My baby daughter had a bad case of stage fright when she born; she was overdue, my wife was induced, and we werTwo word summary: Enormously enjoyable!
My baby daughter had a bad case of stage fright when she born; she was overdue, my wife was induced, and we were still in hospital for several days before she arrived. Over that time, we did a lot of reading to kill the time. This wasn't one of the books we took with us - this was an impromptu purchase from the hospital bookshop when our travelling library was running low.
I think my first comment was, "Django Wexler. What an awesome name for a spec-fic writer!"
Django — the D is silent as most everyone now knows — the nickname of the great Belgian-born jazz guitarist Django (originally Jean Baptiste) Reinhardt, makes a dynamic musical choice for any jazz aficionado. Reinhardt's nickname "Django" is Romani for "I awake." The name has become more familiar with the release of and acclaim for the Quentin Tarantino film Django Unchained.
So about the book?
Right, of course. Sorry, I'm suffering from new-baby sleep deprivation so my chain of thought is rather squiggly.
This is 'flintlock fantasy' - a term I've heard, but never read before. Most fantasy is set in a medieval era ('classic fantasy' - castles, knights, swordplay, etc). Some fantasy is set modern-era (urban fantasy - cars and computers, etc). Some is set in a spin-off of Victorian era (steampunk fantasy - steam power, airships and clockwork, etc). Flintlock fantasy is set in a Napoleonic equivalent era (muskets and cannons, etc) - it's a great combination, and I don't know why it's only recently coming to prominence.
As a kid, one of the TV shows I was allowed to stay-up late and watch was Sharpe. Based on Bernard Cromwell novels, the show starred a young Sean Bean (he of Lord of the Rings & Game of Thrones fame) as a British soldier in the Napoleonic wars. It was an awesome show (and one I'd love to re-watch some time). I also have a soft-spot for Wilbur Smith's Courtney series which is set in a slightly later era (but more sailor/explorer based than military). I haven't indulged either of these loves for many years, which is one reason why The Thousand Names went down quite so well with me!
You see, this isn't 'amazing' writing. There are many clichés here (more on that later), and the prose is more workmanlike than inspirational, but the experience as a whole was enormously enjoyable. I've seen other people compare it to The Black Company series as another recent flintlock fantasy work, or the Malazan Book of the Fallen series as another military-focused fantasy work. Unfortunately, I've not (yet) read either of those series, so to me the most comparable author springing to mind is Brandon Sanderson. That's a big compliment in my book, because Sanderson has become my go-to guy for reliable, fun, 'popcorn' reading.
The Thousand Names is driven by three soldiers, each of which are graduates from the Tabula Rasa school of Character Stereotypes.
- The Honourable Captain (HC) often acts cynical and resigned to the 'realities' of military life, but at heart is an idealist, a white-knight and a natural leader. He just needs a reason to believe!
- The Girl Dressed as a Boy (GDaaB) has run away to join the army and lives in fear of the other soldiers finding out her secret, while simultaneously proving that she's a better solider than any of them!
- The Enigmatic Colonel (EG) is Shelock Holmes in a uniform - a tactical genius, with razor-sharp insight into strategy and man-management, which allows him to steer his men to victory against huge odds again and again.
In an fantasy-world version of Egypt, in a Napolenoic era equivalent, HC and GDaaB are serving in an something like the French Colony forces - propping up the rule of an Egyptian Prince. An extremist religious faction whips up a rebellion, the Prince's local forces (trained by the French) defect to join the rebellion, and the wild desert raiders also throw in their lot with the uprising. Massively outnumbered, our forces retreat back along the coast to an old fortress. The rebel forces don't pursue, instead consolidating their grip on the capital. This is where the story starts, with HC nominally in charge awaiting the arrival of EG and the reinforcements. GDaaB is a lowly 'ranker'.
It's predominantly a military story, with set-piece battles providing opportunities for the Girl Dressed as a Boy to prove her mettle and work her way up the ranks, for Enigmatic Colonel to prove his genius, and for Honourable Captain to regain his belief and focus.
