Columbus day

Ch 1

Our main character is army.  Off duty in his home town.  Our setting is northern Maine USA.  Aliens have attacked.  Why northern Maine? Best guess is their ship crashed and they're waiting for a tow truck to come get them.  Main character and some coconspirators kidnap an alien.  Its described as a hamster.  But like a human hamster.  Another alien ship shows up.  They blow up the crashed ship.  Our assumption is they're picking up their people and going somewhere more important. But they send out a search party presumably to get back the kidnapped alien.  So no such luck on the leaving.  Then there's an attack. Narrator explains that its other aliens and those aliens are the real bad guys.

Ch 2 pg 17

It's a year later and bishop, that's narrator's name, is going to war on behalf of the aliens that saved them from the hamster aliens 

Ch 3 pg 32

Big chapter.  Bishop goes to a planet they call camp a or something like that.   Bishop gets in fighting shape.  Everyone is underwhelmed by the weapons they're given.  He has relations with a lady named Shauna that's a fast runner.  He gets promoted to Sargent and is shipped off to a planet they are calling paradise to steal farm land from the hamsters.

Ch 4 pg 62

Bishop is sent to guard a small farming village.  Things go well, until one of the villagers finds out that bishop had captured a hamster on earth.  The governor is coming and wants to have tea with bishop.  He's all upset at how not war the war hes doing is.  I think I dislike bishop.  Like I think hes a good person,  but I wouldn't be upset if he died.

Ch 5 pg 75

The governor tells bishop that earth is being played by the lizards.  Some wormhole shift made earth more appealing and so the hamsters bombed earth to make it less appealing.  As a result the only value earth has is to have its military forces rented out.  They meet a lot more and talk about all sorts of stuff.  At one point bishop gets pulled out and put on another base so the lizards dont find out the full extent of what he's learned.

The weather is bad.  They have a word for it that translates to musty blanket.

Ch 6 pg 93

Bishop is doing his best to earn his keep at the base.  He's told there's a lizard ship.out in the jungle some folks are gonna go check out.  He's in.  Whilst checking out the ship, a bunch of hamster ships show up and bomb the base.  Bishop is gonna fight back.  The group of 17 people make it to an armory and then up a mountain via some tunnels amd succeed in blowing up a couple troop transport ships.  Pretty soon after, the lizards return and the hamsters surrender. 

Ch 7 pg 114

Bishop is promoted to colonel because the lizards are impressed by how many hamsters he killed.  They're a warrior race through and through. The lizards are horrible in every conceivable way.

Ch 8 pg 124

Bishop is charged with planting potatoes. He's on a convoy full of soil and seeds and all his trailers are blown up.  The lizards give him orders to retaliation by killing civilians and he refuses that order.  He gets arrested for refusing that order.  Lots of people are getting arrested for refusing orders today.

Ch 9 pg 149

The hamsters attack with full force and in doing so damage the prison so that bishop and other prisoners can escape. But then they are al captured by hamsters.  Remember the governor bishop was talking to?  Turns out she's vice president of the planet and she wants bishop to come work for her as her human liazon.

Ch 10

The book goes way off the rails here. 

Bishop is in a private prison.  A door unlocks.  He goes through that door.  What looks like a beer can starts talking to him.  Long story short, its a powerful ancient AI.  It helps him steal a ship and he and the other three people that escaped the lizard prison all escape together.  They fly to a human supply post and get 20 more volunteers to be part of the mission to save earth.  The gist is the AI, that bishop names skippy, can shut down wormholes. They get to earth, they shut down the wormhole, that gets the lizards off of our planet.

Ch 11 pg 176

They successfully steal the hamster ships and then get picked up by a lizard ship and they kill all the lizards and they jump through space to a point where they think they'll get picked up by the lizards' bionic overlords.

Ch 12 pg 188

The jump is successful.  So is getting picked up by the bionics. Then its skippy time.  He takes over the ship and disabled all the bionics in less than a second.  They're gonna be on this ship for a while so they try and make it home.  That's rough for 2 reasons.  The first is the bionics are way smaller than  human beings so nothing is comfortable. The second is its all very utilitarian and its hard to settle into a place that's so sterile.

Ch 13 pg 203

Remember how skippy said the bionics could replicate food?  They cant really.  What they can make is tube sludge.  It's basically oatmeal but bad.  Skippy makes a bunch of flavors for Joe to try.  They're getting ready to try to find and go through a worm hole.  Joe is worried it will be defended.  Skippy explains that's not how wormholes work they pop up in different spots around the same area.  They know where so they can reliability use them.  But they're far enough away so no one group can monopolize them. The plan is basically they're gonna go where they know a wormhole is about to form.  If no one is there, they go on in.  If they see a other ship, they run away.

Ch 14 pg 217

They find some ships that skippy can hack to get the info he needs.  He finds out there's an asteroid that has the wormhole network control device they need to shut down the wormhole near earth.  They are trying to come up with a plan to attack the asteroid and its not going well.  They need space suits and the bionics bodies are small so they cant use theirs.  Then they realize the lizards have space suits.  But they're too big.  But skippy says he could modify them to fit someone thats 6 feet tall.  Then in a real funny bit Joe finds out that there's an armory of robot fighting machines on the ship.

Ch 15 pg 229

They make it to the asteroid and they attack.  There's this giant military base on the other side of the asteroid that's as big as the moon.  They're attacking the science base on the other side. So its important they do it fast.  It's a real military fight against a much larger force. People die.  But they get out of there and skipoy triggers the auto destruction on the way out.

