Second-hand books (33, 34)

These books were both second-hand. Well, I'm not quite sure about The Daughter of Time, but the copy I read was a bit shabby and quite aged, so I'm guessing it is.

In the case of Fearless, my mom bought it recently at a used book store in the Centro. Those things are crazy. My mom had gone to lunch with some friends nearby, and I had gone elsewhere to buy some concert tickets*, and afterwards we met up to book-hunt. I couldn't call her phone (no service inside bookstores, apparently) so I walked into the first shop I saw, and found her working away at the Used English table. There was already a big pile of goodies already set aside.

So we worked away at opposite ends of the table, dissecting piles and remarking upon the findings ("Hey, another Sweet Valley Twins!" "Mmm"). Well, my mom worked, and I held up books which I thought were cool (an old Hardy Boys mystery, a book from the 1950s about raising babies, etc.). When we payed, there were enough books to fill her backpack.

Anyway, she bough Fearless either on that trip or on a subsequent one to the same store a few days later (she regretted leaving behind a book about Samuel Pepys which she had originally turned down because somewhat expensive).

Anyway.

Book 33: The Daughter of Time, by Josephine Tey.

This was really good (good characters, historical mystery, et.c etc.) but it was SO HARD to get through. I had to keep flipping back to the genealogical tree at the beginning to see who everybody was. And then there was the business of remembering who had claimed whose children were illegitimate and when, and whose mistress was where in what year, and who is Warwick? And who's Clarence? And Henry VII was the grandson of whose cousin again?

It all got to be too much so I put the book down for two days or so, and when I returned to it I'd forgotten whom most people were. Aagh.

And then it turned out that not only was there a genealogical tree at the front of the book, but a different one at the back. It would have been really helpful if I'd found it before I'd finished the novel.

Fearless, by Francine Pascal

Another Francine book! (number 12 was Hangin' Out with Cici). This was quick, entertaining and the writing style was good (I think the style would have better fit a short story, but it worked fine in the book, too). It's the first part of a series, and out of curiosity I read the plot for the next few books. They get pretty weird.

This one was good, though.

*but apparently they don't sell concert tickets on Sundays. Note to self: buy those soon or they'll run out. And Alestorm will probably never return *sob*

**They really did