Say No to the Duke by Eloise James

This is the fourth book that takes place in 1790s England at the Duke's house who has umpteen children by three wives.  This book focuses on Lady Boadicea, who goes by Betsy.  Her mother was the Duke's second wife who ran off with a Prussian Count leaving the Duke with two children, one of whom isn't his.  But Betsy is most definitely his. She looks so much like her father.  Betsy is determined once she goes to Boarding School and discovers the gossip surrounding her and her mother--that people expect her to have loose morals--that she'll prove them wrong.  So she plans to get marriage proposals from every high ranking eligible bachelor out there and do so by being the opposite of herself and acting so sweet and innocent.

Her plan has worked perfectly and she is receiving a proposal from a Duke whom she turns down but he won't take no for an answer.  Also in the room at the time is Lord Jeremy Roden who is staying there recovering from the Revolutionary War and a great loss he had of men on the battlefield.  He was the only survivor of a bloody battle.  Betsy keeps trying to get him to play billiards with her because she knows he is good and wants the challenge.  So that night they make a wager: one night with him no strings attached or if she wins he will take her dressed in boy's breeches to an auction so she can bid on something which is something that women aren't allowed to do.  He agrees if Lady Knowe, her aunt comes with them.  She wins the game and wins the wager.

So Jeremey takes Lady Knowe and her friend the Dutchess whose son proposed to Betsy who also wants to wear men's breeches.  The Duchess's son comes along with them but he disapproves of this plan.  Jeremy, on the other hand, thinks this is an interesting idea.  While staying at the inn in town where the auction is to take place, he runs into his father who is looking for him.  It's been a year since the two talked because Jeremy feels that he let his father down.

The more the Duke pursues Betsy the more that Jeremy wants her for himself.  But Betsy is worried about being too much like her mother and Jeremy is not sure he's fit for anyone considering he spent time in Bedlam after a fireworks incident left him unable to remember what happened.  Parth, a friend of the family gets him out. 

The sex scene doesn't take place until the end of the book, which is disappointing.  I would have liked to see her lose the wager and have to sleep with him no proposals asked and seen her deal with her feelings that she's like her mother for being wanton with him and then have him deal with his feelings of PTSD and not wanting to marry because of it.  But that's not the book I got.  It was still good as James's books are always good.  I give this book four stars out of five stars.

Quotes

But there was something wrong about men with yellow hair.  It took away from their…their manhood.

-Eloisa James (Say No to the Duke p 62)

The sad fact was that wicked men were interesting and good ones were boring.

-Eloisa James (Say No to the Duke p 63)

Don’t ever believe the word ‘no’ unless you say it yourself, dear. It makes life much more agreeable.

-Eloisa James (Say No to the Duke 173)

There is no right in war. There is only what happened.

-Eloisa James (Say No to the Duke p 188)

A true leader feels he has failed every man he loses.

-Eloisa James (Say No to the Duke p 190)

Married people say all sorts of things to each other.  It’s the nature of the beast.  Your spouse is the one person who can be honest with you and still be loved.

-Eloisa James (Say No to the Duke p 232)

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Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John

Dumb is a band with three members: Tash on guitar, Will on bass and his brother Josh on vocals.  They win the Battle of the Band at school and the prize was a set of recording sessions.  When Piper publically points out their faults she soon finds herself the manager of Dumb. The problem is Piper is deaf.  She invites her friend Ed to their band practice and it soon becomes apparent that the band needs Ed's drumming skills to fix them.

But that's not the only change made. Josh wants to add Kallie because he wants to go out with her and thinks that if he lets her in the band the popular girl will go out with him.  He convinces Piper to agree with him by pointing out Kallie's hotness will get people interested in the band.  The problem is Kallie can barely play the guitar.  This pisses off Tash, whose normal setting is pissed off.  Will, the one who is out of it most of the time, is also against her be allowed in the band.  But Ed, the deciding vote, goes with Piper because he likes her so much.

Piper decides to get them on an easy listening radio station and to do this they need a song to be played there that would fit the format.  So she writes a song appropriate with that format and Ed writes the music and the band records it but Kallie's sound is turned off due to what Tash told the engineer.  Piper knows this and lets it happen. 