Ch 16 pg 246

They go to earth.  Everyone gets to go home for a bit.  In Joe's case home is Colorado to meet with the president and then a bunch of government stooge.  They pretty much all suck ass.

Ch 17 pg 271

Skippy gets on the internet and chats with a billion or so people.  Talking to a single person is just soooooooo boring to him.  Talking to a few million people at once is more his speed.  They talk to the president about what to do about the remaining.lizards.  skippy says to evacuate the area around the bases and he can take them out woth rail guns. 

Ch 18 pg 280

second half Carl the dungeon crawler

Ch 28

Donut is a natural charmer so the interview is great despite Carl's complete incompetence. The only good thing related to Carl is that he has a catch phrase.  GOD DAMN IT DONUT.

Ch 29

Carl and donut talk to Odette in private abd she gives them sone tips.  The best one was stop complaining so much.  Complaining is funny. So if you complain about something theyre gonna keep giving you that thing so viewer's can laugh at you.

Ch 30

They go to the second level and fight some monsters and find a saferoom and open the rewards they got for the boss fight.

Ch 31

A lot of people didn't make it.  The lady with the shopping cart is assumed to be one of those.  All the old folks people are just gonna go straight to the stairs.  Carl says he'll clear the way. 

Ch 32

Theyre fighting diseased leprechauns. 

If they get their loot, they get moonshine jugs that they can turn explosive by attaching a torch.  Problem is if you touch them at all, you are infected and you cant heal.  Carl is infected and it lasts a while.

Ch 33

They find the headquarters of the diseased leprechauns. Turns out their while deal is they're an MLM (pyramid scheme for those not familiar with the modern vernacular for a very old scam) with the goal of selling moonshine. It has a 5 percent chance of killing you.

There are some fairies, actually flying little ladies that are in charge.  Donut charms them.  Through some shenhannegans they separate the fairies from the diseased leprechauns and Carl blows them up with a moonshine bomb.  Then they kill the fairies.  They find a recipe for an immunity smoothie, one part moonshine, one part fairy.  The boenders are in the next room. 

Ch 34

Problem is the next room is next to the boss fight and this particular boss is a krakenkaren and they're the real top of the pyramid and they have tentacles that can reach into the room with the blenders and are also diseased.  So Carl and donut fight diseased leprechauns and avoid the tentacles and blend the immunity smoothie and thank God they do because carl gets hit by a tentacle and is temporarily infected by vigorous measles before the immunity kicks in.  

Carl has donut turn one of the diseased leprechauns into a zombie and gives him a hug explosive and some dynamite and tells him to run into the room with the karenkracken.  

Ch 35

It works, the karenkracken is a dead.  Carl is not, just barely.  Why?  The powers that be are really dedicated to his barefootedness and gave him a pedicure kit that pretty much make his feet invincible. 

They go to the safe room to look at their loot and talk about stuff.  Again, the powers that be are invested in keeping Carl pants less and barefoot.  Carl gets a pair of boxers that give him a shield spell once a day.  Mordekai is about to tell h8m something really important right when an admin shows up.

Ch 36

An admin comes in and explains that they are getting so many interviews that they now need a PR person to handle them and Zeb is that person.  Carl has a meltdown.  Donut saves the day by talking about gossip girl and bonding with zeb over it.

While zeb is distracted Carl asks mordekai WTF and mordekai explains that the planet in charge of the game has been taken over by basically the nazis but worse and they are in dire economic straights.  This is very bad for Carl because they dont get paid until the game is over so theyre trying to end the game asap so they can get that money.  The game ends when everyone is dead.

Ch 37 pg 314

They make their way past TONS OF grubs to the old folks Homer's and its cool that theyre all working together and its going well until zeb gets on the chat and tells them to RUN to the next safehouse.  One of the old men is pissing on the wall.  This is bad becuase there's was previously an announcement that if you pissed anywhere other than a bathroom you would be killed.  I think also the rest of your group.  So if Carl and donut do not gtfo they'll get caught in the crossfire.

Ch 38

I remembered it wrong.  You dont die when you pee,  you summon a monster from the bottom level.  This one is level 93.  It's horrible.   Donut casts fog and it allows most of the old folks to get away to the safe room.  Mainly because the monster charges right for Carl.  His shield spell saves him.  Carl is thinking he can make a run for it to the safe room pretty easily now.  Except the monster casts a spell that reverses gravity and Carl is flung painfully to the ceiling.  Also an old lady.  Carl grabs the old lady and barely makes it to the break room.

Ch 39

They watch the recap show.  It's all very upsetting. Tons of people being killed. The most surprising part was they showed how much damage Carl did to the level 83 .monster with his bomb.  It took away 25 percent of its health.

The plan at the beginning was to wait until Carl had access to his shield spell again and use that to get away from the level 93 monster.  Now it sounds like theyre gonna do something more reckless. 

Ch 40 pg 338

They create a contraption that the goblin moped can tow.  It's a bomb deploying ramp.  Donut can pull bombs out of her inventory, onto the top of the contraption and they will slide down the ramp blowing up whatever is behind them.  In this case its the monster.  The basic plan is to go in a square , blowing up the monster , hopefully killing it before they get back to the safe room.  This is more complicated because a bunch of the grubs have evolved to level 3 and theyre much bigger and a pain to avoid whilst driv8ng a goblin moped at top speed. Also, some of the grubs have evolved to the pupa stage.  These are basically human sized flesh mounds.  Also hard to avoid.  They blow up a bunch of these with bombs that also do damage to the monster.  

