Mandy

Hooo, where do i start? the ending really hit all the high notes of a classic blockbuster movie climax a la Avengers, with the moment of desperation when Wax died, to the sudden revelation of the Bands of Mourning being that stupid spearhead that Wayne nicked right from the start :joy: it was fantastic to read and also why i'm still not asleep yet at 1+am even though i have to go in to the office early tomorrow morning. truly a Sanderlanche!

i kinda knew that Wax wasn't going to really die because he's already on the cover of The Lost Metal but if i hadn't seen that yet i would certainly be quite worried since this is book 3 of Era 2 and usually big plot shifts can happen at this juncture. i was really rooting for Marasi to be the ones wielding the Bands of Mourning to light the place up and save everyone, but ah well. also, those people with the red glowing eyes? did we ever see them in Era 1? are they completely new to this world? and why is it that Trell now seems to be the icon that all the “bad” people are gathering around? also that epilogue!!!! is that Kelsier!? or is my guess completely off?! i mean, he's the Survivor, right!? is he really coming back???? what's going on???

i also really liked where everyone is romantically at this point. i was really worried about Steris's safety this whole time but i'm glad that she's wound up safe and happy with Wax, i like that Marasi is still kicking ass by herself and even has a foreign suitor now, and Wayne, being the complete lunatic that he ism is probably best suited for something casual with MeLaan.

totally excited for the new book coming out this month!

overall 4/5 for me. had to suspend quite a bit of disbelief given that this is a genre that isn't meant to be taken seriously at least in terms of plot and tropes, but overall it was surprisingly engaging. that's also something I wanted to emphasize - it is not meant to be taken seriously, and people should also realise that there should be a line between what you might find spicy vs the values you actually espouse and believe in irl. this book leans into the taboos that work for some people but it's not like everyone who enjoys this book is actually going to be acting on these taboos in their real lives. it's pretty normal and common for people to find certain situations spicy in theory or roleplay but would be nauseated and disgusted by it if it happened in a real-life situation.

anyway, spoiler thoughts: the incest thing in this book is fairly mild - Tiernan hooking up with an uncle (half-uncle?) and cousins whom she's never met. relationships like that have been fairly common in human history (and I'm talking about as recently as the early 20th century, at least for cousin marriages and romances). the book really leans into the "family" thing so much that it's actually quite hilarious and makes for funny commentary on these sidelines. i think what was perhaps a bit more taboo was firstly the idea that a teenage girl was having sexual relations with 3 men while stuck in a cabin during winter (albeit consensually and barely legally - the author makes sure to note that she just turns eighteen before anything starts), and some scenes that i guess are supposed to play into non-consent in a BDSM way because Tiernan is shown to be wanting it. i think those non-consent scenes could've been written a bit better though, because it's never made clear to her partner that she wanted it, and we as readers only know from what we can read from her internal monologue. that veers a bit into dangerous territory IMO in validating sexual assault. again though, i only gave this book a bit more leeway because as i said earlier a lot of the events in this book is playing into painting a fantasy of taboo sexual kinks (basically porn in written form and with a bit more story), and non-consent is a big one.and that's also why i don't like Kaleb. he was a huge red flag to me throughout the entire book and I'm honestly surprised that he was end-game for Tiernan. he was the one who bullied and pressed her the most. I kinda couldn't quite buy into the Kaleb romance in the end. I kinda got a little bit why Tiernan might feel sorry for him but couldn't really quite understand why she would fall in love with him at all. also didn't get why the whole Jake affair had to happen either, especially the fact that she had sex for the first time with Jake of all people. he was pretty calm when she eventually moved on to his sons. I know everything settled nicely in the end for Tiernan x Kaleb to happen, what with Jake randomly shifting his attentions to Mirai and Noah deciding he's more in love with moving away than with Tiernan (weird considering he spent so much time saying he loved her), but ultimately I was still Team Noah. Kaleb was just too extreme in every way and the moments of vulnerability felt too contrived and too inconsistent given the rest of his behaviour for me to really get into it.

“Liberty, equality, fraternity, or death; – the last, much the easiest to bestow, O Guillotine!”

What a book. It was Dickens but also not really Dickens. This book, imo, is my best enjoyed for its abstract ruminations about the brutality of humanity that is ubiquitous through the social classes, rather than waiting for the plot to kick in tbh.

Gone are Dickens's signature grimy sights and sounds of the poor working class of London, replaced instead with an even grimier and bloodier countryside of France. In place of his very-English plots, we instead get something revolving around the French Revolution, which is almost a little out of character for Dickens (at least based on my own poor knowledge of him). This book is also tremendously more violent than his usual, but that's perhaps unavoidable given the subject matter. But what still makes this very much a Dickens novel is his unwavering interest in examining the class wars that precipitated the Revolution.

The Revolution, of course, took place more than a century before Dickens was writing, making this essentially historical fiction. Not that it matters since his plot is not concerned with the social niceties or customs of the 1750s, but the actual historical moments of the Revolution.

The overall theme that human beings are just awful no matter what class you are is a little depressing but honestly not unjustified given our track record in history. Dickens did a pretty masterful job at showing the apathy and lack of compassion that the nobility showed to the peasants, which then precipitated the Revolution characterized also by an identical apathy, lack of compassion, and even a tyrannical bloodlust from the peasant classes.

There were plenty of parts in the book that seemed a little excessive and meandering, but ultimately it was generally enjoyable because of Dickens's hard hitting commentary. The first third of this book was actually surprisingly witty and satirical, a little Austen-esque in the sharp barbs and jabs that Dickens takes at his own characters and which I don't usually associate with his writing.

The plot itself is pretty straightforward and if I were simply to read a blurb on it, my reaction would probably be, “That's it? How did this take so many pages to say?” But it's also about how Dickens wrote it. No part of this book embodied this better than the very ending. Without spoilers, I'll just say that while I had pretty quickly guessed how the plot was going to resolve itself so there was no anticipation or tension for me, Dickens still managed to hit me in the feels anyway by the sheer force of his writing.

Dickens has always been a hit or miss author for me as I don't completely jive with his plots or writing style but I'm happy to say that this one is definitely shaping up to be one of my favorites from him.

3.5/5. This wasn't the easiest book to get through, but also not the worst. It was engaging enough and my biggest issue with it is really not so much a flaw on the story's part but more of a personal preference thing. This is quite obviously an Arthurian retelling and I guess I hadn't realised how much this would hinge on what is basically medieval British military history. Nevertheless though, the story did a good job at a proto-magical realism sort of world, where people with some magical power can coexist with the threads of history.

The book starts with an old and wizened Merlin looking back at the very beginnings of his life and the encounter between his parents from whence he was conceived. He begins life as the bastard son of Princess Niniane of South Wales with a mysterious father whose name his mother never confesses even under duress. Even at the tender age of six, Merlin is already showing signs of having inherited his mother's gift of the Sight, a future-seeing ability that comes upon him in flashes and when he least expects it. Meanwhile he discovers a crystal cave near his childhood home and a mysterious tutor, Galapas, who helps to kickstart Merlin's journey into the thick of British warfare and politics, culminating in his part to play in the birth of the child named Arthur.

As a disclaimer, I am not intimately familiar with the Arthurian legend aside from what most of us would know from pop culture. I think this is probably my very first Arthurian retelling.

The writing of this book is very much of its time (from the late 60s). It sometimes even smacks a little of Lord of the Rings. There's a classic feel to the prose akin to LOTR, but yet mostly it's emerging into a more modern style that we would be more familiar of today, and reads a bit a bit like Ursula K Le Guin's Earthsea Cycle, all of these being written and released within 20 years of each other. It is occasionally a bit repetitive when certain statements and events are repeated over and over again, but otherwise it's entrancing and fairly easy to read - certainly a good deal more digestible than Lord of the Rings was.

The biggest issue that I had with this one was just how so much of it was full of battles and movements of war and who won which skirmishes. Kudos to Stewart for either having done ample research on the subject or being able to make up all of these on the spot, but it wasn't really my thing to read. Even aside from the military bits, there was also a lot of long paragraphs, either of description or of action, that I felt were almost unnecessary to read, and I found myself skimming through a lot of these near the end.

For characters, I did like Merlin quite a bit and was very interested to see how he was going to turn from naive young boy to the incredibly famous wizard that we know of today. I was expecting some 80s training montage moment where he goes from zero to hero within a flash of a few years, but that actually didn't happen. Merlin does hone his skills of Sight but it's not spelt out for the readers how, and throughout the whole story he continues to protest that he is no prophet and cannot prophesy at will. He does perform some feats that dramatically improved his reputation in the region as an enigmatic magician, but a lot of it is actually due to his intelligence and quick thinking more than any real magic. After all, being able to see glimpses of the future doesn't help you build a whole structure as he does later in the book.

