Nico
The second installment of the Greenbone Saga didn't disappoint. I can't say that I love the series, but I am fully invested in the characters and manuverings and can't wait for my hold on Jade Legacy to come through.
There's a lot of brilliant aspects of the book: interesting world, interesting characters, traveling librarians being tough and cool as heck, etc. However, so much of it reads like a YA, from the protagonist to the depth of characters to the story telling. This could have been a much stronger book and as it is there is much missing to make it a 4 or 5 star read for me.
I was hooked on this book after completing the first chapter, unfortunately I slowly began to lose interest as it continued on. In the beginning I found the premise of the world and turns intriguing, but ultimately the book stayed flat at the second half. I didn't find any of the complexity or depth I crave in a good book's characters, character relationships, and plot. In the end I found it to be a very average book.
I suspected that after reading A Dead Djinn in Cairo I was going to gobble this up too and that's what happened! I'll say I didn't enjoy the mystery or the characters as much in this installment, but I'm glad a read it to help prepare a bit for Master of Djinn.
I'm happy so many readers found value in this book. Alas, it didn't resonate with me. I was enthralled by a couple moments, but I was ready to DNF during most of the book. My two major issues were I felt as though it was three different books from moment to moment and it felt like a missed opportunity to be so much more. To the former point, some anecdotes and subchapters were so strong, like the photography story and chapter 8 and conclusion. Then I don't know what was in the middle, it was self-helpish plus recipes and stories that seemed rambly and the main points weak or lost on me completely. To my second issue, well more so hope going in after listening to photography story, was that it was going to compare their real world experiences to case studies or data related to safety or murder. At the end I wished this book was like “The unthinkable: who survives when disaster strikes and why.” I know Karen and Georgia are not journalists, but to me chapter 8 demonstrated to me what these two are capable of doing. I would be interested in reading a second book by them.
Oh yeah, this turned into the creepy, dark read I was looking for. However, the first part of the book (maybe 1/4 or half of it?) was in a train-of-thought, first-person narration style with nothing really happening and I did NOT enjoy that. But there's this one scene that basically was nearly my worst nightmare and I couldn't put it down after that.
This is my first time reading Stephen King. It was fine. I thought it had a stronger start and middle compared to the end. I probably won't continue on with the series in the near future, but I'm definitely intrigued enough to read more King of some kind down the road.
I'm shocked by how much I did not like this book as a whole, since I adore “The House in the Cerulean Sea” and I like books that discuss death and grief (Klune has a handle-with-care warning at the beginning of the book and I really appreciated that). In many ways I found the two books similar, however to me this one is clunky and clumsy. For the first 2/3rds of the book, I had many problems with the character development, characterization, and plot. Yes I did tear a couple of times and ultimately I recommend for folks to decide for themselves.
I LOVED it. This is now one of my favorite books of all time and by far the best novella I've ever read. If you are in the mood for a bit of humor in your books and don't mind reading about a djinn who cusses a lot, and want to see cool mix of mythology (djinn) and sci-fi check this out.
Audio review: This was a lovely novella that begins when Silver, a young man obsessed with legends and myth, walks into Tobias' woods. I often struggle with single-POVs, but being in Tobias' mind and following him care for trees, sit at the fire with his cat, sharpen his knives, and shift in his feelings towards the humans he meets was a soothing experience. I enjoyed the queer romance and slow journey to the end, though I wanted a bit more from the final conflict. I can see myself picking up the second book in this duology when I'm craving connection to the forest. As an urban dweller experiencing winter that might be sooner than later.
Ogawa does something unique in this collection that I don't want to mention because it might be a bit of a spoiler. I respected it, but overall I didn't love this collection because only a few of the 11 stories elicited any emotion out of me. The others had left me confused about the author's intentions and at the end of them I've just thought, “okay, that was a short story I guess.” There's some creepiness, but with a title like “Revenge” I thought I was going to get a lot more from this.
I went in thinking I'd love it, then three chapters in I thought I was going to hate it. In the end, I felt as I do with some YA: so impressed that an author was able to fill a book with such a depth of complexity of individuals and character relationships in a short amount of pages. And what an imaginative reinvention of a story I thought I knew. I thought it is brilliant for what it is.