Something really horrific happens in all this some of the pupas hatch to reveal giant hornets.  I hate this.

The bike starts to overheat as they see the stairs down to the next level.  This brings us to carls super secret plan he hasn't told anyone.  He lays down an oil slick and then has donut teleport them around the corner.  The result is the monster slides down the stairs and is killed.  Carl knew this would happen because Rory the goblin shmanka told him it would.  Mobs cant go down the stairs.  They dissolve half way down.

The problem with this is they dont get credit for killing the monster.  But theyre still alive and Carl likes that.

Ch 41

The old folks Homer's and their old folks go down the stairs.  The hope is on floor three the old folks will be able to make big changes amd be useful.

Carl and donut kill things on their way to thenext safe room where they plan to relax for a while before their interview. A new admin contacts them and says zeb is in timeout and theyre subbing in and has moved their interview to a different show that pays more.

Ch 42

They get on this show and its a much less civilized affair.  The audience is bloodthirsty preteen boys.  The host is an orc.  The first guest is a couple random guys from (guessing based on their names) China.  They're making them play a game where they have to guess if people in a situation live or die.  If they guess right they can teleport out of certain doom.  Through a series of events Carl gets to break in and talk some shit.  The result is he gives these guys some good advice and when theyre teleported back, they make it back to the saferoom.

Also, the host says there's special guests brought in for their VIP guests.  Expecting it to be the girlfriend,  but we'll see who it is.

Ch 43

Carl has some more fun with the ass hole host.  Turns out one the 9th floor part of the thing is a giant battle between royal families and the host is gonna take part this year.  So Carl is gonna kill him when he gets the chance.

Also, the surprise guest isn't the ex, its the crawlers that tried to kill Carl.  Fun reveal, the explosion Carl left for them killed their daughter.  So now its personal.  A d the host gives them a magic item that allows them to find Carl wherever he is.

So Carl has at least 3 "people" that are gonna be trying to kill him.  At least he doesnt have to worry about the host until the 9th floor.

Ch 44

They go back to a safe room and they open loot boxes and watch the recap show.  Then zeb comes back and tells them there's a sex tape going around where Carl fucks the TV host orc with his HUGE dick.  All of this is very political with all these different factions infighting and whatnot.

Ch 45

They go to do the boss fight so if the murderers come after them thy will have the neighborhood map and see them coming.  They find a bunch of dingos in cages and Carl gives them treats and they become friendly.  

They are attacked by a bunch of kobols.  The d8ngos help them fight the kobols.  The boss bad guy is an angry hamster and they defeat it in a pretty easy fight.

Ch 46 pg 403

The prize at the end of the fight is a pet.  Carl makes the mistake of letting donut pick the pet and she picks this weird chicken looking thing.  They talk to mordekai and he tells them that if they dont get the thing to bond with them they won't be able to bring it down to the 3rd floor.

Ch 47 pg 409

Turns out the only thing the weird chicken likes is killing.  So they kill stuff together and they bond.  

Carl notices weird stuff in his inventory.   He realizes this must be agathas stuff because he put her shopp8ng cart and everything in it into his inventory but only gave her back her shopping cart.  Just then agatha comes back.  

Carl now thinks she's an alien plant.

Epilogue 

Odette tells Carl their pet is a velociraptor.  

Bonus material 

Rory the goblin gains sentience. The guards come to kill the goblins because sentient mobs is bad for the game.  While the guards are lining up to murder them rory overheard them saying that Carl and donut.  Now Rory is out for vengeance. 

So Carl had 4 people trying to kill him.

dungeon crawler Carl matt dinniman first half

Carl was "lucky" to be outside when the syndicate repo'd the earth.  He wasn't instantly killed when all buildings were smooshed.  He and his girlfriends cat are gonna go into a DND dungeon and try to survive.

Ch 2 pg 13

Carl and cat make their way through the dungeon to a rat man i a tutorial room.  Carl has to punch a couple goblins before rat man let's him in.  Rat man is named mordekai.

This book has got me. I care if Carl lives or dies.  Here's the key quote from Carl that did it "i didn't have time to think about the stupidity of the jokes."

Ch 3 pg 24

Carl asks mordekai for advice.  Mordekai says if he doesnt do something about the goblins theyre gonna go home and get their whole family and come back.  Carl doesnt love this so he kills the remaining goblins and comes back.  Mordekai then explains that humans aren't special, this is one of many human seeded worlds and humans never do well in these dungeons as theyre too busy asking why this is happening and they get killed waiting around for answers instead of rolling with the punches like the arakocra mordekai comes from.  Omg, you seen regular show?  There's a bird man named mordekai on that show. Wonder if this mordekai is based on that character. 

Ch 4 pg 34

Mordekai explains a bunch of game mechanics to Carl.  The bit that's interesting to me is that this is an intergalactic reality show.  And its kinda like the hunger games in that people can sponsor you and send you stuff.

Ch 5 pg 48

SOme of this world building matt is doing here is dumb. They've been building and destroying planets for thousands of years.  But they only figured out certain really common sense stuff last season.  So they've been doing it wrong for eons?

Carl gets his stuff.  No shoes or pants.  But this is DND so maybe the stuff he got that we haven't had described will be good.  The funnest thing is a legendary pet biscuit. Mordekai tells him its worth hundreds of gold and he's not sure whether to use or sell it and donut solves that problem by jumping up and eating said biscuit. He turns into a gross blob.  Mordekai says it might take 5 to 10 minutes for this to sort itself out.

