbereth. He's the worst. He had a moment of growth and then completely backslid. And poor Galladel was completely ineffectual in a transparent attempt to make Elbereth look better. I just feel really bad for the Shillmista elves, because we have seen Elbereth demonstrate exactly zero traits that would indicate he'd be a competent ruler.

The dwarves were fun, I guess, but a bit too prone to comic relief for my taste. I liked Tintagel and Shayleigh fine, but they were mostly there as props for Elbereth. I've decided Tintagel is my favorite, simply because he shilled Elbereth less, but that's not saying much.

Kierkan Rufo had, by far, the most compelling storyline. I was genuinely invested in seeing him wrestle with his fear and conscience. And I was really pleased when he came clean to the others. It was, therefore, absolutely bewildering that after that growth and development, he suddenly regressed to being a horrible coward in one chapter. As I said in the review, I guess Salvatore decided he made a better villain than antihero, but the shift felt very sudden. And it's a shame, because he was actually interesting.

So yeah. It's not the worst book I've read. I still prefer Cadderly to Drizzt as a lead character, but it wasn't a very enjoyable read either, and it's kind of killed a lot of my anticipation to see where the series goes from here.

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In Sylvan Shadows - Chapter Twenty-Four and Epilogue

2026-03-20T01:30:51Z

Posted by: kalinara

Well, we made it to the final chapter. Not the final review mind you, because there's an epilogue after this. But close!

Nah, let's finish it in one go.

We saw the villains go down and we saw Cadderly get re-traumatized. On the plus side, my arbitrarily chosen favorite character gets to live! Yay!

( Hey, I'll take what I can get )

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