Discussion: When Real Life Effects Your Reading

Tell me if something like this has ever happened to you:

I've wanted to read The Wrath & The Dawn for over two years. I decided that I would read it for one of my categories in the Diverse Reads Book Challenge. I downloaded the book from Audible. I've got my headphones on. The narrator seems to be doing a solid job.

...And yet I'm not past Shazi and Khalid meeting alone for the first time. He hasn't even entered the room yet. Why?

Well, lets just say I'm freaking out the way someone should when reading Stephen King. Not this. *siiiigh*

My heart is pounding, my stomach is in knots and I keep pausing the book every few paragraphs to try and alleviate the tension. I've read way darker and scarier things both on and off of this blog. Yet this book is stressing me out to the point where I'm not reading / listening to it (or anything, since I tend to focus on one book at a time.) and I am beyond frustrated.

But I think I've figured out why. My Dad had a stroke during surgery last October and was in a coma for 28 hours. I switched from writing my Sealer Saga to working on my Tales of Ellithica series because the characters in Sealer Saga (Lords of Death, Famine, Plague, etc.) felt too raw. Y'know that part from Aladdin where the camera zooms in on the vendor and he goes "Too close. A little too close." That's what I'm talking about.

All of the pausing is also leaving room for a lot of critical questions:

• Why did we not see any of Shazi and Shiva's friendship before Shiva was murdered?
• Why did we not get some time to care about Shazi before she was thrust into this disaster?
• Why am I suppose to care about Tariq? I have no history for him and Shazi.
• Where in the curse does it tell us that Khalid needs to murder wives? Why not find people suffering of uncurable illness, prisoners who need to be executed anyway, host a death lottery, etc.? 
• What is Khalid's full reason / motive? In 1001 Nights we know the king's last wife betrayed him and that he started killing young brides to ensure that this would never happen to him again.
• Shazi, what exactly is your plan? I'm sure we're going to get storytelling to keep her alive past dawn, but how exactly is a noblewoman going to kill a man we've been told has been trained as--and is skilled as--a warrior. 

I think I may be too focused on seeing fault here; like my mind is in beta or editing mode rather than purely in reader mode since stress is keeping me from getting lost in the story the way that I would want to in order to listen and gave an honest review. 

Do you think I should put this one on hold and come back later? Have you ever had real life effect your enjoyment of a book? I'd love to know. 

Should I Keep Reading?: Alice in Zombieland by Gena Showalter

She won’t rest until she’s sent every walking corpse back to its grave. Forever.

Had anyone told Alice Bell that her entire life would change course between one heartbeat and the next, she would have laughed. From blissful to tragic, innocent to ruined? Please. But that’s all it took. One heartbeat. A blink, a breath, a second, and everything she knew and loved was gone.

Her father was right. The monsters are real….

To avenge her family, Ali must learn to fight the undead. To survive, she must learn to trust the baddest of the bad boys, Cole Holland. But Cole has secrets of his own, and if Ali isn’t careful, those secrets might just prove to be more dangerous than the zombies….

I wish I could go back and do a thousand things differently.
I'd tell my sister no.
I'd never beg my mother to talk to my dad.
I'd zip my lips and swallow those hateful words.
Or, barring all of that, I'd hug my sister, my mom and my dad one last time.
I'd tell them I love them.
I wish... Yeah, I wish.

Sounds fabulous, doesn't it?

It should be.

Gena Showalter has been one of my favorite authors for years. I discovered her work all the way back in 2000-something when she wrote The Stone Prince. I actually e-mailed her, years before I knew book blogs ever existed, and told her how much I liked it. She is the Only author I've ever done that for and to me what she did with that book warranted it. (And she wrote me back, for what it's worth. I still have the e-mail ten years later.) 

So why am I having trouble here? I'm on chapter four and to put it bluntly, I feel like I'm done. Maybe I'm being impatient since I wanted to use this as part of my reviews for the Spooktacular Paranormal Reading Challenge? Or maybe it's just totally not working for me? Either way, I must confess I'm a little disappointed. 

What's Good? 

1. Hello, spirit zombies! I haven't gotten far enough to really dig into this, but from what I've read in the reviews I've looked at for the book, this seems like a totally unique take on classic BRAAAINS! I like anything unique and different, so regardless of what I think of anything else, I must give credit where it's due. 
2. The subtle hints toward Alice In Wonderland. This is not a retelling, but parts of the story do seem to play a clever and subtle homage to the original tale. The chapter titles, the cover design, the heroine's name and the cloud shaped like a (white) rabbit all spring instantly to mind.

What's Driving Me Crazy? 

