Living With the Dead (Kelley Armstrong)

I have found lately that I have been "breaking up" with more and more book series as they can't seem to hold my attention after the initial few books.  Perhaps they should have just been trilogies or the author is just trying to milk something that is past its expiration date.  Kelley Armstrong's Women of the Otherworld series is one that I have been really happy to keep up with though.  Living with the Dead is the 9th book in this series and I am pleased to report that Armstrong has succeeded where other authors have failed.  She has managed to create a base group of characters that continue to interact with each other and new characters to keep the series fresh.  But the development of the characters is rich enough that you still feel like you are catching up with old friends when you read about them and recognize them from other books.  That is how I always feel about my favorite characters anyway.  I think an excellent book should leave you satisfied but slightly bereft when you finish it.  I definitely felt that way as I finished it this morning and immediately went on Paperback Swap (http://www.paperbackswap.com/) to make sure that I had put the next books on my wish list. 

For those interested the series is as follows:

Book 1: Bitten















Book 2: Stolen















Book 3: Dime Store Magic















Book 4: Industrial Magic















Book 5: Haunted















Book 6: Broken















Book 7: No Humans Involved















Book 8: Personal Demon















If for no other reason than to save yourself a lot of time and headache, you should join Paperback Swap to be able to quickly find out series titles, orders, and names.  If I get into a series by reading one of the books in the middle, I have to go back and read from the start.  My mom doesn't mind skipping around but it drives me crazy. 

Back to Knoxville!

I just recently moved back to Knoxville because significant other, John, got a good job here and I am finding many good things in its favor.  Because I was born and raised here, and went to undergraduate school here (Go Volllllsss-uh!) I think I took the city for granted.  After being away for 3 years, I am definitely finding Knoxville wins out in a lot of ways when I compare it to my former home:

• Recycling available: I could only recycle numbers 1 and 2 plastics in Las Vegas while here, it is any plastic with a number and some without (like the lids!?) All my friends and colleagues had tried in vain to find any place in Vegas that took glass recyclables.  Just think about the vast amount of bottles of wine and beer and liquor consumed in that city of sinning and nowhere to take them to get ground up for new bottles? 

• Hardwood floors: unheard of in the desert.  (No trees to speak of= no one thinks of building with them.)  So I had ceramic tile (which I love, but face it... if you drop it on tile, it's broken) and grubby tan carpet in my apartment in Vegas.  I am not a fan of carpet, be it grubby tan or expensive deep-pile exotic wool.  It is hard to clean, hard to keep clean, and if you have ever pulled any up, you know it is never really clean.  Las Vegas has this fine particulate dust that gets everywhere.  Combine that with the cat fur that was also omnipresent in my domicile, and I had an apartment that became a battle zone of dirt and dander.  Pearl cat is allergic to dust mites and significant other, John, is mildly allergic to cat dander.  Go figure.  My new apartment= all hardwood floors except for the bathroom, yea!  (I'll probably have to expound on the joys of my new place in a whole other post...)  By far the best thing about non-carpet is the ease with which cat vomitus is cleaned up. One swipe with a paper towel and you’re done! Back with my grubby carpet it was a multi-step process. First you had to assess the consistency of the throw-up… Would you make a bigger mess by trying to clean it up immediately? Or was it vital that it wait a few minutes to congeal to make picking up easier? Either way you are left with a spot on the carpet that has to be later dealt with. (I found the Bissell Spot Bot was the best.)

• Bike friendliness: I thought moving to Las Vegas with its flat, straight roads would mean commuting by bike would be easy.  Not so much.  In the first month of living there one of my graduate school colleagues was hit on his bike.  Then he was given a ticket for biking on the sidewalk.  (Even though the cop admitted to him that he thought it was too dangerous to ride on the roads.)  I knew of two others over the course of my three years that got hit by drivers as well.  And these are just people I knew personally.  I have been impressed since returning to Knoxville with both the amount of people I have seen riding bikes, and the amount of designated bike lanes.  I'm looking forward to my dad changing the seat on his old bike to a "lady seat" (his terminology), so I can join the ranks of self-propelled non-motorists. 

• General friendliness: I know it is a cliche that people are nice in the South (at least to your face), but I think it's really true.  I probably won't notice it once I have been back six months or so, but for right now it seems pretty apparent.  It is the little things that stick out to me.  Like the smiles and "thank you"s you get for holding the door for someone.  Or if I apologize for some minor infraction (say, bumping into someone in a crowded bar) I actually get a smile and a "no problem" in return instead of a dirty look.  People actually give you a wave when you let them over in front of you while driving.  I think these little kindnesses build up in a cumulative way that really make you feel warm and fuzzy. 

I guess I just wanted to say I was proud of how our "little city that could" stacks up against a big one.  Keep it up, Knoxville. 

I have given up my desire for an e-reader.

I think it was just a phase.  I still want a digital crockpot though.  Preferably this one: