January Reading Recap

   Earlier this month I talked about some of the highlights from the books I read last year. Unfortunately, I missed a lot of books because I had read so many throughout the year. In order to avoid that this year I'm going to try and do a reading recap every month or so and talk about a few of my favorite reads (or listens, if they were audiobooks). Without that preface, here goes:
   1. Marvels by Kurt Busiek
   This is a graphic novel. At the beginning of the year, I read a bunch of graphic novels. I gave this one four stars. It's interesting because I gave Superman: Birthright 5 stars, and yet I'm talking about this one. Busiek writes a story of what it would be like for humans to live in the Marvel universe. He shows how humans react to those different than them and wonders how they should react. All in all it was a great read. Now that I talk about it, I'm wondering why I didn't give it five stars... Oh well, no time to think of the past!
   2. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
   Some call this the greatest book ever written. I wouldn't call it the best, but its definitely up there. Karamazov is a long book and it reads like it. There's lots of plot, character development, and philosophy jammed into those many pages. It can sometimes be slow, but this book is such a fascinating read. There's so much to think about in this book. Most prominently is the issue of evil and suffering which plagues every Christian. This book smacked me in the face, and then made me wonder if maybe what I had seen as a problem was the solution in itself. I'll let you decide, which means you have to read this book!
   3. The Bacchae by Euripides
   Euripides is an author (playwright, rather) I've just started reading and he is great! I started with Alcestis and Hippolytus (both great), then tried The Bacchae. Let me tell you, this is a fascinating read. It is the story of Dionysus (the wine god) who gets mad at a King for being unkind to him, then Dionysus kills him. It makes absolute sense from a logical standpoint. The Greek gods, or Roman for that matter, were not known for being nice. However, what I found amazing was that Jesus, who was hurt twice as badly by humanity, was gracious and not spiteful. I thought this was a great read and I should probably read it again.
   4. The Nameless City by Michael Scott
   A few months ago I bought a Doctor Who collection of short stories and just now got around to listening to them. Of the five I've listened to so far, this was the best. Scott does a great job of getting into the Second Doctor's head (the narration by Frazer Hines helps a lot) and generally makes it feel like a Second Doctor story. The story itself, while not super deep, is fun and intelligent in its own right. Actually, it did make me think a little about justice and revisionist history. And there's bagpipes! How can you go wrong?
   5. King's Warrior by Jenelle Leanne Schmidt
   I got this book when it was free on Kindle around two years ago. I've been slowly reading it ever since. It is a fairly good book, if a little slow. I won't say too much about it now, since I'm probably going to do a review of it in the near future. Still, I'd recommend it if one is interested in large scale epic fantasy stories.

   Those were some of my favorite, or most interesting, reads of January. What books did you read this month? What did you think of them? Comment below and tell me about it!