Tshania Sedai
This book is a bit outdated in its examples and styling, but the information about how to create different types of seams in leather and suede are still very relevant. It has great information about the different types of tools that will be helpful for working with leather that you may not have for working with other textiles. I wish it was a bit more explicit about when certain techniques may be preferable to others - it does list a lot of examples as to when something could be useful, but almost every instructions tells you to test with your particular textile. This, of course, is sage advice, but can be a bit frustrating when you are trying to plan out a project. In any case, if you are looking for a book full of great projects and patterns, this probably isn't the book for you. There is a bag project, which actually looks pretty useable, but otherwise this book is much more useful as a reference about seam types, useful tools, and construction processes. I wouldn't have it as a main construction reference - other books are much more useful in regards to actually constructing a garment - but this book is great at highlighting the most useful techniques for working with leather. I think there may be some tools notions that are more modern and have been invented since the book was published, but overall I think it was very helpful in getting me started on a leather sewing project.
I read this book quite some time ago, and found the story disturbing and haunting. I recently had the occasion to re-read this book, and found the story even more compelling than I remembered. In this book, Jon Krakauer describes the events on Mount Everest that resulted in the deaths of so many experienced and well regarded mountain climbers. The firsthand account is well researched and brutally honest. The story drives the reader toward the conclusion with an obsession that makes it easy to understand the mindset of the climbers on Everest, and have compassion for everyone on the summit that day. A great piece of journalistic writing, highly recommended.
The Lost City of Z is a great look at the historical expeditions that explored the Amazon, especially those of P.H. Fawcett and his search for Z, a city whose history is closely linked with the fabled land of El Dorado. This book is a fascinating look at the history, ecology, and anthropology of the region, while still being an entertaining and fascinating read. A perfect book for summer reading.
Heart in a Box is the story of a girl named Emma who has just gone through a breakup, and wishes that she could get rid of her her heart so that she will no longer have to deal with the emotions of pain and loneliness. Of course, after “Bob” shows up to grant her wish, she realizes having no heart is worse than having a broken one, and goes on a journey to reunite the pieces of her lost heart.
This is one of those sorts of stories where I the entire time I was reading it I was like, “yes.” The author just gets it. From the awesome gay best friend to the need to do weird shit to your hair after a traumatic event, everything in this story just felt so connected to reality, despite the fact that the entire plot is based on a fantastical heart loss and reclamation system. The character's journey takes her on an epic cross country road trip, with stops in several major cities. I haven't been to all of the places Emma visits, but I've been to enough of them to appreciate the authentic vibe the writer and illustrator have given the setting. Mostly, though, it is being able to identify and empathize with Emma on every step of her journey that sells this story. Granted, Emma's actual situation is a bit unique, as are many of the ordeals she must face on her quest, but the emotional issues she deals with are universal and completely understandable.
The art in this graphic novel is unique, strange, and beautiful. It took a little while for me to adapt to the style, but it is visually striking and suits the story. The artwork really started to grow on me after a bit, and I really fell in love with it by the end of the story. The visuals greatly contribute to the feel of the characters and setting as the story progress. It is incredibly well integrated with the story being told.
Overall I think this is a fantastic story, with beautiful art, and a charming and heartfelt message. I love all of the characters and how they interact with each other and the world around them. The book feels effortlessly truthful in a way that many other stories strive for, yet fail to achieve. It is depressing, heartwarming, entertaining, and thought provoking, all while being a quick read. It leaves a lasting impression, and is a story I'm sure I'll want to revisit in the future. Highly recommended.
The Traitor Baru Cormorant is a fantasy novel about a young girl who wants to overthrow the empire that has colonized and destroyed the culture of home. Baru is a very intelligent child, and asks probing questions about the nature of the new people who have come to trade with the people of her home nation. Trade, of course, is only the start of the interactions between the empire (commonly called the Masquerade), and the people on her home island of Taranoke. Baru is aware of the problems that the empire will bring to her home, and vows to find a way to stop them. She is chosen to attend the empire-sponsored school, where she is an intellectual prodigy, and earns a position as an accountant in another of the empire's holdings. While there, Baru uncovers the plot for a rebellion, and must choose when the time to strike out against the empire is right.