I did also feel like Stewart wrote this from a Christian perspective. As we know, during the time period this was set in, the territories around Britain were rife with a variety of religions and beliefs, of which Christianity is only one. Merlin, being from Wales, does in fact grow up with that plethora of religions available to him and for the first half of the book remains somewhat open-minded. In the second half of the book or so, though, Merlin becomes inexplicably pretty convinced that monotheism is the way to go. Whether it's Mithras or Apollo or Christ, it's all one and the same to him, and that his powers come from the one God whichever form people choose to believe he takes. Whether or not this reflects Stewart's own beliefs is anyone's guess, but I do feel like some aspects of this was definitely skewed a bit more to the Christian side of things probably as a function of the time and place it was written in.

Seeing that this is one of the few Arthurian retellings written by a woman, I went into this one keeping my eyes peeled for how women were treated. I know the original Arthurian legend is not exactly well-known for feminism and I didn't think that this book was going to rock the boat too much in that aspect, so I had my expectations tempered. There are only 3 notable women in this book, and I'm not sure I'm 100% satisfied with how they were written but in different ways.

Firstly, there is Niniane, Merlin's mother. She shows grit, conviction, and loyalty in the way she absolutely refuses to give up Merlin's father's identity, even when several characters in the book (some of them her own family members) are truly awful to her and threaten in so many different ways to spill the beans. She's also the only other person in the book to be able to use the Sight, but yet it is said that, being a woman, she only can use it in the matters of love. That was... really unnecessary. Why? Not all women are interested in love. Not all men are interested in war. Plus, Niniane barely gets any lines at all in the book and lives almost like a shadow.

Secondly, there is Keri, a girl who Merlin later meets and is the first girl who Merlin is actually romantically and/or sexually interested in. She is shown as being rather forward as well as being quite straightforward when it comes to sexual liaisons, but yet also mercenary and manipulative. Again, she barely gets any lines in the book.

Lastly, there is Lady Ygraine, the Duchess of Cornwall who will come to play an important role in the way history unfolded. She gets significantly more lines than either of the above two, but only properly appears in all of one chapter. Ygraine is by far the most interesting of the female characters. She has Keri's forwardness with sex and isn't ruthless or unfeeling, but yet she possesses ambition and intelligence befitting that of a ruler, which Merlin also acknowledges to himself. Yet, Ygraine is also depicted as also a little bit wily and deceptive, and implied to be akin to Helen of Troy, The Woman who brings (wise) men to ruin because she's such a temptation to them.

So all in all, not the best female representation imo, though I gave this book a lot of leeway given that it was written in the late 60s. I would consider reading the second book but the writing was so heavy that I feel like I need to have a good, long interval before continuing.

3.5/5. I'm so glad I've finally read this one, since it's been on my TBR for the longest time. Overall, I had a lot of mixed feelings about this book but overall it was a fairly enjoyable ride and I'd probably keep on reading the rest of the trilogy, although I'm not in a huge rush to continue at the moment. The characters were probably the best part of the book, the world was OK but I wasn't a fan of the way it was built in the story. This book being such an iconic cornerstone of the grimdark subgenre had me intimidated lest there was way too much gratuitous suffering and torture porn, but I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't so bad, or maybe I've already been reading too much violent stuff. I don't really like excessive graphic violence, so I was happy for this.

I would give my usual summary of the book here but honestly it's hard to summarize, and that's one of the major issues I had with this book. There're all these threads of plot happening but you don't really quite know what it all leads towards, or what the endgame of the book is. More on that later.

We start off the book being introduced to perhaps our three main characters, Logen Nine-fingers, Sand dan Glokta, and Jezel. We switch perspectives between these three incredibly different people. I don't mind multiple perspectives and I enjoyed it in this book because each character's inner voice was so distinct and different. Logen was definitely the protagonist I could root for, while Glokta is an intriguing malcontent that is the most fascinating of the lot. I was the least interested in Jezel in the current moment, but because in many senses he's the most “unspoiled” of the three characters, I feel like he's going to have the biggest character arc in front of him, so I'd be interested to see what happens to him in the rest of the series. It's also interesting how Jezel almost seems like a “pre-Glokta” and I think Glokta doesn't like him for precisely that reason. Jezel reminds him of who he used to be in a life that no longer exists for him. It also raises the question whether Jezel is going to go through the same kind of pain and suffering that Glokta did, and how similarly or differently will he deal with it.

So, about the plot. We kinda meander along and it's almost just like following the journeys of these 3 people but without really having any inkling about what all of this is tending towards. Logen goes on to meet Bayaz, the first of the Magi, at the same time that Glokta is navigating the difficult and treacherous politics of Adua and Jezel is training for his fencing competition while also carrying on a forbidden intrigue with a respected mentor's sister. We have some vague notion that conflict is brewing on the North and South borders of the Union, but all these plot elements seemed rather scattered and disjointed, and there isn't any one big Problem overarching everything.

It was all fine enough to meander along with these plot elements, but the book only really got interesting for me after the 70% mark, when we start to learn more about the mythical figures at the beginning of the history of the Union, and some very enigmatic references to the origins of magic, which also makes one wonder whether Bayaz is going to go over to the Other Side or something, especially given what Yulwei said to him at the end. It sounds like any use of magic is essentially of a diabolical nature and therefore has to be only moderately used, but Bayaz seems to be throwing that out of the window more and more. Will he become the true villain of the series?!

I'm glad I finally read this and would like to continue on the rest of the series at some point, but I'm not in a rush.

A semi-cozy mystery with a lot of heart but also without being too sugar-coated idyllic. Hovering between 4 and 4.5 because I can't decide. I thoroughly enjoyed this one from start to finish, with an endearing protagonist that I was rooting for almost from the very beginning. This book also touched some of my soft spots and made me tear up a few times, though it's not meant to be anything of a tearjerker.

Molly Gray is as unassuming as her name. She works as a maid at the Regency Grand Hotel, a dream job for her since her passion in life is cleaning up. Everything seems to be almost idyllic at the Regency Grand until one day Molly goes in to clean the suite of Charles Black, one of the hotel's richest and most important guests, only to discover him dead on the bed.

As a protagonist and the first person narrator through which we experience the story, Molly is as endearing as they come. She talks about how she's not so good at reading social cues and body language and tends to take things literally, which seems to likely put her somewhere on the spectrum. Though the story never explicitly says so, it's only all too obvious from other characters' reception of her as well as the various behavior that Molly exhibits that she's meant to be a neurodivergent character. As a neurotypical reader, I cannot speak to how authentic or accurate this portrayal of ND people is so I won't touch on that,. I understand that the author is herself neurotypical as well.

Nevertheless, I found Molly endearing in her kindness and the immense love between herself and her Gran. Molly is one of those people who want to see the world and the people in it as inherently good unless proven otherwise, and that sometimes made me feel so bad for her. I occasionally wanted to scream at her for not seeing how other characters were manipulating her, but I was always rooting for her from the beginning, and I'm usually pretty blase about protagonists in general.

The mystery itself was fairly simple. At first Charles Black's death was suspected to be of natural causes, but soon we learn that the death as well as the entire hotel itself is not quite what it seems. While Molly is our central protagonist and we experience the story through her eyes, she isn't exactly an investigator and doesn't do any active sleuthing. She isn't passive per se, but she also isn't going to be the sleuthing star of her own cozy mystery series anytime soon. The mystery is resolved by other people while Molly simply follows the instructions requested of her to usher the case to a close.

What really shines through in this book is the human relationships, both past and present, that Molly mulls about, reminisces on, or forges throughout the book. Of particular note is her relationship with her grandma, revealed to us through timely flashbacks and which brought tears to my eyes.

Thoughts on the ending: I thought the book could've ended well enough with Rodney getting arrested and then charged with the murder of Black. Everything that happened after that sent me into a tail spin.I'm really not sure how I felt about the reveal that Molly was the unwitting accomplice in essentially euthanizing her grandma. It kinda put a bit of a dent in the perfect relationship between them that I was enjoying thus far. Not so much on Molly's part but on Gran's for asking her granddaughter to do such a thing and continue living with the trauma of having committed such an action. That sounds completely out of character for such a sweet character like Gran to have asked Molly to do. And then also the final reveal that Black's Murderer was in fact his ex-wife. I didn't mind this reveal so much but I was very confused how Molly could reveal that much in a courtroom and then get away with not revealing who the figure was. At the very least I would expect the police to have to reopen investigations into the murder. And why would she withhold that information right to the end? If she was trying to protect the first Mrs Black, then why say it at all? If she wasn't, then why not volunteer that earlier? Why at that specific moment when Rodney was just about to get convicted, an outcome that I'd assume Molly would've wanted. Also, why did Giselle send her that last cheque out of nowhere? I actually expected that it had been her who murdered Black and that Molly was now blackmailing her. I was just so confused.

Overall, this was still a fun and easy read, highly recommended for anyone looking for a cozy or light hearted mystery.

Many things about this book has compelled me to give it a 5 star rating. It's captivating, but in a weird morbid way like the way you can't tear your eyes off something that is so so weird, out of this world, and quite often disgusting and horrifying. Trigger warnings apply at the end of this review because hoo boy did this book have a lot.

