Valerie

Let me start by saying Katherine Arden is a really nice person who even comes into town a day early for conventions because local bookstores tweet at her to come visit. Really cool person who has clearly done a ton of research into Russian mythology and folklore. Definitely my favorite part of the book is the coexistence of household spirits and Christianity. I think a lot of stories end up firmly on one side or the other, but Arden's story (while clearly supportive of the chyerti) firmly favors the idea that both can be true.

Anna is the most interesting character in my opinion. The difference in being born with the Sight and told “these are normal things” and “these are demons” is portrayed with skill and makes her a fascinating if tragic character. Honestly, I'd reread this story from her perspective.

While it was a slow starter (I see Arden setting up Russian politics for the second book, but it was hard to get through to actually hear Vasya's beginning), I think this is one of those books aimed at a YA audience that successfully translates for older readers. Not sure when I'll get to the sequel, but it was a fun read reminiscent of Tamara Pierce with a Russian twist.

Really, this book is 3.5 stars, and the demotion is mainly due to it taking me so long to get into the characters. Cherryh's world – galaxy, really – is enormous, and she needs a fifth of her book to set up the extraordinarily complex political and social structures. Her introduction of characters was slow, but provided enough misleads and second guessing as to make the characters grow more interesting as the story progressed.

The story itself is about the speed at which humans begin to evolve socially once space travel and space colonies are a reality. It's a political book, without too much of the science behind how they got there, which suits me just fine. I liked the archetypes she created for colonials/stationers, merchanters, and Unionists, and I like that this wasn't a clear-cut Empire vs. Rebellion story. It resonated with me on the level of “Okay, so the Empire's not so great, but the Rebellion is total chaos.” Pell and the Konstantins' situation as a wishful neutrality in this war-torn era is the place I'd most likely find myself.

I'll be honest, though, I wasn't a hundred percent invested in most of the characters. Maybe it's Cherryh's style or just the fact that I really wanted to get back to certain viewpoints, but I found myself glazing over when we were in a point of view I didn't enjoy as much. Mallory is a fascinating character, and one whom I never really like but end up rooting for nonetheless; however, her POV is so busy as she goes through political stratagem after military schematic that I sighed every time it was her turn. There were also just a ton of characters whose alliances and motives I could never quite keep straight, but that's likely more a personal attention-span problem.

I think the complexity of the story is why the hisa are so important. Their wonderfully simple, emotional viewpoint is a welcome break from the worried and frustrated humans. The hisa calm the pace, and their childlike nature and straightforward perspective make us care for them on a level we just can't for the humans. I love the way Cherryh describes them, love their patois, love every time they say “love you.” They harbor none of the resentment a lesser author would give to this race and never break character by acting too human. They even distinguish good humans from bad humans instead of generalizing. If they occupied any more of the story, it might have become an Avatar-esque oversimplification of a native species, but as is, it's a reminder of what exploration means: the melding and evolution of multiple cultures. I looked forward to every chapter in Satin's point of view.

Among the humans, Talley was easily my favorite and had all the best surprises. He starts out, like the hisa, an innocent with whom the reader can easily side. However as his character and motives grow more complex, he keeps the reader and other characters guessing. Ayres was interesting as well, and I liked the evolution of his relationship with Azov and Jacoby. Never a clear line in this tale.

On a completely different note, I will say this story does have a strikingly unique feature that made me just about stand up and cheer: happily married couples.

I am known to get extremely frustrated with romantic plot lines in the middle of big stories. Romance has a tendency to detract from the actual plot, just something authors throw in because everyone does it. Characters starting a relationship in the middle of an epic space battle often make me go, “Really? You think now is the best time for this?” On the flip side, so many stories begin with unhappily married couples or widows/widowers deep in grief. If a character begins happily married, you can rest assured that will change by the end. It's like a happy marriage is the fiction in fiction.

This story has not one but 3 happily married couples, if you hisa bonding as marriage, who stay happily married to the end. The couples all function well as couples and do not waste time with typical bickering. They see the chips fall, and they do what has to be done to keep their loved ones alive, even when that means separating for unknown periods of times. The characters in this story have a very believable concept of focus and priorities, and for that I tip my hat to Cherryh. Our time is not wasted learning about the relationships' histories. It is enough to know that these people got married because they loved each other, and that love is going to motivate their actions in crisis. Done and done with no wistful gazing at the the stars.

