Wheel of Time letter No. 2: Robert Jordan's hyperbole

(To Robert, written August 26, 2020)

I’m about 6 hours into Lord of Chaos (which is 41 hours long,) and here’s what’s happening so far:

Nynaeve is trying to find a cure for stilling using Moghedian’s powers on Siuan, Lianna and Logain. Morgase is searching for allies outside of Caemlyn when she discovers Rand has invaded her kingdom, killed Rahvin, and captured her throne. Elayne and Min are in Salidar, having a chat about how they’re both in love with Rand. Lanfear and Asmodean were reborn into different bodies*. Perrin is still in the Two Rivers and is considering going to find Rand because he can feel the pull of him from partway across the world. Faile is annoyed that she has to deal with the everyday goings on in the Two Rivers, and when Perrin said he was leaving to find Rand, she wanted to go with him but he didn’t want her to. Demondred, Graendal and the rest of the forsaken who are still alive are placing scheme on their agenda. Rand is fighting anonymous men for training because Lan has left in search of his new Aes Sedai. Masrim Taim visits Rand in Caemlyn because Rand has declared amnesty for men who can channel. Rand lets Taim teach the other men who can channel. Taim seems surprised this is the only thing Rand wants him to do. Then, Rand visits some of his generals, and there’s talk of war with Illian. Lews Therin is screaming in Rand’s head to kill everyone and burn down the world.

One interesting narrative that has seemed to pop up in this book is Rand’s view of the Aes Sedai gentling men. In “Eye of the World” it was painted as a kindness because the men eventually went insane. So gentling was seen philosophically as doing the least harm, as only the man who could wield the one power would die (eventually) rather than a bunch of people dying as a result of his power. In “Lord of Chaos,” Rand believes it to be a “culling of the population.” (Robert Jordan literally uses those words, and it was kind of disturbing.) I’m still torn on whether or not this book series has feminist leanings. I’m not sure it’s a good look for a narrative to say “men need to fight back against the women who don’t want them to use their true power.” 

I think it’s normal for our minds to want to apply the principles of fantasy as a statement on our everyday life because so many fantasy writers, from Orson Scott Card to NK Jemisin, use fantasy to impress their own views of the way things ought to be through their stories. It’s clear Robert Jordan’s military training has weighed heavily on his story, as did his personal views of gender roles. Is channeling in men a metaphor for men who are in touch with their feelings and show emotions? Is this a half-baked misogynistic metaphor about how it’s a woman’s fault that men can’t have emotions, and here’s an examination of a society in which a woman’s power has “gone too far”? Or do I simply have to accept this plot point as it is and not question it?

The Wheel of Time stans on Twitter kind of spoiled that Rand turns evil before being good again. I anticipate “Lord of Chaos” being a little darker, and I’m ready for it! But I do wish I could figure out what this book series is actually trying to say about gender roles. Also, one of the Wheel of Time stans on Twitter compared Faile to Thanos. I’m not sure what that’s supposed to mean either!

*I know this is wrong. The Forsaken that were reborn into new bodies at the beginning of the book were not Asmodean and Lanfear, but instead Aginor and Balthamel, who (I think) were killed in the first book. I found that info on Wikipedia, and tried REALLY hard not to read any spoilers inadvertently.

Wheel of Time letter No. 1: Where I ask an important question

(To Robert, written August 20, 2020)

Last night I finished Fires of Heaven and this morning I started Lord of Chaos. Here’s what’s happening:

Lanfear shows up and tries to kill Rand for sleeping with another woman. Moiraine tackles Lanfear and they both fall through the portal of a ter’angreal and everyone assumes they’re dead. Rand assembles some Aiel and they go to Caemlyn to defeat Rahvin. Meanwhile, Nynaeve encounters Moghedian in Tel’aran’rhiod and leashes her with an a’dam. They travel to Caemlyn and help Rand battle Rahvin and kill him with balefire. 

The first thing I was thinking when I read this section was when Moiraine wrote a letter to Rand before her “death.” She said she discovered three possible outcomes of an encounter with Lanfear after visiting Rhuidean. It made me think of Moiraine as Dr. Strange. And then I was thinking that Nynaeve might be She-Hulk, since she can only channel while angry. Which Marvel superheroes (or villains???) would the Wheel of Time characters be? I was thinking Lan might be Captain America and Mat could be Iron-Man. Rand might be a villain, though! He’s been conquering various territories with impunity, and Nynaeve noted at the end that his face seemed hard, cold and emotionless. 