The story opens with the unwelcome and unceremonious birth of the infant Jean-Baptiste Grenouille in the stinkiest spot of all Paris, and indeed in all of France. As he grows, being kicked from place to place, he begins to realize that he has a truly extraordinary gift of smelling things. You'd think that he has dog-like levels of sniffing and teasing out scents, but Grenouille's talent goes far, far beyond that of any mortal creature. Soon he finds himself in the house of a parfumer where he learns the art of parfumerie, and Grenouille has found just the scent he wants to capture - that of young virgin girls.

From the blurb and my above description, it might seem like this book is clearly going to be some sordid serial killing with lots of sexual violence but - it actually isn't. Grenouille is a very strange protagonist. He's almost sympathetic in the first half of the book when everyone around him is either repulsed by him or only suffers his company for as long as they can manipulate him for their gains. While one might chalk up Grenouille's repulsiveness to the fantasy elements of the book, the fact that a lot of it is also ascribed to superstition in the plot feels like it's sending a message. What would Grenouille have turned out to be if he had been raised in a less superstitious and perhaps more loving environment?

Grenouille is quite certainly psychopathic. I know that term conjures up images of serial killers often with depraved sexual appetites and whatnot, but I mean to describe him in the sense that he has no conception of emotions, feelings, or anything that makes humans human. It's almost as if he is completely separate from the human experience and a lot of times he feels like an alien being with some resemblance to a human. That also means he does not have the same motivations and desires as humans do, including almost a complete lack of sexual interest in any way. He has a weird, almost child-like innocence for most of the book, which is honestly an extremely weird thing to say about a murderer.

The writing of this book was beautiful. I've never been one to appreciate scents in general, but this book did such an amazing and immersive job in describing the scent-scape of 18th century France, from the roiling stink of the cities to the clearer and thinner fragrance of the countryside. The plot itself was already plenty engaging but the writing was what kept my eyes glued to the page. The plot was already madness to begin with, so I guess I was surprised at how it managed to culminate in even more madness still. Yet, the ending was oddly befitting, though it was also a lot of jaw-dropping WTFery.

I would only be a little cautious of this book potentially glamourizing serial killers or psychopaths. This is not just historical fiction, but actually historical fantasy. People like Grenouille do not exist, and it would be a mistake to imagine that there is anything sympathetic about the murders that he eventually commits, nor is that remotely excusable in the real world.

TW: Body horror, infidelity, child abuse, child death, infidelity, references to incest, graphic violence, murder, animal abuse, animal death

Who said Halloween-y books always had to be scary? This is a perfect example of a tremendously wholesome read that was also perfect for the Halloween season. If I could liken it to a confectionary, it's a pumpkin-shaped chocolate chip cookie - witchy on the outside, but so so sweet on the inside. This checked a lot of boxes for stories that I enjoy: found family, a decent romantic slow burn with chemistry that developed organically, and even a magic system I actually really enjoyed. 4.5 stars!

Mika Moon is a witch part of a group that she (and she alone) names the Very Secret Society of Witches. Being brought up a witch also meant that she had to accept that alone is the only way they could survive, since magic had a tendency to blow up in people's faces if there were too many witches congregated in the same place. The Society's meetings every third month was the only exception to the rule, and always very carefully conducted. The only way Mika finds relief in being who she is is making YouTube videos pretending she's a witch. These catch the eyes of the inhabitants of Nowhere House who waste no time in inviting Mika over to give them a hand with their own prickly problem - three adopted child-witches who have never been taught to control their own magic.

To be very honest, it took me a while to properly get into this book and the first maybe 20-30% was a bit slow-going, even though the writing was smooth and everything. The story only really picked up from there and I basically zoomed through the rest of the book once I got past that point. Some parts of this book made me laugh out loud, some parts of it made me tear up.

Mika is a great protagonist and one that I could get behind. She was cheerful but also not ridiculously rainbows and sunshine. She was strong but also had moments of vulnerability. She had some scars from her past and upbringing, but she wasn't some tormented brooding hero with tons of trauma from the past. Overall, despite all the magic and everything, she just seemed like a character very relatable in this day and age - would not be surprised if Mandanna had drawn inspiration from the real histories of people she knew, or maybe even her own. Also just wanted to throw in a shout-out to Rosetta, whom I found even more relatable than even Mika, with her bookish fandoms, her loneliness in childhood, and her eagerness to go out at all.

For a book like this, I expect the magic to simply just be the window dressing for the themes around family and romance that it's truly interested in, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that not only has there been a solid amount of thought put into the magic system of this one, but also that I really very much enjoyed it. Magic in this book is depicted as a sort of living force that permeates through everything, something like the Force in Star Wars, except that it takes on the behaviour of a wilful child or puppy. Witches are able to harness that energy to create magic in the form of spells or potions, but in the same vein, when the energy isn't used or brought under control, magic can take things into its own hands and make unintended things happen, like witchfire bursting into being out of nowhere. Magic is also attracted to witches in particular and wants to be used, but it also means that if too many witches congregate in the same place, there's a higher concentration of rowdy magical energy in the air and a much higher chance of disastrous accidents happening. It's all pretty refreshingly unique and honestly surprising considering this isn't a “serious” fantasy book.

The pacing was great and while I guessed a lot of the reveals at the end (except one or two), I still enjoyed the ride.

Spoilery thoughts about the last third of the book: I almost think that it ended a bit too perfectly. Everything was not just neatly tied up which is a matter of course, but it also had rainbows and sprinkles on top. Primrose not only allowing Mika to keep the girls together, but even making the effort to know them and get along with them? And even allowing the Secret Society meeting to be held there so everyone could recast the wards for Nowhere House? Definitely ultra-perfect. But tbh, I'm not even mad. I also guessed correctly that Primrose and Lillian were related, although I had actually thought they were the same person (identical twins - I was almost right). I really thought Jamie was going to be a witch or related to one too, but I guess that fell flat. I also guessed that the Society would come together to help Nowhere House recast the wards in the end.

Honestly, most of this book had pretty A-class humour and Wodehouse's sharp comedic writing was brilliant in here. The reason why I gave this only a 3 stars is because, after about the 50% mark, there are a lot of racist themes that pop up and which unfortunately happen to be integral to the plot. Personally, I'm all for reading books in the context of the time period it's written in and that is the reason why I haven't already DNFed and rated it lower. It was uncomfortable to read and ultimately I just can't, in good conscience, give it anything higher than 3 stars.

Bertie Wooster is infatuated with the banjolele and in his steadfast determination to keep up with the instrument, Jeeves resigns from his service. Thrown out of his apartment for being a noise pollutant, Bertie finds solace in lodging at Chuffnell Regis, a cottage belonging to an old school pal Chuffy, who had immediately snapped up Jeeves as his valet straight after his resignation. As with any Jeeves story goes, things get complicated when American heiress Pauline Stoker, to whom Bertie had been engaged to for just two days some time ago, and her father turns up as guests of Chuffy, along with Sir Roderick Glossop.

Wodehouse stories are entertaining but they do follow a bit of a formula: Bertie and Jeeves has some sort of disagreement over some thing or other (a banjolele in this one, but it could be Bertie insisting on a certain tie, or being mad about a girl), and separately Bertie will get called into a situation where he sinks into trouble quicker than someone flailing in quicksand. Everything seems to get hopelessly messed up and entangled, but eventually by the end, Jeeves works everything out, usually at Bertie's expense (usually making a huge fool out of his employer, but which Bertie would be past caring about at that point), and also neatly finding a way to eliminate the thorn in their relationship at the same time. Jeeves always prevails.

This is primarily a reason why I love Bertie & Jeeves stories. Everything becomes so messy and then everything is neatened up so beautifully. Along the way, you get some really sparking examples of humourous writing. If Wodehouse set about trying to satirize the foppish, empty-headedness of the average upper-class young male specimen, he could not have done it better in the dynamic between Jeeves and Bertie. This book is no different in that regard and the writing, at least in the first half of this book, is one of the better examples in the whole series.

But then we come to the disastrous second half, to put things lightly, really did not age well. To summarize the offending plot element, a troupe of travelling musicians of African descent are in the Chuffnell Regis neighbourhood. Some terms are used to refer to them which were fine back in the 1930s, but certainly derogatory now - this I could have closed an eye to given the time period. It is however when Bertie finds himself in a sticky situation and then has to use “boot polish” on his face in order to disguise himself as one of the musicians in order to make his way out is when the trouble starts. I was hoping that this is just a transient scene which would end in a chapter or two, but nope - this goes on and on almost for the rest of the book, with other characters responding negatively to seeing Bertie in what is essentially blackface.

I reiterate that I'm a believer that books should be taken in the context of the time, age, and society it was written in. I don't know about Wodehouse's own personal belief systems and have not read up about his life at all, but taking the book on its own merit, I don't think that there was an overt racist agenda in this plot. It just read like an author who was reproducing the (harmful) values that has been ingrained into him by the time period and society he lived in, but not that he was enthusiastically goading people on to do harmful or malicious things. Nevertheless, there's no denying that reading it in 2022 was rough, which is why I could only rate it at 3 stars. If the plot element had been completely absent, this would be minimally a 4 star, if not higher.