Final thoughts: If you enjoy complex political drama and also outer space, you will really love this book. If you're like me and have trouble keeping up with complex political drama, I suggest you keep a wikipedia page open and handy.

I wanted to like this book a lot, but something about it just didn't connect with me. I think it had magic realism ambitions in a commercial fantasy, and I wish it would have taken more risks and done less explaining. I enjoyed the actual story a lot (though the final villain reveal didn't necessarily feel earned to me), but I had trouble feeling very deeply for anyone except perhaps young Orchidea. It's not a bad book by any means, but I think the prose fell just shy of being a really great book.

I love Connie Willis enough that I was willing to give a rom-com a try, but in the end, it wasn't for me. I do love her humor, musical references, and style. The sci-fi parts are quite fun, and it picks up a lot after the mid-point, but the trappings of the genre are just not what I enjoy. Great fun if you're into rom-coms, but she has a lot of better sci-fi if you aren't.

This book is absolutely charming. I think that's the best adjective I can find to describe it. Written by Charlie Jane Anders of io9 fame, it reads with the speed and snark of an io9 article, but it also has a rich sense of both the fantasy and science fiction vault of tropes. Anders plays with these tropes, using them and suberting them to support what is essentially a Romeo & Juliet story if Romeo & Juliet both really loved their families and thought about the consequences of their rash actions and understood that being 13 is really not a time to make lifelong committments.

Basically, it's everything I love.

If I had to make a criticism, it would be that some of the pop culture references feel a little forced and stale already, and given that this book is set in the future, they just don't seem to make a lot of sense and forced me out of the story. It was, however, very easy to slip right back in to Patricia and Laurence's bizarre collision of worldviews, methodologies, and circles of allies. Anders weaves in a unique magic system that draws from folklore around the world as wel as a selection of near future technologies, all of which I want, making the bits between action scenes just as entertaining as the pivotal moments.

It's funny, sweet, heartbreaking, and thoughtful. A wonderful choice for fans of modern speculative fiction.

I rescued this book from a family garage sale because I had such clear memories of loving it though I didn't remember anything besides talking wolves. On an adult re-read, yeah this is the kind of LOTR knock-off I loved as a child but that doesn't really hold up.

The book club I'm in picked this one, and sort of billed it as a Firefly-esque ragtag crew space opera, which admittedly is something I'm a little tired of already. The way I interpreted was that there was a romance sub-plot. What I got was a straight up romance with an SF background. If that's what you're looking for, you'll enjoy this one. If not, don't bother. The story beyond the romance is weak, the characters are blah, and the writing is pretty juvenile. I don't read a lot of romance, but to me even that felt pretty weak and uncomfortable. It was like reading fanfic for a show I'd never watched. Maybe it's okay if you just want some light space smut, but I'd avoid it if you want an actual space opera.

Ann Leckie is definitely one of my favorite modern authors. She writes with such a great sense of humor and has such incredible world-building skills. While I didn't like Provenance quite as much as the Ancillary series (it doesn't make quite the same social commentary), I did find it a very enjoyable adventure. I love the idea of “vestiges” and a culture that is built around collecting artifacts whose value changes with each moment. Maybe it's because I own a ton of relatively worthless things that i value so highly...

While this book doesn't deal with gender issues as directly as the Imperial Radch books do, Leckie does make a point of including gender neutral pronouns for certain characters, and being non-binary is a subject treated as ordinarily as being cis-gender. She even has characters who determine gender with their assumption of adulthood, a pretty great concept. On her book tour, Leckie spoke at length about stealing from archaeology, and I'd really be interested to read her annotations on which cultures she pulled from to write this and her other books.

Set in the same world as the Radch trilogy, but not in the Radch, this book is also full of Easter eggs for readers of the previous trilogy while not necessitating reading in order. When Radch characters show up, I had a whole different view of them than I did in the first series, which is a pretty cool trick to pull off.

Provenance is engaging, twisty, emotional, and altogether a great read. Highly recommended to people who like their space opera with biomechanical spiders and a diverse, non-binary cast.

Well, I grabbed this book hoping for more poppy first contact hijinks, but what I got was a deep dive into depression, trauma, and the descent of the US into fascism. So not exactly like the first book. It's good. Ellis is a good writer, and she builds complex characters with complex relationships. That said, it is a much harder read than I was anticipating, and ended up taking a lot more out of me than I intended to give. If you like aliens and hate fascism, it's still a good read, but if you're processing any lingering traumatic events or want something for the beach, maybe skip it.

