Musing Mondays - reading for the #readthemallthon & what book I wish I'd written

Musing Mondays - August 29, 2016

Musing Mondays is a weekly meme that asks you to choose one of the following prompts to answer:

• I’m currently reading…

• Up next I think I’ll read…

• I bought the following book(s) in the past week…

• I’m super excited to tell you about (book/author/bookish-news)…

• I’m really upset by (book/author/bookish-news)…

• I can’t wait to get a copy of…

• I wish I could read ___, but…

• I blogged about ____ this past week…

I'm currently reading/I bought the following books in the past week: 

I'm still in the midst of Read at Midnight's #ReadThemAllThon this week so my current read fulfills one of those challenges. It's also the book I got in the July #owlcrate. I am reading devouring This Savage Song. I started it first thing when I got up yesterday morning (most people use coffee as a means of waking up, for me it's a half hour of reading and a cold shower.) and I only have 81 pages left to go. I have been waiting ALL DAY to get home from work so I could finish reading it!

I had planned to read as much as I could over my lunch hour, but one of my coworkers and I got to chatting away about all sorts of things (specifically a research/writing project he is working on revolving around Barbara Gordon's Batgirl, which I am really looking forward to) so I didn't actually get any reading at all done. And then I'd been hoping to have time to write this post while I was on the public service desk in the afternoon, but then my manager and I got to talking about schedules and unions and building codes and the Ontario Government elaws portal so that didnt't happen either, so I decided I would write this post first and THEN I would finish devouring my book. I am so, SO enjoying this book. Absolutely loving it, everything about it. I am so thankful that I got it in the Owl Create or I might not have been aware of it until much later. Next on the docket after I finish this one is Saga Vol. 3  which I should also manage to get through tonight, and then Just Girls.

More books were purchased last week...I keep saying that I am going to stop buying books until I've read all the ones I already have/already have out from the library. That never seems to actually have any follow through. This time I made one of my usual mistakes, I wandered over to the book aisle in Walmart. I found two books that I'd been wanting for ages but couldn't justify spending full price on when I knew I wouldn't get to them for awhile. They were very cheap though so I could hardly pass up such good deals! So what did I buy last week?

The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black

It was only $5! I've been wanting to read it ever since I first heard about it, now I can. Goodreads summary:

Tana lives in a world where walled cities called Coldtowns exist. In them, quarantined monsters and humans mingle in a decadently bloody mix of predator and prey. The only problem is, once you pass through Coldtown's gates, you can never leave.
One morning, after a perfectly ordinary party, Tana wakes up surrounded by corpses. The only other survivors of this massacre are her exasperatingly endearing ex-boyfriend, infected and on the edge, and a mysterious boy burdened with a terrible secret. Shaken and determined, Tana enters a race against the clock to save the three of them the only way she knows how: by going straight to the wicked, opulent heart of Coldtown itself.
The Coldest Girl in Coldtown is a wholly original story of rage and revenge, of guilt and horror, and of love and loathing from bestselling and acclaimed author Holly Black.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children - by Ransom Riggs

This movie-tie-in edition was on for $7.50 which is definitely a good deal. I've heard nothing but good things about this book and have been wanting to read it for years and I figured with the movie coming out and me wanting to see that I figured now is a great time! Goodreads summary:

A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. A strange collection of very curious photographs. It all waits to be discovered in Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience. As our story opens, a horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. As Jacob explores its abandoned bedrooms and hallways, it becomes clear that the children were more than just peculiar. They may have been dangerous. They may have been quarantined on a deserted island for good reason. And somehow-impossible though it seems-they may still be alive. A spine-tingling fantasy illustrated with haunting vintage photography, Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children will delight adults, teens, and anyone who relishes an adventure in the shadows.

          THIS WEEK’S RANDOM QUESTION:  Which book do you wish you’d written, yourself?

I actually feel kind of blasphemous for saying this, because I am such a HUGE Potterhead and I do love J.K. Rowling's writing, she is my favourite author; I wish I had written Harry Potter and The Cursed Child myself. That was honestly my first instinct when I saw this question. I know that J.K. Rowling didn't write this on her own, even if I hadn't known that going into the script I would have known from reading it. It doesn't read like anything else she's written and more importantly it doesn't read like her Harry books. One of my first reactions as I was reading the first few acts was that it was reading like a fanfic...and not a good fanfic necessarily (at least in the beginning, I loved the book overall but I did have problems with it...). 

I wish I'd had the chance to write it, first and foremost because that would mean I'd been writing with my writing idol and what book fan doesn't wish for just that chance? But I also think I could have written a really good story within the parameters of Cursed Child's plot. Maybe that's just me having a big head but it's how I feel. I definitely feel like I could have written Harry better than he was written in this book. I honestly can't believe he'd grow up to pull some of the things he pulled in this book. And there are so many problematic things with the portrayal of Hermione in this script! Hermione who was/is/always will be a feminist icon gets the short of the stick in this regardless of the fact that she's the Minister for Magic! But now we're getting away from the fact that I wish I'd written it and into my analysis of it so on that note I am going to end this.