If this is something you could probably stomach reading and you are already a fan of Jeeves stories, then this book would be good to check out, but it's not something I'd be actively recommending to people, and especially not those new to the series.

This is my first read by Straub and what a ride it was. There were highs and lows, but despite everything I was so sucked in to this story that I declined game night with my husband because I had to find out what was going on. The horror in this one was visceral, palpable, and perpetual, though for modern standards I found it tolerable and have read more nightmare-inducing stories. There's a long long list of TWs applicable which I've tried to list down at the end of this review but do your own research too just in case I missed out on anything.

We open the book with a character Don Wanderley whom we know nothing about and he seems to be escorting or kidnapping a child. Whatever we may have felt about Don, we soon also realize that the little girl is... creepier than him. The book then flashes back to the Chowder Society, a group of four aged men who have been long time residents of the small, rural town of Milburn, New York. They gather every few weeks to tell each other ghost stories as a way of coping when one of their number, Edward Wanderley, mysteriously passed away close to a gear ago. It becomes abundantly clear that the Chowder Society has a ton of secrets of their own, and a persistent evil seems to have revisited Milburn.

Let me first talk about the writing. I can see the author's writing as being rather polarizing. It's got a hazy, nebulous quality to it, and can often meander and go into over-description. But it kinda works for this book, as interested as it is in dreams, nightmare, and imagination. In tandem with the fact that this book has some of the longest chapters I've ev

The horror in itself was pretty well done. There were supernatural entities that kept you guessing - Were they tangible? Were they harmable? Were they just figments of the imagination? As the book goes on, worse and worse things happen until the stakes almost go unbearably high. The only thing you can really be sure of is that mysterious prologue you read at the beginning and the one character in it - but even then you're not 100% sure because the book undermines reality a lot. Hallucination and imagination is interweaved and you can never really be sure if the scene you're reading is reality.

In terms of characters, there isn't really one that particularly stuck out to me as a favorite. In fact, I got confused between the side characters a lot because everyone had the same generic names, and I have a feeling this was very much on purpose. In large gatherings where we have name after name being mentioned doing this and that, everyone just started blending together and we can't differentiate bodies in the crowd anymore, and I think this adds to that dreamlike quality of the story, where everyone sort of has a face but also doesn't. Of course, this doesn't apply so much to our Chowder Society members and the couple of people they eventually enlist to help them confront what's threatening them.

Spoilery thoughts: This book would've been 5 stars but I thought the horror dampened a bit after we kinda get a better idea of what Eva Galli was. When it's explained point blank that she's some kind of shapeshifter, the horror kinda loses the enigma that is what kept it horrifying in the first place, and it almost becomes like a magical realism novel or fantasy. I was less engaged in the very last chapter than I had been for the rest of the book, which is odd considering it was meant to be the climax.I also didn't like that Galli didn't seem to have a solid motive to be haunting these men, aside from being akin to a hunter hunting prey for sport and then ramping up the hunt when it felt insulted by them. I had initially thought that Galli was a real woman who had been possibly sexually assaulted and murdered by the Chowder Society and was now coming back for vengeance, but it didn't turn out to be the case. That seems to he her very first appearance in the Milburn circle so there really doesn't seem to be any solid motivation for her moving there or deciding to terrorize the people there.The characterization of women in this book also left much to be desired. I can't think of one we spend significant time with that wasn't overly sexualized with voracious sexual appetites, and that included Eva Galli herself. In Galli's case she's an actual demon or some kind of evil supernatural being, while in the cases of Christina Barnes, Penny Draeger, and even Viola Fredrickson, they all wind up dead (the former two notably at the hands of male apparitions and in the midst of something like a date or attempting to meet an extramarital partner). It's a miracle that Stella Hawthorne only almost dies, I was pretty sure she was going to be killed spectacularly. There seems to be some kind of anxiety or preoccupation here with women confident of and comfortable with their sexuality that they need to be demonized or killed. It's also notable that none of the married men in Milburn are unfaithful as far as I can remember, and it's always the women and wives who are sexually insatiable.

Nevertheless, this was overall a really good and enjoyable read for me and entirely in line with Spooktober and the coming end of year season.

Trigger warnings: Child abuse (physical and sexual), murder, mutilation, suicide, body horror, drug abuse, animal death, infidelity

Overall, really enjoyed this one. While Alloy of Law felt more self contained western/Victorian action thriller, I found that Shadows of Self started expanding that to the wider Mistborn lore and a lot of very interesting and far-reaching questions are being asked. We also have your usual Sanderson mix of tortured heroes, semi-mysterious comic relief characters, unknowable omnipresent gods and demi-gods, and just a whole lot of fun.

Continuing where the first book left off, we follow Wax now as he, at the behest of Harmony himself, tracks down a mysterious and nigh invincible creature that's looking to start a revolution in Elendel. Marasi is now pursuing her dreams as a constable led by Aradel, while Wayne is still... Wayne.

Steris continues to be my favourite character of this series, if not of the entire Cosmere, which is saying a lot considering she's such a side character who has barely appeared in Books 1 and 2 so far. She's like Mr Collins from Pride and Prejudice, but less pompous and more honest. We left off Book 1 with a really weird and sticky romance undercurrent going on between Wax and Marasi, but which Wax has pointedly avoided by stupidly getting engaged to Steris - and yet, he seems to be gaining ever more affection and respect for her, his partner in this almost-marriage of convenience. I wouldn't be mad if Steris ended up with Wax, but tbh I don't think she needs him to shine on her own. I'm kinda hoping that she'll turn out to be an OP character in a later book - why would Sanderson put such a bright and unique character in the wings for no reason and to serve no plot purpose? Her damsel in distress role has already expired at the end of Book 1.

Some lore theories for the rest of the series: I still wonder what is it that "moves" Bleeder and Bloody Tan and it's not Harmony (and that conversation he had with Wax in his head was so weird and hilarious), it can't be Ruin/Preservation anymore so I'm not sure if it was ever fully explained. I had a Cosmere super-fan explain to me that name Marasi mentions at the end, Trell, is the god of Sazed's old religion. My cross-Cosmere theory is that Trell is going to end up being someone from the Stormlight Archives... it's wild and I don't know enough of my Sanderson timeline and connections enough to back it up but I just have a hunch like that.

Some thoughts on the ending: The moment Bleeder took on Lessie's face and mannerisms, I had a sneaking suspicion that Lessie had been Bleeder all along, but I quelled those suspicions given that Bleeder never revealed it and chose to only say it *just* after Wax had to kill her - again. I gotta say **poor Wax**!! having to kill the person you loved not once but *twice*!! He not only has to work through that but also the whole trauma of realizing that this person you loved had lied big time to you, had murdered a vast number of people, had conspired with your murdering uncle against you, and was inches away from putting a bullet through your head just moments before. I hope Wax realizes that Bleeder, though she had been Lessie, was no less of a murdering psychopath of a kandra.

I'm in too deep now to stop reading this series and so intend to finish up Book 3 before the new book for Era 2 comes out in mid-November.

4 to 4.5 stars. This was a really good book that was actually written with children as the target audience here. One might be surprised to find a book talking about death and decomposition to be aimed at kids, but Doughty says in the preface that it's actually children instead of adults that have the most bare-faced questions about death and who are the less squeamish about the subject. She believes that everyone, whatever the age, should understand the realities of death because it's a necessary part of life, whether in our dealing with the loss of people around us or in confronting our own mortality, and that's actually a pretty heartening thought.

I've followed Caitlyn Doughty on her YouTube channel for a while now. When I first discovered her channel, my “morbid” curiosity took hold of me and I watched video after video. But I grew to really enjoy not just the entertaining and light-hearted (but always respectful) way she broached the topic of death, I was also surprised by the attitude she hopes to inspire in more people: that we should be less afraid of death, a phenomenon that is as necessary to life as birth, and to understand more about it. This book is no different. I started this very late last night when I was exhausted from finishing another book, but her tone still made me burst out laughing twice in the first couple of chapters.

Some interesting nuggets that I learnt from this book which I hadn't already known from her YouTube channel:

1. In hot, humid climates like where I am, if you bury a person or a dead animal in shallow grave, you're not likely to find anything left after a few months, not even bones. They're all easily degradable in these conditions, and especially in the shallow layers of earth where it's richest in oxygen and therefore decomposing microbes.
2. Differently sized adults could still fit in the same urn after cremation because height matters more than weight in terms of how much ashes a person will end up being.
3. Post-mortem poops happen and morticians have a variety of ways to deal with them, somewhat explained in the book.
4. My turf, Singapore, is given a paragraph here! Caitlyn talks about crowded cemeteries and how America might eventually run out of burial space, but then also give the example of Singapore and Hong Kong (but mostly Singapore) as immensely population-dense places with zero space for burial. We only have one cemetery here still open for burial but even then you only get that plot for 15 years then you're exhumed, cremated, and stored in a columbarium. That happened with my grandfathers who both passed decades before I was born and before our population density got this crowded, so they were both buried for all these decades until very recently in the past 5-10 years it was mandated that they had to be exhumed, cremated, and put in a columbarium.

