Today is week two of our readalong of A Local Habitation (No.2 October Daye by Seanan McGuire) arranged by Lisa from Over the Effing Rainbow.  I read the first book as part of a readalong at the start of the year and thought it got off to a good start but book No.2 is speeding along.

The schedule is below, so if you want to join in or jump in with the comments then please do so.  Without further ado here are the questions and answers with a customary word of warning that spoilers will be lurking below:

1. ALH is a very odd place – what do you make of it so far and it’s inhabitants? It has a different feel to the last book doesn’t it?

I think this book feels different than the first – probably because it’s pretty much contained to the environment of ALH.  ALH is a very odd place.  I would love to know what it was like before the trouble began and all the other inhabitants ran away leaving this very unusual bunch of characters and a desperately lonely place.  Also a little sad that the remaining few have nowhere else to go and feel somewhat trapped.  The place has a detached feel – it feels like you could be in space almost and ALH could be a huge space ship with it’s twisty corridors.  I realise that probably sounds odd! But it just feels very remote from everything else.

2. There is certainly a lot going on at ALH – different dynamics, what are your feelings on the people you’ve met. Anything at all about those remaining and those who have died.

They are a very unusual bunch – maybe they were less noticeable when they were mixed in amongst others but now, in the face of everyone else leaving, they do kind of stand out as odd.  I can’t help distrusting all of them!  I still keep wondering about Alex and his sister – there seems to be something wrong with those two – it occurred to me for some strange reason that maybe it’s one person and they shift into the other character – but I can’t remember whether or not we’ve ever had a scene where they were both present at the same time.  Alex does act very oddly whenever Terrie is mentioned?  Then we have Gordan the Coblynau – I don’t know what to make of her but she certainly seems to hate the purebloods which makes me wonder why she doesn’t hate Januarn.

3. The phone call with Tybalt. I was curious about his comment about Riordan and what do you think he intends to do next? We’re learning a little bit more about the Cat Sidhe – what do you think Tybalt’s next move will be?

He seemed a bit animated didn’t he ‘She held a crown without a kingdom thanks to that Riordan bitch’.  Seems like there’s more going on with the cat world than at first meets the eye!  I reckon that Tybalt is going to maybe show up at ALH!  I sort of hope so anyway.

4. Barbara – what do you make of the new evidence that has come to light with her dealings with the Duchess of Dreamer’s Glass? What is she up to? 

This feels like a red herring to me.  I don’t know what Barbara is up to but I can’t imagine it has anything to do with the deaths somehow.  And anyway, she’s one of the victims now!

5. It looks like Toby is going to try and summon the Night Haunts? Any thoughts on how this will go and speculation about the Night Haunts?

I have no idea what the Night Haunts are going to be like but I imagine they’re a bit scary!  It’s a fascinating aspect of this world and one that I want to know more about!  And why don’t the fae rot btw?  The fae world seems kind of sad doesn’t it, like they’re a shadow of their former self and all this slinking around hiding from the humans for fear of reprisals.

‘These days you’re lucky to get a battered changeling and her under age, half-trained assistant, and the princesses are confused technological wizards!’

‘Up the airy mountains and down the rushy glen, I dare not go a-hunting for fear of little men’

6. Any guesses so far as to what’s going on?

I have to admit that I’ve been jumping about all over the place. – it’s like reading an Agatha Christie book where everyone’s a suspect!  Originally I didn’t trust April, I think she probably has a good motive after what happened in her past, plus she has this strange ‘doting on January’ thing going on – I think she must be connected to the phone calls not going through to Sylvester and also something about the strange puncture marks on the bodies – it’s almost as though people are being plugged in?  I wondered at first if April was getting ‘rid’ of people because of some sort of jealousy over January – then I wondered if she was actually ‘gathering’ people into her computer (like forming her own little community) which would answer why the Haunts haven’t been to collect the bodies – because they’re not actually dead (like she’s downloading people somehow).  I also can’t help wondering why April doesn’t know what’s going on – she seems to be able to go everywhere and see anything.  I ended up feeling that maybe she’s trying to protect this aspect of her world by taking everyone into her world.  Then I got all suspicious over Gordan – there was a comment from Toby about her being niggled over ‘Gordan’s too clean hands’ – don’t know why that got either Toby or my attention but it did.  There was also a comment about Coblynau being able to trap enchantment in living metal – I wonder whether Gordan is trapping people somehow!  Maybe they’re working together.  The other thing that was odd was when Toby and Quentin were looking at everyone’s rooms and April turned up unexpectedly – there was like a tank with miniature Hippocampi (and by the way how cool do they sound – I wants) swimming about and when April turned up they all shied away – like they don’t trust her.

Basically, I’m all over the place really.  I quite like the idea that somebody is gathering all of these people up somehow – well, I don’t like it exactly!  but it seems like a possibility.

Week 1: Saturday 5th March, Chapters 1-8 hosted by Over The Effing Rainbow
Week 2: Saturday 12th March, Chapters 9-16 – hosted by Lynn’s Book Blog (me!)
Week 3: Saturday 19th March, Chapters 17-25 – hosted by Books By Proxy
Week 4: Saturday 26th March, Chapters 26-end – hosted by The Bibliosanctum

All are welcome and there’s a discussion page over on Goodreads if that makes it easier to join.