Ch 6 pg 57

Some of carls gear is pretty good.  He's now effectively the strongest person that's ever lived.  Also, his cat can talk.

Ch 7 pg 62

Cat is super strong now.  But its all superior and what not and Carl tells it to fuck right off.  Cat appologizes and they make due together.

Ch 8

Fighting a lot of rats and cockroaches. 

Ch 9

They find a sage room and it's good and thers a fuzzy dwarf that cooks good food for them.

Ch 10

They fight lots of cockroaxyes.

Ch 11

They get to the cockroach boss fight.  It's a giant Hispanic lady.  They win the fight. 

Ch 12

They get a map from winning the boss fight and are able to find another safe room where mordekai is and he explains some things.  

Ch 13

They do some more exploring and find a dead lady.  She was killed by another player with a shotgun.  They're gonna a track down the son of a witch that did this and kill him.

Ch 14 pg 113

They go back to the food safe room and they watch the ad for what's going to be their show and donut is uoset that they didn't get featured. The food guy tells them sad stuff about how all this has previously worked.

.ch 15

Theyre exploring and they are no good at fighting slimes.  

They make their way to the goblins area and they make a deal to buy a moped off of the goblins for the baggies of meth they have and info as to where they got it.

Ch 16

The goblins go to steal the llamas' meth and Carl and donut steal a bunch of stuff.  

Ch 17

They also use the goblins own gunpowder against them.  They load it all up in a cart and roll it into the goblins boss chamber and blow it up.

Ch 18 

They go back to the room they blew up to do more looting and there's nothing there.

Ch 19 pg 141

Also with the goblins boss was a bunch of babies goblins.  They get an achievement for killing babies. 

They get to a safe room and this one sucks.  No friendly cooking or guidance npc to talk to.  Just a cookie that gives you 10 experience. 

They open a bunch of the achievement boxes They got and Carl feels bad about himself.  But not that bad.  None of this is his fault.  It's the aliens fault.  Carl is just trying to exist.

Ch 20 pg 149

Remember they found rebeca wong's dead body and vowed vengeance against doug m killed them? Well, they find doug m hiding out in a bathroom. Cat wants to magic missile him, but Carl has a better idea, he goes back to the safe room.  Doug has an experience cookie and shiots at donut.  But it doesn't work cause they're in a safe room.  Also Doug has a partner Maggie my who shoots at Carl.  Doug and Maggie are temporarily frozen.  Carl and donut run away.  But Carl leaves some goblin bombs seconds from explosion in a dead rat and a trap.  We will see how that goes.

Ch 21 pg 163

Carl gets on his goblin moped and heads east.  They find spray paint messages and follow them.  They end up next to the burrough boss, which appears to be a giant fleshy packman that moves very fast in a circle.

Ch 22 

They find the people doing the spray painting.  It's a bunch of old people. This blows Carl's mind.  How the hell could a group of elder lies have made it this long? Because their caregivers are with them.  All the stories are sad.  But Carl has a plan.  He's gonna grind and get stronger and then the bunch of them are gonna fight the fleshy packman.  Carl has a plan.

The elderly home is in Wenatchee 143.1 miles by car from Seattle. 

Ch 23 pg 180

They go fight lizaeprd people to level up.  The old folks Homer's specifically told them not to do that cause they are venemous.  But Carl's Cape makes him immune to poison. They do pretty good with donut zapping lizard folk with magic missile and Carl finishing them off.  Donut refuses to actually attack anything cause it is beneath her.  She might get dirty.  We will see how that goes as Carl lights up his penultimate cigarette and they step into a boss fight.

Ch 24

The boss fight is a gym and the lizard folk are dude bros.   Especially the boss.  Carl had a few scrolls of fog and it basically gives him cover enough to take out all the underlings while donut flings magic missile at the boss.  Now it's just Carl and the boss and donut.  The boss is amazingly strong.  Carl whacks him with some weights and he's feeling pretty good about himself and the boss's health is super low.   But the boss gets a hand on Carl's neck.  This is it.  Carl isn't gonna see tomorrow. But no, donut leaps in and bites the boss and does enough damage to get his full attention. We see here that donut is a glass cannon.  One hit and donut is flung across the room looking hella dead.  Carl finishes off the boss and donut is not dead.  

Ch 25 pg 194

They go to a training room to go through their loot and ask mortekai a bunch of questions. He explains that your stats matter when using items. They should have had donut use the scrolls because her intelligence score makes them more powerful. The coolest thing is Carl gets a gauntlet so he can punch things without taking damage.

Ch 26 pg 203

They are ready to fight the boss.  It is the ball of swine.  It's a bunch of pig people in tuxedos and dresses like theyre going to a fancy party but theyre mushed together in a big ball that just.keeps rolling forever it seems.

They  put together a kinda ramp thing that gets the ball of swine stuck in a tunnel. Then they stab it a lot.  Eventually the ball sorta loses cohesion.  Then the pig people separate out.  They are all very confused.  Carl should feel bad about this.  But fear has taken over and so he uses his cool new gauntlet to punch a bunch of relatively harmless pig people to death.