The band is falling apart and they're playing the music they hate and Piper isn't acting as a good manager.  Her younger brother Finn, a freshman, plays guitar and he agrees to work with Kallie and Tash on the songs.  But there's only so much he can do. The reason she became their manager in the first place was to earn money to replace the money in her college fund that her grandparents set up for her that her parents raided in order to pay for cochlear implants for her baby sister.  Piper resents her sister for the attention she is getting from her parents and for her ability to hear.  Her dad never even learned to sign.

This book is a complex one that shows teens as they really are and shows the experiences of a deaf teen in particular.  It also does a pretty good job of describing a recording session.  Josh is a wonderfully manipulative guy who you so desire to get what he deserves, but he is needed in the band to sing as a lead singer so your hopes may never come to fruition.  This is a great book that has great characters in it and I give it five out of five stars.

Quotes

“I don’t think anyone who’s motivated by fans of money will ever get it.” “Get what?” “Music. It’s not about those things. It’s about a feeling. It’s about expressing yourself. It’s about letting go.”

-Antony John (The Five Flavors of Dumb p 156)

Don’t worry about wanting to change; start worrying when you don’t feel like changing anymore.  And in the meantime, enjoy every version of yourself you ever meet, because not everybody who discovers their true identity likes what they find.

-Antony John (The Five Flavors of Dumb p 234)  

Listed On Amazon:  https://www.amazon.com/Five-Flavors-Antony-2011-09-29-Paperback/dp/B012YX2BR0/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=five+flavors+of+dumb&qid=1564422963&s=gateway&sr=8-1

Star Wars Vol 7: The Ashes of Jedha by Kieron Gillen (Writer), Salvador Carroca (Artist), GURU-eFX (Colorist), VC's Joe Caramagna (Letterer)

The Empire has returned to Jedha in order to mine kyber crystals that might have survived the Death Star's attack of the planet.  But there are partisans who are resisting this and Leia, Luke, and Han are there to help them, but first, they must win over their trust.  Meanwhile, the Empire has the Queen Sho-Turin helping them because Vader threatened her planet with destruction if she didn't.  So she has provided mining machines to help with the mining.

Luke follows a man named Chulco to the old temple of the Jedi there on the planet in order to finish Chulco's quest. But they run into trouble while there.  Meanwhile, Leia and Han are trying to stop a new mining machine that is indestructible.  They can't blow it up, though one of them tries to on a near-suicide mission.  With Leia absent, Han is forced to take control of the ground forces, something he is not too comfortable with.  

This was an exciting comic with great characters in it.  Ubin, the Rebel fighter who goes on the suicide mission is nearly determined to die for the cause rather than live for it.  And Luke learns a valuable lesson about responsibility as Han learns that he too can be a leader.  This was a great book that explores a world destroyed by the Empire that is still fighting them despite the odds.  I give it five out of five stars. 

Listed on Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Star-Wars-Vol-Ashes-Jedha-ebook/dp/B07BH44PC7/ref=sr_1_2?crid=251RMLMGBLTJK&keywords=star+wars+vol+7&qid=1564143536&s=gateway&sprefix=star+wars+vol+7%2Caps%2C207&sr=8-2

Paper Girls Vol 5 by Brian K. Vaughn (Writer), Cliff Chiang (Artist), Matt Wilson (Colorist), and Jared K. Fletcher (Letterer)

In the previous comic, a cop is hassling Tiffany about being out so late at her age and wants to take her home.  Tiffany must flee. She heads for home where she runs into her future self's husband. Her future self is out buying something and her parents are out of town.  She explains to Chris who she is and what is going on.  He agrees to help her but he wants to go out and find the older Tiffany first.  Meanwhile, the other girls landed in the mall and realize that one-way time travelers had of communicating with each other was the comic strips, especially Chuck Spachefski's. So they go to his house and find that he is really Charlotte and she knows that they are time travelers and that there is a war going on something a time traveler from the future told her about.  One group believes in time travel and one doesn't.  Both are from different time periods.  Then Charlotte decides they know too much and need to go.  So they hightail it out of there and go in search of Tiffany.  They go into another riff with Tiffany 2000 going along with them.

