Category: Books

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Books

Winter Quick Book Reviews

Middlegame by Seanan McGuire. (4/5) An intriguing interlocked journey of two heroes, drowning in schemes and maneuvering. A fascinating take on altering time.

Nostalgic reread – Hawk of May by Gillian Bradshaw. (5/5) Arthurian myth set shortly after Rome retreats from Britain; Gwalchmai is humble, sorcerous, repentant and inspiring. It’d make for a tremendous Pendragon game…

Kingdom of Summer (the sequel to Hawk) shifts gears. (5/5) We follow Rhys, who gives up his family to serve Gwalchmai and the light. His common sense is such a contrast, steady effort lands him dangerous insight.

In Winter’s Shadow (the final book of the trilogy) brings us Gwynhwyfar’s story. (4/5) Only a superb telling makes her sympathetic, but she is. The kingdom crumbles, despite so many people striving and sacrificing… the seeds of division and pride are too strong.

Elidor by Alan Garner. (2/5). Fast paced, set immediately after WWII, with an interesting “through the wardrobe” into Elidor. Well written but oddly paced, and foreign due to the London side of things (strangely enough).

Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig; 4/5. This kicks off the Miriam Black books, and does so compellingly. Miriam’s a great heroine, though unpleasant to be around. She faces way too much, and endures.

Mockingbird, Miriam Black #2, by Chuck Wendig. It starts off strong, then turns into an interesting investigation. Louis makes a great foil to the life she wants to lead, and that she resists, and the family’s dark gift and acts make sense.

The Cormorant, Miriam Black #3, by Chuck Wendig. Miriam goes to Florida, which has such a strong sense of place. She almost understands the creep terrorizing her life this time , even though nothing goes right. Her resolve to abandon her curse feels authentic.

Remnant Population by Elizabeth Moon is amazing and complex; it was hard to put down. Reminds me favorably of A Key, An Egg, and Unfortunate Remark by Harry Connolly — and not just for the age of the leading lady. (5/5)

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Books

Nov-Dec Book Reviews

His Majesty’s Dragon, Temeraire Book 1 by Naomi Novik. (4/5) I really enjoyed this one; it favorably reminds me of the other SF&F recastings of Napoleonic ships and tactics. As soon as I finished, I wanted to get the next ones in the series.

Throne of Jade by Naomi Novik was enjoyable, but not as successful as His Majesty’s Dragon. Started strong, but travel was lengthy — good for immersion, but hard to keep interesting. Characters still engaging; China events mostly pay off. (3/5)

Black Powder War (Temeraire book 3) was another slow start; after delay Istanbul becomes interesting, then it finishes strong. Enjoyed it, but not enough to keep going. (2/5)

The Oracle Year by Charles Soule. (4/5) A book set today with barely any fantastic elements. It’s engaging — kept me up reading late each night. It does a great job of providing tiny but affecting events and believable consequences from them.

Why Girls are Weird by Pamela Ribon. (4/5) Anna tangles with modern life, relationships, desires and delusions. Another entry in a tiny niche that I often enjoy: early blog writers as stars of the story.

Sheri S Tepper- The Visitor: A decent idea that I never really warmed to; not as well executed as most of her novels. (2/5) A few parallel stories that come together; an odd mash of modern, religious, and post apocalyptic.

In an Absent Dream – Seanan McGuire (4/5). An interesting trip through the door, great interactions and grounded perspective. Not the best starting place for the Wayward Children series.

The Return of Depression Economics by Paul Krugman: Well presented, with clear and illustrative examples. The various replays and “contagion” affecting investors with broad heuristics (instead of deep research) feels like shortcuts bite us 101. 4/5

How Long ‘Til Black Future Month? by N. K. Jemisin. Great collection of short stories, including a few concepts that went a different direction elsewhere. Strong stories for many different reasons–The Effluent Engine characters, … Not Enough Tomorrows setting. 4/5

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Books

September Book Reviews

Finished Warcross by Marie Lu over the weekend. Solid 3/5; higher if you’re a relatively new SF/F reader. Great characterization, but both the romance and Zero’s ID were “as expected”, instead of surprising. I did gulp down the last ~100 pages instead of sleeping.

Just finished The Book of Hidden Things. It does a great job of teetering on the edge of real, surreal, and mystic. Plus South Italian small town life… really enjoyable. 4/5.

Finished Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie last night. It’s modern (rather than sci-fi, where I normally read), but it’s such a different world. It’s well worth trying! (4/5) Ifemelu and Obinze are both great characters, though I tended to prefer Ifemelu’s chapters. Their interactions at home and in the west are both bright and clarifying. You root for them, alone and together. Great book structure too.

