Elizabeth

A pleasure to hang out in the World of the Five Gods, as usual. This one was an excellent combination of the theological elements in the world. Although it would have been nicer to spend some more time with Desdemona, I'm still giving it heart-eyes emojis.

I struggled. I struggled so hard. The first half of the book dragged and dragged and eventually I realised it was because all of the supporting characters, who masked Fitz's incompetence, weren't there. Fitz and his wolf BFF does not make a compelling story (for me). Once Fitz met up with some old cast members again, it was a bloody great story to the end. But that first half dragged so long for me, this only gets an ‘I liked it' review.

On the other hand, Wit-bees. Fucking marvellous.

I read this so long ago I can't think of any definite impressions, except that it didn't suck. Which is one heck of an endorsement from me, at any rate.

Full disclosure: I've known the author for a bajillion internet years (this is an actual measurement of time) and she sent me an ARC.

I can't even tell you how fun this was - cosy tropes encased in beautiful language and FEELS, because obviously. Mage from the slums who can do ‘impossible' things, because he hasn't been taught they're impossible. Should-be debutante who instead hangs out with the lower classes and gets her eyes opened to social and class injustice. A fight against prejudice and authoritarianism.

BUT ALSO, inter- and extra-planar shenanigans, a cracking pace, a delicious romance (FEELS), and a sidekick I did not see coming. 

I really enjoyed this until the plot train began bearing down heavily and driving everyone into the unpleasant-and-predictable corner, but then surprise! Penultimate twistage saved the day. I am very pleased with this turn of events (pun intended), and will be pressing on.

This book was disappointing to begin with. The world outside the fence (and the events that led to the dystopia) didn't hold my interest, and the problems I expected to see develop between Tris and Four didn't really happen. Four was too much the ‘perfect boyfriend' and not enough a multi-dimensional character. I wanted to see some more feels from him, not just towards/against Tris but the other characters in the book that have a major impact on his life.And then I kept reading and discovered why Roth didn't do the typical and expected relationship drama, and then it was pretty much just all the fucking feels. The end totally redeemed the whole thing, and as much as it ripped my heart out it was exactly the right call to make. Not my favourite of the trilogy but incredibly more satisfying than [b:Mockingjay 7260188 Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, #3) Suzanne Collins https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1358275419s/7260188.jpg 8812783] for the last installment of a YA dystopia.

This one was my favourite of the trilogy, and I think it's because Something actually Happened. But to get to this point, to understand the jeopardy and the conflict, you do need to read the first two.

On the other hand, the Something that Happened is so far removed from the plot of the first two stories that I can completely understand why fans of the first don't like the last overmuch.

The brilliance of this book is in the details. Both lives of Patricia contrast in obvious, clichéd ways. The details of both her lives is what made this book lovely. The awful, soul-destroying relationship, and the wonderful, supportive relationship. The life with no career and the life being financially independent. The life with children who love and respect her in her elderly years, and the life where her children shove her in a home.

The book isn't without flaws. Most of the dialogue was stilting and felt unnatural. The awfulness of one life in contrast to the ‘fantastic' other life really was predictable and annoying. The threesomes with Michael without the need for making babies? Ehhh. I'm also really not a fan of alt history at all, although that isn't really a big thing in the book (think Forrest Gump: the story is about his life, rather than the history that happens around him).

But, I love that things happened to Patricia at the same time in both lives. The description of those lives is the best part. The tedium of a boring life with a boring husband. The joy of finding an equal to spend your life with. The awfulness of pregnancy and childbirth and raising toddlers. The wonderfulness of finding something fulfilling to do with your life and time. I relate to a lot of those things. I cried a lot.

This is my second attempt, and I had the same issues as the first time around.

The Humans of New York vibe didn't work for me. I enjoyed it, but I felt that it was wrong for the story. The first time around, I stopped at the Djinni infodump. It got worse. I felt like Wecker was showing her hand, because only Major Plot characters get a backstory. I honestly felt she could have weaved it all through a little more deftly.

Because, she deftly weaves information throughout the rest of the story, in a delightful way. She tells us obviously the Djinni doesn't need to carry matches. Later, she shows, instead of tells, us why. From 1/3 of the way through, when Things start happening, it is a lovely story. You all know I'm a sucker for religion in a story, and even better they're “real” (as opposed to secondary-world ones). In fact, the biggest disappointment was the end, but I can live with it.

