First things first: Find Chapter 28 of Servant of the King here.

Then come back and read this…. (Look down! No, not at your shoes, silly. At this post. Yes, it’s long. But yes, it’s awesome.)

I wonder if maybe I bit off more than I can chew.

Of course, that’s using the word ‘chew’ in place of the word ‘read’ and ‘bit’ in the place of the phrase ‘checked books out of the library’.

No, that doesn’t quite work, because if you replace ‘bit’ and ‘chew’ with ‘read’ and ‘checked books out of the library,’ you get this:

“I wonder if maybe I checked books out of the library more than I can read.” And that’s not good syntax.

Huh.

All that aside, I have a lot of books to read! Don’t believe me?

Wait, do you seriously not believe me?

What have I ever done to lose your trust?

Do I owe you for that thing with that pie in the face? (Tell me you get the oblique movie reference!)

Moving on. Here are the books I’ve got on my plate. Er.. what’s with the food eating references? And that’s not even only me—these are commonly used references throughout all Englishdom. Why do these expressions that have very specifically to do with food used so commonly in contexts that are not involved with food?

WHAT IS THIS OBSESSION WITH FOOD?

Stay on target, Jared. (Movie reference?)

Right.

I’m just finishing Garth Nix’s excellent trilogy that I think is simply called Abhorsen. The first book is Sabriel, the second book is Lirael, and the third book is Abhorsen. The world has a bit of a learning curve, but is very well realized and the stories are quite good. My one critique is that the esteemed Mr. Nix (whose name was used as a curse by Alcatraz Smedry in one of Brandon Sanderson’s Alcatraz books) is using third person omniscient perspective. He’s doing it well, but it’s a little harder to feel an emotional connection to the characters.

I’m on the last book in that trilogy.

Next, I’ve got The Reagan Diaries. This was recommended to me by a good friend, and since I love reading about important figures in American history, this was a no-brainer. I’m actually looking for the audio recording of this book so that I can listen to it while I work, so I probably won’t read this book next.

Actually, the next book I read will be Scott Westerfield’s Leviathan. I admit I follow Scott on Twitter; he seems a cool fellow. And he mentions this series often, and I really like steampunk, so I went for it.

On the steampunk note, I heartily recommend Phillip Reeve’s Hungry City chronicles. Totally knocked my socks off. I found them under the fridge. My socks, not the books.

Then I’ve got two compilations of Conan the Cimmerian stories by Robert E. Howard. The books themselves are called The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian and The Bloody Crown of Conan. Given that Howard essentially invented the sword and sorcery genre, I figure I owe it to myself and craft to read these.

Plus I love Conan. I’ve read one of the Conan books that L. Sprague de Camp wrote based on Howard’s work and I liked it. I plan to read all of those books, but I’m going to the source first.

After those, I intend to bide my time until I get my hands on The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson by reading Weisel’s Night trilogy and some Dianne Wynne Jones.

Oh, and maybe at some point I’ll finally get a copy of Mockingjay. Cue the screams of excitement.

So many books to read. So many books to write!

What have you read lately that impressed you, depressed you, changed you, knocked your socks off, or angered you?