Despite this stereotypes and clichés... it works! There's a lot of love for good old-fashioned, character focused adventure here. I've already namechecked Sanderson, but fans of Louis McMaster Bujold, Julian May, Tad Williams and/or Peter Hamilton are likely to enjoy themselves here. There's not a great deal of 'gritty' if you prefer your fantasy with an edge, for all the guns and death this is actually a clean-cut honour and heroes sort of lark.
The fantasy element is gradual - quick spoiler tags here for a discussion of the magic system: (view spoiler)[It seems to be a 'symbiotic spirit' magic system. Each of the 'thousand names' of the title seems to refer to a different magical spirit (a naath). There are Egyptian Priestesses who work to learn the spells to bind a naath to a host. Some naath have limitations, eg 'can only be bound to women'. Different naath seem to embue their hosts with different skills, - 'ability to animate corpses', 'super strength/speed', 'ability to throw invisible walls/spears of force', 'ability to heal any wound', 'ability to absorb/devour other naath'. The scope of a thousand different naath, certainly gives the magic enough room for flexibility - it's like X-men, but you have your powers bestowed upon you, rather than being born with them. The long term effects of being naath-bound on the psyche have not yet been explored, but my hunch is 'not good'! (hide spoiler)]
Mr Django has already announced that there are 5 books planned for the series, 1 per year, so it's going to run for a while yet 2013-2017, so arguably the best time to start reading will be 2016 to blitz the four existing books just before the last one comes out. I've been foolish enough to start before book 2 is out... so I'll be waiting patiently for my yearly instalment!
As long as military books don't turn you off, this is highly recommended.
Note: Baby Tabitha was eventually born on 23rd June, and is a happy, healthy little sprog.
So my wife got called into hospital to be induced on Friday afternoon. I grabbed the book I was halfway through to take with me, Vernor Vinge's DeepneSo my wife got called into hospital to be induced on Friday afternoon. I grabbed the book I was halfway through to take with me, Vernor Vinge's Deepness In The Sky. I quickly finished that, and it was good. Then I picked-up one of my wife's books that she had bought, Mercedes Lackey's Aerie - the fourth in a kids series about dragon riders; that lasted a few hours and it was OK - better than I'd expected, to be fair. Without any more books to hand, I went down to the hospital shops and bought Django Wexler's The Thousand Names and S. E. Lister's Hideous Creatures to keep me going. Much patience is required when a baby has stage fright.
Quick aside: If anyone can find out what the S. E. initials stand for, please let me know because I haven't found out yet and it bugs me.
Of the two new books, I plumped for Hideous Creatures first because the blurb namechecked Gaimen and I thought the cover was lush. The pencil sketch style looks great - if I ever write a book, that's the kind of cover I'd want.
Well, the Gaimen namecheck is misleading. I can see what they're trying for - in terms of content/concept there's some similarities with American Gods - but in terms of style and delivery, Gaiman wouldn't be first to mind. The fine is heavily foreboding, strongly gothic 'fear of the unknown' flavour. It reminded me most of Jamrach's Menagerie. More a Booker nominee than Hugo - that kind of literary ballpark.
It's a story about secrets, revelations, dark journeys and haunting memories. The pacing is spot-on, which is refreshing as stories of this kind often bloat. The non-linear telling is never overdone or confusing. From an analytic standpoint the plotting is superbly balanced and arranged, and the final send-off got the hairs on the back if my neck standing on end beautifully.
But I didn't love it.
There are three main characters to carry the plot - Arthur, is the youngest son of a proud English line, sailing to America to run away from dark secret number one. Shelo is a native American, covered in tattoos, surrounded my dark magics and on a mission to avenge dark secret number two. And Flora is the daughter of a famed outlaw, looking to escape from dark secret number 3.
For me, Shelo and Flora work perfectly - they each carry a powerful sense of foreboding and hope, respectively. The issue for me lay with Arthur - his is a tale of redemption, but it's also the core story that binds the other two. I just didn't like Arthur. Nor did I dislike him. He's weak-willed, fatalistic, takes no responsibility for himself, anyone or anything, has nothing (in his present) that he loves, so nothing feels at stake... I just never invested enough in Arthur's plight to feel swept up in the story.
As a specific complaint, much is made of Arthur's 'odd' body, but never with enough clarity to make it seem worth all the fuss.
