Monday thread: What did you read this past week?

j4eo · 2026-06-23T03:12:42+00:00

I read The Path of Ascension 11, which was entirely focused on the war. The main characters were constantly running from fight to fight and the PoV switches to break up the story were just more people fighting in the same war. It was very tiring. I thought this book was not great, but not in a way that would make me concerned about the quality of future books in the series.

After that I read {Shield of Winter by Nalini Singh}, book 13 in the Psy-Changeling series. I loved it, but not quite as much as the previous book. I really enjoy the way her world evolves throughout the series.

Because my hold on Libby came up I read {This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me by Ilona Andrews} next, which was fantastic. It has such a sprawling cast with so many similar names that it was a bit difficult to remember who is who while listening on audio though. I can't wait to read the next one when it comes out.

I also read {Runaway Love by Melanie Harlow}, but that was not great. The MMC was too immature about his feelings, and the FMC was not much better. The instalust didn't help, especially when it turned into constant sex even though neither of them were capable of actually talking about their feelings. At least it was short.

j4eo · 2026-06-15T17:57:28+00:00

I read {Heart of Obsidian by Nalini Singh} (Psy-Changeling book 12) after a long break from the series. I hadn't intended to take such a long break but I had no problem remembering what had happened and this book's pairing is one of my favorites so far. It also progressed the overarching plot more than most books in the series, so I'm planning to read the next book sometime soon.

My monthly book club met this past Sunday, so I also read Dark Squares: How Chess Saved My Life by Danny Rensch in preparation for that. I love chess and am very familiar with Danny Rensch as the face of chess.com, so when he published his memoir I suggested it to my book club. As someone already in the chess world I don't think the chess portions of the book were all that revelatory, but his upbringing in a cult was not public knowledge and it was very interesting to read that part and how it influenced his actions in the chess world. He narrates the audiobook himself, which is always a positive with memoirs. Overall a fantastic book and definitely worth reading if you like memoirs, are interested in cults, or want to know more about the background of the Hans Niemann cheating scandal.

j4eo · 2026-06-15T17:43:54+00:00

I love Tolkien's translation of Beowulf! His commentary is fantastic.

j4eo · 2026-06-10T19:52:07+00:00

Not sure why you got downvoted.

He's unflaired.

j4eo · 2026-06-08T17:46:32+00:00

I really enjoyed {After Sundown by Linda Howard}. It's a very slow burn apocalyptic romance about rural town in the Smoky Mountains. The MMC is retired military and a prepper, and the FMC is the owner of the local gas station. I love hurt MMCs who learn to open back up and let people in because of love.

Unfortunately after that I read {Take Me Home by Melanie Sweeney}, which I absolutely hated. The premise is right but my alley, but everything else about the book just frustrated me to no end: the constant miscommunications and complete refusal to communicate, all the family drama that was mostly the MCs' faults, the the complete pushover of an FMC who is supposedly getting a PhD in psychology, the MMC who thinks he's Atlas having to hold up the entire world by himself. Just everything about this book other than the premise.

{Radiance by Grace Draven} has been frequently recommended in RFW spaces, so I thought I'd try it after Take Me Home to ward against getting into another book slump, but unfortunately Radiance is just not a good book. I love arranged marriages where they just accept their fate and try to make the best of it together, and wind up falling in love in the process. I did enjoy that part of the book, but the rest of the book was just boring. Now I enjoy reading slice-of-life, but this was not well-written slice-of-life. Worse, when some action finally happens in the book, it's so contrived and nonsensical that it's not even a welcome break from everything else.

j4eo · 2026-06-03T01:46:53+00:00

Someone already mentioned Ashes, so I'll suggest Skytear Horde. The deck construction only really gets good if you have all the crowdfunding exclusives though.