Ch 27

They finish killing the pig people.  Carl also tells donut theyre gonna stick with the old people.  He phrases it like a question but donut knows he's an old softie.  They go down to the second level, except they dont end up in another dungeon.  They end up in an interview room.  They're gonna be on the show.  Donut is soooo excited.

in the lives of puppets

Pg 1

There's a broken down. Old house in the woods. A man (described as not a man.  So probably a robot.) Starts living in it.  He fixes it up and feels good about it.  But he is lonely .  As luck would have it a couple comes by and abandons their baby with him and he's not lonely anymore.

Ch 1 pg 9

The robot appears to be gone and the baby has grown into a man and he has two robot friends and they go to scrap heaps looking for more robot.parts together.

Ch 2 pg 18

The robot is ok.  He is the grown baby's dad.  They have solar power for dad and robots.  The grown baby is named Victor. He has fruit and frozen meat to eat.

Ch 3

Victor goes back to the robot heap and finds an android that still has skin.  One of his robots is a nurse robot and she thinks the android is good looking.

Ch 4

Vic and the vacume robot and the nurse robot go back to the robot heap and are able to find a replacement arm and foot for the android.  But no power source, which is what really mattters.

Ch 5 

Vic and the two robots work on the android.  Foot and arm look nice.  They don't have any synthetic skin, so they use some wood paneling that vic found.  The android looks nice.  Still no power source.  So it's a nice looking decoration.   Nurse robot suggests they could stand it up in the corner and have it hold a potted plant. 

Ch 6

Vic has a "heart" he made for his dad as a backup power source for when his starts to have trouble.  He gives it to the android.  The android comes to life.  THE android does not appear to enjoy being alive.  VIc's dad  hears the commotion and barges into Vic's lab.  The Android thinks he's an attacker and moves to defend Vic and company.

Ch 7

They talk a bit and the. Hal jumps out the window and dad does too and follows him.  Somehow they (vic, Rambo and nurse) find Hal as he was hiding but staring at a butterfly and Rambo almost runs it over and hal jumps out to save it.

They talk more and the general consensus is Hal cant be so bad if he wanted to save a pretty butterfly. 

Ch 8 og 103

Just talking.  Nobody jumps out of any windows or anything. 

Hal starts by telling everyone how much he doesnt like them.  But he must like Vic cause he's following him around like a lost puppy.

Dad explains to Hal that whatever he was before doesnt matter. With the heart Vic gave him Hal is now completely different from what he was.

Also dad seems to be trying to hide that Vic is a person.

There's some negative foreshadowing. Best guess,  Hal is a terminator robot and Dad knows it, but thinks maybe Hal won't kill vic cause of his heart.

Ch 9

Hal doesn't know anything so he asks vic a lot of questions. When vic tells him about needing to kill animals and eat them hal runs out in the woods and brings back four rabbits. They listen to music with dad and they all have positive feelings about everything. 

Ch 10

They go to the dump and thers a dirigible and robots and its scary and they run back home. Dad puts them all in an underground bunker and makes hap promise he will protect vic and he agrees.

Ch 11

The robots show up and tell dad they're gonna have him decommissioned cause he's obviously defective.  Dad tips out his own heart so the robots can't have it.  The robots light everything on fire.

Vic goes into shock for a while.  When he comes to nurse robot shows him a video his dad made for him.  He explains about how people made robots and the robots saw people sucked and told them what they could change so their suckiness wouldn't end in catastrophe. But the people wouldn't listen so the robots killed them.  As predicted,  Hap is a terminator. But he made a promise to protect vic and he better not break it.

Also, vic isn't a real boy.  Dad made him in a lab.  

Ch 12 pg 162

They're gonna go rescue dad.

Ch 13

They go to the junk yard and find a sleeping old one.  Nurse robot hacks it to find out where its signal is coming from.  It's 700 miles south east.  Victor has a little nervous breakdown. 

Ch 14

They walk through the forest and they find a road.  Rambo wants to walk on the road.  HAP tells him not to.  He finds a piece of metal, throws it on the road and it goes zipping out of site.  It's setup to move really big metal stuff super fast.  How did hap know that?  It keeps Vic up at night. It's a little scary every time your terminator friend does something unexpected. They decide to follow the road from a ways away so the robots don't get crushed by whatever it is that does the metal moving and so that Vic doesn't get cancer and die.

Ch 15

They find a house and the robot there traps them in the house cause he runs a freak show and theyre all freaks.

Ch 16

The government shows up to.kill all humans.  But the crazy robot that kidnapped them hides them so nobody gets killed.  But then im confused cause then it seems like they crazy robot attacks them but why bother saving them from.the government just to attack them?

Ch 17

I knew it.  Humanity was wiped out.  Giovanni created vic from scratch. It has been centuries since humans last walked the earth.  Crazy robot loves humans and he was the one that helped Giovanni escape.  The reason he attacked Hap, which was a miserable failure,  is that he recognized him as a HARP since it was a HARP that came to the door looking for Vic.

Ch 18 pg 241

Mad hatter robot says he'll help them get into the elect4ic city, which it turns out was last Vegas.

Ch 19

They're snuck into the city in crates with help from an old "friend" of the mad hatter robot.  The theory is they will be picked up by the blue butterfly or whatever the revolution is called.

Ch 20

What are the rules?

Stick together

Run if we have to

No dallying

No drilling 

Be brave

They make it to the back door of heaven and put in the key the coachman gave them.  A robot man comes and asks a bunch of questions and victor tells them his whole life story.  The robot man let's them in with the promise he will take them to the blue fairy.