Victory Conditions by Elizabeth Moon (4/5). An excellent conclusion to the 5 book series about Kylara Vatra. (I decided that I liked her fantasy quite a bit, so decided to check out her SF. It worked out nicely!)

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Books

Want by Cindy Pon

A solid, interesting cyberpunk dystopia, of the rich sealing themselves into environmental suits and letting everyone else choke to death.

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Books

The Midnight Star by Marie Lu

The third book of the trilogy, set about a year after The Winter Star. The blessings of their powers have brought Adelina victory and conquest, but the whispers are stronger than ever. Raffaele leads the Dagger Society and shelters her sister… but his research on the blood fever and the consequences of the interaction of the immortal world on the mortal gives the book its pivot and shapes the second half of the book.

Tears streamed over the last couple of chapters; I really felt for Adelina and suffered alongside her as she made her difficult decisions. All in all, it was a great end to a good series.

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Books

The Rose Society by Marie Lu

A very solid middle book, that mostly avoids the trap of feeling like a middle book. This charts Adelina and her sister coming together, gathering allies, and coming to power. They’re opposed by the inquisition at home, and are rivals with The Dagger Society.

I like the scheming and struggle; it ends on a harsh but dramatically appropriate note.

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Books

The Eterna files by Leanna Renee Hieber

A well written book, full of 19th century mores, seances, and ghostly communication. I liked the characters, but was only meh on the world.

For a Victorian lover, I’d unreservedly recommend this book. Similarly, for someone who loves the steampunk aesthetic, this has some common ground. For me, though, I don’t have an interest in reading further.

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Books

The Young Elites by Marie Lu

Ha! I originally thought that this was a continuation series for Legend…, but nope, it’s a whole new world. It’s fantastic, but with mostly subtle magic other than the titular Young Elites.

Our heroine is conflicted; there are a lot of screws being turned on her. From the very beginning her life is pretty terrible; she’s rescued, but her rescuers have ulterior motives.

I liked it quite a bit and am queuing up the sequels. (It looks like this series is also a trilogy.)

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Books

Damage Time by Colin Harvey

A very interesting book; a bit confusing at first, until you come to realize that Pete Shah’s job is to delve into recorded memories… so some of the interstitial chapters are from his professional research and only tie indirectly to the main plot.

There’s a strong theme of memory and identity, and how they’re linked. It’s not abstract or musing–it’s an interesting police procedural with weird tech. The big tech is memory recording and dissemination–basically simsense and BTL–but there are other strong elements, like the expensive personal transportation due to climate taxes, flooding and sea walls, etc. There’s also reference to a great thinning of the planet by plague a generation or two ago.

I liked the world building, the continuity of existing cultures, even with the remade map of this near future. The world is grim, but by no means hopeless.

I really like the changes to Pete as he rebuilds himself; near the end, he points out just how much of the impact of tragedy is lessened when you don’t viscerally remember the reasons you love and hate. The cat and mouse between Pete and Kotian is setup at the beginning and delivers by the end.

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Apocalypse World Roleplaying Books

The Watch by Anna Kreider and Andrew Medeiros

A very interesting game; I read it in PDF. It’s an Apocalypse World game that reminds me of Apocalypse World, with strong influences from Night Witches. (Missions feel very similar, though I like the streamlined version of just dealing with complications.)

The setting is great; it’s a fantasy world without Fireballs and Wishes. The characters are women of the watch, who resist the machinations of the Shadow–which has possessed the soldiers of the land, and turned them against our heroes.

The system is written boldly, clearly identifying the themes, and noting that there are reasons that they’re boldly calling out toxic masculinity, foregrounding women as heroes, etc. There’s clear direction that this may affect the players strongly; the X-card is cited as a bare minimum to keep the players at the table safe as they explore these dark themes.

The MC guidance gets very direct, explaining what the Shadow is, how it manifests, and guiding the MC to make some choices to guide their characterization of the Shadow and the influence. The missions are very reminiscent of Night Witches, including the roles (and corresponding rolls) that characters take during the mission. Fortunately, it doesn’t look like failures spin off more rolls with further bad consequences, as sometimes happens in Night Witches missions when trouble begins manifesting.

I really like the idea of this game; while it’s strident in places, I think the game benefits from the clear explanation of what underpins the Shadow and the setting.

Reading along, I found a few small copy editing errors, but nothing that was tough to work around. It was much less jarring than, say, the first copies of Rise of the Runelords.