If you're open to learning more about death in a light-hearted sort of way, including some weird questions about it (”What happens if you eat popcorn kernels before getting cremated?”), this book - and Caitlyn's YouTube channel - is definitely for you.

This is a bit of a hard book to rate. Technically, it had some flaws that I couldn't ignore with its pacing, structure, etc. and the characters were generally not likeable, but... despite these I enjoyed it, and certainly more than I expected to at the beginning. If you go into this one throwing realism out of the window and expecting almost a sort of modern Shakespearean drama with all its attendant wild and crazy happenings, you might end up enjoying this one.

Our narrator and protagonist, Oliver Marks, has just been released from prison where he had served 10 years for murder. As he walks out of prison, the sympathetic detective who had arrested him in the first place asks him to tell him the real story of what happened. Oliver reminisces about his time in the Dellecher School a decade ago, and the group of 7 theatre students that he had been intimately part of. Filippa, Wren, Alexander, Richard, James, Meredith, and himself, and how their group, once so close together, slowly came to a climax of tragedy and heartbreak before falling apart.

When I first started this book, I was a little annoyed by how stupid pretentious these students were. They ate, lived, and breathed Shakespeare, to the point of inserting random quotations into their everyday speech when it fit the occasion. It felt like a lite version of The Secret History, a book which I DNFed about a third through and didn't enjoy very much, so I was pretty nervous and apprehensive at the beginning of this one when it gave me a lot of TSH vibes. Luckily though, this eased as the book went on. I'm not sure if I just got used to it or because the drama between the students were a bit more compelling and engaging, or the characters were more interesting to read about. Whatever the case, there was certainly a compulsion for me to keep reading and I finished probably the last 75% of the book at one shot, unable to put it down because I wanted to know what happened.

There are two things to keep in mind here that might make the book go down easier. Firstly, like what present-day Oliver mentions in one of the prologues, on hindsight Dellecher felt more like a cult than a school. It's not obvious when you're reading about it from the perspective of fourth-year-student Oliver, but then again cults never are that obvious when you're in the thick of it. It does also explain some of the more over-the-top moments where it almost felt like Oliver would rather die than leave Dellecher, and would certainly sacrifice any number of his family members to stay. It explains why these ostensibly well-educated, intelligent, and sensitive young adults are willing to put up with so much crap in their time at Dellecher, apparently to become better at their craft of acting.

Secondly, this book is a homage and a love letter to Shakespearean plays, particularly tragic dramas. It's not aiming for realism here. A lot of events that happen, especially in the last 25% are so incredibly unrealistic that I find it pretty clear that the author was deliberately steering away from realism and really indulging in that wild, fantastic endings that Shakespeare is famous for. It's basically a modern-day Shakespearean soap opera. This book demands suspension of disbelief In the same way that one would do so when watching soap operas. If you can get past that, you might actually enjoy it.

Thoughts on the ending: I had actually wondered that perhaps Oliver had been convicted for the the murder of someone else and not Richard, and that we're going to see him murder James at the end, but I was wrong. Some people thought the ending was a little shoehorned in with Oliver and James being gay, but I would disagree with that. There have always been little hints and stuff through the book where you might wonder if you were imagining things and thinking too much, or if you were meant to think that there was something between the two. I did really enjoy the fact that this was building up in the background all along and it finally emerged at the end. I do kinda think that James's possibly faking his own death at the end was a bit unnecessary, but it's just about as unnecessary as, say, a faked-death in Romeo & Juliet. I think the just-missed opportunity at a HEA and the OTT sacrifice from Oliver was Rio paying homage to all these tragic plays where everyone winds up accidentally dead or maligned some way or other.

Ah, Murderbot. I've missed its jaded-ass voice, and its obsession with entertainment media is so relatable. “Why am I compelled by my guilty conscience to work, I just want to stay in my corner and watch drama serials all day” is definitely a mood.

I'm starting to think that the episodic nature of Murderbot novellas are probably... deliberate? To perhaps mirror the episodes of the serials that it loves watching so much. In any case, that's completely up my alley and my short attention span these days. This installment was enjoyable, with Murderbot teaming up with some old friends to bring down a nasty corporation.

There're definitely some interesting messages to be had if you dig a bit deeper below the surface - there is criticism about capitalism and big corporations gaining too much power, there is questioning what exactly makes humans human, and then also living through events from the perspective from a robot for whom the boundaries between AI and humanity is tenuous at best. This is the book where Murderbot catches feelings, and it doesn't like it.

I'm not a huge sci-fi reader so there are occasionally passages where I zone out quite a bit. Murderbot can sometimes get a bit technical in its narrative, but even just being there for its hilarious asides and commentary on the events and people around it, as well as the dialogue that goes on between itself and its companions is worth reading this whole series for.

Certainly continuing on the rest of the series.

4.5/5. The Murderbot Diaries sets a high standard but Rogue Protocol kinda squeezes above that benchmark and does things even better than its predecessors.

The titular Murderbot is just a little bit more sarcastic and sharp-witted, just a little bit more human, and the plot is just a little bit tighter and more satisfying to read.

Here, we see our favourite rogue SecUnit (security unit for the uninitiated) decide to go upon a mission to collect evidence to prove wrongdoing against some Big Bad Corporation, GrayCris. It leads him to what is ostensibly an abandoned terraforming facility, but is actually an abandoned illegal mining operation. To collect evidence he has to sneak aboard a team shuttle going down to assess the facility, but soon finds himself doing what he's always told himself he's done doing - protect humans.

There is so much to love about Murderbot, I don't know where to start. Is it his reluctance to get attached to humans? Is it his hermit nature and love for soap operas? Is it him blanking out half way through an intense suspenseful moment and deciding to instead spend those 6 minutes watching the TV show he had on pause in his mental feeds? It's probably all of these things.

Miki, the robot introduced in this installment, provides the perfect foil for Murderbot. It's a perfectly docile, innocent, child-like pet robot that believes wholeheartedly in the goodness of human beings, an attitude that Murderbot is simultaneously jealous of and nauseated by (”I didn't have a stomach so I can't vomit”).

I am endlessly amused by how offputtingly technical the titles of these Murderbot stories can be sometimes - All Systems Red, Rogue Protocol, etc. It calls to mind a story exceedingly burdened with technical and scifi jargon. While there is definitely some of that here, Murderbot is so relatable and so human-like that arguably I've not seen a better example of how blurred the line can be between AI and a 21st century human being.

If you haven't read Murderbot Diaries, you should. Now. It doesnt matter whether or not you are a fan of scifi because this is a protagonist anyone can identify with and enjoy.

Another beautiful piece from Le Guin! This was an incredibly atmospheric story and such a breath of fresh air, as the Wizard of Earthsea had been. Short though this book was, I find it difficult to summarize the story, which was both simple and complex at the same time. Suffice it to say that I was thoroughly enthralled by the plot and the characters.

Tenar is the central protagonist of this book. She's flawed, she's striving to be better, she's confident, she doubts herself and her value systems. She's both relatable and yet a protagonist that we can root for and hope that she comes out the other end okay. I also particularly liked her personal assistant, Manan, cringingly subservient though he may be sometimes.

A large part of this story takes place in a maze of pitch-black underground tunnels, and it is testament to Le Guin's writing that I almost felt claustrophobic just reading about these. I couldn't imagine how any of these characters could be walking around in the complete darkness, in a labyrinth of tunnels, without going mad with fear. I really felt what it meant when it was said that the Nameless Ones have power in that domain there.

Thoughts about the ending: Did Ged really just promise Tenar all these things about leaving the Tombs and then left her there alone? That kinda feels like a shitty thing to do. I'm hoping that that's not really the end of her story because that would be really shitty, and that's the reason why this is a 4 star and not higher. While Tenar hadn't been in a very great place to begin with, at least she was mistress of her own domain to some extent. Ged basically told her to come out and be free, the byproduct of which was killing and destroying all the people she had ever known, including Manan (justice for Manan!), and then he abandons her in this wide wide world that she had never stepped into for most of her life? I'm not saying that they need to be together forever just because he brought her out of it but at least he shouldn't be immediately dropping her as soon as she brought him out of that place - it almost feels like he was using her, which would have been really shitty.

100% definitely going to continue on this series. More people need to read the Earthsea Cycle and this needs to be adapted.

Overall, this was a pretty tight novella, or maybe because the rule-based world that Lundy escapes to is more appealing to me.

Katherine Lundy disappears into a mysterious door in a tree that takes her to the Goblin Market, a world where the concept of “fair value” rules over everything. Need a place to stay? You need to provide an item or a service to return fair value back to the person who puts you up for the night. She meets an owlish young girl, Moon, and the aged Archivist who explains the world to her. Lundy, as she comes to be called in this world, occasionally returns to her original world especially when her adventures in the Goblin Market end badly. Soon, she needs to make the choice between one world or the other forever.