There's no denying the skill, artistry and vivid imagination at work here - but without that core character arc to really carry me, I felt more like a critic in a gallery than the rapt audience of a master-storyteller.
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of lif
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of life, so I’ve decided to diversify and pursue six different lists simultaneously. This book falls into my FINISHING THE SERIES! list.
I loves me a good series! But I'm terrible for starting a new series before finishing my last - so this reading list is all about trying to close out those series I've got on the go.
Summary: Butcher back to his best!
Cheesy motor racing analogy: The first few books in the Dresden Files are like the beginning of a motor race - a little congested while the cars are still bunched up, taking it a little cautiously through the first few turns. Then we hit a solid patch of great storytelling/racing, where the cars are strung out nicely and everyone's hitting their stride. Then zoom! - the run up to Changes is amazing, the home straight, top speed, overtaking manoeuvres and you can't take your eyes off the page! After that excitement, Ghost Story and Cold Days are an abrupt change of pace - slamming the brakes on and manoeuvring through a hairpin turn and chicane - these are difficult corners and Butchers steers us through them adroitly - but they don't carry the same rush as what's happened just before. Which brings us to Skin Game, which to me feels like Butcher back to his best, we've got a fresh straight in front of us and we're slamming the gas pedal down! Everyone wearing their safety belts? No? Let's go!
Butcher also mixes up his storytelling technique - (view spoiler)[for the first time in the Dresden Files, Harry is being an unreliable narrator - he's deliberately not telling us things (hide spoiler)]! It works really well because it's unexpected - we're so used to trusting Harry - and Butcher does a good job with the foreshadowing... I knew something must be coming to turn it all on it's head... but I couldn't quite put my finger on what...
I said to my wife when I finished it that I thought just one element was handled badly: (view spoiler)[The birth of baby Lash (the new Bob). The whole parasite/spirit of intellect thread is integral to the plot at key moments, and we're all braced for some awesome 'birth' scene, possibly in Harry's head, featuring his subconscious again, and maybe flashbacks to Lash... or something! Instead we get... Molly 'delivers' the baby spirit while Harry is passed out and it's all job-done by the time he comes round. Lost opportunity! Booooo! (hide spoiler)]
If you've got to book 15 in a series... you're a fan already! - but this is a great instalment and recommended whole-heartedly.
With this third book in the series, I felt Aaronovitch had really hit his stride. This book, the fourth in the series, was aBest Peter Grant book yet!
With this third book in the series, I felt Aaronovitch had really hit his stride. This book, the fourth in the series, was a pure pleasure to read. It ran on rails and I found myself so immersed in the story that I wasn't looking ahead, I wasn't trying to second-guess it, I wasn't trying to analyse it mid-flow. As such... that ending blind-sided me like a pick-up truck running a red light... BAM!
I won't extol the virtues of the series here - if you're looking at reviews for book four, odds are you've already read books one, two and three! Let me just reassure you that this one is another bullseye.
I'm also very excited about the BBC TV series based on these novels that is in development! Check-out this casting blog to whet your appetite for what that might look like :-)
After this I read: Dumbledore's Army Reunites at Quidditch World Cup Final - but for some reason, Goodreads decided to delete the entry for that short story and all associated reviews (cheers for that!) so let's just jump straight to the book I read after that: The Algebraist...more
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of lif
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of life, so I’ve decided to diversify and pursue six different lists simultaneously. This book falls into my HUGO WINNERS list.
This is the reading list that follows the old adage, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". I loved reading the Locus Sci-Fi Award winners so I'm going to crack on with the Hugo winners next (but only the post-1980 winners, I'll follow up with pre-1980 another time).
I'm feeling confused...
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Why didn't I like this book more?
People I trust go nuts over this book: Nikki: "I loved the book. I read it with my teddy, Helen, at all times, because it felt somehow wrong to read something that spoke to my teenage self without her -- this book really felt written for me, and I could talk about it for hours, if given the chance." Appatt:"The most important aspect of this book is that it is a love letter to science fiction and fantasy books" "The little comments about the books and the love the author via her characters show for the books make me want to read sf/f until my eyes fall out." Algernon:"Here is probably an explanation of why I love this story so much. It feels written especially for me. I recognize myself as a member of this group that is unable to pass a bookshop without entering and browsing the shelves."
