Spriggana

Extra half of a star for the very last part of the epilogue ;-)

Year of Vorkosigan #1

I decided to reread the whole Vorkosigan series in internal chronology order in a year. Reading two books / stories a month will give me a month to spare.

So, I started with “Dreamweaver’s Dilemma”, but as it does not have a standalone edition I read the whole collection.

The DD I would rank three-and-half stars, the first three stories are between three and three-and-half. But the whole collection is elevated by the last one – “Aftermaths” – which is a five stars story. But more about it when I get to the Shrads of Honour.

A paint-by-number cosy mystery, and not very well executed.

Things like the protagonist discovering a vital clue remembering details about a poem written by one of the characters years earlier - but that is the first mention of the poem in the book. Yes, I checked.

Said protagonist arrives to a small town, where she has never been, and just like that she is best friends with almost everyone (except the one person nobody likes) to the point everybody is giving her all the information, only sometimes hinting that maybe the police would like to know…

With loads of cosy mysteries on the market you can skip this one…

If anyone looks for a fantasy novel – this is not it. It's basically a window-dressing for a romance/mystery set in ~1920.

Dwie i pół gwiazdki, jak zwykle u mnie zaokrąglone w górę. Największa wada: fabuła opierająca się na tym, że nikt niczego nie tłumaczy bohaterce żeby potem nazywać ją idiotką i radzić żeby się nie mieszała, a gdy w końcu próbuje się nie mieszać oskarżyć ją że stchórzyła. Może to i życiowe, ale nie musi mi się podobać.

Drugi zarzut to WIELKI spoiler:
Dziwnie łatwo nasza bohaterka pogodziła się z tym, że własnoręcznie zabiła ukochanego ojca. Owszem, była pod wpływem demona, ale wciąż pamięta sam akt. No i jest jej smutno. OK.

I think I fell in love with the rag doll constructs. ♥

Disappointing. Some good parts drowned in endless “everyone thinks X's dead / But X is not!” (for various X), “Bee got away / Bee is captured again” and drama pumped up by people not talking to each other. My favourite character in the whole LONG book (45 hours in audio) is Motley The Talking Crow...
I would definetly put it down if it were not the Grand Finale of all the Elderlings Realm series, and I'm not sure if I could get through it reading instead of listening.
One and half star, rounded up as I always do on Goodreads.

Ej, ale teraz ten cliffhanger to już całkiem autorski jest, nie wydawniczy! To kiedy następny tom?

Ocena wstrzymana do po Polconie, żeby podtrzymać suspens ;-)

I know it's a cozy mystery, but still, some research and a dose of realism would be nice.
A person telling an abused wife to go to the police in 1937 is not very likely, but I could live with it for the sake of the story.
A Jew in 1937 Berlin telling anyone to go to the police is much harder to accept.
A Jew in 1937 Berlin telling an abused wife... There I can only sit and shake my head. It's just a detail from the background, but very jarring.
And the main story has not been very engaging, possibly because of the victim being one nasty person we have just met, so no attachement there; and nobody we care about is in fact involved, other then Molly nosing around as usual when she was meant only to sit on the interviews.

A dissapoinment after several books by North I really liked. I felt like it lacked a plot – Charlie travels, delivers objects, things are happening to him, but he is rather passive. And all the shreds of conversations he keeps hearing seem to exist only to hammer a Mesage home. While I do agree with the general message, it felt really like not at all subtle proselytizing.
Still, I like North's writing and there were passages worth reading on their own, so not a complete dissapointment.

