Travel Reading Part 5

For the last three months, I've been gone, walking across Canada with a group called Crossroads Pro-Life. I was very, very busy, but I did manage to read a few books. Blogging about them was a different story, however. So it's been so long now since I read many of them, that I thought I could do travel posts like I did last summer, and just write a couple sentences for each book.
Here goes:

"A Civil Campaign" by Lois McMaster Bujold
Grade: 3 stars, maybe 2 1/2?
Actually a bit disappointed in this one--the first time for this series, I think. I'm not sure, though, if it was the book itself, or the fact that I'd just started Crossroads, or the fact that I'd heard more hype for this one than the others. It was definitely more Romance heavy, though, even than Komarr, and some of the romances were not to my taste. I still think Ekaterin is the perfect wife for Miles, though, and I greatly enjoyed the parts with them and with the Emperor Gregor.



"Odd Thomas" by Dean Koontz
Grade: 4 stars
A thriller/mystery/paranormal, where a fry cook named Odd who can see the dead and hints of the future has to save a town from a horrible fate. Dean Koontz is Catholic, and it shows up in little interesting ways in his books, which is quite cool for me. The mystery/thriller/paranormal part was interesting (especially the bodachs!), but I think it was Odd's character and relationships that stood out to me most (unusual for this kind of book).



"Brother Odd" by Dean Koontz
Grade: 4 stars
Third book in the Odd Thomas series (I was told to skip the second). This time, the Catholic elements are even more obvious, as Odd goes to hang out at a monastery while recovering from the events of the first novel. The paranormal aspects were more interesting this time as well (those weird bone creatures! and the bodachs!). Great fun.



"The Ruins of Gorlan" by John Flanagan
Grade: 3 stars, maybe 2 1/2?
First book in the Ranger's Apprentice series. Fairly standard beginning to a children's fantasy series, with a few attributes that make it stand out. Although... I forget what they are because it's been so long, haha. Obviously doesn't stand out that much. But I know I really enjoyed the training sections (seriously, some day I'm going to write a story that's half training montages--I love them), and the character of Horace.


"The Burning Bridge" by John Flanagan
Grade: 3 stars
Second book in the Ranger's Apprentice series. This is where it first starts to become less of a cliched fantasy series, but one of the main parts of this is a spoiler, so I can't talk about it. Horace is still my favourite character, and I hope he just grows more awesome as the series progresses.