misericordiae

Should be wrapping up The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold in the next day or two. I like it enough to finish it, but apart from a few sections, it's much slower than I generally care for.

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Read:

The Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen

After an investigation goes sideways, a detective gets relegated to running a cold cases department with just one assistant. They end up looking into a politician's disappearance from 5 years ago.

I enjoyed this (and it was a fast read), but the details of the disappearance are kind of gimmicky. I've since watched the Danish adaptation, which I found kind of disappointing for how much they stripped out and tweaked (although they did tone down some of the stereotyping, thankfully). Planning to watch the new series that came out last week as well (Department Q), to see how it compares.

Bingo squares: continent HM, motion picture, orange, x of y, alliterative, award HM, responsibility HM, jerk HM (maybe?)

Small Gods of Calamity by Sam Kyung Yoo

A detective that can see spirits gets involved in a case that's connected to his past, and is forced to team up with someone he hates to defeat the soul-eating monster behind it all.

This was a fun little novella, incorporating elements of Korean shamanism into kind of an urban fantasy with horror elements. It's well-paced, and manages to give you a decent sense of the main characters, despite being plot-heavy. I had a couple of small quibbles with it, but will gladly try more from this author.

Bingo squares: minority author HM, x of y, short, lgbtqia+

I don't read on desktop, but I use Pocketbook Reader on my tablet. Free with no ads, and lets me use any colors I want, override terrible embedded fonts and cramped line height, change margins, etc. It does have a couple of quirks that annoy me from time to time, but I haven't found a replacement I like better.

Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold. I enjoyed the first two books (Cordelia prequels) in the author's Vorkosigan Saga enough to want to try something else by her (since I've failed twice to get into the first Miles book). I think this is her only other big series? Anyway, it's been sitting on my TBR pile for a long time now, and I finally picked it up to read for bingo.

I don't mind a slow start, but IMO this had a very looooong slow start (~30%), to the point I put it down to read something else. Of course, it turns out I paused right before things started to pick up, so now I'm chugging along with it just fine.

You might have a look at Darebee workouts/programs. Can search by 'upper', 'abs', etc to cut out a lot of stuff your foot might have trouble with.

And then Loki got preggers, and gave birth to Sleipnir, an 8-legged horse that Odin rides around.

Currently in the middle of The Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen. I've watched a lot of Scandinoir, but this my first time reading it! Too many flashbacks for my taste, but otherwise it's engaging, and I'm looking forward to finding out if my theories are correct.

Also still reading No One Will Come Back for Us by Premee Mohamed. All the stories so far feel like the equivalent of art sketches, but I'm ok with that.

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Read River of Teeth by Sarah Gailey. Fun little novella that's essentially a western, but with hippos instead of horses, set in the South. I saw some reviews that felt it wasn't long enough or developed enough, but I thought it was fine. I enjoy plot-focused stuff, though, so YMMV.

Bingo squares: saddle up HM, lgbtqia+ HM, creature HM, minority author, x of y

I've seen the adaptation of The City & The City, but while I remember liking it, the concept seemed pretty gimmicky. Does it feel more natural/realistic in the book?

I've started No One Will Come Back for Us by Premee Mohamed, a collection of cosmic horror stories. I do love me some cosmic/eldritch horror, and The Butcher of the Forest was one of my favorite reads from last year, so I'm hoping I'll enjoy this, too.

Despite not really being a short story person, I tentatively picked out 2 or 3 collections for bingo this year. My plan is to read them in pieces, between other things. We'll see how it goes!

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Finished Golden Terrace, Vol. 1 by Cang Wu Bin Bai. I found this okay: the translation was pretty dry, the pacing was a bit rough, and I never got invested in the romance. I am interested in how all the political intrigue plays out, but I doubt I'll get around to reading the second volume (nothing gets wrapped up at the end of Vol. 1). This is probably a good pick if you like romance-focused historical C-dramas (it's got the vibes), but I don't think I'd recommend it otherwise.

Bingo squares: different continent (HM), minority author, LGBTQIA+ (HM), political, jerk (HM)

Agreed! Although, I drop a ton of books within a few pages, and still end up with a lot of "okay" reads. I don't super mind that; if I only read things I happily breezed through or couldn't put down, I'd only end up finishing one or two books a year. Maybe I'm just hard to please?

I like Temple more than I thought I would, but the metronome mechanic is annoying. You don't have to hit everything on beat, but ofc it's better if you do. It'd be nice if there was an option either to always have the ticking on, or to have the beat reset to match the first cast in a chain.

Shout out to the visual designer, though: it's hard to give them a bad color scheme, and the glitter on one of the color channels is a nice touch.

You might look up 'linked stories'/'novel in stories': they're single-author collections that have all the stories set in the same world, often with shared characters, sometimes with an overarching or background narrative. Might be a good middle ground?