I felt again, by the end of Fires of Heaven, that Robert Jordan has some feminist leanings, but he’s not quite there yet. Rand has a big existential crisis around killing women and sending women to war, which I think reflects more of Robert Jordan’s own military experience. One of Rand’s spear-maidens approaches him before the fight with Rahvin and says that he shouldn’t feel bad about sending women to war, and that the spear-maidens “carry his honor,” that he was dishonoring them by refusing to let them fight. I think women in the US military can be in combat roles now, but there’s always been a big debate about drafting women and allowing them to fight. Since Wheel of time is set in a theoretically matriarchal society, Rand’s reluctance to allow women to fight and refusal to fight/kill women still shows the ways the book clings to patriarchal ideas outside the narrative. Rand’s conversation with his spear-maiden shows how inextricably  linked a woman’s sense of self is with what she does for a living. More broadly, I think the narrative asks the question: Should men be gatekeepers to who a woman is? Some other story beats between Rand and the Aiel illustrate how society outside of the Aiel Waste is aggressively patriarchal. Aviendha remarks to Rand that he should be allowed to grieve Moiraine’s death, but “some wetlanders still believe men shouldn’t grieve.” It’s odd that these moments are broken up by Mat’s “Women, amirite?” incredulity. These “comedic” moments blunt the seriousness and pointedness of the questions Robert Jordan asks about masculinity and its role in society.

I’m not at all convinced Moiraine is dead. Maybe I’m being a “meta-reader” but this series was written before every author callously killed off main characters a la George RR Martin. The book spends a lot of time setting up the idea of lives being cyclical, of major players in “the pattern” dying and being born again into new lives, the way Birgitte was. My pre-guess is that Moiraine will either show up again somewhere else, or that she’ll be reborn into a new life, possibly as Faile and Perrin’s daughter. I’m kind of skeptical now that the TV series will revolve around Moiraine as much as the creators say it will. It could just be that Rosamund Pike was the biggest name they could cast, and so they’re framing the series around her.

I started “Lord of Chaos” this morning, and I’m still pretty set on finishing the series. The biggest annoyance so far is that Moghedian is pronounced differently between the two books (MOG-a-dean in Fires and mo-GIH-dee-an in Lord) Do I think the Wheel of Time series is the best thing I’ve ever read? No. But it’s entertaining enough, and still good to knit to. And it’s interesting to examine the feminist issues in the book and try to determine where the author actually stands on women. He certainly has some ideas!

 

It's been a year, and all I've read was almost half of the Wheel of Time series.

 Hello everyone,

It's been a while, and my life has completely changed.

I don't live as close to a beach as I used to! Instead, I live closer to a city I enjoy, my family, and a support network of friends. 

I fell short of my reading goal of 200 books last year. I got to 189 and the holidays got the better of me. Too often I think we've become afraid of failing, and this was an exercise in being unafraid of failure. Failing meant I still read 189 books, and that's pretty good. I'm still kinda proud of myself for taking so much time for reading. 

 

Since then, I've been working my way through the Wheel of Time series. Robert, the friend who got me into comic books last year, said that he read Wheel of Time in middle school and got through the 10th book and quit. The books are written by Robert Jordan (not the same Robert as the Robert who got me into comic books, obvs.) who has some weird ideas about women... but we'll get to that.

Wheel of Time is going to be an Amazon Prime series at some point, starring Rosamund Pike. The series has been lauded for its diverse cast (even though a lot of the principle characters are still white.) Also I'll argue that we can never have true diversity in our media and culture if we continue to pull from the same white male literary canon.

The book series is 14 books long and the titles are as follows:

1. Eye of the World
2. The Great Hunt
3. The Dragon Reborn
4. A Shadow Rising
5. Fires of Heaven
6. Lord of Chaos
7. A Crown of Swords (I am here)
8. The Path of Daggers
9. Winter's Heart
10. Crossroads of Twilight
11. Knife of Dreams
12. The Gathering Storm
13. Towers of Midnight
14. A Memory of Light

Jordan died partway through writing the series, so some of these books were written by a guy named Brandon Sanderson. I heard he was a major Wheel of Time stan and decided to take it upon himself to finish the series using Jordan's remaining notes, and with the blessing of Jordan's wife (who was also Jordan's editor).

