Yes, I am, it’s something I’ve pushed off for some time because I heard the LOTR books aren’t exactly easy reads. But if the main trilogy is anything like The Hobbit, I think I will quite enjoy them, as The Hobbit has been an enjoyable read.
Also, that Kingslinger podcast looks interesting, I might listen to it when I read the Dark Tower, though that’s some years out.
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OK. I reread the ending AGAIN.
Summary
And it still rubbed me the wrong way. He/It has feelings about things, people, ideas and a logical brain. I just can’t see Murderbot being content to just sit, become a couch potato and watch his vids I would think he would get bored. There HAS to be a sequel in the works. It is like watching a movie, and at the end, you know the tale isn’t finished. That’s how I felt about this book.
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My thoughts on Murderbot so far
Summary
For the most part, I have the same problems with this installment as I do the others before. I find the writing style isn’t my taste. And like @delenn13 said, I find all the book’s endings feel kind of anti-climatic as if the story should go on for another 50 pages or so, but just cuts off.
I also find action scenes within many of the books to be a little overdone, going into in-depth detail about technologies, and the exact circumstances of the action, such as exact positions of opponents, speeds, times, and confusing settings. It might just be my poor reading comprehension, but I feel they could be dumbed down a bit to make for a more coherent reading experience.
I could go on a while about the little things I dislike, so I’ll just get to some more of what I consider to be good/interesting about the books.
I think Murderbots character, who was in the first books a pretty simple character, has evolved to be a little more complex, where you kind of have to read in between the lines to pick up everything. For example, Murderbot claims to not like humans or their company, yet all he watches is human shows, full of human interactions and such. Along with that, in the previous book, the little bot that was close friends with one of the humans, Murderbot seemed to detest its relationship with the woman, yet in the end, I felt like Murderbot began to envy the relationship a little, which helps explains why in this book Murderbot went through so much effort to save his supposed “master”.
In conclusion, I would say I get the appeal of the books, but there are too many little things I dislike about them to say I truly enjoy them.
Responses
I do agree with some of your dislikes, such as I do believe that Murderbot being able to hack everything that moves was a little annoying, and kind of invalidated a lot of problems that were faced.
I also agree that at some points the emotional talk could be a little heavy-handed, but overall I think it was subtle enough to be interesting.
One thing I disagree with though is with disliking the fact that Murderbot becomes less anxious. I think it added necessary character development to a character that would have otherwise become stale over a period of 4 books. Also, while I am not at all qualified to say so, I do believe that practicing talking to people can help with anxiety at least a little bit, but you can correct me on that if you know something I don’t.
Along with that, I agree with all of your likes of the books. Many of them were high points or just simply relieving when they didn’t go with the alternative plot options.
It seems I interpreted the ending a little differently, as I came away with the feeling that Murderbot, while claiming to only wish to watch media, everyone in the story knew, along with Murderbot, that if he did do that, he would secretly miss human interactions and all the adventures. It’s kind of like how a normal socially anxious person thinks, when they’re out at a party for too long they wish to be home, but when they’re home for too long they wish to be out and about, even if it’s only a secret desire.
I do however agree with you that the story did feel a little unfinished, as did many of the previous books.
I also just want to say what doesn’t need to be said, but this is all my opinion, I do see both of your guy’s points of view, and don’t want to appear as if I’m attempting to invalidate your opinion, just bringing up my own interpretation of the story.
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Thanks for the views, @Nateninja21 
It’s always amazing to have read the same thing but different people see it in different ways. I am not sure if you will hear from @Glider. I haven’t heard from @joxter or @Glider in over 3 weeks. 
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@delenn13
Nah, I’m still here. I’m mostly lurking at the best of times and with additional stress… it seems I tend to withdraw from interaction a bit more than usual, sorry 
On the topic of Murderbot
About anxiety: I don’t have any first-hand experience with anxiety but I do dislike the trope of “being exposed to anxiety source will help you get over it”. I suppose sometimes it may be the case but pretty often it’s not. I don’t have any concrete sources I can cite, it’s just an impression I got from listening to some podcasts, vlogs, stuff like this.
About the ending: My interpretation is way closer to Nate’s. I don’t see any “murderbot turns into a couch potato” there at all. As I saw it, it was fairly open-ended - there was a bunch of options to consider (like taking another security-consultant type job or helping with the documentary) and there was no pressure to chose right now. And I did not even feel like continuation is needed -
But yeah, the story goes on after the 4th book, here’s full series on goodreads: link
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Poll number 5, and the one I think has the strongest selection. Make sure to vote if you plan on joining, though it isn’t technically a requirement.
As usual, I would like to give disclaimers to some of the books above.
Firstly, all of the books are/were free on the Tor.com newsletter, except for Network Effect, which is/was not free there at any point, as far as I can tell.
Secondly, I normally try to keep the books on these lists short, but that’s very difficult to do, so here is the list of books whose page count ranges from 300 to 500: Witchmark, A History of What Comes Next, Middlegame, and Network Effect. Everything else ranges from 70 to 150 pages.
I will be posting the results in more or less a week.