I was unsure of this one going in for two reasons. 1) The overused A&B title format which just signals blandness to me and 2) I had my big fairy tales but for adults phase all the way back at Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, so I'm hard to please in this area. My hopes were raised when I found out that T. Kingfisher is actually Ursula Vernon whose graphic novels I've enjoyed for many years, and her style and flair really saved the book from the mire of grown up fairy tale tropes. It's a good story, that suffers maybe a little too much from deux ex machina plot devices, but the characters and writing make it feel part of the world and not a cheat. Overall enjoyed it and would recommend to people who love a dark fairy tale and people who used to love them but have lost faith in a tired subgenre.

This was the number one recommended book for new parents from my husband's therapist group, and I can see why. It is less of a “how-to” and more of a self-reflection tool. It focuses much more at analyzing your own childhood, personality, and history, pulling out the good things and gaining awareness over the problems. It respects that every family is different, and instead of prescribing 5 steps for potty training, discusses how to stay calm in situations and what to do when you inevitably do lose your cool. I think it's a book I'll be coming back to as I start this journey.

After the last two intense, complex books I read, this one was a delight. Granted, I have been dealing with a bit of a TFA obsession since the movie's release, so my opinion is far from unbiased, but I still had a great time. The book is really three novelettes each one centering around one of our new heroic trilogy in the months, weeks, and days leading up the to events of the films. They are nothing you have to read, but they help establish a few of the character traits which make these three stand out and become the leading characters.

Finn's was probably my favorite story because A) we actually get to see Captain Phasma say more than three things and B) it's the most different from what I had assumed about his character. Also, the life of a stormtrooper is not something we've ever glimpsed in any of the movies, so it was a fresh story. Sadly, Poe's story was the most dragging, probably because it's most descriptions of X-wing fights which are fun to watch, less fun to read. Rey's is a solid middle ground story that made me very thirsty.

It's probably not a good collection for the casual Star Wars fan, but if you, like me, are having a hard time wondering what to do with your life until Ep XIII, then this is a nice way to spend a few hours.

I really enjoyed half of this book, but the other half annoyed me to no end. I think that the portrayal of Katrina as a homeless, trans, violin prodigy willing to sell her soul for a scrap of dignity is extremely well done, realistic, and poignant. However, Lan the donut lady/alien refugee mom was so flat and dull that it inhibited the whole story for me. From the non-sensical romantic aspects to her frequent disregard for her children, I just could not get into her storyline at all, especially not mashed together with soul stealing demons. Aoki is great at writing about food for sure, but the overall conceit of the book is just not for me.

I think all expectant moms should check this book out. I honestly wish I'd read it earlier because there's a ton of information about fertility and conception myths that would have been really helpful. Oster uses a data-driven approach to help pregnant people make the best choices for themselves and their baby. There's SO MUCH information out there, and a lot of the US guidelines for pregnancy are based on “silly women can't control themselves,” so it's nice to have data just laid out to see the risks for yourself. It has really helped ease my anxiety. Highly recommended.

I've been 50/50 on CJA's novels, but I really think she excels at the short story. The range demonstrated in this one collection stretches from whimsically cheerful to violent absurdist to scathing speculation and dark realities. "Captain Roger in Heaven" and "Power Couple" are probably the standouts that were new to me in this collection. I think the only one I really didn't care for was "Fairy Werewolf vs. Zombie Vampire" which just tipped my whimsy scale over the edge. The only other slightly disappointing factor was that I already owned other collections featuring these stories, but it was still a nice excuse to reread them. I think I could read "As Good as New" any number of times and still appreciate it.

The book jacket to this edition calls her "This generation's LeGuin," but I think that's not entirely fair. Yes there's a heavy dose of social commentary and speculation, but CJA's style is distinctively her own and is deeply rooted in this generation here and now

I am a huge fan of Madeleine L'Engle's books for young readers, the books which truly set me on the path for science fiction for a tender age. One of the volunteers at my school learned this and gave me a copy of this, L'Engle's first book, written for adults. In L'Engle's forward to my edition, she cites that this is very much a first novel worked on for ages before she found success with “A Wrinkle in Time.” It's definitely not a book I would typically pick up from the description, but it does have its charm.