This time they land in the future which is the most dangerous place for them as a man named Jahpo who goes by Grandfather is looking for them to do what we don't know.  The girls split up with two of them going to try to find a cure for Mac's leukemia and the other three going to find Wari who they believe to be the same one they met back in prehistoric times.

Wari is suffering from dementia but she tells them her story of how she took the lifeboat back with the doctor when her people sent another one and the doctor raised her son as her own.  Jahpo is her son.  Mac finds out that she doesn't have leukemia but a time traveler's cancer that is incurable.  The girls have a walkie talkie to talk to each other and one group gets into trouble and needs help.

This comic really pushes the limits of the series as Jahpo tries to fix something in 1988 which is where they want to return to.  1988 has turned into a war zone and they're heading right for it.  This book is deep into the characters and the sense of fate and being unable to outrun it.  I love this series and this book lives up to the hype. I give it five out of five stars.

Listed on Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Paper-Girls-Vol-Brian-Vaughan-ebook/dp/B07HYHMRYH/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=paper+girls+vol+5&qid=1563967807&s=gateway&sr=8-1

Mistress of the Ritz by Melanie Benjamin

This book is "inspired" by true events since for once the author couldn't find any reliable source material so she made up a great deal. And maybe that made the difference because this book wasn't as good as her other books The Aviator's Wife and The Girl in the Picture.  This book was about Master and Mistress Ritz, the Auzellos, Blanche and Claude who run the Ritz in Paris during World War II.  It's told through the eyes of both of them--each taking a chapter.

Claude's viewpoint starts at the beginning when they met in 1923 and he takes his job managing the Ritz.  Theirs is a whirlwind romance and they're married before they know anything about each other including when Claude wants to take a mistress like all Frenchmen do and tells her about it.  This does not go over well with Blanche who believes in being faithful to your spouse.

Blanche's dialogue picks up when the Nazi's have taken over Paris and the Ritz, though the hotel is allowed to stay open for business unlike the other hotels in the area.   Sometimes she looks back in time to when she met Lily a Russian communist who goes off to fight in the Spanish Civil War.  They form a close friendship so that when Lily returns to Paris and needs help, Blanche gives it and demands that she be allowed to aide the Resistance.  While Claude is obsessed with protecting the Ritz, Blanche is doing something important.  But Claude promised no more mistresses until the phone starts ringing at odd hours and hanging up.  A signal from his mistress to come running.

This book is just one more in a million books set during the War with people working with the Resistance.  It is interesting to see how much Coco Channel who stays at the Ritz cozies up to the Nazis and begins a romance with one of them.  But this book offers nothing new and I preferred other books such as Code Name Verity and D-Day Girls and All the Light We Cannot See.  Maybe it would have been better if she had had more to work with. Or maybe the subject matter is overdone.  Benjamin excels at writing books that are based on lots of source material but this book shows that she flounders when she has to make it up on her own.  I give this book an extra star for being based on real people which somehow makes it more interesting.  My score is three and a half stars out of five. 

Quotes

He felt that women were at times more bothersome than they were pleasurable.  But only at times.

-Melanie Benjamin (Mistress Of the Ritz p 59)

As if, in talking about her, she is real to him; and if he couldn’t talk about her, he’d be afraid she would disappear.

-Melanie Benjamin (Mistress of the Ritz p 108)

That is what occupation does—it wears you down until you accept evil.  Until you can no longer define it, even.  Let alone recognize it.

-Melanie Benjamin (Mistress of the Ritz p 238)

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Wolverine Book Two: Three Months To Die by Paul Cornell (Writer), Kris Anka (Artist), David Curiel (Colorist), VC's Cory Petit (Letterer)

In the previous comic, a virus has wiped out Logan's immunity and healing factor and made him vulnerable to his enemies, of which he has quite a few.  He has decided to quit teaching at Jean Grey Academy and work through this by fighting through this.  He takes a job offer from a man named Offer who wants to take over Sabretooth's operation.  He becomes close with those he works with, especially Pinch and Lost Boy.  Pinch he's having a romantic relationship with and she's got a daughter she hopes to get back to and doesn't quite trust him.  He wears a suit of armor to protect him.  But he betrays the group because secretly he's working for S.H.I.E.L.D. undercover.  Sabertooth in an attempt to get at Logan and the sphere that he has been looking for kidnaps Pinch's daughter.

