Checked Out with Green Hills Public Library District

Episode 8 - Do You Believe in Magic?

• Green Hills Public Library District • Season 1 • Episode 8

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Travel through worlds built of magic and myths in Checked Out’s 8th episode, “Do You Believe in Magic?” Tessa and Sara are joined by long time fantasy fan and Green Hills Librarian Patrick to discuss world building, magic systems, and escaping reality.  

Check out the media we talked about in this episode here: https://ghs.swanlibraries.net/MyAccount/MyList/76472

Interested in hearing your favorite book, topic, or genre discussed? 
Send a recommendation to ghpl@greenhillslibrary.org 

SPEAKER_02:

Hello everyone and welcome back to episode eight of our podcast. I'm Sarah. I'm Tessa, and this is Checked Out with Green Hills Public Library. Today we are excited to have Patrick here on the podcast with us. Pat, can you tell us a little bit about what you do here at the library?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, hey, I'm I'm Pat. I'm super excited to be part of this because I get to talk books with you too all the time. So to get it on tape, great. Um, I'm the adult services librarian here. I also do the 3D printing with Tessa.

SPEAKER_02:

Awesome. We love the 3D printer here. Why don't you tell us a little bit about what got you into reading and what you primarily read?

SPEAKER_00:

My oldest memories are of my mother with a book. She always had a book in her purse. So if we were at a red light, she'd pull out that book. If we were at a stop by a train, she'd pull out that book. She always had a book. Um, and then her sisters, my aunts, we'd go to their house and they had just large giant bookcases. So for whatever reason, I was enamored by books. And I remember the first author I got into, I was really young, I was probably in about fourth grade, but I got into Stephen King. I convinced my mom to buy me needful things, which I would not recommend you hand to a fourth grader, but my mom bought it for me. And then from there, I just kind of kept reading, eventually becoming an English teacher for a period of time, and then now a librarian. So I've always been book or book adjacent.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you for that intro, Pat. Glad to have our listeners get to know you a little bit better and what you do at the library and how you got into reading. This episode, we're gonna talk about fantasy books. I do know that both of you like to read fantasy, and I don't really know much about fantasy. So why don't we talk about our introductions to fantasy and how we got into reading fantasy?

SPEAKER_00:

Like I said, Stephen King was my first author love, and it was from there that I kind of branched out. Uh he had some fantasy books, Eye of the Dragon and his Dark Tower series, that I remember reading and kind of being my initial entry point into fantasy. And then more forcefully, I jumped into the fantasy world in high school when my freshman English teacher, Mrs. Littleton, assigned us Magician Apprentice, a book in the Rift War saga by Raymond E. Feist, and I loved it. Uh it was that chosen one narrative that Pug might have been an orphan, but he was an unknown, and he kind of grew to be the most powerful being. His best friend, Thomas, was a tank. We loved that book. Uh and we convinced Miss Littleton to allow us to read the second book in the series for class, and then beyond that, I ended up reading the rest of the series on my own. And kind of from there, I just kept going. Read through the wheel of time, Lord of the Rings, Brandon Sanderson. So I kind of just I just kind of kept reading since I picked up that first Stephen King book, fantasy or fantasy adjacent?

SPEAKER_01:

Fantasy for me definitely started. I feel like a pretty basic answer to say would be Harry Potter when I was 10, 11, Percy Jackson. I think that much like you, Patrick, once you start and you find that you love it, you kind of can't stop finding new things in new series. And luckily, fantasy is a genre that definitely lends itself to long-form storytelling and series. So you really get to stay and like marinate in those worlds.

SPEAKER_02:

I'm the odd man out today. I don't have too much knowledge about fantasy, but I also in grade school read Harry Potter, Percy Jackson series, love Greek and Roman mythology. I think that I read a lot more fantasy in grade school and high school and kind of fantasy adjacent, so like that dystopian novel. So Divergent, The Hunger Games, things that aren't classified as fantasy, but have a little bit of those elements of fantasy.

SPEAKER_00:

I want to pick up on something that you said, Tessa, that uh that made me think about what I like about fantasy. And you were talking about Ceres and Harry Potter. And one of the things that I love about fantasy is that watching these characters or watching this world or watching events develop over the course of many books, and sometimes where something will happen in book two that gets paid off in book five. And that's one of the big draws that I like about fantasy is that kind of long form or or long-term serial storytelling.

SPEAKER_01:

And I think that's where fantasy kind of loses you, Sarah. You're not really a series girly in that kind of way.