Ch 21

They get to the blue fairy and they hook up hap to a machine and they forcibly go though his memories and everyone gets to watch as he kills hundreds of people and grows a continence.  It's very painful.  So it's not just the heart that makes hap not want to kill people.  He chose to not kill people.  They (victor, Rambo and nurse ratched) remove him fro the whole matrix hookup despite the blue fairy's dire warning that it would be very bad.  As promised it is bad.  Hap tries to kill vic.  But then vic kisses hap and he kinda snaps out of it.  The rest of the book is just vic and hap making out and dry humping.

Ch 22

In what feels like a personal slight against me, other plot continues beyond making out and dry humping.  In fact, there is no dry humping in this chapter at all.  Tsk tsk tsk. The blue fairy says they will help them try to save Gio despite how stupid it is.  But then says that the fate of robot kind hangs in the balance.  If they dont succeed in saving Gio the authorities will remove free will from all robots.  Talk about burying the headline.  Seems like that's something the blue fairy should be fighting against directly rather than basically not stopping Vic and the group from trying.  Hap is having a hard time.  Vic kisses him again and they snuggle and its totes adorbs.

Ch 23

They go into the big authority building and Hap pretends to be a HARP and the three are prisoners.  There's an odd thing in the elevator where they wanna go to floor 124 but as hap is pushing the buttons vic says wait and they go to the 12th floor on accident.  But then they make it up to the 124th floor and there's a HARP and they fight and win.  But in that fight the heart they made for gio breaks.  So the plan to put the heart in gio is out the window.  So they try to talk to him and that doesnt work.  

So instead they go to the secret plan the blue fairy gave them.  A computer virus that wipes the memories of all the networked robots.  It doesnt affect Rambo or nurse but hap and gio are mind wiped.  They take them up to the top floor and escape on the robots dirigible. 

Part IV 

Ch 24

the lost bookshop ch 37 - 56

Ch 37 opaline

Her brother has found her and drags her off to an insane asylum. 

Ch 38 Martha 

Our hero plays cards with Martha and they talk about life.  Martha uses her mentalist powers to read our hero and our hero doesn't like it.

And if you've forgotten Madame Bowden is our hero.

Martha is reading a book and the book tells her to go up to the attick. She does, but she cant get it open.  Our hero arrives and instead of asking for help from a hero she lies a out what she's doing.  Our hero sees right through those lies.

Ch 39 henry 

He's down and the world is going to kick him.

His finding has been pulled.  He says he's gonna keep doing what he's been doing and get to the bottom of this mystery. The great mystery from my perspective is how will he do that without money.

He turns to the internet and finds that opaline was someone's maid of honor. He looks up that lady and finds a letter to a newspaper about the deplorable condition of insane asylums in Ireland. 🇮🇪 

Ch 40 opaline 

She has a fleeting hope that she might be able to escape when she is taken to the hospital to have her baby.  But when the time comes she isn't taken anywhere.  She has her baby and im.lead to believe that her baby was born dead.

Ch 41 Martha pg 295

Things are going well at university. 

She sees henry and they have a brief awkward interaction. 

Ch 42 henry

He gets a call from  Madame Bowden inviting him to Martha's birthday party. They dance, he freaks out and tries to escape but our hero Madame Bowden stops him.  She makes him go back in and give Martha her birthday present.   It's  a super expensive pen.

43 opaline 

Being stuck in an asylum sucks.  It sucks worse when you've just undergone a stillbirth.  Shes prepared to starve to death so she can be reunited with her baby in the afterlife. But her roommate Mary says she needs her help to escape.  So she starts eating again.  But Mary gets sick and is likely to die.

You take the good, you take the bad,
you take them both and there you have
The facts of life

source: https://lyricsondemand.com/tvthemes/thefactsoflifelyrics.html

The facts of Opaline's life are all bad.  Butt she does send a letter to her friend Jane that we know in the future tries to do something. So maybe there's hope for.us after all dear reader.

44 Martha 

She has a book she's pretty sure opaline wrote.  She goes to henry to discuss.  Henry is real awkward about it.  He can't stay to talk, he's late for his bus. The Opaline research is the only thing in his life.  I cant imagine he really needs to catch this bus more than he needs to hear more from Martha about this book.  But we'll probably find out soon

45 Henry

He's going to the asylum. Martha goes with. It's a good thing she does.  His approach of asking  nicely is worth fuckall.  Martha's idea to claim theyre doing a government spot check works much better.  She finds opaline's file.

46 opaline 

She has been here for a long time.  World war 2 has started.

She gets a letter from Jane saying her mother is dead.  She goes to the doctor to request going to the funeral. He tells her the funeral was weeks ago.  She has a sudden clarity of purpose.  She grabs the doctors knife and threatens to kill herself.  That will stop her brothers money train from rolling in.  The doctor just let's her go.

47 martha

This chapter is all sorts of fun.

Martha's mother comes to visit.  Madame Bowden is happy to be there and welcomes her in.  To Martha's memory she has never spoken.  Mom tells her that her grandma was an orphan.  She died when Martha's mom was 3.  She went to Dublin to find her biological mother and was hit by a train.  Unless this is the reddest of red herrings she was opaline's daughter.  

They talk more about life and love and whatnot and when she leaves she says maybe she'll get to meet Madame Bowden next time.  

Maybe there is no Madame Bowden and this is all the magic of her great grandmother's magical bookstore. 

Ch 48 henry

He and Martha talk about opaline and the book and her file.  Maybe there's hope for their friendship. 