Daniel Rand and Shang-Chi take Logan to an island to help him figure out why he didn't kill Sabertooth.  Fear of death is now inside Logan and it's messing him up.  Keeping him from completing the mission.  So the island of Miyajima teaches him about death and how to overcome your fear of it.

Meanwhile, Pinch is with Sabertooth trying to save her daughter.  Offer betrays her and teams up with Sabertooth.  Sabertooth sends Hand soldiers to the island to seek out Wolverine.  Sabertooth intends to remake New York City over in his own way--a way that is bad for everyone.

In this concluding comic you learn more about Logan's past. A past that haunts him still.  Will he be able to stop Sabertooth from his diabolical scheme?  After fighting Death will there be anything left of Logan to stop him?  This is a very good comic that explores such lofty ideas of Death and Logan's fear of it and how he can overcome it to move on.  I give it four and a half stars.

Listed On Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Wolverine-Three-Months-Die-Book-ebook/dp/B00OMB0JJK/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2?keywords=wolverine+two+months+to+die&qid=1563532955&s=books&sr=8-2-fkmr0
     

Ms. Marvel vol 6: Civil War II by G. Willow Wilson (Writer), Adrian Alphona (Artist), Takeshi Miyanzawa (Artist), Mirka Andolfo (Artist), Ian Herring (Colorist), Irma Knivila (Colorist), VC's Joe Caramagna (Letterer)

In the previous comic she has been busy working with the Avengers. So busy she hasn't noticed that Bruno is dating a girl named Mike.  Jealousy rouses its ugly head.  But she doesn't have time for that.  A relocation organization is using her face to promote it causing bad feeling in the neighboorhood.  They are wanting to change the neighboorhood into something different and are handing out purple goo drinks that are causing people to turn into zombies.  Dr. Faustus is behind it all and now he has Bruno working for him in a zombie state so Kamala goes to Mike for help.

In this comic, Captain Marvel calls upon her to join a task force that Kamala will lead that will pick up criminals before they commit a crime.  This seems like a big weight off of her shoulders.  Ulysses the Inhuman is able to predict who will commit a crime and where and he's working for Captain Marvel.  Things go well at first, but soon someone she knows is arrested for the crime he's thinking about committing and Kamala sees this as a bad idea.  But can she go against Captain Marvel?

Bruno will get deathly hurt in this squirmish and Kamala must deal with the aftermath of their friendship if he survives.  Interspersed are flashbacks to her family history going back to Karachi which add a bit of flavor to this mix.  It isn't easy going against your hero even when your friends are urging you to do so.  Kamala must make a fateful decision one that will leave repercussions on the series.  This is still a stellar series that I love and this book delves deep inside Kamala and her history to tell a story that is topical yet timeless.  I give it five out of five stars.

Listed On Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Ms-Marvel-Vol-Civil-2015-ebook/dp/B01N9B5JWI/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3UUPOI8HCMRKI&keywords=ms+marvel+vol+6&qid=1563358830&s=books&sprefix=MS+Marvel+vol+%2Cdigital-text%2C180&sr=1-1

Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo

A convict with a thirst for revenge. [Mattias]

A sharpshooter who can’t walk away from a wager. [Jesper]

A runaway with a privileged past. [Wylan]

A spy known as the Wraith. [Inej]

A Heartrender using her magic to survive the slums. [Nina]

A thief with a gift for unlikely escapes. [Kaz]