The story tells the coming of age of Katherine Forrester, an aspiring pianist. L'Engle paints beautiful pictures of grief and loneliness which I found strikingly accurate. The way that Katherine deals with the many rainfalls of her life all seem fundamentally grounded in truth. They are without doubt the best part of the book.

That said, the actual story is not exactly to my taste and the dialogue is sorely dated. The story takes place just before WWII, and I just have a hard time knowing what is conventional slang and what is just stilted and awkward. In that area, at least, the first novel-ness stands out.

If you are in need of a somewhat maudlin coming of age story, L'Engle's style still makes this worth a try, but for me, I need a few tesseracts to make the journey stand out.

I got this book for Christmas, and while it isn't the sort of thing I'd normally pick up for myself, I ended up really enjoying it. Every time someone asked me what it was about, I had a different description because it's just about so much. The title is a bit sensational for the actual themes of aging, death, trauma, and love. Each character is a work of art in their depth and complexity. The historical aspects seem meticulously well-researched, and it while it is not necessarily a work of historical fiction, it has lots of vivid descriptions of racial and feminist issues in the 40s-60s, including Japanese internment and relocation, a topic that desperately needs more coverage as the last first-hand sources are all in their 80s and above.

If I had to narrow it down to one idea, it would be that there are many ways to love at many points in our lives, and aging is as much about loving as any other point in our lives. Familial love, passionate love, comforting love, friendship love, even loving our pets are all explored with both tenderness and pragmatism.

This is a crying novel, and I think I'd like to read it again when I'm older. I may just be too young to connect on the levels Allende is working, but I'm old enough to appreciate the beauty of this story.

Beukes is a great writer and thorough researcher who created a cast of interesting, powerful, complicated women throughout time. It just sucks that most of them are murder victims. I think I understand conceptually her desire to give voice and depth to the as she calls them “pretty corpses” of crime thrillers, and she does that, but the genre itself is still limiting. The murderer is misogyny person, literally killing women who would otherwise change the world. It's a solid metaphor, but a frustrating read.

Also, while the time travel element is cool, the paradoxes always hurt my brain a bit. The writing was good enough that my suspension of disbelief was only strained rather than snapping.

I love the works of Lovecraft, but I love works that draw from lovecraftian mythos a lot more because they can use the good parts and cut out the racism and misogyny. Lovecraft Country, however, takes the idea one step further. Instead of ignoring or excusing the problems, it leans into them to show how much scarier they are than any tentacled horror. It's a brilliant book, and really does a great job as both historical and supernatural fiction.

It's been a while since a book made me cry, but I sobbed all the way through the second half of “The Last of the Winnebagos.” Dogs, man. I can't handle dog stories. Connie Willis goes beyond talented into the realm of gut-wrenching, emotion-twisting savant. Some of the stories in this collection are delightfully quirky (Emily Dickenson vs. War of the Worlds as told in a thesis proposal anyone?) and some are deeply depressing (She really knows a lot about the Blitz), but every one is a gem as would be expected. This is probably a good collection if you've never read Willis before (although one story does read better if you've read the Doomsday Book) and is a must for fans of her other work.

This volume is our introduction to Raven, daughter of the Pirate King and identity of The Black Arrow. Raven is our rogue character, chaotic good in the alignment schemes. Also really great outfits. I would love to cosplay either of her outfits.

The story is simple (we're on a classic hero's quest here with Adrienne gathering her party of unlikely allies), but still enjoyable. Whitley's commitment to providing quality entertainment with a diverse cast, a positive message, and a serious amount of action and adventure remains clear. This particular volume is somewhat divorced from the main storyline and can be appreciated without having read the other books. Highly recommended for anyone looking to inspire a young adventurer.

I was sadly a little disappointed in this book. I love The Hum and the Shiver so much, and I really enjoyed the world building and concept, but this volume felt a bit clunkier. Mostly, I think the romantic plot lines just threw me off and felt a little squicky. Actually, Bronwyn's romantic plot lines were my only issue with the first book too, so maybe I just don't enjoy Bledsoe's style with romance. I was much more interested in Bliss and would have liked to explore her character more. I will probably continue the series cause the world is such an interesting and unique one, but I think I'll take a break first.

Look, I heard a lot of great things about James Tiptree Jr. She sounds like an extremely interesting person, and I'm told I should give her short stories a chance as that's really more her medium, but this book just ... wasn't good, and also was deeply problematic. I try to read books with respect to the time period they were written, and I know this was written in 1985, but even so.

