Valerie

What if your brother was probably the messiah? Or your son was? Or what if your whole family believed you had supernatural abilities that could rescue them from poverty? What would that do to you and your perception of the world? Those are the questions posed in this surreally beautiful book. Set primarily in Hawai'i, it is a story of a family struggling with poverty, marginalization, racism, grief all while working out if they are actually the center of a divine awakening. Vivid description, a depth of characterization, and some really powerful questions. My mother-in-law recommended this to me, and I'm glad she did because I doubt I would have found it on my own. While definitely not recommended if you are looking for something light and fun, I'd pick it up if you want some literary magical realism that will give you things to think about long after you finish.

Jeff Vandemeer and Alan Moore love this book, which should have been a clue right there as to how weird it is. Oh the back cover mentions cyclops, robots, ghosts, and a not quite empty Eden all embedded in colonial Africa with a cast of fictional and factual characters muddled together like a stirred parfait, but it's weirder than that. In the first fifty pages, I had no idea what was going on. After 100, I thought I had an idea. After 150, I rejected that idea and just sort of kept going to the end when I had less of an idea.

It's easy to compare this book to Vandemeer's Southern Reach, but the latter had a very science fiction feel to it while The Vorrh is more mystic and fantastical. Maybe it's that element that made it harder for me to process all of the weirdness without much context, but the endings (and I pluralize that on purpose) didn't give me a whole lot of satisfaction. There's a core of a “be careful what you wish for,” “Don't eat the apple” story here, but I would have liked a little more foundation on which to ground some of the more bizarre characters.

I don't think it's a series I'll continue, but it certainly kept me thinking and guessing through the whole thing.

I made it. I'm not sure I picked the best time in my life to finish this series, but I made it through. Essentially, my review is that if you liked the first two, you'll need to read this one, and if you didn't like the first two, don't expect it to change. Kuang concludes her historically grounded, raw and unfiltered look at war and the corruption of power without any concessions to the reader's love or dislike of any given character. Punches are not only pulled but given brass knuckles and a couple of keys between fingers. Rin is particularly stressful as she spirals out making even a reader who has been sympathetic to her up until now want to shake her. It's an ugly, heart-breaking, mesmerizing book, and while I doubt I will ever have the oomph to read it again, I'm glad that I did. My advice before you start this last chapter is to make sure you're emotionally balanced enough for the ride.

Emily St. John Mandel has a gift for writing about liminal spaces. The spaces between countries, time period, social classes, families, strangers. She creates such a web of deep, complicated, flawed characters and takes you on a time-bending journey through their lives. I hadn't read this before I listened to Sea of Tranquility which is really a continuation and honing of the skills (and several characters) she already had nearly mastered in this novel. While there are elements of magical realism and ghost stories, it's not one of her truly speculative works like SoT or Station Eleven, but it is absolutely worth the read if you enjoyed her writing in those books.

I'll admit that the beginning of this one worried me, but the story won me over in the end.

Nemesis Games splits up the crew of the Rocinante and gives us every crew member's POV for the first time. It is a lot of fun getting to know Naomi, Alex, and Amos as more than just “Holden's Posse.” The situations that separate them are a little forced, however, and except for Naomi, the reasons they left never pan out into much of stories, meaning the central plot of the book is just trying to get the crew back together again. There's political turmoil and a couple alien issues, but for the most part it's just a family that wants to get back together, and there's the sweetness to that which has kept me attached to this series.

We have returning favorites, and I'm super excited to have Bobbie back on the story front lines. We also get Clarissa Mao returning, so the crew has a River Tam now. Did I read right that the tv show is changing her name to Andromeda Mao. Andromeda?! What the hell? We needed spacier names or something? Ugh... I'm digressing.

Naomi's plotline is by far the most exciting, and we get a real glimpse into how she became the woman she is. Naomi is an unconventional heroine to say the least, and the decisions she makes definitely don't coincide to any traditional archetype. At this point, she is the most interesting member of the crew, and honestly kind of an anti-hero at that. I think she is the best thing the Corey team has created, and I really hope the tv show does her justice.

The overarching storyline does not advance a whole lot in this book, and it feels a bit more like a filler/retrospective than it does the next one in the series, but the ending definitely shows that the protomolecule troubles are not over, and I'll be on board when the next novel comes out.

I could have liked the book a lot more if I didn't detest so many of the decisions made by the main characters. I get that they are supposed to be naive farmboys, but seriously there is a difference between naive and stupid. I liked a lot of what the book had to say about gender roles, and I'm a sucker for high fantasy language (though less than 5 chapters to start the action would have been nice), but overall I found the book a bit lackluster. It's a book I've always been hesitant to read because I walk in knowing how much will never be written, and that fact alone may keep me from pursuing the series.

I really loved A Memory Called Empire, but one of the bits of it that felt a little forced to me was the Mahit/Three Seagrass romance. I feel like that book was so much about Mahit and Yskander and the murder mystery that the romance just didn't ever feel like it belonged. This book actually changed my opinion completely. This book is totally about the complicated relationship of Mahit and Three Seagrass because it's about the complicated relationship between colonized and colonizer. They are the microcosm for the larger political themes, and the two stories play out in a way that is both realistic, emotional, and fascinating. The political intrigue is ramped up another level, the aliens are great, and Martine's writing remains strong. If you liked or were just ambivalent with the first book, definitely go on to the second. Well-deserved Hugo.

I'm betting Sonia Manzaon hear's “I grew up with you,” an awful lot. It's probably true every time too: 44 years a is a long time to be on a television show and a number of successive generations are taught and inspired by it. Maria was always one of my favorites because so many of her scenes were with Oscar, and Oscar is best muppet. Also Super Grover. I digress.

My school district brought Sonia to speak at our district literacy training, and event which (as a math teacher) was less than useless for me and was starting to make me question career choices. Finishing with her was very smart. Listening to her talk about the power of art and literature and diversity reinvigorated me and made me stop counting the hours of summer vacation left for just a little while. I bought her memoir without a second thought.

This book is heart-wrenching, and made more so because it is probably not a big step away from where my students are right now. Sonia writes candidly and powerfully about her experiences with abuse, racism, sexism, and culture shock in and outside of the country where she was born. Some chapters physically hurt me to read, and others inspired me to be a better teacher to my students, to know that even if we come from different places, we can still connect if we recognize each other as humans. It's a good time in our cultural history to read this book too.

This isn't necessarily a book for Sesame Street fans of all ages, but I think it exemplifies the core of love and tolerance, even in chaos, at its heart.