Sadly, this book did not feel written for me.
Among Others is a massive clash of characters (5 stars) vs plot (2 stars).
I love Mori, she's awesome. She's the kind of gal I could talk books with for hours. She knows her sci-fi. She knows the importance of books on a deep, cellular level. She lives more in her books than she does in a body. We would understand each other, even if we didn't agree about particular authors - I totally don't feel her affection for Le Guin - but I'm pretty sure Mori would forgive me that. I'd be delighted to invite her over for pie and after-dinner Scrabble.
But... just because I think the girl is a kindred spirit, doesn't mean I'm going to love reading her diary. There are three strands to Mori's diary - and I was only totally sold on one.
(SPOILERS FOLLOW)
The first strand is the straight-up adolescent girl's life/drama/angst. Mori has run away from her mother because her mother's mad, and her madness lead to the incident which killed Mori's twin sister, and left Mori walking with a stick. Social services have placed Mori with her estranged Father, who she never knew. Her Father lives with his three kooky sisters, who pay to send Mori away to girl's boarding school. Mori does not fit in. She eventually makes friends in the local town, finds a boyfriend, and goes home to confront her mother.
The second strand is the fantasy element. Mori's mother is an evil witch. Mori and her sister grew up communing with fairies. Magic is real, but always plausibly deniable: magic can make a flower appear in your hand, but only because someone dropped it out of a plane above you and it fell into your hand. Magic can change what was to make what's now - it's twisty and dangerous. Fairies are strange. Mori doesn't know much about how it all works, she's never been taught, she's just grown up with it in the Welsh valleys, but it's real and nobody else knows about it. Mori performs rituals for the fairies and sees the spirit of her dead sister. It's wonderful and strange and nothing like Tolkien or Rowling.
The third strand is the books. Mori reads voraciously; many books a week. She ploughs her way through all the great sci-fi of her era and her informed and insightful extrapolations from themes in books to her own situation and scattered throughout the novel. Her love of books tints everything else she sees.
Overall Among Others is a unique, clever and fascinating book, but I never got that "this was written for me" feeling. I always found it enjoyable to read, but all to easy to put down again. It moves very slowly. For all the motion, there's very little progress. As I mentioned earlier, I'm no Le Guin fan, and Walton carries her torch; the power is in the quiet moments when everything changes.
Among Others won the 2012 Hugo award (fending off A Dance With Dragons, Embassytown, Deadline and Leviathan Wakes). It also won the 2012 Nebula award (fending off Embassytown again, as well as Firebird, God's War, The Kingdom of Gods and Mechanique.) Among Others did not win my personal favourite award, the Locus, where it was nominated for the fantasy award but lost out to A Dance With Dragons.
I've not read any of those (yet) except Embassytown - and I rate the Miéville higher.
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of lif
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of life, so I’ve decided to diversify and pursue six different lists simultaneously. This book falls into my GIFTS AND GUILTY list.
Regardless of how many books are already queued patiently on my reading list, unexpected gifts and guilt-trips will always see unplanned additions muscling their way in at the front.
In the interest of transparency, let me say this: the author, Marie Browne, is a friend of mine. I’ve never reviewed a friend’s book before and I’ve been torn as to how to approach it. I want to do my bit to help promote the book because I’d love to see it do well - but then, countering that, is my honesty and integrity as a reviewer. I almost want to over-react to dispel all suggestion of a biased review by writing an analytical assassination of Qualia’s flaws – but I’m not sure Marie would appreciate that!
Rather than continue to confuse myself and fight to remain impartial and objective, let’s just agree now that I was a partisan fan from before I’d even received my copy of Qualia. Having said that, I won’t let my review collapse into boring, rose-tinted flattering drivel – I’m hoping that my extra insights into the writer, her history, life and interests, can provide an interesting perspective for potential readers.