There are a lot of things I really loved about this book. The first section of this book, when the empire was taking over Taranoke, was heartbreaking and beautifully written. The reader was given the perfect amount of space to take in what was happening to the people of Taranoke, without the revelation feeling either too graphic or too cold. Anyone who has ever studied any sort of history of colonization could have seen the disaster coming, and also known there wasn't anything to stop it. I also really liked the general concept for the book - a woman on a mission to bring down an empire from the inside. It is an interesting revenge story and provides a great framework for intricate political plots full of intrigue, double-crossing, and betrayal. I also absolutely loved the very end of the book. I thought the way the afterward was presented in the form of letters was brilliant, and succinctly tied up any loose ends that may have been left at the end of the story.
All that being said, there were, however, a lot of things that I thought could have been better about this book. Much of this book focuses on the time that Baru spends as accountant, and the rebellion she must deal with in that position. This meant that much of the book was political and economic discussions being held between one or two characters at a time. Now, I'm as excited about a good cost-benefits analysis as the next reader, but I feel that this hindered the world building and that is made the “intrigue” not quite as intriguing as it could have been. I also think that it was probably more of a let down because the introduction to the book was so brilliant. At a certain point I stopped reading because I was enjoying it, and was reading it because I felt I needed to get it finished. There were a lot of moments of dialogue where I felt I could have mentally swapped names of the characters in the scene and it would have played out the same. It wasn't that I couldn't keep track of all the dukes and duchesses and governors running around - it was that I just kind of stopped caring. I think the characters just needed to have more character. I know that part of the plot device was to have all of their motives be secretive, so that the reader could never be sure of what was going to happen, but I think I've seen that sort of device used better. If the reader doesn't have a chance to establish what they think a character should do, then they can't really get that feeling of being blown away when they see what a character does do. This problem bleeds into the end of the story; the novel ends with a very dramatic event that should have been absolutely gut-wrenching, yet I couldn't feel the anguish I wanted because I just didn't feel that invested in the characters. Similarly, I thought that Seth Dickinson's idea for a masked empire was wonderful, and worked very well thematically with the story, but I wish it had been developed a bit more. The mask was something that should have sent fear or terror or hated up my spine by the end of the novel, but was visually absent for much of the story, and sort of lost its punch by the end of it.
I do, however, have to commend the book for striving to focus on issues of gender, race, and acceptance. Baru is already a strong, smart, ambitious woman, who also happens to be from a repressed and broken race of people. She also happens to be a homosexual, which is violently discouraged by the empire. Much of the story centers around her trying to hide this fact for her own self-preservation, and dealing with the expectations of leaders trying to promote a heterosexual society. I think that the science fiction and fantasy communities have been clamoring for more diverse characters for a while now, and I think it is great to see them starting to appear in books that are being promoted by several of the more main stream fantasy publishers.
So, overall, I have very mixed feeling about this book. I think that mostly I am disappointed because it was a pretty good book when I think it could have been amazing. The concept for the plot, the characters, and the world was great, and I really liked that this book wasn't afraid of dealing with difficult topics. I just don't think the execution of the story lived up to the promise that the idea of it had. The fact that the writing was so lovely at the start of the story doesn't help, because it just made me want the middle of the story to be as good to match it. Unfortunately, I think this is the sort of story that either needed to be much longer and developed more, to give the reader more time to become involved with each of the characters, or less bogged down in the middle so that the reader could see everything play out from more of a distance. Personally, I'm in the needs more development camp. I wasn't in love with this book as much as I wanted to be, but I am very excited to see what Seth Dickinson writes in the future. I think his ideas are great, I just wish there was a bit more character development and world-building in this novel. I think this is a great novel to recommend to someone who is either searching for more diverse fantasy stories or who is on the lookout for new and upcoming authors. For readers who are looking for more elaborate fantasy worlds with rich histories and complex magic systems, this might not be the book for you. I'm glad I read it, but I'm also ready to move on to another world with new characters.