Instead of reading the books with my eyeballs, I am listening to them on audiobook. Audiobooks are becoming my preferred method of consuming literature because I feel like I can absorb details a little better than when I read them, and I can do other things while listening. Normally I listen to audiobooks while taking a walk, but it's also nice to listen to a book while I'm driving or while I'm sitting in the evening and knitting. Michael Kramer and Kate Reading read ALL of the Wheel of Time, and they're absolute champs. Sometimes, there are long stretches where people stand around the room and Jordan describes what everyone is wearing, and I can sense a little impatience in Kramer's voice! I get impatient, too, during these parts, so it's fine.

The fourth book, A Shadow Rising, which is 41 hours long, got me through my big move. I listened to the longest stretch, about 8 hours straight, while driving through 7 states to my destination! Let me be real: These are not the most groundbreaking works of literature I've read, but there's something comforting about them. Jordan bases a lot of his concepts on various Asian myths and European legends (Arthurian legend is the most dominant.) He also draws a lot of inspiration from J.R.R. Tolkien, so much so that Eye of the World seems almost like a Fellowship of the Ring retelling. It quickly finds its own unique footing.

The main thing that makes these books unique is its gender-based magic system. The magic system also is the root of many of this series' problems. Men and women draw power from the "true source." Women take a power called Saidar, and men take Saidin. Women weave flows of magic using primarily water, air and spirit, while men use fire and earth. Jordan's world is a theoretical matriarchy, where an order of women in power, the Aes Sedai, use their power to guide world leaders. Saidin, the male half of the true source, has been tainted by the Dark One long ago, and any man who tries to channel the power eventually goes mad. If the women find men who can channel, they are automatically "gentled" (severed from the true source) for their own good.

One man who can channel, Rand al'Thor, becomes "The Dragon Reborn" a hero of legend reincarnated! He and his two friends, Mat and Perrin, are considered ta'veren, people who can influence those around them. There are three women who I would consider main characters as well: Egwene, a young women who is "strong in the power," Nynaeve, a young village wisdom who can only channel if she's angry, and Elayne, the daughter-heir of the kingdom of Andor. Wheel of Time was written mostly before Game of Thrones, so Jordan doesn't really kill off characters. The structure of his world almost doesn't allow it, as heroes can be "woven back into the pattern" from a world of dreams. Yeah, this book series is a little wild.

The other thing I'm doing, for myself, but also for Robert's entertainment (since he told me about this series) is I've been writing Wheel of Time letters and mailing them to Robert. If you have not yet taken up hand-writing and snail-mailing letters during a global pandemic, what are you even doing? Look, I know I'm not going to single-handedly save the US Postal Service from certain ruination at the hands of bad-faith actors, but I'm going to try! I got a bunch of stamps with fruit and flowers on them, and started hand-writing lengthy book reports about Fires of Heaven. Robert has been a good sport about it all, and he's written back twice when I've asked very important literary questions!

I've written other letters to other people, but I think I might publish some excerpts from the Wheel of Time letters here, when I get the chance. And if you want a letter from me, just ask! I'll write about almost anything. I mailed my best friend Kevin a recipe for peanut sauce the other day. Our communication with one another does not always need to be instantly gratifying!

So that's kind of the long version of what's been happening to me, through the lens of a 30+ year old book series. I hope the few people who happen across this blog in my corner of the internet have been kind to themselves during this trying time.

The 12+ books I read in October, ranked

This month I finished two audiobooks, two print books, and a massive stack of comic books* I borrowed from my pal, Robert.

It's possible this is one of the last posts of this kind I'll write! It's been fun trying to read as many books as humanly possible in a year, but I think I might take things at a more leisurely pace in 2020. Anyway, here are some books:

12.) Last Tango in Cyberspace by Steven Kotler: This was my one and only DNF in October, and third DNF for the year. The premise of this book sounded fun: Man whose superpower is extreme empathy gets caught up in a murder mystery. The actual book is more like: Man smokes a lot of pot and takes advantage of the amenities in his hotel room. I got a little more than halfway through this one before I had to quit. It was relentlessly stupid.

11.) My Sister, The Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite: This little story was kind of interesting. It’s about a woman whose sister inexplicably kills her boyfriends. It shows all the ways the woman enables her sister, and how she is ultimately tethered to her after covering up her crimes.