This is another “origin story” book where we find out the backstory of one of the main characters in the present timeline, and this time it's Lundy. I've just had to go and re-read a summary of Every Heart A Doorway, which I've completely forgotten about at this point, to refresh my memory on the role Lundy plays in it. In this one, Lundy shows herself to be a pretty relatable protagonist: she yearns to get away from the real world and the bullying that being the principal's daughter gets her, but at the same time she cannot quite forget the family who, flawed as they are, wants the best for her - or at least, what they think is the best.

I do wish Moon and the Archivist had a bit more memorable personalities, however. I don't remember Moon to be anything other than a mischievous owl girl who is Lundy's best friend in the Goblin Market with no other point to her storyline, while the Archivist felt somewhat like a vehicle for lore dumping.

The Goblin Market was a nice reference to the famous poem by Christina Rossetti. I last read that poem many many years ago so I can't quite remember the details of it, but I have a vague recollection that it might have been an allegory about children interacting with the “temptations” of adulthood and then eventually regretting it when they can no longer reverse things. There is a slight parallel to this in the story, but not a strong one.

Overall though, this was still a great installment for this series and I'm looking forward to the next one.

3.5/5. A little on the fence on this one. It had a pretty fun quest-like adventure where our heroes from the School go on a journey towards Confection in order to put Sumi back together again, but I felt that it was a little bogged down by some didactic aspects that felt a bit too heavy-handed imo.

I think some part of my experience of this book was dampened a little by the audiobook narrator's interpretation of Rini's voice. While the narrator was pretty good for the most part, she made Rini sound rather high-pitched and whiney, and since Rini is such a central character for this story, it got really grating really fast.

There also didn't seem to be a central protagonist per se, with each character taking turns in the spotlight. I get what the intention was behind that but it also made me feel like I couldn't really root for any one of them. Cora was perhaps the closest to being a protagonist. While I also get the intention of why we had to dwell so much on her insecurities, it also felt like she was a bit too defined by that. Again, I get the intention - childhood bullying and fat-shaming can be traumatizing and it's not easy to break free from those memories - but at the same time I thought it did her character a disservice to make it seem like that was literally all she could think about, if she wasn't bemoaning her lack of friends. We see so much of Cora's fears of what she might hear her new friends say about her physique in association with the candy world of Confection around them that, ironically, it becomes all we do associate Cora with, just in the opposite direction. IMO, a single or a few mentions of this to provoke thoughts amongst readers would've been just nice to raise that awareness which I agree is important, but to continually dwell upon almost nothing else was excessive. (I almost feel a bit afraid to mention this in my review because it kinda feels like I could get cancelled for having a different opinion on how I would like representation to happen in books)

Confection sounds like a diabetic nightmare and as someone who doesn't like sweet things that much, the thought of having to swim in a soda sea almost makes me a little nauseated.

Overall, a very short and sweet (hah!) novella. I look forward to continuing the series.

The vibe of this entire book was polar opposites to what I'm used to from Mistborn and honestly, I'm not mad at it. The characters were not as gray and complex and intriguing as I would be used to seeing in a BranSan novel, but the dynamics were pretty fun. This felt like a bit like BranSan-lite, but I'm really not mad at that.

Some background info: I read Book 1 of Mistborn Era 1, skimmed through Book 2 and skipped Book 3 all together, before catching up on the overall events of all of them via the Coppermind summaries before I dived into this book. I was really quite so-so about the first book in The Final Empire trilogy and the series just didn't really improve much for me. I can't pinpoint what didn't really catch me about Mistborn because I love Stormlight Archives.

Despite my unsatisfactory sojourn with Mistborn Era 1, I was still pretty interested in trying out Era 2. What was the most interesting to me in Mistborn had been the magic system and we still get a ton of that in Era 2, but in a completely new environment with new characters and a new overarching plot. I was excited to give it another go, but was even then surprised by just how different this felt from a Cosmere novel. For one, Alloy of Law takes place in a sort of late Victorian-esque setting with horse-drawn carriages, newly electric lights, steam trains, and lots and lots of guns. It was really interesting to see how the Mistborn magic system, so dependent as it is on metals, would fare in a steampunk world full of metal.

Waxillium and Wayne were actually really fun characters. They weren't mega-tortured and brooding like Kaladin (from Stormlight Archives) or even Vin from the first Era, but that's kinda what I like about them. They provide a breath of light-hearted fresh air. Of course, they have their own histories, I'm sure, but there's still something more light-hearted about these two than other BranSan heroes, Wayne more so than Wax.

Between the two notable female characters in this book, I actually kinda like them both. We see a lot less of Steris, Waxillium's sort-of fiancee, and I basically thought she was going to be a fleeting character who will only serve as a foil to bring out the other female character at first, but I was particularly intrigued by her when she says to Waxillium: “You are what you choose to be, Waxillium... I did not make these rules. Nor so I approve of them; many are inconvenient. But it is the society in which we live. Therefore, I make of myself something that can survive in this environment.” By the end, I was... kinda rooting for her? I'm not sure how my opinion will change in subsequent books, but that's the way it ended.

Marasi is, of course, the main female protagonist in this one. She did have her moments and I liked that she was not just a scholar (obviously unusual for a female), but also that she owned up to not liking to be out in the Roughs and enjoying her city conveniences and dresses, etc. and while she almost feels embarrassed about it sometimes, she didn't feel like she should be. Her character is a bit more of the “popular” type, in the sense that she's likeable and obviously written to be rooted for by readers, which is maybe a good part of the reason why I'm actually leaning towards Steris a bit, but I'm not mad at seeing more of Marasi in subsequent instalments. I'm intrigued to learn more about how her Allomantic powers are going to play out - everytime someone says their powers are useless, BranSan will find a way to make it super awesome in the end. We got a glimpse about that at the ending of this one when Marasi's powers were critical in the capture of Miles, but I feel like there'll definitely be more.

If you're into gun-toting steampunk Victorian fantasy with metal-burning magic, this one is for you. If you're already a Cosmere fan, don't go into this one expecting anything like Stormlight Archives or Mistborn Era 1, because the tone and setting is so much more light-hearted than the other two and that's not a failing in my books.

Between 4 and 4.5/5. This was such a breath of fresh air! Nevermoor had a lot of heart, colour, and just all around good storytelling. The fact that it is a middle-grade offering also makes this a great choice for a palate-cleanser: just formulaic enough to be comforting, but also imaginative enough to keep things interesting as you go along, guessing what's going to happen next.

As a protagonist, Morrigan is a pretty solid one. She's got a boatload of insecurities that possibly middle-grade audiences may find relatable, but it's also never over-dramatic or annoying enough to annoy me either (and I am a few decades away from being at the age for middle-grade). Her patron Jupiter North, however, is my favourite character. He feels a bit like a cross between Willy Wonka and Dumbledore - alternately goofy and wise, comedic and menacing. They're joined by a very colourful cast of characters that have distinct personalities: Fenestra the Magnificat, Hawthorne the dragon rider, Jack the eyepatch boy, Dame Chandra, Kedgeree, Frank the dwarf vampire, and so on.

Nevermoor felt a bit like Enid Blyton meets Harry Potter meets Umbrella Academy, while the titular Trials remind me of the Triwizard Tournament from HP Goblet of Fire. There's something very magical but yet down to earth about Nevermoor, almost a bit steampunk but without the machines. There's also something a little gothic about everything here too, from a celebration called the Black Parade to Morrigan Crow herself always being described as being deathly pale with black hair, black beady eyes, and always wearing black.

Despite all this and the tribulations of the Trials that Morrigan goes through, there's an element of child-like optimism throughout the whole story that isn't over-done. We don't get saccharine-sweet morals of the story, or having the world be so black and white that it doesn't feel real adults. Characters, whether they are “good” or “bad”, are always more than what they seem. First impressions can sometimes be an accurate reflection of the person, but often they turn out to be completely different from how Morrigan had first thought of them.

The storytelling here should also be commended. I picked this book up after a slew of books targeted towards adults but none of them had as solid a storytelling as this one. The structure, the pacing, the build-up of tension, the character introduction, the plot and character development, the revelation of twists, everything was just so so solid and well done. I was so pleasantly surprised and it was a breath of fresh air for me.

I also want to give a huge shoutout to the audiobook production. The narrator, Gemma Whelan, was such a delight to listen to and she really pumped in so much life to the story. She also gave each character such a distinct voice, accent, or tone that they really jumped off the pages. The audiobook also had short snippets of instrumental music in between chapters and I found that it somehow enhanced my experience getting into the story quite a bit.

I would certainly be continuing on the rest of the series for whenever I feel like I need a solid and reliable palate cleanser in between heavier or denser reads.

2.5/5. This was a really difficult and complex book to rate, probably because Feynman is a really complex character. If this book had purely been him explaining Physics concepts, it would almost certainly have rated a lot higher. But it isn't. As a disclaimer, I'm completely new to Feynman. I only very vaguely know of his name because some equation or other has probably been named after him, and that's about it. I didn't even know about his involvement in the Manhattan Project (or, indeed, that it was named the Manhattan Project).

