Hi everyone! It’s been a pretty good reading month for me, as you’ll see. I read 3 books and 2 comic books for a total of 5 books this month! I’m quite happy about this progress! I also started reading for school so I read a chapter for each of my classes from the text books. Each chapter was just under 50 pages long and it for sure is the longest it’s taken me to get through 50 pages. Those chapters were incredibly boring but the books I read weren’t!

I have to say though, I am so glad I prioritized reading those chapters over writing for my blog. So if you don’t know, I try to write all my posts for the week and take photos as well as schedule over the weekend. I put off writing my posts until I finished reading my school assignments, and I’m happy I did that as I was feeling very stressed about it! Although now I’m worried I won’t finish my posts in a timely manner.

 

As always I’ll rate Goodreads style, up to 5 stars, using full star increments. If you want to friend me on Goodreads feel free (link in my signature or look me up, StarringPamela on there)!

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Dance Class: Romeo and Juliet (Dance Class #2) by Crip

2 out of 5 stars

Dance Class is a children’s graphic novel following best friends Julie, Luce, and Alia in their dancing adventures. The book revolves around their class putting on a production of the ballet “Romeo and Juliet” and their crush on the new student and Romeo, Tim.

I rated this book 2 out of 5 stars as I thought it as funny but ultimately not very good. Each page was like it’s own story in the story, there was really no continuation in the story except for occasional pages referencing their production and the end when they actually put on the production. Honestly I don’t even remember Tim in the story or who did what. I did accidentally get the second book from the library instead of the first so maybe the character introductions were done better in that book, but it doesn’t seem likely as it’s just not well written. Still the little stories were humorous and the art was simple but cute as well. Ultimately though, it’s for an audience much, much younger than me and I won’t continue the series.

The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, Volume 1: Squirrel Power by Ryan North (Writer), Erica Henderson (Artist)

2 out of 5 stars

In The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, Squirrel Girl is heading to college, so this book follows her as she moves out of Iron Man’s attic (I’m not entirely sure if he knew she was living there?) and into the dorms with a roommate. She and her standoffish roommate both immediately break the rules as Squirrel Girl brings her pet squirrel and her roommate brings her pet cat. Eventually Squirrel Girl has to protect her school campus from villains.

I really need to stop trying to force myself to enjoy comics, it’s just not me I guess! I felt that the art was just too cartoon-y and they drew Squirrel Girl (aka Doreen) really weird. It was clear they were trying to make her look “squirrel like” with big cheeks and prominent front teeth but some of the art just distorted the features a bit too much for me. The story itself wasn’t that well thought out and seemed to make Squirrel Girl just really self obsessed as she is so far “unbeatable”. Ultimately I did not like this book and won’t be continuing the series.

The Crown’s Fate (The Crown’s Game #2) by Evelyn Skye

3 out of 5 stars

This book picks up where the previous story left off, with the new Imperial Enchanter and Pasha’s coronation is approaching. They are both trying to move past the events of the game but both miss their friend and regret what happened. I won’t continue this summary or name the Imperial Enchanter as I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who hasn’t read The Crown’s Game.

When I finished The Crown’s Game I think I said I didn’t want to read The Crown’s Fate as I felt that there was no reason that this should be a series instead of a standalone. After reading the second book, I would still agree. I think that the ending of this book could have been cut and pasted at the end of the first book and we wouldn’t have missed out on anything. It is annoying to me that there are so many attempts to force books to be series when it would wrap up nicely in one book. Apparently the author is trying to write a third book but I don’t feel that the series needs that at all and I am not planning on reading any more of the series.

After the Wind: 1996 Everest Tragedy – One Survivor’s Story by Lou Kasischke

4 out of 5 stars

On May 10th of 1996 eight climbers died during their attempts to descend from the summit of Mount Everest, the highest mountain in the world. At the time it was the deadliest day and year on Mount Everest and remained so until 2014. This story is told by climber Lou Kasischke of the Rob Hall expedition and was published in 2014.

I have read a couple books on Mount Everest, including a few on the 1996 disaster. This was perhaps one of the fairest and most realistic telling story of the expedition. Lou Kasischke had a huge amount of climbing experience, including high altitude experience, and therefore he had a great perspective to be able to criticize and analyze what happened. One of the most surprising changes that I saw was how much Kasischke did consider what Hall must have been thinking leading up to the summit push, notably thinking of his ambitions concerning press and business.

Kasischke does a great job of pointing out all the things he believes contributed to the events but ultimately does call out Hall’s prioritization for giving the journalist on the expedition, Jon Krakauer, a good and positive story. While it’s impossible to know if this was true or not, Kasischke does give a great background on Hall that shows how the risks and decisions he took on that expedition were vastly different on how he’d run expeditions in the past.

Something that Kasischke focused on was his wife and her perspective as well. He did credit a lot of his survival story to her and made clear how much he loved her and their family even if he spend a lot of time apart from them for his hobby.

I thought this was such a great perspective of the day’s events and I was incredibly impressed with Kasischke’s honest story telling. While Kasischke isn’t a writer, he was very raw with his thoughts and gave a very candid memoir on the event. Something I noticed was that he was more open about the necessity of the “every person for themself” mentality of climbing. While it’s easy for people who don’t know much about climbing to say that the climbers should have helped each other more or something, Kasischke does a great job explaining why it’s not just a bad idea, but also almost impossible at that altitude. I am not a climber but I feel that I have a much better understanding of it, even after reading other accounts.

Anyway, there you go with a mini review of the book. I think I’ve almost exhausted the 1996 tragedy books that my library system has to offer, but I do love reading about climbing. Right now I’m reading a book about women who’ve climbed K2.

I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You (Gallagher Girls #1) by Ally Carter

4 out of 5 stars

This book revolves around the main character, Cammie, and her sophomore year at spy school. She’s learning all the skills she’ll need to be a successful spy with her classmates and friends, but is slightly distracted when she meets a boy from town that’s interested in her.

I won’t go on too much more as I did a full review of this book already. I had a great time reading this book and I’m looking forward to the rest of the series, which is sure to be quite long as Cammie has a ton still to learn (seriously, the girl needs a lot of training still). I had read this when I was a teenager and had greatly enjoyed it then. I still liked it a lot now although it’s  very clearly meant for a younger audience but still enjoyable for all!

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And those are my August books! Let me know if you’ve read any of these or if you have any climbing book suggestions for me as well. You know I love those!

Thanks for reading!

Pamela

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