10.) Paper Girls, Vols. 3 and 4 by Brian K. Vaughan: I really enjoy time travel adventures, but I don’t know if I’ll continue with this series. Four volumes in, and I still don’t know what’s going on.

 9.) Snow, Glass, Apples by Neil Gaiman: This was a retelling of Snow White, where Snow White is a vampire and everything in her kingdom is supremely messed up. Don’t read this one to your kids.

 8.) Batwoman: Elegy by Greg Rucka: Unlike Paper Girls, where I felt like the story was unfolding almost intolerably slowly, “Batwoman: Elegy” was really good at telling a lot of story in a few pages. And I felt like it was complete after the one volume I read. Very dramatic, and very satisfying.

7.) The Flintstones, Vols. 1 and 2 by Mark Russell: This is a smart take on The Flintstones. It examines social institutions such as marriage and consumerism in a silly, prehistoric town. As someone who questions and overthinks almost everything we do as human beings, I found it quite enjoyable.

 6.) The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead: This is a bleak book with a shocking twist at the end. It is a fictional story based on real events at a boarding school in Tallahassee, and it was on a “recommended reading” list Barack Obama posted on Facebook sometime a couple months ago. I would recommend it too! Thanks, Obama!

5.) Exhalation by Ted Chiang: Another Obama recommendation, this is a series of short stories from the guy who wrote “The Arrival.” Initially I thought the stories would take a much more sinister/dystopian turn, in the style of other near-future-type stories, but I found them neutral and relatively mild. I felt the narratives asked questions, but let the readers figure out the answers for themselves.

4.) The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl, Vol. 2 and 3 by Ryan North: I continue to be amused and delighted by this series. It’s upbeat and has an encouraging tone. I loved the second volume, where Squirrel Girl encounters Ratatoskr, a mischievous squirrel from Norse mythology!

3.) The Unwritten, Vols. 3-9 by Mike Carey: Initially, I really loved this series because I felt it was a good introduction for people who don’t like or don’t read graphic novels to learn to love graphic novels. In vols. 3-9, there’s still a healthy dose of literary allusions, but I feel like the story started to go off the rails a little bit. I still have two more volumes to go, and I hope it ends well for all the time and brainpower I’ve spent on it. I still love it a lot, though, don’t get me wrong.

2.) Rat Queens, Vols. 2-6 by Kurtis J. Wiebe: I’m always in the mood to enjoy this series about female friendships in a whimsical fantasy setting. I’ll be keeping an eye out for Vol. 7, which comes out early next year.

1.) The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang: The best way I can describe this book is “R-rated Final Fantasy.” This novel is gritty and brutal and makes no attempt to soften descriptions of war crimes and other atrocities. It was one of those books where you’re so invested in the characters and the plot, you get a literary hangover by the end. Alas, I think a copy of “The Dragon Republic,” the next book in the series I was supposed to review, got lost in the mail!

I’m 30 books away from reaching my goal of 200 books on the year**. Unless I finish a book every other day for the rest of the year, I probably won’t make it, but I made a valiant effort!

What was your reading goal this year? Are you going to achieve it?

*True happiness is lugging 15 pounds of comic books in your suitcase through the Orlando airport. 

**Goodreads counts every graphic novel volume as a book, and I've said before that I don’t necessarily think that counts, but here we are.

The 10+ books I read in September, ranked

September was a month for bad books! I had one DNF and two that weren’t very good. When a book puts me in a weird mood, I can’t say nice things about it.

10. “Whisper Network” by Chandler Baker: This book was on Reese Witherspoon’s book club list or something. I feel like people who don’t work an office job would find this book revelatory. For me, I got about a third of the way through it and had to DNF it. It put me in a really bad headspace where I resented everything. Yeah, I know all about the ways women struggle at work. I’m sure this book is for someone, but I didn’t need workplace gender politics in infuriating detail.

9. "Homeland" by RA Salvatore: In my fun adventure to learn more about Dungeons & Dragons (because clearly I don't have enough hobbies,) I found a spinoff novel. I read this one, and right now I’m reading “Shadowdale” by Scott Ciencin with a friend. These aren’t great books! “Homeland” was written in 1990, and I guess almost 30 years ago it was fine for the society led by dark-skinned matriarchs to be framed as evil! This story’s optics really got to me because I was reading it while I was reading another book that ended up being a little higher up on the list.