Kaz "Dirtyhands" Brekker, leader of the Dregs gang is offered a huge sum of money, enough to give his boss twenty percent and the rest of the crew $4 million Kruge each to break into the unbreakable Ice Palace and get Bo Yul-Bayur out. Bo is a Ravkan who has managed to turn jurda, a caffeine-like substance into jurda pardem, a lethal drug that makes the user addicted and turns their Grisha powers up on high.  Fabrikators can turn metal into gold or make very lethal weapons out of it.  Each has their reason for wanting the money and Nina wants to see Mattias broken out of jail that she didn't mean to put him into and this job would free him.  But nothing goes right on the job and Bo turns up to be dead with his son Kuwei has taken his place and is searching for an antidote to jurda pardem.  Nina takes the jurda pardem to save them and to make Wylan look like Kuwei so that when the trade is made if Kaz doesn't get his money he will not have risked Kuwei.  Which is a good thing since Van Eck who hired them, double crosses them and takes Inej captive.  

This book opens with them looking to find where Van Eck has stashed Inej by breaking into his lawyer's office and looking through his books.  They figure out where Inej is but decide to kidnap Van Eck's pregnant wife to ensure that they get Inej back.  A trade is made on the bridge and they get Inej back.  Kaz, who admitted his greatest fear to Inej, that he hates being touched and that's why he wears gloves all the time cannot allow Inej to make him weak so he pushes her away a bit.  

Mattias and Nina have a hard row to hoe with Nina still craving the juda pardem even though she purged it out of her system on the boat ride back.   Her powers have also changed. She is no longer the normal Heartrender she was before but can call bones to her to do her bidding.  She must deal with this unnatural use of her talent and Mattias must somehow cope with the fact that she is the enemy that he grew up hating.  

Wylan finds out things about his father that he never knew and comes to loathe him even more.   Jesper's father comes from back home because the loan on his farm is now due and he doesn't have the funds and is hoping that Jesper does along with an explanation as to what has been going on.  Jesper lies to his father in hopes of not having to tell him that he is a gambler who was in debt.  

Kaz has a plan to end Van Eck by having him arrested for market's fraud when he takes a mechanical weevil and destroys the sugar silos that are owned by him and betting on sugar being in short supply by putting money in the market under their names for sugar stock.  But nothing goes according to plan.  Van Eck is not working alone and that makes him more dangerous than ever because he wants to destroy Kaz and his gang.  Will Kaz be able to figure out a new plan in time to save them all?

This book has amazing characters and sharp dialogue.  Each chapter is told from someone's point of view and you really get to know these characters even more than before from the other book.  This series ends with this book so sadly this is the last of these characters you will see, I guess, though she has written other books set in the same world so anything is possible.  I hated letting them go I had grown so attached to them.  This book is a must read of the highest order.  I cannot recommend it enough and give it five out of five stars.  I'd go higher if I could.

Quote

You are a stolen painting, Kuwei.  Too recognizable to sell on the open market, too valuable to leave lying around. You are worthless to me.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked Kingdom p 46)

Better terrible truths than kind lies.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked Kingdom p 56-7)

Knowledge isn’t a sign of divine favor. Prosperity is.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 71)

Zoya used to say that fear is a phoenix.  You can watch it burn a thousand times and still it will return.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 188)

He’d started to think of Jesper as fearless, but maybe being brave didn’t mean being unafraid.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 203)

I think you’d flirt with a date palm if it would pay you any attention.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 235)

We endure all kinds of pain.  It’s shame that eats men whole.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 283)

I don’t hold a grudge. I cradle it. I coddle it.  I feed it fine cuts of meat and send it to the best schools.  I nurture my grudges, Rollins.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 300)

Nina glanced from Inej to Kaz and saw they both wore the same expression.  Nina knew that look.  It came after the shipwreck, when the tide moved against you and the sky had gone dark. It was the first sight of land, the hope of shelter and even salvation that might await you on a distant shore.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 314)

And that was what destroyed you in the end: the longing for something you could never have.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 419)

Suffering is like anything else.  Live with it long enough, you learn to like the taste.