Ok, I can't. Spoilers for literally the last pages: WHY DOES IT HAVE TO BE A ROMANCE?? UHGH.

I enjoy a good YA dystopia but this one was a little too much grounded in reality for me. Rather than some futuristic or post-apocalyptic world, this could happen tomorrow. Every time I thought things couldn't get worse, the shit completely hit the fan. It scared the pants off me, and I loved it. You should read it.

Having already been a regular blog reader, and having read all this before (as well as the introspection that is touched on here, but expanded later on the blog), this book wasn't as great as I wanted it to be. I already went on that journey with Wheaton.

But I do always like to read the backstory of blog posts, and especially how we spin writing to make ourselves look better or hurt less. I did enjoy the explanation of the blog posts part of the book.

And I am glad Wheaton came to the point where he could embrace his life on a spaceship, and his life beyond.

I have Feels about this book.It's historical fiction, which generally means a lot of “Look, Ma, I did the research!” and that is definitely going on here, but I never felt it was dumped on me. Hild (the character) is written in such a way that the information a reader needs to know (or, more often, the writer wants to impart) feels like a natural part of her- with a HUGE caveat: Four-year-olds, and seven-year-olds, do not have the maturity Hild displays at these stages of the story. Maybe when she approaches teenage years, given her position in the royal family and the role created for her, the insight and maturity she is given is a bit more believable. Until the story got there, however, I was firmly rolling my eyes but willing to press on a bit more until that rocky start resolved itself.It's a character-driven story, to the point where nothing happens for extremely long stretches, in an already long book. Which is fine for real life, tedious for a pleasurable read. By half-way I was extremely ready for the book to be over. But the reasons the book is slow are also it's greatest strengths for this medieval historian reader. If you're interested in fifth-century daily life, noble life, political struggles and scheming and the machinations of the court, the loud and noisy manoeuvring of men and the quiet and subtle manoeuvring of women, marriage alliances and childbirth and weaving and healing and the conflict of Ionian and Roman Christianity with each other and with the ‘pagan' gods already established, this novel is full. It's historical fiction in the purest sense - Griffith has taken the highlights of a historical figure whose life we know nothing about, and reverse engineered them into a story of her childhood and how she developed those talents. The only ‘solid' information extant about Hild the Saint is the hagiography helpfully provided by Bede ([b:Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum 18935708 Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum Bede https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1385328180s/18935708.jpg 26943388]) in his documentation of the Christian conversion of the Anglo-Saxons. Griffith is explicit that she made up this story, but I worry that readers will miss that part. An improbable-but-not-impossible role is carved for Hild that makes her a woman of agency in the world of men, but it is her mother's role that is far more usual for a noble woman politicking in the court, and the role of her sister more usual still.

I thought for a long time I didn't like Harry Potter, after having read this book, and then I thought I should get over that and give the series a go, starting with a re-read of the first book. Screaming fans over the world might have a point, right?

This was not the book I remembered, and I really enjoyed reading it.

Given up. While the Audible narration is brilliant (Kate Redding, of course) the audio editing is terrible and the story is tedious. I'm adding this only because I spent so much time giving it ‘one more chance' - usually I don't add my DNFs.

If this was the first in the series, I probably wouldn't have continued. The story switches between Akiva and Karou, but also gives POVs from new people (to show what Akiva and Karou are doing). It doesn't flow as nicely, and certainly isn't linear as the author switches up the order of events to heighten the drama. It didn't suck, but it wasn't my favourite.

But. I love the world, I love the concept, I love Karou and Akiva (and the cast of old friends and enemies), and so I was happy just to be pulled along for the ride.

As I was reading this book I was reminded of one of Nigella Lawson's cooking porn shows, in which she said she didn't know if she actually liked drinking tea or if she had convinced herself she liked it because she knew it was good for her.

I've attempted Pratchett before and found him hard-going, as I have with Douglas Adams and Ben Elton, who write in the same style. They take a lot of effort and, although I had a lot of I see what you did there moments, and a few genuine laugh-out-loud moments, I don't know that the effort I had to put in was repaid by the enjoyment I got back.