4.5 stars. I really enjoyed this book, especially the quest and friendship elements. My problem was I kept getting pulled away by the descriptions of the character with leprosy since from the start he felt really stigmatized. Then I deep dived into symptoms and realized Hayes got the symptoms wrong and was really perpetuating myths about the disease. From then on the repeated mentions of “the leper” and his symptoms just made me really angry every time. Not sure why Hayes chose to go this route...and how could someone with such severe “symptoms” of the disease be an expert marksman???
Audiobook Edition If you like books about witches I HIGHLY recommend. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this story of modern witches and murder. It's very atmospheric and I really liked following the different POVs. Nearly a 5-star book for me, it just has some problems with inconsistency that I can't ignore. I'm surprised it only has 1,200 ratings at the time I'm writing this.
I came into this already familiar with some facets mindfulness and habit building, but I still found this non-fiction excellent. For me it reinforced the good things I know, planted food-for-thought, and taught me new things. Highly recommend for all.
It's a sci-fi dystopia with romance and political intrigue. I struggled with this book a bit because I was more interested in one protagonist over another. I even wanted more of some of the side characters. The world-building is really strong in this book and if you want to take a dive into some unique and dark sci-fi I recommend this one, especially if you like YA (this is not technically YA/teen but it read to me like YA/teen).
The first chapter and quippy writing style immediately hooked me in. The dystopian world of fallen gods and wizards and demigods kept me interested for quite a while. This short book is fast-paced, but that turned out to be a pro and a con. Pro because something new was always happening and at first I gobbled it up, but con because I was fatigued by the end and disinterested in the conclusion honestly. Also, it was just very plot and action driven and there wasn't as much time spent on character and relationship development...I think it was a missed opportunity to really elevate the book.
I'm so glad my first Thompson was Far from the Light of Heaven, because I was quite disappointed with this one. It started off with a MC I was interested in and cool world building in a future within an alien biodome. But I don't know what happened in the middle 50% and I didn't care about the plot or our MC - it just took too long to get to the last 100 pages that were the most interesting part. I think I did a disservice to this one by consuming via audiobook, since I think reading it would have been better to absorbing the many layers. I will check out Thompson's future works because I loved The Light of Heaven so much, but if I started with this one I would be very apprehensive to try more.
Conceptually this book is brilliant and a unique fantasy experience in my reading history. I suspect for those who need 50-50 character development to plot, or more heavy character development, might not be 100% in love with this book. I'm a very feely person, and there were no feels for the first 3/4 of the book. Action happens, there's flat dialogue, there's external conflict, there's background on characters, but there's reference to anger and love that only feels like words, not an emotional experience (which is what the strongest books convey in my opinion). Even the stakes never felt very high for most of the book, which they are in the book's reality.
By page 300 when what I've been waiting for finally [begins] to happen, I was getting the feels a bit more but still waiting for the emotional connection for the characters to each other, themselves and to their city. The main characters are avatars for their boroughs, but I never felt the power in what that means, I felt that power the strongest in relation to geography but not its people - though we're told about each borough's people a few times. I wish the events and conversations between page 300 and 400 had been moved up earlier, and then expanded much more. The last 50 pages were amazing, interesting and surprising.
The book is 3.5 stars for me. I hope down the road I'll reread this to see if I missed what I believe is missing and go to the rest of the trilogy.
I really enjoyed the political intrigue, strategy and character development of this book. Multi-POV stories tend to be my favorites, especially when they put you in the heads of antagonists. The ending of this book was fantastic and I'm excited to continue the series. Fans who like the maneuvering of ASOIAF will enjoy this.
Highly recommend for adults if you're willing to learn new things, relearn things, and unlearn things. I'm going to have to reread this again sooner than later because each page, even in graphic novel form, had so much information I definitely didn't absorb it all, but hopefully seeds were planted. I hope to find some supplemental reading to this brilliant and needed book.
This is the first book in a long series with hard magic. I really did not enjoy this or care very much about the characters, but I am intrigued enough to try the second.