SPEAKER_02:

No, that's definitely true. I think that in terms of a collective series or a long form type of narrative, the most that I do is interconnected standalones, which will maybe follow the same group of characters, but each book is focused on one or two of those characters, and the other characters pop in and make those appearances just as a callback to them. So it does kind of lose me. I kind of get a little bit lost in the world building. It doesn't capture me as much as I would like it to. I feel that I need to just dive right in. And so having this totally new and different world than what I know complicates it a little bit for me. But I do know that that is something that a lot of people do like in fantasy, that they are seeking that other world.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, that's the other thing that I really like about fantasy is how it opens a door to a world that is often very unlike our own or like our own with certain different elements. The thing I like about fantasy is how it is almost like this machine that is built by the author with all of these imaginative different parts, creatures, characters, the world, magic, all of these small little elements that all function together to tell this imaginative story that takes place in a world that is often very different from our own.

SPEAKER_02:

One thing about me, I love the creatures. I love the magic systems. I think that that's such a cool and interesting part of fantasy. I love magical realism, for example. So Ninth House, I'm always singing Lee Bardugo's praises because I love that book so much and I love the magic system that she has in that book.

SPEAKER_01:

With how much you love Ninth House and the aspects of it that you do love that are fantastical, I think that urban fantasy is where you could really find a home within the fantasy genre. It takes our world and adds things into it. So you have the general construct of a contemporary book. For example, I just finished City of Gods and Monsters by Kayla Edwards, and it's a urban fantasy romance. So sold. So romance is definitely in a forefront in the plot line, but it is a world where they have cars, they have cell phones, they have electricity. Like those aren't things that you would necessarily see in like a more medieval-based fantasy world. And I think that that could really work for you because you can see the world that you know and just add things into it.

SPEAKER_02:

All right. I definitely like that. I will be adding the city of Gods and monsters to my TBR.

SPEAKER_01:

And going along with urban fantasy and you bringing up dystopian novels as well. I also think that fantasy includes a lot of social commentary on our world and problems that do exist within our society and kind of taking them and reframing them into a new world.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, yeah, you mentioned one of you, I believe, mentioned the Hunger Games, and I think one of the not read it, uh, but I think one of the ways in which that story functions is at an allegorical level, where yes, it's telling this fantastical story, but what it's really doing is making comments about the world that that we live in. So I think one of the other draws about fantasy for me is that allegorical social commentary where it can show me a world that is not like my own in order to have me better understand the world that I do live in.

SPEAKER_02:

I definitely think that the social commentary element of fantasy writing is something that is so important to it. I did just finish the graphic novel series saga, and I thought that that was chalked full of social commentary. And there were moments that I was like, oh my God, this mirrors our world so well. And the commentary is what kept me engaged in it, that I could live in this world that isn't my world at all, but it has so many aspects of it. It was a really nice journey to be on.

SPEAKER_00:

Saga is a great example, and pretty much anything by that author, Brian Kayvon, is going to be both fantastical, but also rife with uh comments about the world we live in. One last thing I want to mention though about like fantasy and the draw of it is I'm really drawn to that quest narrative that many fantasies inhabit, that hero's journey that seems to be the spine of many of these stories. Lord of the Rings being a premier example of that quest narrative where it begins in the Shire stillness. Then the outsider Gandalf comes in, um, they find the ring, there's the inciting incident, they leave the Shire and they're almost always in motion until you know they're they're back in the Shire and they've gone through this journey. I mean, the Hobbit is called there and back again. It's embedded in there, this idea of leaving home, staying in motion, and then returning back to that stillness, a changed person.

SPEAKER_02:

In high school, we learned the hero's journey through fantasy, through the Hobbit and Hercules.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's one of those things where the more you look for it, the more you see it. So many of our stories. I mean, Disney is and Marvel are are so reliant on that hero's journey structure to tell their stories. So there is something about that particular narrative that is at the core of our human experience or our wants and our desires or the way we understand the world.

SPEAKER_02:

I think it also makes sense then that there are so many fantasy series because this journey is a long journey. It can be multiple books in a series, and all these heroes are the chosen one. I think that that is also something that's so interesting to see possibly a character that you can relate to, like Harry Potter. He's just a kid, he's just a little guy, he's just a little guy under the stairs. Exactly. And and we follow him and we love him and we have this long journey with him.

