The Regional Office is Under Attack!: Don't be a stranger

Superpowered female assassins

Defending the Regional Office is Sarah (who may or may not have a mechanical arm)

Weaving in brilliantly conceived mythology, fantastical magical powers, teenage crushes, and kinetic fight scenes

I'd seen the book The Regional Office is Under Attack! (don't forget the exclamation mark) a few times around the interwebs and when I finally picked up a copy and looked at the back cover summary, well, those lines jumped out at me. So naturally I had to take the book home with me.

This book probably comes the closet to the book I WANT to exist though it never really gets there*. BUT this is better than any of the other books I thought would fit that mold. There are multiple narrators and POVs (a fav style) as the book opens with the titular attack on the regional office, an underground headquarters for a cadre of assassins under the shell company of a travel agency for billionaires (excellent cover story). The story shifts back and forth mainly between two characters, Rose, a mercenary leading part of the attack, and Sarah, an executive assistant to one of the heads of the organization and one of the few people still at the office. We get what they're doing in the present and how they got to this point.

There are also chapters from a history book The Regional Office is Under Attack: Tracking the Rise and Fall of an American Institution explaining how the office came to be, including some history on the precogs who help identify future employees. There are also a few other POVs though the three above are the main ones.

What exactly do these super powered female assassins do, when their office isn't being attacked? Oh just save the world from total devastation. Alien invasions, inter-dimensional travel, that sort of thing. But the focus isn't on those stories. They're mentioned in passing. Right now the attack on the office is what's important. Why is this happening? Who ordered it? Can the regional office be saved (...well I mean, the title of the history chapters sort of tells you, no) and should it?

Overall the story was entertaining and kept me turning the pages, although the set up was more interesting than the execution by the end. I was still entertained but I was less invested in the characters. Even now I remember wanting to know read on and see all the twists and turns, but at this point, 6 months after I finished it, I can't actually remember exactly what happened.

Good, if ultimately not-that-memorable of a story.

Gif rating:

*The Office but instead of a paper company, it's something ridiculous, like a company of superpowered assassins or a company that deals with zombie removal or some other exciting and action-y professions juxtaposed against the mundane every day office life. Is that too much to ask?

Title quote from page 106

Gonzales, Manuel. The Regional Office is Under Attack!. Riverhead Books, 2016.

2017 Reading Challenge - check in 2

So a hundred years ago (or like, April but really, 2017? Every week is at least a year) I snagged a Reading Challenge thing posted by Etudesque who grabbed it from PopSugar. I thought I'd update the list every couple months. How adorably optimistic of me. Instead I apparently started a draft for "check in 2" and then promptly forgot about it. #MyLifeStory

It's almost the end of the year so let's see where I'm at and how much I have to go to complete this by end of year. You know, something I will definitely be able to do.

1. A book recommended by a librarian
2. A book that's been on your TBR way too long
3. A book of letters
4. An audiobook
• Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
5. A book by a person of color
• Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
6. A book with one of the four seasons in the title
7. A book that is a story within a story
8. A book with multiple authors
9. An espionage thriller
10. A book with a cat on the cover
• We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby
11. A book by an author who uses a pseudonym
12. A bestseller from a genre you don't normally read
13. A book by or about a person who has a disability
14. A book involving travel
• All Our Wrong Todays by Elan Mastai (time travel is travel, right?)
15. A book with a subtitle
• Shrill: Notes from a Loud Woman by Lindy West
16. A book that's published in 2017
• Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward (released in Sept)
17. A book involving a mythical creature
• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
18. A book you've read before that never fails to make you smile
• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
19. A book about food
• The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
20. A book with career advice
• Feminist Fight Club by Jessica Bennett
21. A book from a nonhuman perspective
• A Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. Maybe? I mean, some of the characters are not human and we get their perspective. Right? Maybe
22. A steampunk novel
23. A book with a red spine
• I'm Judging You: The Do Better Manual by Luuvie Ajayi
24. A book set in the wilderness
• State of Wonder by Ann Patchett
25. A book you loved as a child
26. A book by an author from a country you've never visited
• Rich People Problems by Kevin Kwan (Singapore)
27. A book with a title that's a character's name
• Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
28. A novel set during wartime
• World War Z by Max Brooks
29. A book with an unreliable narrator
• Grotesque by Natsuo Kirino
30. A book with pictures
31. A book where the main character is a different ethnicity than you
• The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl by Issa Rae
32. A book about an interesting woman
• Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud: The Rise and Reign of the Unruly Women by Anne Helen Petersen
33. A book set in two different time periods
• Locke & Key by Joe Hill & Gabriel Rodriguez
34. A book with a month or day of the week in the title
• Atlanta Burns by Chuck Wendig
35. A book set in a hotel
36. A book written by someone you admire
• We Were Eight Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates
37. A book that's becoming a movie in 2017
38. A book set around a holiday other than Christmas
39. The first book in a series you haven't read before
• John Dies in the End by David Wong
40. A book you bought on a trip
41. A book recommended by an author you love
42. A bestseller from 2016
• The Road to Little Dribbling by Bill Bryson. At least, I assume it was a best seller.
43. A book with a family member term in the title
• The Stepford Wives by Ira Levin ('wives' count right?)
44. A book that takes place over a character's life span
• Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
45. A book about an immigrant or refugee
46. A book from a genre/subgenre that you've never heard of
47. A book with an eccentric character
48. A book that's more than 800 pages
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling
49. A book you got from a used book sale
50. A book that's been mentioned in another book
51. A book about a difficult topic
• White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America by Nancy Isenberg
52. A book based on mythology

So not that bad. 28. And there's still time, you never know. 

November Reading Wrap-Up

Reading-wise, this was sort of a rough month. I hit a bit of a wall where I wanted to read something but nothing that I had was really interesting me. There were a few false starts. I did get some reading done. It's not even my worst month this year but still, not great. It was pushed forward by a lot of rereads. I guess something known was what I was looking for. No surprises.

Perhaps December will be more successful. Or not and we'll just give it another try in the new year. Trying to set realistic expectations.

Let's see those stats

Total books read
4
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
Gabi, A Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quintero
Why Have Kids? A New Mom Explores the Truth About Parenting and Happiness by Jessica Valenti

Total pages read
1,185

Fiction
75%

POC authors
25%

Female authors
50%

US authors
75%

Book formats
ebook: 75%
paperback: 25%

Where'd I get the book
Kindle/Audible: 75%
Chain bookstore (I think...): 25%

Reread
75%

Books by decade
2000s: 50%
2010s: 50%

Books by genre
Fantasy: 25%
Humor: 25%
Sociology: 25%
YA: 25%

Resolution books
50%
The Graveyard Book by a non-US author (Gaiman, UK).
Gabi, A Girl in Pieces is by a POC author (Quintero, Latina)