8. “The Bride Test” by Helen Hoang: I would recommend Hoang’s “The Kiss Quotient,” which I read earlier this year, but I would not read this book. The power dynamics between the heroine and the hero’s family were really unfortunate. The story follows Esme Tran, a young Vietnamese woman who is brought to the United States to be a wife for Khai Diep, an autistic man. All I could think about was human trafficking, and that’s not what you want to be thinking about when you’re trying to read a romance novel!

7. “Moon Knight” Vol. 1 by Warren Ellis and “Moon Knight” Vols. 1-3 by Jeff Lemire: I read these because a friend read and recommended them. I liked the Lemire Moon Knight better than the Ellis because Lemire wrote more of a dreamy mindscape instead of just a normal punching-bad-guys super hero. I’ve found that when you read about a super hero with a lot going on in his or her brain, the art tends to be a little more abstract and interesting.

6. “Dungeon Master’s Guide (5th edition)” AND “Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes”: I learned how to play Dungeons & Dragons last month. I’m nowhere near competent enough to be anyone’s dungeon master, but I will say if you’re writing an adventure novel and suffering from writer’s block, the Dungeon Master’s Guide and the Tome of Foes offer some cool ideas that could be included as a bare framework of a fantasy story.

5. “The Turn of the Key” by Ruth Ware: This book is about a nanny who cares for four girls in a creepy high-tech house. One of the girls dies, and the book is written in letters from the nanny to a lawyer about what happened inside the house! I listened to this as an audiobook. I need to get a physical copy for my mom because I think she would really like it.

4. “Paper Girls” Vols. 1 and 2: I’m really enjoying this time travel saga! After two volumes, I haven’t figured out quite what’s going on yet. Good thing I have two more volumes to read!

3. “The City in the Middle of the Night” by Charlie Jane Anders: This book is a really cool scifi book I found at the library about people who live on a dying planet and are complacent and insistent in continuing how they live rather than finding ways to adapt. One of the characters befriends an alien creature that’s a cross between a crocodile, an octopus and a beetle. I would recommend this, but be warned it’s pretty weird and quite bleak.

2. “The Prince and the Dressmaker” by Jen Wang: This graphic novel is about a prince who feels more like a princess. He hires a dressmaker, Frances, to make him feel more like himself. This book was about gender identity, written for young people. It was colorful, sweet, and most importantly, respectful.

1. “Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America” by Ibram X. Kendi: Several people recommended this book to me after I expressed an interest in anti-racism work. It is a very dense 500-year history of racist ideas in America, and it took me almost all month to get through an audiobook version. My main takeaway from it is that racism is far from being a thing of the past. It is an abhorrent aspect of our society that has festered for centuries, and no amount of having black friends will get rid of the repugnant ideas that continue to mutate and evolve. The book’s title is from Jefferson Davis’ inauguration speech, when he said he believed black people were “stamped from the beginning” to be inferior to white men. This is mandatory reading for every white person. If you are reading this blog and you are white, you have to read this book now. I don’t make the rules.

Some stuff I'm reading now
“The Grace of Kings” by Ken Liu
“Shadowdale” by Scott Ciencin
“The Poppy War” by R.F. Kuang
“Where the Crawdads Sing” by Delia Owens

Road to 200
I'm at 141 books out of 200, about 8 behind where I should be if I want to achieve my goal!

6 secrets to getting books for free or cheap without violating anyone’s intellectual property

If you're an avid reader, you're probably looking for ways to stretch your dollars and get the maximum amount of books for your money.

Levels of affordability are different for everyone, and only you can determine how long you want to wait for a book, or how much you want to spend. Before you go railing about supporting authors’ work, please know that I AM willing to spend money on books that I know I like. For example, after I listened to “Spinning Silver” by Naomi Novik (which I only got by paying money for an Audible subscription,) I went out and bought my own hard copy of the book. Not only that, but some indie books are tough to find in a library, so I might buy an electronic copy if reviews are good.

If I bought every book I ever read for full price I would be in utter financial ruin. Thank goodness for the ways you can get books for free or cheap with minimal effort. Here are my secrets:

I went to the library for one book and I left with six.

1. Go to the library 

This seems like the most obvious thing in the world, but a lot of people don’t know that you can just drive to a building, walk inside, and borrow all of the books therein for free! Not only can you borrow books, but libraries sometimes have a section of books for sale. At my library, hard cover books are $1 and paperbacks are 50 cents.