-Leigh Bardugo (Crooked House p 478) 

Listed On Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Crooked-Kingdom-Sequel-Six-Crows-ebook/dp/B01BBXF0HM/ref=sr_1_3?crid=1HRGILLR2924X&keywords=crooked+kingdom&qid=1563191988&s=books&sprefix=crooked+%2Cdigital-text%2C174&sr=1-3

Rat Queens Vol 3: Demons by Kurtis J. Wiebe (Writer), Tess Fowler (Artist), Tamara Bonvillain (Colorist), and Ed Brisson (Letterer)

The Rat Queens are Betty, a hippie halfling thief whose idea of a meal is drugs and candy, Hannah, a rockabilly elven mage, Violet a dwarven warrior who shaved her beard and then there's Dee, an atheist human who is skilled in combat has magic abilities and can heal, who comes from a family who worships a squid deity named N'Rygoth.  In the previous book, they were asked to find a woman named Bernadette and an assassin of the Black Khali may be involved.  Dee's husband shows up and tells them that the Haruspex Requiem was stolen. This is the death mask worn by the high priestess of their religion that absorbs all of their knowledge upon their death to be transferred to the next high priestess who wears it.  The Rat Queens have found Bernadette and all they can do is fix her so she is back to normal and not spouting nonsense but she will still be blind.  A man named Gerrig has stolen the Haruspex Requiem with plans destroy Palisade the town he created.  He doesn't have the papers with the spells so he is using what he knows from memory to call to the creatures from the abyss causing the others to hallucinate mostly bad things that will distract them from coming after him. Dee has the spells he needs.  Dee winds up becoming the High Priestess of N'Rygoth.

In this book, Hannah's dad has gone before the Council and attacked them for not being what they should be.  It turns out that the last time years ago when Hannah was a child her dad took down the evil Council for its practices and installed those who were involved in the revolt as the new Council.  Hannah and the gang are heading to her hometown to visit her father because she hasn't heard from him in a while and is worried about him.

Dee wants to end her religion by killing their god.  But she needs help and luckily her brother happens to be there attending his fifth anniversary at the Mage University.  Her atheist brother is shocked to find out that there is a god in the first place.  But he has information on Hannah. Things she hasn't told her friends.  She entered a pact with a demon to help her with her school work and was sent before the Council and banished from the University.  While there she attacked the Council.  But it wasn't really her it was the demon working through her who did so.  Hannah's other secret is that she is half demon herself.

Can the Rat Queens survive this new information and attitude from their friend Hannah?  These strong women will be tested and fighting their way out may not be possible.  This is a great series and this book continues the fun and danger these amazing women go through.  Hannah will be tested mightly and push herself away from her friends so what will they do to help her if anything?  I really loved this book and I give it five out of five stars.

Listed on Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Rat-Queens-Vol-3-Demons-ebook/dp/B01DL9FW2W/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=rat+queens+vol+3+diamonds&qid=1562761374&s=gateway&sr=8-1

Summer Knight by Jim Butcher

It's raining toads and that portends that something is off in the universe.  Harry Dresden is still in trouble for causing the war between the Red Court of Vampires and the White Council of Witches.  He needs to go before the council.  However, he's spent the last several months holed up in his lab trying to find a cure for vampirism so that he and his girlfriend Susan can be together again.  She still hasn't fully turned because she hasn't taken a life yet, but it's only a matter of time.

Harry gets a visit from the Winter Faerie Queen Mab who bought his indenture to his godmother and wants him to do three tasks for her. The first is to find out who killed a man whose death appears to be an accidental fall down the stairs.  She is being accused in Faerie of his murder and wants her name cleared.  Harry turns her down.

Then Harry goes before the White Council who want to trade him to the Vampires for an end to the war.  But the war probably wouldn't end even with him being turned over, his few friends argue for him.  And Harry can bring the safe passage to them in the Nevernever by working for Mab who helps to control it.  It is decided that he should go on trial to determine whether or not he is a wizard.

On this trial, he will bring peace to the Faerie Kingdom.  Not an easy task for anyone.  It turns out that the dead guy was the Summer Knight of the Faerie Court, a possible human task performed this time by a human.  This is why the courts are planning on going to war.  The Summer Court is weak without the Knight's mantel and its near midsummer which is when the Summer Queen is strongest so she feels the need to bring the fight now while she has a chance.  Oh, yes, there are three queens on each side and the Winter Knight as suspects.