SPEAKER_01:

I love the chosen one trope. I find it hard to care about the journeys that take place in fantasy if we don't have that chosen one. Because I I've seen discourse of people being like, everyone can't be the chosen one. It's the people we're choosing to tell the stories about. Like it it has to. You have to have some sort of draw. The main character has to be someone important in this world, or then you're treading into like cozy fantasy territory, which there is a group of people that that's for. I want it to be me really bad. There are a few that I enjoy, but like it's not what I'm reaching for. I want that big, dramatic, drawn-out journey of our character developing. I especially like when we start with them when they're very young and get to see how growing up and maturing physically can also impact the journey that everyone is going on. Like you said, Harry Potter, he's this little kid. Kaladin is just a slave carrying a bridge. That's where you have to start in order to make that impact that fantasy is trying to make.

SPEAKER_02:

All right, let's dive into Rex because I know that you guys have a ton for me, and I'm pulling out my pen and notepad to take some notes here. I can start us off since I don't have too many recommendations, since again, this is not my wheelhouse. But recently I ventured into the journey to read Throne of Glass, and I would like to separate the art from the artist here for a moment. I'm enjoying it. I think that it's a very interesting series and it's really engaging. I like the characters that I've met so far. I'm only about three books in. Assassin's Blade did wreck me, but we are trying to finish this series, and hopefully it'll be done by the end of this year. No promises.

SPEAKER_01:

Throne of Glass is such a classic fantasy storyline. And I will say the plotting of it, with you reading Assassin's Blade first, I made you do that. Um, that is a reading order that I will stick to. Assassin's Blade is a book of novellas that take place before Throne of Glass, like the book Throne of Glass. And there are things that you need to know in there that you don't need to know until the end. Like until Kingdom of Ash. And you're gonna be like, oh, she thought about that. So there are like a lot of small pieces which start when they start falling into place, it's like a very rewarding reading experience to have followed it that far. Again, separating art from the artist. I'm gonna love Harry Potter till the day I die. It's ingrained in me from childhood, the nostalgic factor. And sometimes you just you have to do that. You have to enjoy things.

SPEAKER_00:

Never read Sarah J. Mass, but I do love Harry Potter and I and I agree with what you said. It's something that I've revisited numerous times and it's just ingrained into me. And every time I see it on my bookcase, I have a very positive feeling. I would say, in terms of some of the like tent pole series or authors, I I know Tessa, you and I, Brandon Sanderson, we both like him. I think you're still in the midst of reading The Stormlight, but I've read a lot of the Mistborn stuff. So I'd I'd say anything by Sanderson, and he is one of those where every book is part of a larger Cosmere narrative, so they are often interconnected, some more than others. He is both one of those authors that you can pick up any book, but there is also a sequence, maybe that would be best to read them in. Uh, I would recommend starting though with Mistborn, since it's it's probably the least connected. And Wheel of Time is it's one of my favorite series. It does is it it comes with a lot of issues in terms of its pacing, it all its writing style, but overall it is one of my favorites. And then my strongest recommendation, my favorite author that I think more people need to read is Joe Abercrombie. He has a trilogy that put him on the map. So the first law is three books, and he is very much looking at Lord of the Rings and twisting it a lot. There is a wizard character, and it's very low-level magic, very gritty, very violent. Uh, and then there's two sets of trilogies, and in between those two trilogies is, I think about three books and one book of short stories. And in the middle of it all, the heroes is probably my favorite fantasy book, but it could be read. It's a standalone, it's not part of a series, but the characters are from the larger first law world, so and the the conflict and everything that they're involved in is part of that first law.

SPEAKER_01:

I am currently reading The Blade itself, which is the first one in that trilogy. So I don't have full, full thoughts for you yet, but so far so good.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay, so I do have another recommendation. I know I'm surprising myself here, but um, I want to talk about Lady Macbeth by Ava Reed, which is focused on Shakespeare's famous character, Lady Macbeth, and it takes more of a fantasy route and it focuses on Lady Macbeth being this very magical character. It also has the three witches, so it has that magic element in it. And I think that it worked for me in terms of a fantasy book because it was a world that I already knew. I had read Beth in high school and college, so I had a background and a very good connection with the characters in the story and that world. So being brought back there, even though it's taken a different turn, was still an easy thing for me to follow. So I would recommend that one.