49 opaline 

She makes her way back to her shop.

She befriends a Jerry POW who helps her rebuild.  Her thought is to sell the manuscript to finance a full rebuild. Alas, the man She left it with is dead.

She and the Jerry (who's not really a Jerry, he's Austrian) do this shop rebuilding for 3 years.  He is sent back to Austria.

50 Martha

Our hero is missing.  Martha doesn't know what to do about it.  She calls her mom to talk about it.  Henry shows up.  She has a bit of a meltdown and she tells henry she wants him and they kiss.

51 henry

They totally did it. 

We get confirmation that Martha's tatoo is Emily bronte's manuscript.

52 opaline 

This chapter is all killer no filler.

Opaline decides to get revenge against her brother. She goes to a friend at the times and tells her story.  It's not interesting to him.  Women get placed in institutions,  no big deal.  So instead she starts digging into her brothers military records. All the men get killed for cowardice. 

Aside,  they mention shell shock. I always thought that term didn't come up til ww2.

Lots of evidence that a lot of those men weren't deserter.  The article is written and going to press.

She goes to her brother's to tell her of his upcoming demise.  He tells her he's really her father. A sad side affect of his sewing his wild oats with a French lady.  She asks her name cause she wants to find her real mother cause of course. But hes like, it doesn't matter and it don't remember. 

As she's leaving he kills himself with a gun.

53 Martha

She and henry are canoodling.  He came here with a purpose before the canoodling started.  She found the birth certificate of Opaline's daughter.  As we knew, its Martha's grandmother.

54 henry

They dont really discuss the whole being opalines great grandmother's daughter thing.  They talk about how the hero of the book Madame Bowden only ever interacted with the two of them and Shane.  Martha doesn't think she was a ghost.  They go up to the attick and there's doors and tunnels and they end up back in Martha's servants quarters.  

55 opaline

That lovely Austrian man returns and they live happily ever after. 

56 Martha 

They emerge from the servants quarters the next morning to discover that they are no longer in Madam Bowden's house.  They're in the lost bookshop.

Epilogue

Happily ever after.

Authors note 

This isn't an easy book to read.  It's a book about women being abused and oppressed. But its also a book about how books can inspire people.

The story collector extract pg 415

Sarah is going to Ireland becuase of a ceramic sheep.

No, she's going from New York to Boston because she's leaving her husband to live with her sister. 

She gets drunk at the airport and wakes up in Ireland. 

She calls her sister and doesn't apologize once.  What a monster.  She was worried sick.

She ends up renting a cottage.

Who knows how long she'll stay.  A couple days?  Weeks?  A lifetime?

the lost bookshop 19 - 36

19 opaline

She's got a bit of a romantic thing with the landlord.  He's married with kids so they just hug but you know they wanna bone.

20 Martha

Her husband shows up and madame Bowden tells him to fuck right off.

21 Henry 

He calls his fiance and says things he doesn't mean like I love you.  Also she tells him that his mom told her that his dad is in rehab.  He doesn't care.

He bumps into Martha at the library and they make out and she signs up for a class.

22 opaline 

She goes to England to research Emily Bronte.  She runs into her Moroccan man.  They go to an auction. 

23 Martha

Madame Bowden is the hero of the story so far.  She kills Martha's husband and Martha is a real ungrateful brat about the whole thing.

24 Henry

He goes home and breaks up with his fiance

25 opaline

She goes to a closed down bookshop and talks to an old lady about Emily bronte and buys an old sewing kit of Emily's for two dollars.

26 Martha

She goes to Henry's bnb and is told henwint home.  She feels very bad about kissing now as she thinks he has abandoned her.  She foes home for the funeral. 

27 Henry

He stays home longer than expected to help his very pregnant sister.  She has her baby.  His dad shows up and it pisses Henry 9ff.  Henry texts Martha and she doesn't respond. 

28 opaline

She's pregnant and it seems like landlord is into it.  She investigates this sewing kit she got from the old lady.  She finds a hidden compartment and she finds a notebook  and thinks it might be the beginning of Emily Bronte's second book.

Martha has this thing where she dreams of a story and then gets it tatood on her back.  I wonder if its this.

29 Martha

Martha goes to the tattoo shop to have more of her dream story tatood.  She has to wait so she writes it down first.  By the time the tattooer is ready, she says that part of the story is already tatood on her back.  Nuts.

Turns out the book the house gave her is the story of the shop opaline is running.  Fun.

30 Henry

Henry goes to see his dad in rehab.  From my perspective it seems like his dad is trying.  He gets an email from princeton and in it there's a letter from opaline to someone that it seems like was a German prisoner of war and says she was also incarcerated. Guessing we will see that in the next chapter.

31 opaline

She goes to an auction and meets a nice French man whom shows her to the historical library and it's cool.  But then moracan man shows up.  He's there looking for a book.  She wants to tell him he's pregnant with his baby.  But he only care about the Emily bronte manuscript that he can somehow tell opaline has found. He's all, let me sell this for you.  No woman will ever get a high price for a rare book.  She tells him to fuck off forever.

32 Martha pg 243

Martha is insecure

33 Henry

He goes to our heros house and she makes him explain himself.  She doesn't hate it.

34 opaline

She writes a letter to the lady that she worked for in the paris book shop.  She tells her everything and gives her her phone number.  One of the guys she knows from book auctions shows up at her shop around closing time.  She goes to make tea or whatever and comes back to fund he's gone and has taken her letter.  She makes the wild logical jump to thinking this guy must be working for her brother.  She brings the bronte manuscript to her landlord and she flees.