Also, a suspect is the newly arrived Elaine from his past who supposedly died in a fire he accidentally set killing his mentor.  She is the Summer Ambassador to his Winter Ambassador and has been hanging out in the Summer Court for a while.  Billy and the other Alpha werewolves show up to help him when he needs it as does the cop Murphy who is having trouble recovering from her last encounter with things supernatural.

In this book, Harry is not really working with Murphy like he did in the other books because the suspects are all mostly Supernatural and can't be locked up.  Harry will be temped mightly by both Courts, Winter and Summer, to make a bargain with them.  He will have to show them he really is a strong wizard to be able to navigate the Courts and survive.  But this is Harry and surviving is what he does best and this book shows that to its fullest extent.  This book lives up to the strong others that came before it and shows why Butcher is one to read.  I give it five out of five stars.

Quotes

For me, chivalry isn’t dead; it’s an involuntary reflex.

-Jim Butcher (Summer Knight  p 123)

I’m thinking that if this dilemma grows any more horns I’m going to shoot it and put it up on the wall.

-Jim Butcher (Summer Knight p 125)

I’m pretty sure lurking in a dark alley to mug me with your apology isn’t the usual way to go about saying you’re sorry. But I didn’t read that Mars-Venus book.

-Jim Butcher (Summer Knight p 220)

You foil a Faerie Queen. Survive your own execution. Get away from certain death.  And get stuck up a freaking tree.

-Jim Butcher (Summer Knight p 376)

She was also mad. Loopy as a crochet convention.

-Jim Butcher (Summer Knight p 412)

The only people who never hurt are dead.

-Jim Butcher (Summer Knight p 436)

 Listed On Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Summer-Knight-Dresden-Files-Book-ebook/dp/B000OCXG46/ref=sr_1_1?crid=HO2Q9ZSU1CDW&keywords=summer+knight+dresden+files&qid=1562586332&s=gateway&sprefix=summer+kn%2Caps%2C172&sr=8-1

Star Wars: Lando Double or Nothing by Rodney Barnes (Writer), Paolo Villanelli (Artist), Andres Mossa (Colorist), VC"s Joe Caramagna (Letterer)

Kristiss is a woman from a planet, Kulgroon, taken over by the Empire. Her people turned into slave labor to work on droids all day.  She is hunting down Lando Calrissian to bring guns onto the planet and to her people in order to enact a revolution and get her people off the planet and somewhere safe.  Lando isn't really interested at first until she promises to pay off an old "acquaintance" who is now hunting him down thanks to her.

Elthree, Lando, and Kristiss split up once they reach the planet. Elthree, being a droid goes inside the building and blends in with the other droids and looks for ways to help from the inside.  Kristiss gets caught by the Empire and Lando could leave without selling her the weapons but its easier to sell her the weapons than to find another buyer so he stays to rescue her.  Lando gets caught up in some trouble of his own in the Wastelands of Kulgroon by a race of people who live there.

This is a great comic and the witty banter between Elthree and Lando really make it so.  The two of them going back and forth are so funny they make the book so worth reading.  Lando, of course, is worth reading about on his own.  The art is excellent and the storyline is amazing.  This is a wonderful book and I give it five out of five stars.

Listed on Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/STAR-WARS-LANDO-DOUBLE-NOTHING/dp/B07D86CG9F/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=star+wars+lando+double+or+nothing&qid=1562328403&s=gateway&sr=8-4

Jessica Jones: Blind Spot by Kelly Thompson (Writer), Mattia De Iulis (Artist, Colorist), Marcio Takara (Artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (Colorist), VC's Cory Petit (Letterer)

Jessica Jones is in trouble once again with the cops when she is found kneeling over the dead body of Dia, a former client, in her office.  The cops have nothing and Matt Murdoch, once again, helps her out and gets her out of an interrogation room.  It turns out Luke Cage was worried when she didn't come home and her name was on the news.

When Jessica goes to her office late the next night to review the case, which tells her that Dia was a troubled girl who wanted to get out of an abusive relationship and was looking for a reason like a cheating boyfriend, she is shot in the head--and survives.  She wakes up in the hospital and everyone just assumes that she is bulletproof, but Jessica knows that she died that night and somehow came back to life.

