Welcome to Litsy!

Welp, I seem to be in my DNF‘ing era. I‘d say this is a reading slump if I wasn‘t actually enjoying everything but my Spooktober pics.

This wasn‘t Anno Dracula. It was a mishmash of short stories, the first two which were so beyond boring. I then looked up a summary and realized that none of these are worth it, and the one Anno Dracula story is an excerpt of the next book.

Disappointed.

🎃

Kind of a strange mix. Batman lore has enough inherent darkness, I figured going back to the 19th century would have been enough for the vibes without including a rewrite of Jack the Ripper, but it certainly works as a vigilante vs evil foil. The exhibition/man of tomorrow story felt high on melodrama and low on plot, though I appreciate a story that ends with a significant other sticking around after the Batman alterego discovery. 1/?

OMG, the evil mastermind is adorable! 🐛

Digging the vintage aesthetic.

Damsel in Distress ™: I know I often find myself incidentally striking sultry poses while lamenting imminent crisis. 🤨

Men are very finite in the interest they take in things, and if a fellow creature were to rise from his grave to-morrow, he would be speedily forgotten, and have to resort to the variety stage if he wanted to make resurrection pay.

This is quite a switch from this author‘s normal historical romances. It‘s a very dark and graphic mystery centering around a young woman, Fiona Mahoney, who becomes London‘s first Post-Mortem Sanitation Specialist (as she dubs herself) who cleans up after gruesome crimes. She‘s a flawed character who I couldn‘t help rooting for. Her personal mission is to track down Jack the Ripper who murdered her best friend/cousin. Also involved in her story🔻

New podcast on the BBC sounds app.

Although a great deal of the original contemporary documents & files have now been lost, those that remain are here examined to see what they tell us about the thoughts of those investigating the crimes at the time. It follows the murders chronologically with a great deal of cross-referencing to provide an objective look at the killings. This is not a seamless narrative of the crime that reads like a novel. (continued)

So, I am not #DNF this one, but I don't foresee myself picking it up and browsing through it in any definite timeline. It is good, and I am enjoying it, but physically, it's difficult to read (the typeface is hard on my eyes). So, I feel it's not a “relaxing/fun“ read for me right now. It will stay near my bed though, so I do plan on getting to it eventually.