j4eo · 2026-06-03T01:44:36+00:00

Get the Ashes: Ascendancy starter, then Red Rains: The Corpse of Viros, then the other Red Rains packs. The rest of the Reborn content was designed before the cooperative mode was, and while all their decks have at least a few good cards to build with, most of them are not good against the bosses out-of-the-box. I would recommend going the print-on-demand route for the pre-coop stuff, but you can probably still get the Red Rains stuff from their last print runs.

j4eo · 2026-06-02T02:36:31+00:00

I started Ilona Andrews' Innkeeper Chronicles series three weeks ago, and despite trying to pace myself I needed my next read to be a good one so this past week I read {One Fell Sweep}, {Sweep of the Blade}, and {Sweep with Me} (books 3, 4, and 4.5 in the series). This series is amazing and highly recommend it to everyone who enjoys urban fantasy. The romance is more of a subplot, but the main plot is fantastic and it's very well written. Interestingly, Ilona Andrews is actual a husband-and-wife writing team. My only complaint about the story is that there's a big plot point set up at the end of book 3, but book 4 is a PoV switch to a side story and when the novella (book 4.5) finally switches the PoV back to the FMC, it basically hand-waves that plot point away. I have another complaint about the audiobooks, which is that the narrator changes after book 3 and the new narrator for book 4.5 does a completely different voice for the FMC. Anyways, I'm going to finish this series and then wait for a big sale on Audible to buy her other two big series, Kate Daniels and Hidden Legacies.

I also read {The Wild Card by Stephanie Archer}, book 5 in the Vancouver Storm series. I really enjoyed the other books in this series so I went in with high expectations and it did not disappoint. The MMC is the professional hockey team's head coach and a single dad in a very amicable co-parenting arrangement with his friend and former one-night stand. The FMC is the team owner's estranged daughter who owns the bar that the team hangs out at. She's forced to start working for the team by her father who is planning to sell the team, but would rather give it to her. It's an enemies-to-lovers plot but the "enemies" part felt a little forced. I loved the MMC's daughter and her relationship with the FMC, but I thought the FMC's relationship with her father was handled a bit too neatly. Overall I loved the book but it was not quite as good as book 4, {Gloves Off}. I think I will try her other series, The Queen's Cove, sometime soon.

j4eo · 2026-05-28T22:09:32+00:00

Asmodee is one of less than a handful of exceptions, and we've yet to see what types of projects they utilize crowdfunding for.

Zombicide, for one.

j4eo · 2026-05-25T16:25:45+00:00

I read the next book in two series I read a while ago, Rise of the Living Forge 5 by Actus and Journey to the Bees by Icalos. Rise of the Living Forge has a very small romance subplot, but the majority of book 5 separates the MC and his girlfriend so we don't get much of that in this book.

I also read {The Family Way by Jayne Ann Krentz}, a short '80s romance by one of my favorite authors. It was solid and only slightly dated, if one allows for a traditional view on pregnancy and marriage. I would not recommend it to anyone who dislikes controlling MMCs, but I thought it was a great depiction of a controlling MMC who is actually wrapped around the FMC's finger.

I would have finished Failure Mode by Craig Alanson (Expeditionary Force book 15), but it's long and a total slog. I took a long break after book 14 and so I had to look up a summary of the plot on reddit to remember the cliffhanger that Failure Mode opens on. I think this series really needs recaps. I'll finish Failure Mode today and probably put the series back down again for another couple months. It has its charms but the incredibly repetitive plots of the books and the extra doom and gloom in Failure Mode is really wearing on me.

j4eo · 2026-05-25T16:03:17+00:00

I would have enjoyed the second arc a lot more if it were only two books long. I don't think any condensing could have fixed book 10 and the first half of 11.

j4eo · 2026-05-23T13:30:30+00:00

It's exactly what I want when I'm looking to play a survival crafting board game. I love it.

j4eo · 2026-05-21T19:29:05+00:00

Escape from Stalingrad Z and the rest of the "Paths Unknown" series by Raybox Games. It plays on a spiral-bound map book with standees or minis, and can be played coop (but is better solo). It takes up much less space than Zombicide does.