Shadows of Self is the sequel to The Alloy of Law, and continues the story of Waxillium Ladrian and his sidekick Wayne. Wax comes from a wealthy family, but spent quite a few years as a vigilante lawman in The Roughs. He has returned to the city life of Elendel, but he is having a hard time fitting into a world with politics, police, and ever-changing technology. As with the first novel about Wax and Wayne, you get a fun detective story mixed in with some awesome magic and cool fight scenes. However, this novel also has much more development of the changes to politics, religion, and technology since the original Mistborn trilogy. We get to find out what happened to a lot of the cool creatures that were major plot points in the original books as well. This novel also has a fair bit of character development as well, and shows a much more introspective side to a group of characters that could have come across as excessively comedic in the first novel. Shadows of Self doesn't have quite as much action as The Alloy of Law, but I actually appreciate the change of pace, especially because it allows for more world building. Anyone who has read the original Mistborn series is going to love how the events of those novels have influences the religion and politics of the newer stories in such a logical way. There are also quite a few Cosmere nuggets sprinkled into this text, so all of the obsessive Sanderson fans should be quite pleased with that as well. I don't think knowledge of the Cosmere, or even reading the other Mistborn novels, is necessary to enjoy the story, but I do think being able to geek out over the key sentences scattered throughout the book did substantially increase my enjoyment of it. Aside from the Cosmere geekery, I also have to applaud the ending of this book. Sanderson always delivers a great ending, but I believe the only appropriate way to describe this one is that it gives you “all the feels.” I'm trying to avoid spoilers as much as possible, but I will say that if you think the middle of the book gets slightly too focused on the politics and plotting, don't worry - there will be too much emotion to handle by the end. And if you are worried that you won't be able to deal with the emotional ending, don't worry - the third installment of Wax and Wayne trilogy, The Bands of Mourning, will hit stores January 26, 2016. I don't know if this is the fastest publication sequence for two novels in a series like this, but fantasy fans are used to waiting at least a year (or two, or three, or six...) between books, so this quick release sequence is actually really exciting. Although this book had a satisfying ending, I'm really excited for the conclusion to the Wax and Wayne trilogy, so I'm very excited for the end of January. Overall I think this was a great addition to Sanderson's Mistborn series. I think it could be enjoyed by anyone, even without having read the other books in the series, however, this story is one that I think readers will enjoy more if they have at least read The Alloy of Law or the original Mistborn trilogy. It was a great read, with nerd-tastic world building details and enough emotional punches to last me the winter. Highly recommended.
I realized I was never going to finish this book series because it wasn't good, and after reading Marie Kondo's book about decluttering your life, I knew that spending time on the Divergent series would just be creating mental clutter. So here is the review of the first book, which I read several years ago, but never posted....
When I accidentally got sucked into watching the second half of the Divergent movie, I was inspired to read the books. This was, unfortunately, not the best idea I've ever had. Somehow the screenwriters managed to turn a vapid girl trapped in an illogical world into an exciting action adventure story. Kudos to them. Scenes that were emotional and exciting on film were awkwardly cringe-worthy on the page. If I had a single electron for every time Tris “felt electricity” when she was close to Four I could power Manhattan for a week. The world felt gritty and, well, at least plausible on screen - I never really accepted the whole society in the book. Where are the adults? Where are the old people? Why are 18 year olds running things? How do they get food? It's like a child's perspective on what being a teen should be like, without actually dealing with any real issues. It's almost like the book uses being Divergent as an excuse for having fewer emotions - but, really, if they are supposed to be more human, shouldn't they have more? Shouldn't things bother Tris more than they do? This book touches on a lot of serious themes, but I can't say I think they handled any of them well. Too often the answer is violence or submission, neither of which have the lasting repercussions you would expect in a more realistic scenario. Although my ebook has the entire series bundled together, I'm not sure when I'll get around to finishing it - I think my time could be much better spent reading something else.