SPEAKER_01:

I have a few different categories of different fantasy that I frequently read. So I read a lot of young adult fantasy, I read run-of-the-mill adult fantasy, and then I do separate fantasy romance from all of those things because I think that there's a different end goal in those versus something like the First Law trilogy or Missborn, where there's a different focus. I'm gonna pick one from all of them and then we'll go from there. I mentioned the poppy war in our audiobook episode, but just no, she's there. One that I will bring up is the book That Wouldn't Burn by Mark Lawrence. It is a magical library. There's a world within the library, and there's a world outside of the library, and the way that you get there, and the people that you meet, and the way timelines are kind of altered and tailored by what these characters are deciding to do, and then maybe retroactively doing something different. The setting, it's pretty basic in the fact that it is in a library. The characters are fantastic. I wouldn't necessarily say magic system, but more of like um power structure versus like spells magic kind of a thing. Like there is some sort of power source that the library is and how that uh impacts our characters.

SPEAKER_00:

Um, I got a few more recommendations. The requisite recommendations in terms of, you know, like Mount Rushmore, that fantasy guys like me, uh Patrick Rothes, the King Killer Chronicles, um, waiting on book three as we all are, Doors of Stone, Will It Ever Come. George R. Martin again, waiting for Winds of Winter. Uh another author on Waiting for their fourth book, Scott Lynch, The Gentleman Bastard series, The Lies of Maclumora. Those are pretty good. Robin Hobb, if you like long form storytelling that focuses on one character's development from like birth to continuing the story. Robin Hobb the Farseer saga is really great. It's first-person narrative that follows a bastard who has a couple magical abilities. One of his magical abilities is he can communicate with animals, so he bonds to uh night eyes, a wolf, and that relationship is kind of one of the best relationships on my bookshelves. Another author I like a lot, Fonda Lee, the Jade War saga. I mean, that is epic following characters over those three books. It is wonderful. It is kind of different, too, in that it is not your traditional, like European Lord of the Rings based. It is definitely more Asian-influenced. And I recently read Richard Swan, The Empire of the Wolf, and I really like that as well. That's another one that's close to Joe Abercrombie and its grittiness, and the world is also definitely, he's read Abercrombie and is kind of building around that.

SPEAKER_02:

I am busy taking notes here, y'all. Keep these recommendations coming.

SPEAKER_01:

One that the author I feel like is talked about a lot in the fantasy sphere is uh V.E. Schwab, but I don't hear the book I'm going to mention talked about a lot. I do love the Shades of Magic series. I don't know about that fourth book that she put out. I didn't read it. I don't know. Um, but a YA from her is Gallant, and it follows a mute main character, which I think is a very interesting point of view to have as your narrator tries to figure out how to communicate with people who were not ready for her to be mute. But it is giving like intense correlation. Vibes. So if you enjoy that movie, I think that you'll find a lot to be gained from Gallant. Patrick, I know you agree with me on this one. Blood Over Brighthaven by ML Wong. Incredible. Especially for a standalone and it not being super long. Like I feel like it was very concise in what it was doing.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I love that one. Um, and that going back to what we mentioned about allegory and social commentary, I think that that is definitely one of that book's strengths.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, for sure. I have read V. E. Schwab before. I read The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. Definitely an interesting concept. Yeah. I liked the whole like I live a very eternal life. The devil follows me around.

SPEAKER_01:

I loved the devil character. Same. I wanted more of him. Yeah. I think that there could have been a definite shift in what that story was that could have definitely taken it to a different, a different place that I think I personally would have enjoyed more.

SPEAKER_02:

Same. It would have taken me from like a to what 2.53 to could have been a four if he was involved more and that story was told a little differently.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I can feel that. Oh, The Will of the Many by James Islington. I need you to read it like deeply. You will love it.

SPEAKER_00:

I fully commit to reading it.

SPEAKER_01:

It's just so good. I feel like it takes everything from the authors that we often talk about loving and kind of just tweaks it all a little bit to make it something different.

SPEAKER_00:

I would be remiss if I did not mention one of my favorite series, The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher. That is one of those that is characterized as urban fantasy. It follows a magician in Chicago in a world where it's almost like if Harry Potter grew up and then got a job as a private investigator in a world that still had that bifurcated muggles and magic stuff. That is one where I think it's like I can't remember the number of books, but it's probably at 18 or 17 now, and it's gonna get up to like 22 and it as it ends. And it is one where each uh book uh makes the series better and better and better. A few caveats. The first few books do take a little bit of while to get into, and it's one of those where people say, Yeah, but by book four or five. Um and it's true, you will be hooked. Um the other caveat is some of the narration is problematic, so be warned. Butcher seems to love that Raymond Chandler, you know, noir voice.