Qualia isn’t Marie’s debut novel – but it is her fantasy debut. Both her previous books, Narrow Margins and Narrow Minds, are humorous memoirs – and I recommend them unreservedly. Those books tell Marie’s own tale about how she reacted when the Rover car company went bust and took her successful IT support firm down with it. Rather than rebuild her comfortable suburban life, Marie chose to follow her (rather spontaneous) dream and move her family onto a fixer-upper canal boat, and permanently become ‘river rats’. It’s an eccentric, charming and heartfelt yarn about recognising, appreciating and fighting for happiness – whatever that word means for you.
Now, sharing your own experiences, in your own voice with your own style, etc – that’s quite a different kettle of fishies from writing a work of fantasy fiction, and yet Marie has not played it safe.
Qualia tells the story of Joe – a human minion working for the archangel Metatron. He’s your run of the mill, one foot in the supernatural world, messenger, courier, demon-killer, etc. But then (to paraphrase the Fresh Prince) his life gets twisted upside down. His latest job is a bit bigger than he’s used to: kill Lucifer (kind of). It turns out that when you get right down to the nitty-gritty, this whole Heaven and Hell, angels and demons, malarkey isn’t as simple as they’d have you believe, and once Joe gets the chance to chinwag with a few of Hell’s bigwigs, he starts to realise he’s been batting for the wrong side for a long time. So begins a frantic quest through the multiple dimensions of Hell to deliver an insurance salesman called Graham to Lucifer’s throne room before Metatron can erase the multiverse. Joe is helped in his mission by unusual allies - fallen angels, alien demons, his hot hippy neighbour, a dead psychic and her necro-bro, a dragon, a centaur, carnivorous goats, and more eclectic friendly faces – while he’s hounded the whole way by the bloodthirsty archangel Michael and his army, the angelic host. Its one hell of a ride (excuse the pun) and as Will.I.Am would say, it’s fresh, it’s dope, it’s a hoot!
There are elements of Qualia’s style comparable to Chris Moore and Marie Philips. Considering the subject matter, it’s not surprising I can see echoes from the Sandman and Lucifer graphic novels. There’s also an unmistakable urban fantasy influence from Jim Butcher. But when I tried to tell my wife what I thought Qualia was like, the strongest similarities struck me from the screen rather than the page – Kevin Smith’s film Dogma and Josh Wheedon’s classic TV series Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel. It’s that same blend of humour with supernatural action, clever but silly concepts delivered straight-faced with a wink. The humour here is a much more wry British sarcasm than outright gags, but there were plenty of chuckles from me.
There are a lot of specific ideas I really enjoyed. Technically Joe is immortal, but this doesn’t mean he can’t be killed. Joe can most definitely be killed, with all associated pain; he just bounces back to life again later like some kind of sarcastic weeble toy. It makes him grouchy. I loved the way fairies (and dragons) were enfolded into the Christian mythos. The cute but lethal carnivorous goats were a definite crowd pleaser! Each of the different stages in the episodic descent into Hell were imaginative, challenging and interesting. I also thought the semi-sentient knuckle-dusters were a great weapon. There were dozens of nice little fantasy embellishments and flourishes that demonstrated a deep love of the genre.
But what really stole the show were the characters. All of them are flawed but hugely likeable. My personal favourites were the necromancer, the centaur, the surfer-dude angel Rafael and big, bad Lucifer himself. It was the moments of doubt and hesitation that sold it to me – Belial’s guilt over those he couldn’t save from Hell when he evacuated, and over the children who died because he saved one monster too many. Lucifer’s sympathy for those condemned to Hell for suicide. And Joe’s own constant, niggling insecurities that make him such a reluctant hero made him a star for me (I’m a sucker for an anxious saviour).
So what happened to the 5th star?
I think Marie has just tried to do a little too much, too quickly. This book ends on an obvious hook to continue a series – but to me, the story feels like it’s come from a third or fourth instalment in an already existing series. There’s a lot of condensed explaining to do, about the how the system of faith/magic/multiverse works which wouldn’t have been necessary with a couple of prequel adventures to set the scene more gradually. This adventure is a real turning point for Joe, but we haven’t spent enough time with Joe as Metatron’s bitch for that to feel as significant as it should – again, I just feel the defection would have carried more weight had we been a couple of books in already.