I read a bunch of other reviews to try and figure out why anyone liked this book, and the most interesting one said that the author was probably writing about truly horrific things to reflect and highlight the truly horrific things in our real world. especially from her experience as an FBI agent. That might be the case, but none of the horrors really felt like they were being criticized to me.

The child porn stars are just that, and people are uncomfortable around them but no one really criticizes them and there are ample scenes where the girls in particular are naked and objectified. And the reward for one of the stars is to become a concubine to an eleven year old prince who just happens to be good at everything? And he picks her after studying her mom to make sure she'll age well? Then there's the weird father/daughter but want to bang non-relationship of Bram and Linnix, the flippant murder of a comatose teenager which I guess we're supposed to take as setting her free from the will of her sister who is also just sort of left in a coma, the fact that even the female character in command is described purely in terms of youth and beauty and the horror that she feels at her rapid aging is mostly because she's no longer hot enough for her hot husband? I could go on, but... man it doesn't get better. This isn't even getting into the aliens deciding what they really want is to be just like their colonizers including selling their bodily fluids to them.

Also everyone in this book is terrible at their job. Also everyone is either instantly way too intimate upon just meeting or completely lacks intimacy despite being married for years. Also, the “futuristic” dialogue hurts to read. Also, why give away your plot twist with a character who as “good hunches?”

Again, there's a world where I could respect this subject matter in the time period. I like the idea of porn stars saving a group of hapless researches. I like a lot of the progressive (for the time) ideas nearly buried under the problematic points. But none of it is done well or in a sensible way or gave me much of a foothold to enjoy the book. I haven't read any other Tiptree Jr., and if you haven't either I do not suggest starting here.

It's worth reading this book if only because basically it's listening to Takei's awesome voice talking in your head about bacon, Lolcats, and transvestite hookers.

My only disappointment is the ebook is clearly formatted for big color tablets and not my little simple Nook which had a hard time with some of the pictures and formatting. Still a fun, quick read through Takei's adventures in internetland.

The fact that this trilogy is now complete makes me very very sad.

As a final part in this trilogy, though, the book makes me very very happy.

I fell in love the Leckie's Radch trilogy almost three years ago, and the first book changed the way I read. Leckie's sense of language and culture make her novels unique among science fiction. She gets compared to LeGuin a lot, which is fair as she tackles some of the same social issues, but I would also compare her to Joe Haldeman for her sense of scale or Heinlein's take on artificial intelligence. There's a lot of science in her fiction as well as a lot of social awareness. That combination makes her my favorite discovery this decade.

Mercy has everything I love about the previous two books: Snarky Seivarden (lots of it!), Breq tormenting people with song, petulant ships and stations. It also features some of the sweetest non-romantic bonding I've read in ages, which is always a plus in my book. What really makes this installment stand out, however, is the Presger who play an even bigger role than before. Our new translator, who may be Dlique or may be Zeiat, provides a heaping serving of humor as well as tension. I was lucky enough to hear Leckie read Zeiat's introduction at a signing a few weeks ago, and the entire audience was laughing, even ones who were only there for fellow signer, Greg Bear.

Side note, Leckie brought a bag full of memorial pins to give out to fans. Spoilers apply for books one and two, but there's one for Leiutenent Awn and one for Translator Dlique and a third one which she handed out in a manila envelope with “DO NOT OPEN UNTIL YOU HAVE COMPLETELY FINISHED ANCILLARY MERCY” holding it shut. It made me read the book very quickly. Inside was a Republic of the Two Systems pin and SEIVARDEN IS STILL ALIVE SO I DON'T HAVE TO BURN ALL THE BOOKS LIKE I EXPECTED!.

I imagine a lot of people will find the ending a bit harried, but to me it fit with Breq's quick thinking nature and the themes of personhood Leckie has been building all along. It's really nice to see a Singularity in which AI really does want to protect people and not in an “I will trap you in suspension pods so you can't hurt yourself” way either. A little rosy, but an enjoyable change of pace.

The entire Radch trilogy changed they way I think about gender, artificial intelligence, and tea. If you are interested in science fiction on any of those topics, you really should read it. If you're a fan of the first two books, you're doing yourself a disservice to skip this one. I know there's a lot more story in this universe, and I can't wait for Leckie's promised exploration beyond the Justice of Toren.