Cid

I'm honestly not sure why I keep reading Alison Weir's non-fiction. They not bad, they're just... not for me.

Let me put it this way. I am reading these books to find out more about women from history. I get there isn't a ton of information to go on, but there is only so much I can care about how much money their fathers/husbands/brothers/sons/lovers spent on them. Or vice versa. I feel like Weir's primary resources were bills and accounts, which is a cool way to learn more about these women, but maybe keep it in the background a bit more?

I didn't enjoy this one quite as much as the first, but still an excellent cozy-mystery-with-royals.

As an aside: does it say something about the type of mysteries I read and watch that I keep expecting the DCI to be a love interest for Rosie? Yes, yes it does. And I'm so glad he's not!

I really hadn't planned on reading any of these new books by Christopher Tolkien — I've already read most of the History of Middle Earth books, so what new info could there be? But then I saw that the audiobook was read by Timothy & Samuel West! I would listen to Sam West read a phone book, so to Audible I went.

I had expected the audiobook to be a little strange given the format of the book — J. R. R. Tolkien's partially written stories surrounded with (and sometimes interrupted by) Christopher Tolkien's explanatory information — but it worked perfectly! Sam West read the tales and his dad read Christopher Tolkien's commentary, and they both did an excellent job. I shall listen to the Unfinished Tales soon!

I wouldn't necessarily recommend this to anyone who wasn't already a giant Tolkien nerd, but I loved it.

I absolutely loved this book. The characters all felt incredibly real, which doesn't happen all that often for me.

I love Rosaline's bisexuality and the very realistic and varied ways people respond to it. I love Rosaline and Harry's friendship. I love Harry's ability to take criticism, go “yeah, that makes sense”, and change. I love Rosaline and Lauren's friendship. I love Amelie and her love for anglerfish.

I have never seen an episode of GBBO and I still love this book. Do yourself a gavor and read it.

Aww, what a wonderful ending to the series! This one was my fave so far, I loved Huck so much. I hope she eventually adds more to the series!

Listened to this one solely because I enjoyed The Fall of Gondolin so much. But I was reminded why this is my least favourite First Age story... poetry. Scads and scads of poetry. It was gorgeously read by the brilliant Samuel West, but my god it just seemed to go on forever...