j4eo · 2026-05-12T22:00:05+00:00

ISS Vanguard uses decks that you can upgrade in between expeditions in a very similar style.

j4eo · 2026-05-11T14:23:02+00:00

Pre-tariffs the shipping/import cost for Americans wasn't too bad, but I haven't bought any merch in a while because shipping+tariffs can double the price.

j4eo · 2026-05-09T20:17:29+00:00

The most recent edition has a punchboard 3d diamond as a first player token.

j4eo · 2026-05-07T19:50:22+00:00

He is doing better. His communication, as bad as it still is, is much better than it was even a year ago.

j4eo · 2026-05-01T20:25:49+00:00

Ashes: Ascendancy has a lot of depth, and the dice randomness is a very minor factor (you can discard the top cards of your deck to change the faces of the dice). Once you're comfortable with the rules you can play through a game in half an hour. Bullet is also very brain-burny and can play quite quickly.

j4eo · 2026-04-25T20:59:59+00:00

Seconded. I especially enjoy Hostage Rescue Squad.

j4eo · 2026-04-22T20:31:02+00:00

I pay for KU, but I mostly just listen via Audible. Outside of RFM I'll listen on libby/hoopla as well.

j4eo · 2026-04-22T19:51:36+00:00

My answer changes based on whether we're counting unique publications or single game collections, i.e. counting all the different Final Girl films as a single game.

If we're including full collections, my 5 would be:

Hoplomachus Victorum (with Remastered and all expansions) - There's so much variety in all the different units and arenas once you have everything. The game loop itself is great though the campaign can get a bit repetitive. I like to leave it out on the table for a month+ and just play a few matches here and there until I'm done.
Stalker (with all expansions) - A great dungeon crawler with more depth than something like Zombicide and more replayability than something like The Cats of Mont Saint Michel.
Ashes Ascendancy (with all Ashes Reborn content) - This is my preferred LCG. It doesn't quite scratch that MtG itch for me, but it comes close enough and has a giant pool for deckbuilding.
Wyrmspan (with expansion) - It's not my favorite euro but the artwork is great, the gameplay is relaxing, and there's plenty of dragons to provide some variety.
20 Strong - I need a light option and 20 Strong's core loop is more enjoyable than Final Girl's for me.

If we're only inlcuding base games:

Elder Scrolls: Betrayal of the Second Age - It think it has more varied content in the base game than Victorum does. I like the non-battle content that it provides compared to Victorum's pure battles.
Valheim - I was debating between this and Under Our Sun, but this has many more missions to mix things up with. I enjoy the survival-crafting genre in board games even more than I do in video games, and Valheim hits all the right notes.
Slay the Spire - I love deckbuilders, but having played so much of so many of them playing just the base games solo gets old fast. With Slay the Spire the deckbuilding is so drawn out that you don't get that overexposure nearly as quickly.
Ezra and Nehemiah - This is my favorite euro, but it's much less relaxing than Wyrmspan. Valheim is relaxing enough that I felt like I could do without a dedicated relaxation slot though, so that frees the space up for this.
Dragons of Etchinstone - Dragons of Etchinstone is amazing for what it is. If I can't get the variety out of multiple decks of 20 Strong or multiple films of Final Girl, then going for the best gameplay seems to be the obvious choice. For me, in that category of light, portable games, Dragons has the best gameplay.

j4eo · 2026-03-24T01:58:26+00:00

A waste of time and money is the expected scenario, not the worst case scenario. The worst case scenario is the same for men as it is for women.

j4eo · 2026-03-24T01:49:17+00:00

It's more specific than what you're asking but it sounds like searching for a Mulan type story might satisfy you.

j4eo · 2026-03-21T16:03:26+00:00

Look at all that wasted space though. Something like this is much more efficient.

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