Book # 74 - As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner

 I think this book may have put me in a weird headspace for the few days it took to read. Anyway, I'm glad I read it. After reading three Faulkner titles for this project I feel like I definitely appreciate his work even though it is difficult to get through sometimes for a variety of reasons. For such a short book, As I Lay Dying sure has a lot to unpack and think about. A 

Star Wars: The Rising Storm by Cavan Scott

I guess Star Wars: The Rising Storm was okay. The first 250 pages or so were nothing special - just a ton of new characters with weird Star Wars names that needed to be memorized. The ending though set up the next book nicely. So B-.

Hummingbird Salamander by Jeff VanderMeer

Hummingbird Salamander started out well enough and got me hooked... but by the end I just didn't really care. C+

Book # 61 - Nostromo by Joseph Conrad

Well I didn't think Nostromo would be my kind of book and I was right about that. I wouldn't say that it was bad but it also wasn't very enjoyable and I probably didn't get much out of it. The only thing that really kind of interests me about it is finding the parallels between the book and the movie Alien (in which the name of the ship is Nostromo). Hint... transporting valuable metals (or alien creatures) for a large company may not be beneficial to the health of the workers involved. B-

Horror Book # 21 The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories by H.P. Lovecraft

 

Even though this collection had considerable overlap with the previous Lovecraft collection I read, I still enjoyed it. Maybe not as much though... I'm starting to see that he's basically telling variations of the same few stories over and over. And yeah, I see now that some of the stories are problematic in other ways.

Book # 11 Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

 

Except for one ridiculous coincidence near the end of the story I really enjoyed Jane Eyre. I mean come on... what are really the chances that the total strangers that take in Jane just happen to be her cousins that she never knew about? Ummm- there's no chance. Also I guess you could say that some parts of the story are kind of problematic. I mean Mr. Rochester totally lies to Jane about his wife. And also that's no way to treat a person with mental problems. I'd like to see his wife's side of the story... Still though it was an enjoyable read. A.

The Collector by John Fowles

 I'm starting to think that it is better to not plan out so far in advance which books I'm going to read. I had never heard of The Collector until a few days before reading it and I really enjoyed it. Maybe I'll start alternating one "planned" book and then one "unplanned" book. As to how I happened upon it - I was reading about The Catcher in the Rye and saw that this book makes mention of it as a plot point (it also mentions Emma). It sounded interesting and so I put off staring Jane Eyre for another week.  A-