Miło się czyta, ale wolałabym więcej tła. Wiemy że jest jakaś rewolucja – ale jakie są jej przyczyny bohaterowie napomykają tylko półsłówkami, bo przecież wszystcy wiedzą – jakieś podatki, wyzysk w fabrykach, ale żadnych konkretów.
Tak a propos rewolucji to pewnie nie tylko ja wyobraziłam sobie „Niezatapialną” pomalowaną na dumny karmin alizarynowy... ;-)

3½ ★ zaokrąglone w górę.
Ocena nieco niższa niz pierwszego tomu, gdyż w pewnym momencie nieco zmęczył mnie natłok cameo. W „Pokoju światów” mamy Grabińskiego, który do tematyki kolejowo-demonicznej pasuje jak ulał a nawiązania do legend i baśni są wpisane w samą konstrukcję świata, ale w „Wojnach Przestrzeni” jest taki moment, w którym fantastyczne twarze wyskakują zza każdego rogu, i miałam przesyt (nie wspominając że samo istnienie ich wszystkich w świecie, w którym w czasie I wojny światowej Marsjanie zrobili nam duże kęsim w naszą wersję historii jest DUŻYM naginaniem prawdopodobieństwa). O wiele bardziej wolę jednorazowe aluzje (kucharz Chińczyk czy pewna dorożka), nie narzekam też na pewnego kota z Malowanej Moskwy, bo jest tam wstawiony logicznie, ale cała banda z podgórskiej knajpy jednak mi zgrzyta. Jednak po przymknięciu na nich oka rozgryzanie kolejnych fint w fintach Kutrzeby i tajemniczego Szóstego przynosi dużo czytelniczej frajdy.

Well, it is not a typical Vorkosigan novel, there is no Big Crisis of any kind, just a pair of people trying to get on with their lives after losing someone they loved. But I got to finally revisit Codrelia and Sergyar, got to know Oliver Jole and met a bunch of secondary characters I want to know more about.
Definitely book for long-time fans, but there is nothing wrong with that.

The series had been unusal reading experience for me. The first volume had been interesting but for some unexplicable reason I could not really get into it. So I tried reading few last chapters – that went OK. I came back to continue from beginning and stalled again after several pages. So I went and read a few previous-to-last chapters – no stalling. In the end I finished whole book in that manner reading in chunks from end to beginning. And the „it's interesting, but cannot get into it” feeling had been there for the other 3 volumes, so I read all 4 in this somewhat unusual manner, and now I'm waiting for the final one wondering if I should try to read it in the conventional way or give up and start at the ending. ;-)

Zaokrąglone z 2,5 gwiazdek. Niestety, nie jest to wybór tekstów najlepszych z najlepszych.

Extra points for wombat fans. ;-)

2 i pół gwiazdki, jak zwykle zaokrąglone w górę.

More like two and half stars – mostly because I strongly dislike plots hanging on people not telling each other important things. And do not get me started on Pelakkia's apparently non-existing plan for the armory robbery...

W zasadzie to 1½ gwiazdki, ale jak zwykle zaokrąglam w górę.

Rounded up from 1 and half stars. No plot to speak of, and one of the greatest gathering of unlikable people I can remember. Not that any of them is very particulary bad, but I got the feeling that the only reason not all of them are selfish or cruel is that we do not know enough about them...

Tradycyjnie zaokrąglone w górę – prawdziwa ocena to 2,5 gwiazdki. Są w opowiadaniach fragmenty, które mi się podobały „trójgwiazdkowo”, ale niestety jako całość lekko rozczarowywuje. Twórcy serialu zrobili kawał dobrej roboty dodając do fabuł Runciego atmosferę, której w książce brakuje – i nie sądzę żeby to była tylko kwestia przekładu.

It's somewhere between 3 and 4 stars, but, as usual, I'm roundung up.

Cozy mystery with a bit of twist – enough to make a difference and make it stand out from the crowd. (Also: a pug!).

Can you write suspence and intrigue with less then 3000 words? I do not know, Roald Dahl needed 1000 more to write Lamb to the Slaughter, but let's say it's possible, but requires an idea and willingness to strip everything not essential. So sticking to the cosy mystery template in a short story is not a good idea – you get all the ingredients crammed in, but no atmosphere at all.