This book is essentially a collection of anecdotes, almost randomly chaptered and vaguely chronologically ordered, of events in Feynman's life that he found worth noting down. These are also not the key events however - he only talks obliquely about the Manhattan Project in its core, he doesn't even mention what project it was that earned him the Nobel Prize, and he also hardly dwells on some events that had affected him deeply, such as the untimely death of his first wife Arlene from tuberculosis. Rather, Feynman just talks on about the pranks he played on everyone or the various disciplines that he randomly decided to try out and excel at.

This was a structural flaw of the book that I struggled to move past at the very beginning. I found it difficult to follow. Stories would end and I'd feel like there hadn't been a point to the story. I couldn't grasp the timeline because Feynman, though following some vague chronological order, would quite frequently jump to a different time in his life in the middle of another anecdote to make a point. This wasn't as much of a struggle as the book went on, but I'm not sure if I just simply got used to it or if Feynman's anecdotes got more orderly as he reminisced on more recent events of his life, such as his life in Caltech after his PhD.

So since this book doesn't invite us to assess Feynman on what he's best known for—the easy explanations of difficult concepts—I can only judge him based on the values that he's showing us here, and it is difficult. As with any person, Feynman has his virtues and flaws, but oh boy are those flaws hard to read today in 2022, particularly his attitudes and behaviour towards women. While reading this book, I constantly struggled with the dilemma of whether it was fair to judge him based on a 21st century lens given that he did not grow up or was aware of the values in the 21st century, or whether I should take him as a product of his times. I'm inclined towards the latter, but some of the stories in this book makes the former really hard to ignore.

In “You Just Ask Them”, Feynman talks about a period where he decides to “start seeing people”, basically engaging in a lot of casual hook-ups, after his first wife's death. He talks about how someone gave him tips on how to “get something” (i.e. sex) from these “bar girls” without having to buy them drinks. “Treat them with disrespect”, he was told. He tried it out because he was curious like that, and it worked. But he says he never continued it because it wasn't his thing. Nevertheless, though, this whole chapter was uncomfortable to read because of how it only seemed like he treated the women he met here as just puzzle objects to win sex from by different strategies.

More troubling is the chapter “But Is It Art?”. Feynman dabbles in drawing and painting and supposedly excels in it enough to sell some of his works. The whole process of him practising drawing was interesting enough, coming from a physicist who had never before thought he would exhibit any kind of proficiency in art, but it was after that, his fixation of drawing nude (female) models that was really bizarre and uncomfortable. When he was in art classes drawing from nude models, he usually drew from “heavy and out of shape models”, but then only got interested in perfecting the drawing when a “nifty”, “well proportioned” blonde model came in. He says, “...with the other [heavier] models, if you draw something a little too big or a bit too small, it doesn't make any difference because it's all out of shape anyway”, but with the blonde, he felt the need to draw more perfectly in order to capture her beauty. That sounds incredibly dehumanizing to basically any woman out there who doesn't fit into the narrow standards of what is considered a ‘beautiful' physique, a problem that still plagues women and harms their self-image all the time everyday in this day and age. Further, he asks his undergrad students whether they would pose nude for him, when he was a professor at Caltech. If you think that's weird, there are bits where he would pretend to be an undergrad student himself to hook up with these undergrads at bars when he was a young professor. Now, I appreciate that these were wildly different times with different value systems from what we consider correct now, so the question here is how much should we excuse historical figures? If we excuse Feynman because he's just “a product of his times” then to be consistent we should also excuse the behaviour of men in other cultures from other time periods (say, ancient China) because they too were a product of their misogynistic times.

Another troubling point of that chapter is when he talks about how he imagines Madame Curie but bases her on a nude blonde model. “The message I intended to convey was, nobody thinks of Madame Curie as a woman, as feminine, with beautiful hair, bare breasts, and all that. They only think of the radium part.” I'm not in STEM, but I'm superficially aware that women in STEM have long been faced with sexual discrimination and harrassment by men in the field who treat them as objects only worth sexualizing and not to be taken seriously as scientists. There are any number of articles written about this that you can search up. It's therefore pretty problematic that Feynman would even sexualize Marie Curie, a two time Nobel Prize-winning scientist, just because she is a woman. Now I'm not against women owning sexualities and posing nude if they want to. But I certainly wouldn't want anyone to tell me how to express my femininity, or take it into their hands and decide to imagine me nude just because they think it's the best way to express my femininity according to their standards. It feels incredibly reductive and objectifying, especially saying that people shouldn't just think about “the radium part”, never mind that it was the passion project that Madame Curie literally devoted her life and death to.

Feynman undoubtedly went through a lot more emotional turmoil than he let on in this book. I'm not sure how much that excuses the harmful attitudes that he shows towards women here, given that this is written in his words from a first-person POV. He seems to be reinforcing systematic misogyny towards women in his own field, despite having just broken through systematic antisemitism towards himself earlier on in his career. I might've enjoyed this book a lot more if he had been more upfront about his emotional struggles, which apparently he did have but which was not alluded to in this book at all. Instead, the book sounds like someone who only wants to look back at the “light-hearted” parts of his life and pretend the emotional parts didn't exist. I'm not sure how much of it is the idea of masculinity he grew up with (he talks a lot about how “real men” should behave), and how much is that he was still unwilling to confront the emotional struggles that he dealt with in his life. For people who are new to Feynman, it's really a toss-up how much you'd like him from this book. As it is, the only reason why I'm on the fence at all is because I searched up some videos of him explaining physics concepts and he is such a charismatic and effective teacher. If I had based my impression solely on this book, it would certainly have rated lower than my current score.

Hovering between 4.5 and 5 stars for this one. What a beautifully written book with such a refreshing premise and oh so relatable. If you've ever wondered how to perfectly blend sci-fi and fantasy, look no further than this novella. I went in pretty much blind, and thinking that the book was just mislabelled as being both sci-fi and fantasy at the same time as they usually are on Goodreads, but then quickly found out how wrong I was. I'd recommend this to just about anyone, whether you are a fantasy fan, a sci-fi fan, neither, or both. Honestly, in a weird way, this reminded me a little bit of Howl's Moving Castle even though I'm pretty sure that was not Tchaikovsky's intention, and in a truer way

Lynesse Fourth Daughter is the runt of the royal family of Lannesite, facing the disappoint of her mother and the mockery of her sisters in this matriarchal society where Queens ruled and Princesses were meant to be skilled either in diplomacy and politics, or swordfights and bravery - ideally both. She learns of a demon plaguing a far-off forest kingdom of Ordwood and worries that the death and destruction will eventually spread its way to Lannesite, and so sets off to find an ancient, almost mythical, sorceror asleep in his tower, Nyrgoth the Elder. But Nyr doesn't dabble so much in magic as science.

The story is told through Lynesse and Nyr's perspectives, and Nyr is very quickly the one most modern readers would relate to. Without spoiling too much, Nyr's tone is casual, conversational and he has some sparks of humour, although he struggles vehemently with demons of his own, specifically mental health issues that become all too relatable in this 21st century. I favoured Nyr's chapters for most of the book, although I felt like Lynesse's more detached and stereotypically-fantasy perspective was still a good breath of fresh air from some pretty solemn moments that Nyr goes through, which can cut readers to the quick.

My favourite quote from this book hit so hard about anxiety and panic and paranoia. It doesn't spoil anything about the plot or characters at all but I'll put it under spoilers just in case:

”I know that, while I have real problems in the world, they are not causing the way I feel within myself, this crushing weight, these sudden attacks of clenching fear, the shakes, the wrenching vertiginous horror that doubles me over. These feelings are just recruiting allies of convenience from my rational mind, like a mob lifting up a momentary demagogue who may be discarded a moment later in favour of a better. Even in the grip of my feelings I can still acknowledge al this, and it doesn't help. Know thyself, the wise man wrote, and yet I know myself, none better, and the knowledge gives me no power.”

Spoilery thoughts:

The only reason why this isn't a straight-up 5 stars for me is just because I really wish we had found out what exactly the demon was and what its whole purpose was!! I think that was just a tiny detail that was missing from my complete enjoyment of the book. I just loved the whole idea that it was somehow sending out electromagnetic waves but through some kind of weird alternate dimension and that it made Nyr second-guess how much he actually knew about the universe. I love that fact about the universe - no matter how much you think you know, you are always constantly surprised by how much you don't know.I also liked that we ended with Nyr only possibly offering an apprenticeship to Lyn and it didn't need to become some weird romance - although there're all the hints that it might become that way.

I will just end with an injunction to anyone out there to read this amazing book. I loved it incredibly and almost wish that this was a series rather than a standalone novella. I will certainly read more from Adrian Tchaikovsky after this.

3.5/5, but I'm more inclined to round it down to 3 stars instead. This book had a really great premise but there were some flaws about its execution that got more and more glaring as the book went on. If these were improved on in the subsequent books, the overall arch of the trilogy might be very interesting to keep up with.