SPEAKER_01:

Sarah, I have two fantasy romance series that I think besides City of Gods and Monsters, but I'm ready. Ready, but you have to actually do it. I'm ready to not make promises. Heavenly Bodies. I talked about it last episode too, I think. Love them. You have read snippets of it because I made you read it. You also love them. And Daughter of No World by Chris Broadman. She has the Serpent in the Wings of Night, Crowns of Niaxia series. It's fine. The first book is very much vampire, hunger games, magic, and it doesn't do anything really different than that. The one that I want you to try to read is Daughter of No Worlds, and it's definitely more of a classic fantasy take, but the romance and the fantasy are like leveled out. I feel like in fantasy romance, we can like lose the world a little bit. And I think that it does a very good job of using the romance and the relationship to build on the world and kind of make that make sense. So I feel like the world building doesn't feel so clunky and it's not so much an info dump because the characters are figuring out what their relationship and what goes on with them means for the world that Chris Abroadbent created. Also, Dawn of Onyx by Kate Golden. It's simple, it's short, it's cute. The male main character, love him. He's like the big bad king, but he's not. We love him for that. Okay, I will definitely make sure I look into them. Do you have any fantasy or fantasy adjacent things that are on your radar?

SPEAKER_02:

I do actually have a few. So one of them is a Draco and Hermione AO3 band big that I read. It's manacled. And they are publishing it traditionally, and it should be out sometime this year, and it's called Alchemized. So I'm excited for that. And then another one that I am very excited for is the my god, what is it? The irresistible something or other that's also a Draco and Hermione fan fake.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, and Rosen Chains.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, and Rosen Chains.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh the irresistible urge to kill your enemy, maybe?

SPEAKER_02:

Or kiss your enemy. I couldn't say truly. And the other one um is the irresistible urge to fall for your enemy. I haven't read the original of this that was initially on AO3, but I am very excited for the traditionally published release to come out also sometime this year. Finally, again, like I said, I will read anything that Julie Soto puts out. This is also a Draco and Hermione fanfic. It is Rose in Chains. So again, all three of these will be coming out sometime this year, and I will have an update for you all when I read them. And they are fantasy romance.

SPEAKER_01:

Those are all also on my radar. What's your your most anticipated fantasy release this year?

SPEAKER_00:

Most anticipated is Joe Abercrombie, The Devils. It's coming out in May. So that's my most anticipated. Outside of that, it's maybe fantasy adjacent, but Joe Hill has a book coming out towards the end of this year. King Sorrow, I think that I'm super excited about. And then, you know, I think James Logan, he wrote The Silverblood Promise. I think that book two comes out this year, or it's maybe like expected 2025. And then I'm also waiting for the third book in The Talent trilogy by J.M. Miro. Uh Ordinary Monsters and Yeah, Bringer of Dust. Those are fantastic. It's like Victorian London. And I say it would probably be like The X-Men, where all the kids have unique powers. Uh another book I'm waiting for is Marlon James, the third book in the Darkstar trilogy. Uh, and then Robert Jackson Bennett has a sequel to The Tainted Cup coming out in April that I'm looking forward to as well.

SPEAKER_01:

That's gonna wrap up our fantasy episode. Patrick, thanks for joining us for being our first guest on Checked Out. I'm glad that we had a fantasy reader to join me on this one, so I wasn't just monologuing to Sarah.

SPEAKER_00:

Thanks for having me. It was a pleasure.

SPEAKER_02:

All right, Tessa, let's check in with our book club pick. Let's. We are going to be discussing Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins. And just to reiterate from last episode, this will be a spoiler free review.

SPEAKER_01:

Right off the bat, I gave her five stars. Yes. Same. It was just so good. Everything about it, it was emotionally distressing. It had poignant commentary for today. I love Heymanch. And that was really cemented with this one. What were your thoughts?

SPEAKER_02:

I also loved it. I knew that I always wanted Heymanch's story. And I'm so glad that we finally got it and that we got it when I'm an adult. I feel that I'm reading it through a different perspective since I have more knowledge about this world. And so being able to kind of see the similarities that Suzanne Collins like creates in this fictional world.

SPEAKER_01:

You mentioned something kind of that I want to elaborate on. Reading them as an adult, I also think that Suzanne Collins is very aware that the people that are reading the Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and Sunrise on the Reaping are people who grew up with the Hunger Games. Um and I think you can tell that in her writing. They're not nearly as like young adult aged problems. Even in like her descriptions of things and how like detailed she gets into certain things, I definitely think she understands who the audience is for these books. Not to say that like a teen can't enjoy them now, but it definitely hits way harder knowing where you start in this like series with Hamich and then getting where he is now. No, where he was then, and then looking back at it to where he was now.