Pros: You have unlimited access to more books than you could ever read, including new releases. Wandering around a library and discovering new books is fun, And if the library doesn’t have a book you want, you can always ask them if they can get it!

Cons: There’s a limit on the amount of time you can keep a book. My library only lets me keep books for 2 weeks at a time, and then I must renew them, and I can only renew them 3 times before I have to take them back. Newer books might have long wait lists.

2. Libby, Overdrive and cloudLibrary 

These are all apps that do the same thing: They’re an extension of your library where you can check out audiobooks and ebooks, and then return them when you’re done with them. You still need to input the data on your library card to access the books.

Pros: You don’t have to drive to a building to select books. There are no library fines because the books are automatically returned when your loan expires.

Cons: The ebook and audiobook selection through your library might be limited, but again, you can always ask your library to carry a book if you can’t find it. You might wait weeks or months to check out a popular book, but if you have a long book queue like I do, the wait feels like nothing at all, and it’s a pleasant surprise when a book you’ve waited a long time for is finally loaned to you!

3. Sign up to be a volunteer reviewer 

I write for City Book Review in my spare time. Every two weeks, I’m sent a list of hundreds of books, most of which haven’t even been published yet. I can select up to 4 books on the list, and they’re mailed to me to read. After I’ve read them, I have to write between 150 to 200 words about each of them. Different review services have their own sets of rules about writing reviews.

Pros: You can get books from your favorite authors before anyone else does. You have a creative outlet and a platform for your opinions if you like to write.

Cons: Sometimes you don’t get the books you ask for if someone else has requested them before you. I use the book list mainly for discovery, so if I find a book whose title sounds interesting, I’ll go to the Goodreads page and read the synopsis. If that sounds cool, I’ll request the book. Sometimes that assessment is hit-or-miss. The worst is when I read a middling, mediocre book and I must find 200 words to say about it. You MUST review the book within a deadline. It’s very poor etiquette to swipe books from a book review service and not review them. Some of the books you get are specifically advance review copies, which cannot be resold.

4. Start a book blog and use NetGalley 

NetGalley is an ebook service publishers and authors use to generate buzz about books through online reviews. On a lot of Goodreads reviews, you might see someone say “This book was given to me for free via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.”

Pros: You can request books to read in advance of their publish dates. I’ve found some REALLY good books on NetGalley.

 Cons: You’re not guaranteed the books you ask for. Sometimes you’ll get rejected by different publishing places for different reasons. Bigger publishing houses might reject you if you don’t have a big enough social media presence, or if you have a low review percentage. Once you reach about 10 reviews almost everyone approves you, though. Getting there is the challenge.

The inside of the book exchange down the road from my house

5. Used bookstores, thrift stores and book exchanges

I’ve talked before about how I regularly purge books from my house with the Konmari method. My mindset is that once I’ve read a book, the story is in my head and I can pass it along to someone else to enjoy. One of the places I take the books I purge is a book center in Vero Beach that sells used and new books.

Pros: Used bookstores will offer you a dollar or so in store credit for each book they take from you. You can use that store credit toward new book purchases. The last time I went to a used bookstore, I traded in a handful of books for about $10, which I used toward the purchase of a new book I had on my to-read list. Obviously it’s not going to be a book-for-book exchange, but for me, a new story I’ve never read before is worth more than a bunch of stories I’ve already enjoyed. Book exchanges let you use your store credit for half of the cost of your purchase, and they normally only deal in cash.

Cons: Some book exchanges sell used books exclusively. Newer releases are difficult to find, but if there are older books you want to read, you’ll probably be able to find a copy (or several) at a used bookstore. Used bookstores don’t accept advance review copies of books.

6. Share books with your friends 

Lots of my friends live far away, and I love mailing things to them. I enjoy having impromptu Facebook book clubs with friends after I’ve shared a book I’ve read.

Pros: If you have a book you've already read, why not swap it with a friend for a new book? Do you have a teacher in your life? See if your books would be good for their classroom library. If you’re looking for a book, do a social media call-out to see if anyone would be able to lend you a copy. You get to talk about books with your friends who also have read them. Your friends probably have more books than you think.

