Murchie Plus Books: February 22nd to 28th

The premise: I love my dog. I love books. I bring the two together by photographing my wee poodle beside every book I read, barring the comics I get through Marvel Unlimited. Last week, that was the last RUNAWAYS series (which I, unlike everyone else, did not hate, though the ending was super unsatisfying) and the end of ARAÑA (okay, but not as good as I'd hoped it would be).

The photos: go live on Instagram as I take them (or, more accurately, as I edit them) and appear here in digest form every Sunday.

This one's a bit of an odd case. Strange Chemistry, Kim Curran's former publisher, gave me a DRC of DELETE, but they folded shortly before release day and the book was cancelled.

Blah.

I still very much wanted to see how everything turned out for Scott Tyler, though, so I couldn't bring myself to just delete my DRC. I loaded it up this past week because the book has found a new home with Xist Publishing and will be out on March 31st.

It's great. Y'all want it, but make sure you read SHIFT and CONTROL first so you get the full brunt of the awesome. CONTROL, in particular, is one of my favourite (former) Strange Chemistry titles.

Alas, Murchie's vet has placed him on bed rest to help combat a gastrointestinal problem. This means I'll be showing you pictures of little dude laying down this week; quite a change from the norm, where I post pictures of him laying down.

Bed rest is sort of Murchie's natural state. He's more or less a cat.

I read the first volume of DEATH NOTE weeks and weeks ago, only to discover the second volume had a substantial wait list. Blah. Thankfully, it was the only volume that was tied up, so I managed to borrow a nice, big stack of DEATH NOTE as soon as vol. 2 was available. Whee! I'm not loving these subsequent volumes as much as I did the series opener, but it's still reasonably enjoyable contemporary fantasy with a strong crime fiction component.

I did tell y'all I wanted to read some frickin' crime fiction this year.

I don't see how it can possibly stretch on for thirteen volumes, though. I mean, it obviously does, but I'm not quite halfway through it and it's already starting to feel a bit drawn out. I'll need a break after the volume I'm currently reading (#7).

Murchie is bummed out about the bed rest thing, natural state or no. I tried to placate him with the promise of a Rachel Hartman reread, but his grumpiness endured.

I guess rereads aren't terribly exciting when you're a tiny, illiterate dog.

They're the best thing ever when you're a not-so-tiny, literate girl, though. AMY UNBOUNDED: BELONDWEG BLOSSOMING is one of those books that gets better every time I read it. I'll have a proper review for you on Tuesday.

(Yes! I'm reviewing something a bare week after I read it! It's a tiny miracle, made possible by the fact that I'd already blocked a day off for Rachel Hartman's fiction. I thought I'd be reviewing SERAPHINA on Tuesday and talking about Marvel comics on Thursday, as per usual, but I've had to put My Year With Marvel on a one-week hiatus to properly accommodate my Goredd-focused excitement.)

Three cheers for SERAPHINA! I fell deeply in love with Rachel Hartman's debut novel a couple months before its release date and was so excited to revisit it in preparation for the forthcoming sequel. I dutifully knocked five books off la TBR first, then dove in.

Or tried to. DEATH NOTE kind of distracted me, what with its imminent due date, but SERAPHINA was lovely once I actually managed to focus on it. As previously stated, I'll have a review for you on Thursday.

Next week: SHADOW SCALE! A bunch of other e-books, since I'm off to the country for a stretch. I'll be looking after Buster and his feline brother, Ollie, again, and with any luck I'll persuade Ollie to let me photograph him with a book or two. His mum tells me he's become much more sociable over the last few months, so fingers crossed.

I also plan to cuddle the hell out of him. That goes without saying. (Buster will receive a great many pats and scritches, but he's a bit large for cuddles.)