The Princes of the Air is a science fiction space opera about three grifters who long for a better life. They use their wiles to swindle unsuspecting citizens while dreaming of the day they will be able to fly away from their miserable life on Riyah Zain. Orden Obeck has sold himself into educational slavery - there is only one legal way off the planet for him, and that is proving himself to be one of the top diplomatic students at the university. His friends David Koleman and Theodore Cranach Valerian Norne have other options, but they are far too expensive without using their wiles to procure a little... assistance. Besides, if they are going to run off on a crazy adventure, they are going to run off together. They all dream of exploring far off worlds in the name of the Queen, and providing her their unique services. The novel follows the adventures of Obeck, Koleman, and Norne as they work to achieve their goals and have a far grander adventure than any of them ever imagined.
The novel is seemingly made up of several disparate sections, which really only come together in the end. It is sort of interesting to compare to many more recent novels, where characters are followed almost reality-tv style through every minutiae of their lives. The book touches on a lot of the thematic tropes common to science fiction - oppressed classes, the nature of governments, and the trials and tribulations of growing up - all without actively making the novel feel like it is about any of these things. It touches on topics like depression and PTSD as well, which serves to make the main characters feel all the more human. They may be the princes of the air, but they aren't untouchable.
The Princes of the Air is the sort of book that made me question weather I was intelligent enough to read it as I was reading it. I was constantly pondering if I had really picked up all the clues that Ford was laying down. In contrast to so many of today's works of science fiction, which read almost as if you were watching them on a screen, Ford's novel leaves almost as much unsaid as he states directly. This skill is used in all of the writing throughout the novel, but is especially evident in his sections of dialogue. I have been called out for improperly using this terminology already, but the only real way I can think to explain this is to say that Ford is a master of using negative space - the reader has to read between the lines that are between the lines to really understand the complexity of what is happening as the story progresses. The book appears to be an un-intimidating 250 page pulp from the 80s, but it took me more effort to read through it than I've had to expend on epic tomes five times its length. I wasn't really grabbed by the story and swept along (at least, not until the ending), but I was never bored either. This book required effort to power through, but in a good way. The reader has to put in a good deal of effort to keep up with the characters in the story. Well after having finished the book my brain is going back and forth between events and coming up with conclusions along the lines of “Wait, but that means he.... whoa.” I feel I really need to re-read it now that I've finished it so that I can better see all the beautiful bits of plot and foreshadowing that are woven into the story. Perhaps not right away, but eventually - probably after reading more of Ford's other works.
I would highly recommend this novel to any sci-fi junkies out there. Its got the usual bit of cool technology - spaceships, robots, etc. - but it also has an interesting mix of heist story, buddy comedy, “wizard school,” and hero's odyssey thrown in to the mix. For non-genre fans, it might be a bit of a struggle getting used to the world and Ford's prose simultaneously, though I think it is well worth the effort. All in all this book was a fun intellectual challenge, with a very satisfying conclusion.
This is a short story available of Syfy's website (http://www.syfy.com/theexpanse/drive/) as part of their promotion for the new tv series. It is a brief look at the life of Solomon Epstein, the inventor of the drive that will make interplanetary travel feasible, allowing for the events preceding the start of the series. It is a quick story that does a nice job of setting up the politics of the world. It is well worth the read.
I'm months behind in writing my book reviews, and while I feel like I should finish my older reviews first, I couldn't help but jump in to the current discussion surrounding Ernest Cline's latest novel, Armada.
Before I start my review, I feel the need to state that I am a huge Ready Player One fan. I simply adore that book. It is like a love sonnet to 80s pop culture, and it is honestly one of the best books I have read in recent years. I also got to meet Ernest Cline (briefly) while I was at San Diego Comic-Con this year. He seems like a really cool guy, genuinely enthusiastic about everything nerdy, and very grateful for his fans and all of the excitement over his first novel and upcoming film. I was honestly really excited about the release of Armada. Of course, the fancy Comic-Con swag didn't hurt much either.