So it’s a solid 4-star recommendation from me. I think Marie’s done a smashing job with Qualia and it’s a really fun, quirky, imaginative ride. I think she should be hugely proud of what she’s accomplished and I can’t wait to see if she does continue the series (I hope she does!)
If you do buy/borrow/steal a copy of Qualia and find yourself enjoying it – please drop Marie a line! She’s a truly lovely lady and has (after a little badgering) embraced her GR author account - and I know she’d love to hear from you all.
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of lif
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of life, so I’ve decided to diversify and pursue six different lists simultaneously. This book falls into my BEDTIME STORIES list.
I have a little boy and love reading to him, so this reading list will cover the classic (and new) children’s stories we’re enjoying together.
My wife, Millie, and I are taking it in turns to pick bed-time stories for our baby boy, Fin. Winnie-the-Pooh was my choice and then to follow it, for her pick, we’ve just had The Enchanted Wood. I’ve already picked The Wind in the Willows to follow.
Enid Blyton is a very familiar name to me, I must have read most of both the Famous Five and the Secret Seven stories as a child, but somehow The Faraway Tree series passed me by completely. I don’t think I’d ever heard of it before Millie began telling me about it.
The premise is simple enough: a family from the city with three children (a boy and two girls) move out to the countryside. The children are told of an enchanted wood nearby and in that wood they discover a magic tree. Many magical folk live in the woods and up the tree, but at the very top of the tree is a ladder through the clouds to a magical land. The question is, which magical land will be through the clouds today? For it changes, quite regularly, you see. And you never know if the land through the clouds is nice or nasty – but you’re guaranteed an adventure!
We picked up a copy of this book from a second hand book store in the Cardiff arcades and it was a modern re-print. I was only a few pages in when she started complaining that it wasn’t how she remembered it –two of the children’s names were different! She stole the book from me and started flicking through it – “she's called Dame Slap, not Dame Snap!” she muttered. Having never read the stories before I was none the wiser, but apparently at some point the books have been amended by the Politically-Correct Brigade. Determined that we stay true to her childhood nostalgia, Millie picked up her original copies of the series from her Grandmother’s house.
I think this PC editing is all a bit over the top. They changed the little girls, Bessie and Fanny to Beth and Frannie (why bother?) and the evil schoolmistress, Dame Slap (who slaps naughty children) to Dame Snap. I’m sure there are other changes too – having now read the original book there are gollywog dolls and a pony called Blackie –I doubt those survived the editor’s scalpel. All of which, while quite interesting, is an odd subplot for a widely beloved children’s book - and quite apart from the magic of the story itself.
Reading a book aloud gives you a different outlook on a writer’s style, its rhythm and meter, vocabulary and narrative flourishes. Blyton’s work is an absolute pleasure to read aloud, with a wonderful flow and even though dated, the language is infectious – I found myself using Blyton-esque phrases in regular conversation, “oh, how absolutely tremendous!”, “that’s a simply marvellous idea!”, etc.
Some of the magical lands at the top of the tree were playful and imaginative and will stick with me – The Rocking Land, The Land of Take-What-You-Want and The Land of Birthdays. But some others seemed rather uninspired and forgettable – The Roundabout Land, The Land of Ice and Snow, The Land of the Saucepan Man, etc.
Likewise, the characters who inhabit the enchanted wood and the faraway tree were a bit hit and miss for me. Moon-face – a bit weird. Silky – lovely! Mister Whatzisname and Dame Washalot – one note wonders. The Red Squirrel – cute. The Old Sacepan Man – annoying! As for the three children – I never developed different voices for them with my read aloud as I did with the characters of Winnie-the-Pooh because quite frankly they all spoke exactly the same way and had near identical characters. They’re all idealised clone-kids, (good, kind, considerate, hardworking, respectful, etc). Considering how many of these identikit kids Blyton uses in her stories , she must have had a production line churning them out… Famous Five + Secret Seven + Faraway Tree Three = the Fiction Factory Fifteen?
Overall I did enjoy the experience of reading The Enchanted Wood aloud to my son as his nightly bedtime story, but I’m not convinced it ranks as an all-time great. I’m pretty sure Millie would like us to work through the whole series, so maybe it will grow on me, I’m certainly happy to give it a chance.
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