1. Alice's personality seems inconsistent. First we see her as a defiant teenager looking for a taste of normal. Next we see her as a grieving daughter who has lost her family. Next we see her--seemingly on a dime--utterly boy crazed over Cole when they haven't even spoken yet. To the point that she seems (to me) to have forgotten anything else in the world matters. 
2. Kat. I violently, passionately, vigorously hate Kat. I hate the way she talks. I hate the way she acts. And I really hate how she essentially does a scoring card for Alice the first day she starts the new school. It was funny when the geeky guy (can't think of his name) did it in Ten Things I Hate About You. It didn't charm me here, as people in the halls were actually reacting to her. It came across as snide and bitchy and everything I *wouldn't* want in a friend. Like if Harry Potter had let Malfoy tell him who the 'wrong sort of people' were in Harry Potter. 
3. I'm nearly 1/4 through, I'm wagering this is PNR (correct me if I'm wrong, please!) and the hero has not actually spoken to our heroine. That would be mildly annoying by itself, but I haven't gotten to the punchline yet. She has seen him. She hasn't even heard him open his mouth. Yet she is hallucinating what it would be like to kiss him and he is the primary thing on her mind during the rest of that day. Really? I didn't know we were dealing with some kind of lifemate / soulmate trope here, and that's the only way I could possibly be cool with this behavior. 
4. Dude, where's my story? Nothing. Is. Happening! When does this thing actually start to hit the ground and run again? The opening was a good mix but we seem to be stuck in crosstown traffic right now and it's threatening to put me to sleep. 

So now I turn to you, dear readers. Is this one just totally not for me? Or should I keep going and give it a little more time to worm its way into my heart? I'd love to hear your thoughts, so please leave a comment. :) 

Should I Keep Reading?: Unearthly

Normally I read a book and then I review it. If I decide DNF is the right solution for a book I stop and keep my thoughts to myself. But I think that it might be worth talking about some of the books that I feel stuck on. Maybe I'm quitting them too soon, or maybe people just want to know what I think about something, even if I'm not going to attach a score to it.

I'm currently 108 pages into Unearthly, at the start of Chapter Six. And I must tell you all, I am deeply conflicted. There are things that I really love here, and things that are making my skin crawl and / or boring or annoying me. I'll talk about my thoughts on the good and the bad, and then, my dear readers, I will be asking you what the post title says: "Should I Keep Reading?". That's your chance to weigh in.

What Do I Like?

• The angel mythology is interesting. I am not a huge fan of the fact that we get it as a flashback, but it didn't kill the book for me. I like the fact that Cynthia Hand has clearly thought out how her universe works. I like the fact that it is unique (at least within my reading experiences; I'm pretty new to angels as a PNR / fantasy creature). 
• Tucker cracks me up. I think that he has an interesting attitude and I like the interactions between him and Clara. (Currently he annoys her, I think.) It will be interesting to see how that progresses.
• I like how well Cynthia has developed the school that Clara goes to when her family moves, as well as the friends she seems to be making along the way. 
• I like how things like having to switch school, or deal with bad hair, or needing to make friends -- essentially things that I would be looking for if I was reading contemporary -- are considered and addressed here. It's obviously not as deep as it might be if they were the center of the novel, but the balance Clara has to deal with between being part angel and being a 17 year old girl makes for interesting reading.
• I thought that the idea of Clara having a purpose and the reader learning more about it as the story continued and she prepared to face it was going to be an interesting premise.

What's Driving Me Nuts?

• Clara's interactions with Christian this far make me feel like I am reading about a female version of Edward Cullen. She has this semi-stalkerish quality that is annoying both because its *weird* and because she is coming across as desperate for his attention as a girl (rather then researching for her purpose). 
• This part of it likely comes from the fact that Christian has a girlfriend, Kay. I don't care how bitchy she is -- she was there first. Plus, last I checked Clara's job is to save him, not to date him. The constant thoughts she has of him seem to lean far more toward her being attracted to him, and at this point nothing has been introduced that makes this make sense. 
• Clara herself. She's whiny and needy. She complains too much. She constantly thinks about Christian to a point where it seemed creepy and obsessive to me. (She seems more focused on 'He's cute' then on, 'Okay, what do I need to learn about him so I will be ready when the time comes?'. 
• Clara even goes so far as to totally ditch Wendy, one of the new friends she has made at her new school, so that she can follow Christian to where he and his friends are having lunch. Even if Wendy is a new friend, I still cannot respect a girl who does that kinda crap, and the results of her actions drew no sympathy from me. 
• I'm beginning to have the sinking suspicion that this whole "purpose" thing might just be a way to allow Clara to stalk a hot guy and likely end up with him by the end of the book. (To be clear, that last part is a *guess*.) My response to this, despite me being me, is actually *yawn*. I know, I'm shocked about that too. Truthfully I'm more interested in Tucker.

So, what are your feelings on Unearthly? Did you love it, hate it, feel 'meh' about it? Or perhaps you haven't read it yet and were leaning one way or the other? This is definitely an opinion piece, guys. And your opinions are both wanted and welcome. 

...Should I Keep Reading?