Here are some of the issues that I had with the book:

Info dumpiness - The book does a lot of telling, not showing. More often than not, when it's time for the reader to learn more about something, a random tour or conversation or lecture will happen where a character basically just says everything. For example, after the hazardous ride to the Institute, when Alice Quicke wakes up after being in a coma for a few days, she is immediately brought on a school tour by Mrs Harrogate. Why though? Alice is not a prospective student and even if Mrs Harrogate decided she owed Alice some explanation about what her job had been helping them do all along, surely it didn't need to extend to a physical tour around the school? It just seemed like a contrived way to introduce the readers to the Institute. Another example is the one and only time we actually accompany our main characters into class with Miss Davenshaw. She suddenly makes Komako and the other older students answer apparently very basic questions like what are the different groups of Talents, etc. Again, it seemed like a contrived way to spell out the lore and the magic system of the world.

Pacing - The first maybe 30ish% was actually not bad. It was all very engaging until they finally escaped from Jacob Marber at the end of their train journey and reached the Institute. After that, things dragged majorly and didn't pick up until the last 25% or so. I found myself getting less and less interested in picking the story back up during that entire middle portion, even though there were still a lot of lore being explained and revealed at that part. That brings me to the next point...

Overwhelming details - I don't usually shy away from expansive books with lots of world-building and lore and characters. I usually love them. But it does take a lot of finesse to be able to craft that kind of world without completely losing your reader in the ocean of details, which I think this book was just very slightly off the mark here. It got to a point where I was so overwhelmed with details that I read the ending with only about a 75% understanding of what was going on. I think important parts of the world building only creates a deeper impression when I actually see things in action, rather than being told. It works the same way like in classes: you often learn things better when you experience it hands-on rather than just listening to your teacher talk about it. Same idea here.

Scattered questions but no central hook - This book creates a lot of mystery around certain things right from the get-go, including but not limited to: What are the Talents? What kind of powers do they have? How do they exist? What is the Institute? What is Jacob Marber's purpose? The problem lies however in the fact that there isn't one Big Question/Mystery that we are trying to find the answer to. It's like playing a game with many side quests but kinda seem like they're pushing you towards the endgame, but you have absolutely no idea what the bigger objective of everything is. I was interested enough in these little questions to keep going but I kept wondering what was the bigger point of it all. Because you don't know the Big Question overarching everything, you also don't really have that build-up of tension leading to the book's climax.

POV shifts at the worst times - This isn't unique to this book but it does this thing that is becoming a pet peeve. I don't mind multiple POVs in a book and usually can handle it. I don't even mind following multiple groups of characters going around doing different things in different places. What I take issue with is when one group of characters we've been following for the past 2 chapters suddenly land themselves in an imminently dangerous situation, e.g. they spot Jacob Marber coming towards them, then the chapter ends and the next one shifts POV to the other group of characters. It's not only frustrating for me the reader that the chapter ends on a cliffhanger, but also terrible for building up tension because now that I have to spend another 2 or 3 chapters with another group of characters, by the time we cut back to the original group that had been facing the danger, I've completely forgotten what it's all about so whatever happens subsequently barely feels tense or exciting to me. Sometimes, but not all the time, this book does a worse version of this where when we cut back to the original group, we find out that the danger that they had been facing in the cliffhanger actually wasn't that dangerous after all, so it was basically a pointless cliffhanger that was just there to add cheap tension for no good reason.

Writing felt a little rough around the edges - Honestly, the writing wasn't bad in itself. It was certainly engaging at some points, but I did feel like there were parts that felt a bit repetitive or overdramatic. Another round of editing might have been enough to improve this part.

So having spent a whole long review expounding on what I didn't like about the book, I would just end by saying it's not entirely bad. I really did like the premise of it and the world has a lot of potential. The writing won me over in the beginning as well, though the other issues crept up along the way. The book started off being about 4 stars in the beginning, and then dropped to 3 stars in the middle bits especially after our characters got to the Institute, before climbing up to about a 3.25 or 3.5 again by the ending.

Also like, what the heck happened to Eliza??? I was rooting for her so much in Ch 1 and fully expected to at least get a glimpse of her by the end but there was absolutely nothing? Please don't tell me that she's just out of the story like that because I would be pretty pissed. Why spend the whole effort of introducing her so intimately in Ch 1 but then not have her turn up again forever?

2.5/5. This started off pretty decent and an enjoyable Sherlock Holmes spin-off by a contemporary modern author but as the book progressed, I found it becoming weirder and weirder. At the end, I don't know if I could recommend it at all.

For one, Sherlock Holmes in this one seems oddly more intense than he really is in the canon. He also makes a lot more mistakes, which cost the lives of at least 2 characters, and only arrives at the solution apparently just before the final reveal. He even gets himself caught by the villainous magistrate just because he was so absorbed or engrossed by his examination of a body? It just seems so uncharacteristically careless.

A lot of things also seemed to come together too conveniently and unrealistically. When Holmes loses a lot of blood after being actually tortured by the said villainous magistrate, Watson arrives in the nick of time to save him. Imagine if Watson had actually done as what both Holmes and Mycroft had told him to do and stayed in London! Holmes apparently is so much on the verge of death that Watson agrees to do an untested and unscientific method of blood transfusion directly from person to person, using himself as a donor. Despite how dangerous this method is (which Watson acknowledges as much to underline how critical Holmes's condition wad and that they were at last resorts), absolutely nothing happens to either Watson or Holmes after this procedure in terms of side effects. In fact, Holmes is quite literally almost immediately better and he sets off with his usual energy to continue on the case within 15 minutes, with some help from cocaine.

And that's my other issue with this book. The book draws a lot of attention to Holmes's cocaine habit. While this is canon, I didn't like how it seemed to be used almost like a device to “dramatize” the book in a way. It was even stranger still when Holmes used cocaine in the above instance almost like it was some magic substance that gave him superhuman powers. Watson talks about how it exacted a cost on Holmes but we never really quite see how ugly it can get, so the net effect was that the narrative almost felt like it was glamourizing cocaine use a bit.

Right at the end, we find out that Holmes has somehow managed to kick his cocaine habit by... mindfulness. I am myself a proponent of mindfulness but I'm really not sure how much it would help if used as the sole method by which someone tried to get over a cocaine addiction. It almost felt like it was trivializing the problem and struggles of drug addiction in a way. Plus, did mindfulness as a concept even exist back in the Victorian/Edwardian era? It was just such a bizarre way to wrap things up.

So after Holmes gets tortured within an inch of his life, gets miraculously revived back to normal with a questionable blood transfusion and cocaine, he goes on to reveal the villains of the piece and immediately after gets unnecessarily squashed by a falling statue which breaks his leg. After all this, he still somehow survives relatively unscathed after a period of rest and relaxation, and of course mindfulness. It's just so bizarre how many accidents and misfortunes befall Holmes in this story.

This whole story kept me going because it almost felt like a train wreck. It wasn't hideously bad but there were just so many bizarre incidents, overcontrived or convenient plot devices, and anachronisms that I was almost mesmerized.

3.5/5. This was a pretty serviceable murder mystery. Nothing obnoxiously annoying or intolerable, a decent mystery hook at the core of it, a fairly satisfying resolution although nothing completely mind-blowing, and also with a dash of romantic tension underneath it all probably most relevant to those above 30. It was fine, I'm not sure how memorable it is, but it was fine.

Our protagonist is Jodie “Nosey” Parker, a former police officer turned cook and caterer after moving back to her hometown of Penstowan, Cornwall. She bumps into a very old school friend, Tony Penhaligon, and is engaged to cater for his wedding happening in a week's time, though she doesn't quite warm up to his bride-to-be, Cheryl Laity. On the evening before the wedding, as Cheryl is just about to give a welcome speech to their guests, Tony's ex-wife Melissa rugby-tackles Cheryl and an altercation ensues which Jodie breaks up. By the next morning, Cheryl disappears and a body is found.

Jodie Parker is a pretty decent protagonist and I've definitely read many worse ones that annoy me a lot more. I could actually get behind Jodie most of the time, even if I sometimes felt like her attraction to certain men in the cast felt a little too contrived. She does seem to stick her nose unnecessarily into the investigation sometimes but I guess it's a good thing that her nickname really is “Nosey Parker” and it checks out.

Of the two primary male characters, I thought DCI Withers was the more attractive one but I couldn't buy into his chemistry with Jodie, because they had always seemed more hostile to each other until it suddenly just switched to flirtation for no rhyme or reason. I think there's more substance to the chemistry she had with Tony, given their shared history and all that she's done to help him out, but I don't really like Tony as much as a character for some reason. Sooo... I guess I can see why she's stuck in between both.

I don't think any character really stuck out to me really, except maybe Jodie Parker but that's just because the whole book is narrated from her POV. Some of the antagonists in the book were slimy but we also don't really spend that much time with them to properly get a sense of how gross they were.

Overall, everything just felt fine and not much else besides that. I could see myself probably picking up further books in the series when I need another palate cleanser or time killer for sure.