Mood: Wishing it would thunderstorm. We haven't had a good thunderstorm yet this year!

Two more books down, 130 more to go (though that number is constantly growing the more time I spend on Goodreads.)

His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik

Dragons! War! Oceanic battles! Dragons! Napoleon! Did I mention, dragons? It is exactly as it sounds, and if by that you think awesome then you, sir, are correct.

Sleek and proper English navy captain, William Laurence, finds himself wrenched away from the life and career and everything he adores when his crew captures a French ship carrying a rare dragon egg. Sure enough, poor ol' Will inevitably winds up with the obligation and responsibility of said dragon (named Temeraire) and is thrust into Britain's Aerial Corps to meet the fight against Bonaparte's advancing forces in the sky.

The book wastes no time with preambles of any sort. I have to admit that I had my doubts leaping right into the plot in the first chapter, much less the first six pages, and it all felt a little rushed before we had even left the starting line, what with trying to digest the whole alternate reality dragon quirk that doesn't get explained at all before you're thrust into it head first. That aside, it's an interesting concept of taking real historic events and putting a fantasy swing on it, and you get the feel for it pretty quick. I really loved Temeraire himself and the sort of naive but insightful view he has towards everyone and everything. I also really enjoyed the relationship Novik created between the dragons and their handlers; it's very obvious that Will and Temeraire's closeness is built on mutual respect and genuine affection on the half of both parties (which is something I felt lacking from other similar series' like Eragon.) By comparison, the neglect of one of the other dragon characters, Levitas, was heart wrenching. I don't ever cry reading books, but I came fairly close in the case of his small side story. ;_;

Since His Majesty's Dragon is based in a time of soldiers and war, there are a fair amount of battle scenes. I am not an action buff and I'm not particularly interested in the details or dynamics of warfare, so the parts where the story fell short for me were some of the especially longer battle or strategy scenes. I think it's especially difficult to read action sequences since they don't come across on the page as they do watching them on a screen, but fortunately the aerial battles were easier to follow here than a lot of other novel fight scenes I could mention. What I did find pretty nifty, however, were the creative crew systems and gear setups Novik dreamt up for the dragons -- it wasn't as simple as the hero just jumping on the back of his valiant draconian steed and shouting CHARGE! It added a sense of realism -- or at least as much realism as you can create when you're talking about more or less replacing fighter planes with mythical flying beasts.

I'll most likely dip back into the series for more in the future, if anything just for the possible chance for a scene with Napoleon Bonaparte whooping around in the sky ecstatically on the bag a giant flying lizard. :D As a footnote, the author of this series was apparently a fanfiction writer/LiveJournaler who lived in Edmonton for a winter (her biography remarks upon a "truly alarming coat" she now owns from her stint here, LOL.) I'd be interested to learn which fandom(s) she wrote for.

House Rules by Jodi Picoult

Picoult's newest book is about an eighteen-year-old boy with Asperger’s Syndrome ( which is a high-functioning type of autism for those who are not familiar) and an obsession for forensic analysis, who is arrested for the murder of his social skills tutor.

My only familiarity of Asperger's up to this point had been the character of Jerry Espenson from Boston Legal, which is one of the reasons why this book initially piqued my interest. It's one of those conditions that a lot of people rarely hear about and it's always a bit fascinating getting a bit of a deeper glimpse into the day-to-day rituals, complications, and struggles an individual and family touched by something like Asperger's lives with. According to various reviews I've read, Picoult's portrayal of AS here doesn't always necessarily ring true (though who am I to say); but despite that, I greatly enjoyed House Rules, with the exception of the ending which I thought was way too sudden and failed at really tying things up. I hate the ambiguity, it leaves me sitting there forever just craving for closure! D: That, and I and every other reader figured out the "twist" ending barely before the mystery of the crime had even been established. No surprises in this one.

Picoult's books are always a bit of a hit and miss, which is strange when you consider the plots are always the same: Family becomes entangled in a high stakes legal drama centered around a thought-provoking ethical or moral dilemma! Enlists the help of a charming lawyer who becomes emotionally entangled with his client and/or client's family! Cue some sort of angsty romance or affair thrown in for kicks that the parents use as an excuse for coping with the drama! OMG TWIST ENDING!

Despite the redundancy, I admire the way she's always almost able to make all of her characters endearing and relatable on some level, and I can't help but keep going back for more. There have been ones that I've loved such as Nineteen Minutes and My Sister's Keeper, and ones that fell flat with me like The Tenth Circle. Her upcoming 2011 novel reportedly centers around a lesbian couple and gay rights in regards to starting a family in America, which I hope will be another gooder~

Next up on my list is Homeland, the first book in the popular Dark Elf trilogy, but I got as far as the prologue and then somehow became distracted with reading my favorite General Grievous fanfic again for about the fourth or fifth time. (I keep a copy of the whole massive thing printed out that spans across two Duo-Tang because I enjoy it that much. And also, because I'm a giant nerd.) It's one of those stories that hasn't been updated in years and will probably never be completed, which makes me all sorts of sad because we all know about me and closure. :C <-- Epic sad face.

I finally finished watching the 1995 Pride and Prejudice mini-series with Jennifer Ehle and the fabulous Colin Firth. It wasn't all the fireworks and earth shattering amazing that I've heard it praised as, but it was enjoyable. Definitely something I liked to sit down to with a plate of tasty chocolate cake while watching and grinning each time they showed a closeup of Mr. Darcy. What a scowly bear. X3 I have to admit I was slightly disappointed with the infamous wet shirt scene. From all of the hype it's garnered over the years, I wound up with this when I was really expecting more of something like this. On the note of wet shirts, I never realized how many wet, white shirts Mr. Firth has actually donned over the years. I think P&P unintentionally type cast him and wet shirts everywhere. There should really be some sort of Oscar award for it all it's own.

P.S. I was dismayed to witness Jane Austen's obviously discriminatory view on red-heads. On behalf of gingers everywhere, I am hurt, Ms. Austen. Hurt and dismayed! :C