I love your honesty

I enjoyed this and would like to see you do it again. Thank you for all your thoughtful insights.

Really enjoying this wrap up, thank you for giving me freedom to DNF Wolf Hall!! Also I totally agree with your comments about The Broken Kingdom and Jade Legacy.

i've had daemon voices on my shelf for ages im defo gonna try and get to it soon!

Totally agree with you on Wolf Hall! I couldn't figure out why all these people rave about it!😮

I don't know anything about the book, but it looks like Cora was the actual Serpent of Essex! Maybe like that it will make more sense?

This was good. Please keep saying what you don't like and why.

this made me take the essex serpent and wolf hall off my tbr, but i am even more interested in the essex serpent tv series now, mainly cause tom hiddleston in it, yes, but also if it truly is a better story than the book, that's great for me xD

The Essex Serpent description low-key sounds like A Natural History of Dragons (A naturalist (also a widow with 1 son, not being the best mother to him) who studies dragons (which are considered serpents in some cultures) in an alternative universe of Victorian Era England), only the character is much smarter and more era-appropriate, the feminism is much subtler. Currently reading the second book and highly recommend giving it a try. I know you've read book #1 but I think it gets better in book 2, as long as you take the book for what it is, and don't expect a dragon-riding adventure fantasy, but looking for more a murder-mystery vibe - it's not a murder-mystery, but the VIBE is close to that cuz there're a few small subplot mysteries with subtle broody/sinister vibe, there's barely any dragons. And the Audiobook done by Kate Reading is pretty good, too, and they are short books

Oh gosh Liene those first three books had me worried for you! How interesting to hear you say that about When Women Were Dragons, because I just finished reading The Ogress and the Orphans by the same author and I felt the exact same way, like she was trying to convey this important message but hitting me over the head with it, I figured it had to be because it's a middle grade book so I went with it even though I found it annoying, but maybe that's just the way she writes in general. I shall keep this in mind if I ever pick up something else by her.

Liene, my god you make me laugh. Even just the first scene with all the books....... i'm laughing coz i'm like oh wow, she's going to despise most of these bahahahahaha. Im 2 books in, think ill get myself a beer and enjoy the lol's :-)

The serpent book sounds like self insert fanfic Also, are you reviewing Wheel of Prime S3? I hope so. I really need to know more about Not Galadriel, Hollister, and Mean Girl.

Great video thank you. Where did you buy your bookcases please?

- Completely agree with your assessment of anachronistic portrayals of "feminist consciousness" in historical/historical fantasy fiction. - Ha, your experience with Wolf Hall was super interesting to listen to! For my part... I found the character work in Mantel's trilogy superb, and I'm not a character-driven reader lmao (at least, certainly not when it comes to SFF). I found her books immersive, but perhaps I underestimate the role my prior knowledge of that period of history played in my appreciation of them? I also partly listened to them on audiobook, so perhaps that helped as well. Where I agree with you 1000%, however, is that the "third person narration in lieu of first person" was ridiculously, unnecessarily confusing. I eventually more or less got used to it but I just can't fathom why Mantel chose to go with that... - If I may, about When Women Were Dragons, which I really liked because of its theming (though sure I've seen better, still this was above a lot of contemp. books pretending to be "feminist fiction" imo), emotional impact and imagery: I mean, to my mind, there was, precisely, this kind of 'absurdity' of having women literally dragon, as yes a metaphor for female pain and rage, and the government going all McCarthy on that shit to try and suppress knowledge, awareness, etc... at all costs, even in relation to scientific inquiries into the phenomenon. Now of course if you prefer an even more, purely absurdist approach to that, that's completely fair, but I just wanted to point out the fact that is in fact in the book. Or at least I read it as such. But to each their own of course! :) - I thought The Broken Earth trilogy was meh to annoying, so yeah I'm definitely not feeling encouraged to try Jemisin's back catalog... 😅 - The Secret Commonwealth is, thus far, my favourite HDM-universe book, tbh. I know a lot of people hated it, hated adult Lyra, but I was there for it, and for the sustained theming/world-building done with Daemons, Dust, etc... I just hope he manages to wrap it all up in satisfactory manner in book three. 🤞 - Aw, too bad about Ninth Rain! I loved The Winnowing Flame but I could understand some people seeing it as underdeveloped! - I liked most of The Priory of the Orange Tree, but mostly because of the way it utilised symbolism and dragon lore lol. Otherwise I completely agree it's absolutely not feminist literature in any way, shape, or form, but I mean... I've come to learn that, 9/10 times that labelling is just PR bullshit. 🙃

Just curious, do you have a more recent (not 3 years old) "MY ALL TIME FAVORITE BOOKS"? I am looking for my next book, and like your tastes.

I also stopped When we were dragons, but for a slightly different reason. I thought it was very repetitive which I've seen a lot recently and it makes me wonder whether beating people over the head with the theme is the only way for some people to see it. I also tend to have too much of my own rage that reading a book about it isn't always the best idea. I did really like The Crane Husband by Kelly Barnill, so you might try that one. I think I already unhauled the Essex Serpent but thank you for confirming it wasn't for me. Enjoyable rant though. And lastly I thought you wouldn't like Levitation Wakes cause I really did. I may have not liked a first book in a favorite space opera of yours, so I thought our tastes didn't align that way. I am glad you found a few favorites out of the group.

Did you ever read A Man for All Seasons? Same story of Wolf Hall but from St. Thomas Moore's perspective.

Wow! All the way to 1:23:37 without an Abercrombie reference. Are you sure you are feeling better? 😉

I'd love for you to make a video on Proiry, just so you can pull out specific examples of what you mean. I didn't read it with any critical thinking and fully agree some storylines could've been cut completely, but there's stuff you're saying that i don't particularly agree with, but because you're keeping it spoiler free I can't even tell what u mean you know lol Would love to see a review that contains spoilers! As for the little I do get, as a lesbian i thought the romance was good, tho I wish we focused more on it before becoming so physical, and i thought at least Ead, Sabran and Niclays were very compelling characters. Definitely could've done without half of tané's story and almost none of Loth's.

Sounds like a lot of your anticipated reads are going to end up on your Worst of 2023 list.😅 Would definitely watch an in-depth rant review of Priory.

Please do a whole video about Priory, it's so refreshing to see other people with the same opinion on it. I would watch the heck out of a full rant review

I DNF'D Wolf Hall. I tried the audio and it was so confusing as to which character was who and I just couldn't take any more.

"Any minute now I'm going to see the point of this" 😆 I'm fucking dying that the first three were epic fails hahahaha I do wish Jade Legacy had been two books or something because of some of the aftermath being skipped several times -- wish we'd had just a littttleee more time with some stuff. I read Ninth Rain & liked it pretty well, but then I didn't care for the second one and dnf-ed the series.

I struggled thru the Jemisin reviews to get to the catharsis of someone else disliking priory 😂

Finally someone who agrees about Priory of the Orange Tree! Soo disappointing

I DNF'd The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms partly because it struck me the way Broken Kingdoms hit for you. Ah well--it was early in her career, right?

Yeah, you won't like the other Wolf Hall books then 😂. But that's okay!

I DNFd Priory at page 300. And, like you, it's a shame because the book is gorgeous. Too bad the contents don't match the cover. I wanted more dragon riding training, and we barely got any. And fir something blurb on the back, we should have more than 3 pages every 50npages. Also, i just did not care for any character or what happened to them. And while I'm only on Book 2, Winternight is way more feminist than Priory, as is Hobb.

Liene is still the best, Chuck out the rest.

On the women were never educated and it would be so radical to suggest that, Henry 8th's sisters and daughters were equally well educated, for that matter so were the Sforza women. Mostly aristocrats yes but then working class men usually couldn't read or write either. The idea of rights wasn't new either and especially in England, the peasant's revolt basically ended up demanding communism and England hasn't had an absolute monarchy since the 1110s

Would you say you wanted Women Were Dragons to be more satirical? Animal Farm and Stepford Wives are so over the top obvious because they're making a satirical point and supposed to be humorous. I like all 3 of those, but I can totally understand that Dragons could come across as pretentious and silly.

h.g. perry has a book coming in 2024 thats a peter pan retelling ,,, ;0

FINALLY someone who hates the Essex serpent as much as I do. I HATE that book with a burning passion and it's all because of the main character. She's such a pick me and I couldn't believe we were supposed to root for someone as selfish and awful as her. I felt like anytime now the book is gonna acknowledge how awful she is but no she's an author self insert and we're supposed to root for every terrible thing she does because feminism!!! God I hate that book so much and it feels so good to rant about it lol.

For what it's worth, I knew nothing about the plot of Priory of the Orange Tree before starting reading, and I didn't think the romance came out of nowhere. That said, I'm on page 570 right now, and the best I can call it is 'serviceable'. There are some interesting things going on, but also a whole ton of problems. There's a decent book in here, but it badly needs a good editor.

Really appreciate your take on Priory. Would love a full rant review. I didn't read that book but attempted to read the prequel and it was so bland. I DNF'd that pretty early. My general feeling on recent fantasy is disappointment. Apart from a few standouts, I didn't have much success with fantasy in 2023. I didn't give a single 2023 fantasy release 5 stars. Am I too picky or is publishing catering to taste that isn't for me? People are recommending books as five stars and more often than not, I don't get it. Feel like the market is heavily focused on pushing tropes and buzzwords over compelling and/or innovative stories. For example, I'm completely over retellings. A good retelling can be great, but feels like every other book is being marketed as some sort of retelling. I get that no story is completely original, but retellings just seem like a cop out over trying to come up with your own idea. Another example is creature tropes. It's like, zombies are out, vampires are on the upswing, I need to write my vampire book now. And Fae just never seems to go away. It's even happening in the mystery genre, though not quite as bad. Please no more "And Then There Were None" retellings. It's completely overdone at this point.

The Priory of the orange Tree, and the acclaim it received, is 100% a good metaphor for why we cant have nice things mate. It's a sad state of affairs aint it.

Damn, I couldn't disagree more with your assessment of The Broken Kingdoms. It's easily my favorite Jemisin book after The Fifth Season. It devastated me lol

History has a lot of dudes in it.

I, actually, think your reasoning for dropping book1 adaptation is completely rational lol. Doesn't sound like the same story, ergo, not an adaptation, ergo, does not deserve credit or eyeballs. If ur intent is to 'fix' such things, i'm a firm believer that you should write your own story with those things in mind, rather than lazily wearing someone elses IP as a skin suit for your ideas.