Misty Knight stops by and tells her that she isn't the only D-lister superhero that has been shot and killed recently.  White Rabbit, Skein, and Elsa Bloodstone have all been shot recently.   Jessica hunts down Elsa and finds that she is alive and well but had a similar experience to herself.  It turns out that Elsa had contact with Dia too who had come to her for help in killing her because she was a monster.  Which might mean that Dia had powers.

She hunts down Dia's house and goes there only to find Dia there alive and well.  It turns out that Dia has the ability to wish something into existence and after wishing her powers onto her boyfriend things went from bad to worse.  Then hoping to escape him she went to Jessica's office which was unlocked and she sat down and wished that she was free of him and her dead body appeared on the floor.  She didn't think, she just ran and stayed in hiding from the boyfriend.

So who saved Elsa and Jessica?  Is there an answer to this mystical problem?  Yeah, Dr. Strange makes an appearance which is awesome.  I really love the artwork in this book.  This is a great comic with lots of action and a bonus scene at the back of them planning Dani's birthday party which is really cool.  I give it five out of five stars.

Listed On Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Jessica-Jones-Marvel-Digital-Original-ebook/dp/B07G8PF2CN/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Jessica+Jones+Blind+spot&qid=1562159861&s=gateway&sr=8-1

A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway talks about many topics in his atrocious book A Moveable Feast.  He covers his dislike of F. Scott Fitzgerald as a person.  Skiing in Austria with his young son Bumby and his wife Hadley.  His friendship with Ezra Pound. His acquaintanceship with Miss Gertrude Stein and her wife Alice P. Tolkas.  It talks about his writing and how hard it can be sometimes to get time to write.  This book includes unfinished sketches he had written and placed them in the back of the book.

His friendship with Fitzgerald was a rocky one in that Fitzgerald was friendlier to him then he was to Fitzgerald.  Fitzgerald was an alcoholic. Not that Hemingway likely was one too.  They were just different kinds of alcoholics.  Fitzgerald was bright and brassy until everything wasn't type of alcoholic.  Hemingway was the calm and quiet drink your troubles away type of alcoholic.  Hemingway liked The Great Gatsby and saw talent in Fitzgerald if only he could get his act together.  But he hated his short stories. Which I can't believe because I've read Fitzgerald's short stories and they're brilliant.  Yes. Confession time. I'm more of a Fitzgerald person than a Hemingway person.  I've never liked Hemingway and only read this book for my book club.

His relationship with Miss Gertrude Stein was an interesting one considering Hemingway's machoness wouldn't allow for gays to exist.  He even says so in a conversation they have that he keeps a knife on him for the purpose of killing any gay man that comes on to him.  What surprised me was Stein's response in that "the act male homosexuals commit is ugly and repugnant and afterwards they are disgusted with themselves.  They drink, take drugs, to palliate this, but they are disgusted with the act and they are always changing partners and cannot be really happy." But that women do nothing disgusting between themselves and therefore happy and healthy.  It's hard to believe that a gay person would believe this of another gay person. 

I honestly hated this book.  Though it was interesting to read about how they went skiing back then.  There were no ski lifts so you had to walk up the mountain to the top to ski down it which was dangerous.  It was mostly filled with Hemingway's usual style of macho bullshit which I cannot abide.  This wasn't so much a book about his time in Paris in the twenties as a "look at how great I am" vignettes.  And the last one was the worst because he blames the breakup of his marriage on his third wife when it was likely his fault.  I give this book one star out of five.

Quotes

“Is Ezra a gentleman?” I asked.  “Of course not,” Ford said. “He’s an American.”

-Ernest Hemingway (A Moveable Feast p 78)

They say the seeds of what we will do are in all of us, but it always seemed to me that in those who make jokes.in life the seeds are covered with better soil and with a lighter grade of manure.

-Ernest Hemingway (A Moveable Feast p 86)

Listed On Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Moveable-Feast-Restored-Ernest-Hemingway-ebook/dp/B002F08230/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=a+moveable+feast&qid=1561984395&s=digital-text&sr=1-1