35 Martha

She goes to the beach to celebrate Celtic spring.  She goes into the water and its hella inspiring. She sees Henry and runs to his arms and they kiss and cuddle and she warms up.  I thought he came with her.  No, this is a surprise.   He knew she was here because our hero told him.  Also, there's some a book related thing here.  He didn't come for her, he came for books.  She puts her clothes on and just jumps on the train.  This seems nuts.  There's no way the train station can be right there on the beach can it?

36 Henry

Henry wakes up drunk and injured and makes his way to the bnb where the guy tells him that he told Martha that Henry had gone home for good.

They should have placed this book in a time before cellphones.  Any time my brain thinks something akin to a text like "gotta visit my sister, be back in a few days" could have solved this whole thing, you're doing it wrong.

Then he goes to our hero's house and Martha answers and patches up his head wound.  They read a letter from opaline that leads me to belive she gave up her baby for adoption.

Martha tells Henry she doesn't wanna get with him.  And not cause of anything that happened, but more because she's gotta work on herself.

The Lost Bookshop ch 1 through 18

Ch 1 opaline

There's a lady and her family wants to marry her off but instead she sells her books and starts a life as a book merchant

Ch 2 Martha

Matha was in an abusive relationship and left to Dublin.  She got a job with an eccentric lady as a live in house keeper.  There's some weirdo looking in the windows.  He says his name is Henry and he's looking for something. 

Ch 3 henry

Opaline is a bit of a legendary figure in book seller circles which Henry is.  Henry doesn't like his family cause he's into books and they are jackasses.  He found a letter that was sent to her and he feels very proud.  He's looking for her lost bookstore and that's why he was looking in Mary's window.  And he's all little smitten with Mary.

Ch 4 Opaline

When opaline left her family she went to Paris.  She met a man that's also into books.  They should get married and have tons of babies.

Ch 5 Martha 

Martha is good at reading people.  Not books, books make her nervous. She wasn't good at reading her abusive husband.  She blames herself for having been abused.  She's decided to give up on hope or happiness. Not sure which yet.

ch 6 henry

Henry goes to Martha's house and asks her to come to coffee with him and asks about the house and whether there's a hidden bookshop inside and she explains she's just started working there.

Ch 7 opaline 

She gets a job working at a book shop run by an American woman.

Ch 8 Martha 

Martha take her first pay, buys new clothes, throws away her old clothes and goes to the town college.  She has a sudden sad crashing down moment when she realizes she doesn't even know how to check out a book.

Ch 9 henry.

Henry is trying to help Martha with this whole library situation and she drops her bag and he tries to help put stuff back and it pusses her off.  But after a bit of embarrassment they get to talking and henry wonders aloud if opaline ever went to Paris.  Martha asks Google and finds a picture of her in Paris with Ernest hemmingway.

Ch 10 opaline 

They do the scene where the picture Martha found was taken and opaline is immediately worried that her family will see it and come get her.  That's exactly what happens.  But before that she makes sweet love to a Moroccan man.

Ch 11 Martha 

The lady of the house is having a get together and is a nervous wreck.  The ladies that come over are mean.  Martha is sad and lonely.  She wishes henry was there to hold her.  We know that Henry would like to do that.  But she sure doesn't. She sees some odd cracks in the wall and thinks it might be something cool.  I think it might be an entrance to the lost bookshop.  She cant sleep so she goes upstairs to clean up after the mean women.  But the place is already clean.

Ch 12 henry

Henry wakes up Martha by knocking on her bedroom window.  They plan to meet at 11th am.  He tries to impress Martha by buying a fancy pen. But it turns out he can't afford it.  I wish he was a hermit crab so he could crawl back into his shell and and die of shame.

Ch 13 opaline

Her brother and fiance kidnap her to a hotel.  Luckily her Moroccan man saw it all happen and followed them and rescues her.  With the help of the bookshop owner,  she flees to Dublin.

Ch 14 Martha

Henry take Martha to a other fancy book place with a really old book and he tells her she's welcome in the world of books.  She tells him she's gotta get to work several times.  But she never leaves.  Makes me worried she's gonna get fired.  They go out to dinner and she tells him her history with her abusive boyfriend. 

Ch 15 henry

Henry is having this real intimate moment with Martha.  Then his phone rings.  It's his fiance.  She sounds like she's a bit much.  But she's impressive and it makes henry feel good to be with an impressive lover.

Anyway, Martha was already broken and this situation is probably going to break her more.

Ch 16 opaline pg 107

Opaline is shipped off to Dublin where a friend of the bookshop owner has agreed to take care of her.  Surprise, he's dead.  But his son is a good dude.  He suggests opaline stay and run the shop.  She agrees, but the shop is a bit spooky.

Ch 17 pg 117

There's odd cracks in the house.  Martha is concerned but the lady that owns the place is not.  Remember how Martha is good at reading people?  Martha knew henry was engaged.  She could see it in his eyes.

As she's trying to go to sleep there's odd noises and she wakes up to see one of the cracks has grown out.to be a bookcase with one book.

Ch 18 henry pg 123

Henry brings Martha donuts and coffee a apologizes for not telling her about his fiancé sooner.  She says they can still be friends.  She also tells him a out her boss's friend that walked into the lost bookshop and then it disappearing.  Henry recalls the same thing happened to him.  It's real yo.