SPEAKER_02:

It made me want to revisit the series as a whole and read the main like core trilogy again. Uh, just to a experience it again because I love that series so much, but to pick up on the moments that I may have missed as a middle school reader, um, now that I'm a more nuanced reader, she does add a focus on things that maybe she didn't focus on before. I know that these two books that she's recently released, so Sunrise on the Reaping and then The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, they're both longer than some of the original three that she had. So just kind of being able to even build more on that world.

SPEAKER_01:

I also know that a lot of people think that she's just putting them out because she knows people will read them, like cash grab kind of thing. I'm not gonna say that they're necessary, but I think it's very obvious in her writing and how she writes it that it's not a throwaway thing to her. Um, she's been like quoted as saying she only will continue to release things in this series um when she has something to say about what is going on in our world too. And I was not the biggest fan of the Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. The book, the movie is pretty good. I watched it for the first time, like right after reading Sunrise on the Reaping. The movie's a lot better, so if you haven't read it, I would say just watch the movie and move on with your life. But I have a bigger appreciation for that installment after reading Sunrise on the Reaping. Just the way that all of that connects. I will say we're missing like a huge chunk of time in Snow's life. That um, I don't know, I would have liked to see how he becomes president. I also really just want like a random book about the career districts, like one of those tributes.

SPEAKER_02:

It sounds really bad for me to say this right now, but I would love to live in this world more. Not me myself, but I would love to continue to read more about this world. And first, I think that it is important that if you're going to read Sunrise on the Reaping, I do recommend reading the Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Definitely. I think that there's a lot of like background and lore that you get that is helpful going into Sunrise on the Reaping. I do too wanna see like that middle portion, and I'm hopeful that we'll get something sometime soon from her that has that. There were like a few side characters that I was like, oh, I'd love to see how they got to this point.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So, like Plutarch, for example, he's in Sunrise on the Reaping, and I want to see how he got to this position that he's in now. Because we see him in that trilogy as well. So it's just that kind of that timeline that he has lit in this world.

SPEAKER_01:

I I think obviously no spoilers. I think if she goes back in time, we'll get the first quarter quell. That's the one where they voted. Like the send in for the districts voted. I think we'll either get that because I think that there's some commentary to be had on that one, or we'll get Wirus's. Whichever one is mirrors. Is it Wirus or is it okay? I think we might get to see Wirus' story since that's a character that we've known for a while. And there was a mention of what her games was. So I don't know if maybe that was like her introing it or like leaving it open if she ever wants to visit it like that. But those are those are the two that I think she might visit again.

SPEAKER_02:

I will say that she did leave the door open for herself to come back to this world through the perspective of many different characters that we have a connection to. And I think that that makes me feel hopeful that she will come back to this world. I also like a round number of books, so I do want there to be six books.

SPEAKER_01:

I think she might do that too for the sake of it having been a first trilogy and then having three not necessarily standalones, but they're not direct sequels. Yeah. Like it's a series of prequels. Yeah. I feel like for the sake of roundness, she might. I feel like Hey Mitch's story is the last one that I was like, I need to know this just because I enjoy him as a character. So if she never touched it again, I would be happy with where she left it. But I'm always gonna read a Hunger Games book.

SPEAKER_02:

Same. I I can accept this if it's the last one. Will I be like a smidge disappointed because I won't be able to get back to it? Yeah, but they'll always be there for me to reread or watch the movies.

SPEAKER_01:

Overall, I really just I loved it. I loved my time in the world. I loved seeing Hamich. I loved seeing characters that I knew existed and both didn't. I think that it was just a very well-rounded story for her to do as a continuation.

SPEAKER_02:

I also loved it, rated it five stars, and it is now on my bookshelves because I loved it so much. Next episode, stay tuned because we are going to be reading Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones. I'm excited. This is gonna be my third Stephen Graham Jones, so I'm pumped.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I haven't read a horror in a while either. I'll be interested in going back into that genre. And I have like the most mixed opinions on his books. Like I've given him five stars, I've given him three stars, I've given him a DNF. So I really don't know where we're going here. I think it might be an interesting conversation.

SPEAKER_02:

That concludes this month's episode. If you have any requests for us to read or topics to discuss on the podcast, you can contact us at ghpl at greenhillslibrary.org.

SPEAKER_01:

Thank you guys so much for listening. This has been episode eight. Do you believe in magic? I'm Tesla. I'm Sarah, and we're checked out.