This came up on my radar as being something to fill in the interminable gap between Stormlight Archive installations. Then a Goodreads friend read it and enjoyed it. And the clincher was the book being picked as the June 2015 Sword and Laser pick (which have been mostly miss-and-miss for me the past twelve months, either I've read them or I've been entirely uninterested.)Turns out, aside from the main story (and kind of the point of the main story, no spoilers), this book is full of both history and religion and I've realised that I love that in a fantasy novel (I love that in real life, so it's hardly a surprise).It was a fun and enjoyable read, but I doubt I'll pick up [b:City of Blades 23909755 City of Blades (City of Stairs, #2) Robert Jackson Bennett https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1426255519s/23909755.jpg 43516764]. This works quite nicely as a stand-alone.

 If you were thinking “I'd like a novel with the same humour as The Witcher, but set in medieval Europe and throw in some Czech heretics, but also I like magic and demons and shit”, then why are you in my head and also this is the book for you.

A very silly romp, in that our hero doesn't stop thinking with his dick and then has to extricate himself from increasingly tricky situations.

If you're not as familiar or as keen on the history of the European church and it's dissenters as I am, skip the background chapter at the start - you don't need it.

I also genuinely forgot this is the start of a trilogy until I was on the last page wondering how it would wrap up, so the prospect of more pleases me greatly. 

I was enjoying this, right up until the Big Showdown Moment where Stuff Happens and People Die. And then I was bored to tears. But the denouement was palate cleansing, and saved the book from a one star review. A shame, because I remember really enjoying the first book.

This was a delightful surprise: I picked it up because it sounded like a SF I could manage (I'm trying to up my SF reading this year), and instead I found a novel detailing the emergence of a society and a culture with a historian as protagonist.

You know I'm all about history and religion in my SFF.

I absolutely loved my time with Portia and Bianca and Fabian, and although the deus ex machina of the conclusion bugged a little, it was absolutely set up and believable in the context of the story.

Timey-wimey existentialism 

It's GGK, innit? Sometimes I really dig the one-character-in-the-sweeping-world interactions, and sometimes I don't so much. This one was not as strong for me, but there is a payoff both for the characters, and for the reader embedded in his world-building.

There's far more to dig into with this story. It'll needs more than one reading. I wouldn't have expected anything less from Clarke, to be honest.

On the surface, there's a mystery to unravel, but it's more than that.

Having only just finished it (and without spoilers), to me it's a story of surviving, of reconciling the different people you are throughout your life. Personally, I read it as a metaphor for incorporating things that suddenly change - whatever that might be: mental or physical health, parenthood, grief (to name only a few sudden changes) - into who you see yourself as. It's a solitary journey.

I actually really enjoyed it, and given enough time to digest, I'll probably find more layers.

I'm leaving my original thoughts here but, on reread, this book is not great. Not terrible, but I've levelled up in my expectations as a reader and my expectations of Sanderson; Sanderson, in return, has levelled up as a writer. I had another read in preparation for [b:Rhythm of War 17250966 Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive, #4) Brandon Sanderson https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1587089436l/17250966.SY75.jpg 23840265] and to see what I could see about that universe, which crosses over into Warbreaker.If you do pick it up, try and persevere through the first third. It does resolve itself in the end, but the beginning is really quite average.original review:So we'll get this out of the way first: Nightsong is the sword given to Szeth, right?I am loving everything Sanderson has set in his Cosmere universe, this book included. The similar-but-not-ness of the magic systems in each world is nice. This is the story of two sisters (and some villans and gods), as a stand-alone I think it hit the right notes. Certainly, action started happening before the 75% mark, which was a nice change in pacing from the books I've previously read by Sanderson.Vivenna really annoyed me the whole way through, but with good reason. She doesn't all of a sudden lose her privileged-princess upbringing when she rides off to save her little sister, or when the shit hits the fan, and then even when it does her level of naivety is both completely irritating and completely keeping character right through to the end.Again, the theology really drew me in, and I'm wondering if this is a Thing in this universe, or if Sanderson does it in all his books? And, now that I've read Internet Spoilers and realised that characters are crossing worlds (and series), I'm going to have to re-read the Stormlight Archive.

I spent a lot of time waiting for GRRM to hurry up and get back to the characters I actually was interested in, but of course by the time I got to the end I was ready to buy book 3 and keep going. It's not the best thing I've read but it doesn't entirely suck.