Cons: You can't stuff your face with nachos while reading a friend's book. I mean, you COULD, but it wouldn't be very nice to return a friend's book in worse condition than when you received it. I am much more careful with my friends’ books than I am with my own. With my own books, I crack the spine, dog-ear pages, scribble in the margins, eat snacks and use my own books as drink coasters. It’s a mess. With my friends’ books, I sit perfectly still, turn the pages as delicately as possible, never crack the spine, don’t eat or drink while reading, and ALWAYS use a bookmark.

What's your favorite way to save money on books? Leave a comment or drop me a line at carynsbeachreads@gmail.com.

The 8 books I read in August, ranked

So, super cool of Neil Gaiman to retweet me last month. That was wild. Hello, new readers. Glad to hear you liked "The Unwritten" as much as I did! And "American Gods," of course.

Hurricane Dorian is banging down my door, and here I am writing about books. You know, the usual.

8. Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi: This was the first book I did not finish this year because it was just so awful. It was supposed to be YA dystopian romance. The thing I find most interesting about dystopian novels is… well, the dystopia. Good or bad, I’m curious about how authors construct their dystopian society. For this one, it seemed the flimsy setting was wrapped around an even flimsier love triangle. I wasn’t into the bizarre, stream-of-consciousness whiny garbage with weird strikethrough text that's supposed to reveal the trembling inner heart of the main character. And I don’t care how pretty the covers are, they will not tempt me into reading the rest of this series.

7. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card: I picked away at this book for MONTHS and I had A LOT of feelings about it. I didn’t know if I would finish it, either! First, the good: I appreciated how it seemed to predict the way anonymous bots dictate the social discourse online. The bad: I felt like Valentine got the shaft when she was one of the most brilliant characters in the book. She was called upon to nudge Ender (who got chance after chance to be brilliant and failed) in the right direction like a glorified door opener. She was forced to retire her online persona at the end because of reasons. I hated the way Valentine was treated! Her story was more interesting than whatever Ender was doing! The ugly: Orson Scott Card is a raging homophobe (it’s well documented, I’m not going to Google it for you, we’re all adults) and I don’t need that regressive nonsense all up in my sci-fi, thanks.

6. Umami Bomb: 75 Vegetarian Recipes That Explode With Flavor by Raquel Pelzel: I got a copy of this cookbook on NetGalley, and the food photography is so beautiful, but I could have used some more of it! I’m eager to try some of the recipes. Meat eaters who are interested in reducing their carbon footprint through diet would enjoy this book to help transition to vegetarianism. It has a recipe for breakfast spaghetti, for crying out loud! Who wouldn't want to eat spaghetti for breakfast?

5. When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon: This YA romance was constructed like a romantic comedy, and I really enjoyed listening to an audiobook of it. The awkwardness of young love made me giggle. Some of the parts where the heroes were teenager-petty made me cringe a bit. I was pleased it had a happy ending.

4. I Kill Giants by Joe Kelly: This graphic novel was recommended to me when I visited a comic book store in April in Philadelphia. It reminded me a lot of the movie plot of “A Monster Calls” by Patrick Ness (I want to read the book, but I haven’t yet, whoops) with a hint of “Bridge to Terabithia” by Katherine Paterson, which you know we all read and cried over around fourth grade or so.

3. The Dungeons & Dragons Player’s Handbook (5th Edition) by James Wyatt, Robert J. Schwalb and Bruce R. Cordell: I was going to write my lengthy backstory about how I’ve wanted to learn how to play D&D for more than a decade, but that’s a lot less exciting than the lengthy backstory of my very first D&D character. Since this is "Caryn's Beach Reads" and not "Caryn's Elaborately Constructed D&D Characters," we won't get into it on this blog (yet.)

2. A Cosmology of Monsters by Shaun Hamill: This is a very surprising debut book that actually comes out later this month. I read an advance copy of it, and it’s very creepy in time for fall and Halloween! If you like cosmic horror, check it out (or I’ll lend you my copy.)

1. Circe by Madeline Miller: This was the empowering story about the ancient Greek demigoddess and sorceress, Circe, who lived on one of the islands Odysseus visited in “The Odyssey.” It's an older book that I'm pretty sure everyone has read already. I'm just late to the party. I listened to the audiobook, and the woman who narrates it has a lovely speaking voice. The writing was just gorgeous. I was a little weirded out by the ending, but I appreciated some of the themes.

I’m 6 books behind my 200-book goal at this time of the year, according to Goodreads. Better step it up, Caryn, or you’ll never make your goal!