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so the odd ones are longer and the even ones are shorter:) at least there is a pattern
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May be we should replace When Tiger Came Down the Mountain with The Empress of Salt and Fortune? It makes more sense IMO to start with the 1st book of the cycle 
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Chrono Book Club: Book 5
Book 5 has been decided, and it is “Silver in the Wood”
This is where I would usually follow up with time frames etc. However, now I must say that I believe the Book Club has come to a tidy end with finishing up the first 4 books of the Murderbot Diaries. So, this book will be the final one.
Honestly, this thing has gone on for longer than I thought it would, it also has taken up more of my time than I thought it would. So I don’t really think of this as a sad thing, as I knew from the start this gaming community forum wasn’t the most fertile place for a book club, I just intended it to be a quick fun little thing to try out, and in that regard it was flawless.
Of course, this thread is still open if people want to read Silver in the Wood and talk about it. Or even create their own polls for books.
Happy Reading.
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Aha! I have KU so I could check out reflux books - they were no help - But~ I can read this book with you guys.
Edit: much love for free trails. I don’t know how much it costs otherwise.
Embarrassed. I’m done. Not saying anything more yet
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Me too. I was very surprised. And with these headaches I know I haven’t been ANY help. Sorry. You did an awesome job and I appreciate it. 
Now I need to find the book…LOL 
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Getting these headaches every 2 or 3 days makes reading hard. I can hardly finish my emails and such.
So News Flash. I still haven’t read the book; however, I did find this about Murderbot. I tend to agree with it.
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Ok, first thing’s first: I’m sorry it took me waaay long to reply.
Second (probably should’ve been first, but oh well). I want to express gratitude to @Nateninja21 . This whole thing worked really wonderfully for me and I really wanted something like this. It was really fun, thanks. 
About the last book though… I’m not a fan.
I guess I'll still hide it under the spoiler
I expected to like it since I do have a soft spot for this "supernatural is just around the corner" idea usually found in urban fantasy. Calling it rural, while fitting, does not sound right :blush: But most tropes I encountered while reading rubbed me the wrong way:- One of the characters was strong silent type who’s bad at communicating
- Serious issues were fixed by the virtue of a character being rich
- There was a small bossy competent old lady
And Silver was such a prick… Which got even worse when I went through the second book 
Overall it was not a bad read but I’m a bit sad book club went out with this whimper
Oh, and thanks to all participants as well, that was pretty fun
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Edit: the author can flex her prose and such. She’s v. readable and perhaps has better stories to her credit.
Yip. Wanted to comment earlier on this too, but I read the book in like one day, so had to give time for people to catch up, lol.
The second book starts out annoying, so I didn’t even bother. What was the point of the ‘resolution’ in the first, if you’re gonna put all of that to waste in the sequel?
The villain of Silver in the Wood was actually the most interesting character to me. I would have preferred a delve into that guy’s history, instead of the Silver story. The lore just seemed deeper.
Don’t mind the strong, silent trope, but that guy was too dense. Tobias’ origin story didn’t do much to back up his personality either.
Truly this story had a lot of elements that are missed opportunities. It could have been a really interesting world with unique rules and magic.
Sadly, the supporting characters had more complexity, Tobias’ dryad friend, for example, and even Silver’s annoying mother. (She’s a rich brat and product of her time; wasn’t fond of her, but at least she made sense to me).
Disappointing that the follow up story, seems to go the “manufactured conflict” route for dramatic effect, instead of continuing where the last story arc left off. It could have teased out more of the world, its malevolent creatures and the relationship of the MCs. It could have also answered a lot of not too subtle plot holes left in Silver in the Wood. shrug
Never thought I’d say this, but even the Harry Potter series did a better job of making (somewhat) sense in the end (read a lot of wiki stuff, not just the books).
Good premise, inconsistent handling - too many really awesome worlds and storylines are let down this way.
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Hey Hon,
Hope things are good with you. Thinking of you
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Hello friends! 
do yall use goodreads? I’d love to add you if so, or you could add me on my profile.
Recent books I’ve read:
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens (beautiful 
one of my favourites)
Verity by Colleen Hoover (Terrible, idk how people give it 5 stars 
)
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Reid Jenkins (incredible, also one of my favourites)
I got a book subscription box today (from the bcase in South Africa) - they release a theme and have a new book plus extras around the theme. This last month was “Expect the Unexpected”
I’ll upload some pics!
What are some recent good and bad reads of yours?
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Hey, Because of the headaches I am lucky I read the news anymore. Last book I read was from the Book club. I hardly remember what I read plus it makes my head worse.
Whoa, a Lit Palm Tree. Now I have seen a Lite one, been in one near the top while lit(another story) and I have lit one but never gotten one. Lucky you! 
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Yup, one of my last full reads was The Silver in the Wood - not missing much, it didn’t quite do what anyone expected world building wise.
Other than that, read a BL novel which was fantastic with so much interwoven plot and characters. Hm. I started a library book called Full Wolf Moon by Lincoln Child. So far, well written. Stick a pin for opinion until the end. 
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