I had pre-ordered a copy of this book almost as soon as it was available, and I've been waiting in anticipation for months. When it came it had quite possibly the coolest inside of a book jacket I've ever seen, which definitely only made me more excited for the story that was contained inside.
The back of the book of the book also had a cool feature - an old Maxwell mix-tape of the main character's father's collection of gaming songs entitled “Raid the Arcade.” As someone who had used the Castle Anorak blog's soundtrack list to create a Ready Player One Playlist, clearly I would have to continue my love for all things Ernest Cline by creating an Armada Playlist as a follow-up.
This was the sort of book I knew I was going to love before I even started reading it. Video games, 80s pop culture, Ernest Cline, what could go wrong? I even created a ridiculous hashtag on my social media: #ForgetGoSetAWatchmanImReadingArmada - attempting to gently prod my more literary friends who where almost overcome with excitement about Harper Lee's novel that had been released on the same day. Suffice it to say, I was beyond excited to read this book. Which is why, I'm sad to say, I'm finding it almost physically painful to write this review.
Armada is an alien invasion story about Zack Lightman, a teenage boy who spends too much time playing video games. However, it turns out his youth is not wasted, as his high ranking in the game world means he is actually a highly trained drone pilot ready to defend the earth from alien invaders! Beyond that premise, the story essentially consists of Zack learning about his family, and comparing everything to events from 1980s pop culture.
I really wanted to be absorbed in this story, fearing for the lives of the main characters, worrying at their peril from the alien invaders, but I never really had that emotional connection. Possibly because I was never really able to believe that these characters were teenagers in 2015. This story's main failing is that it is set in the present-day, but the characters feel hopelessly stuck in the past. While in school the students are tormenting each other with spitballs. Spitballs! I'm sorry, but in today's world when you have an uninterested math teacher you don't pelt spitballs across the room. You hide your cell phone on your lap and psychologically torment your neighbor through texts, tweets, and facebook. I'm not trying to downplay the seriousness of physical bullying, which is still a problem in schools, but, honestly, today's kids tend to be more sophisticated and less obvious than that. In a world without internet it would make sense, but, as computers and modern technology are a large part of this story, its lack of presence in the classroom feels a bit... odd.
Secondly, it was a bit difficult to believe how much 80s and 90s pop culture the main kids had absorbed. Zack's obsession with his father's possessions explain his knowledge, which was fine, but his friends were a bit too old-school to be believable. Honestly, their conversations would have confused many of my high school friends, and we were in high school when the original Lord of the Rings trilogy was being released. Clearly, my ability to grasp a majority of these references means I'm the Zack of my high school group. I'm not sure how I should feel about this.
Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, I never really believed that the alien invasion felt real. I remember being three quarters of the way through the book and thinking, “This can't actually be happening. Like, it just doesn't make sense.” Unfortunately, the main character points out many of the logical inconsistencies of the book, but even in his attempt to “figure it out,” it just makes the events seem even more ridiculous. Everything just felt so... derivative. I hate saying it, but there wasn't ever really a moment when I accepted this scenario as realistic. The ever critical suspension of disbelief never really happened for me, and, unfortunately, without that the premise of this book really falls flat.
It could have possibly been remedied by an interesting protagonist overcoming difficult obstacles, but even then I can't find much merit in this book. Despite the difficulties Zack had in childhood, he sort of gets everything handed to him on a platter during the invasion. He gets the royal treatment as a top-ranked player from the Armada video game. He sits next to the love of his life who, surprisingly, is pretty interested in a relationship despite knowing Zack for only a few minutes. (Yes, yes, the impending doom of the Earth could be a nice incentive to hurry things up a bit, but still.) He even finds a wise sage with all the knowledge and wisdom and advice he could possibly want (not saying who, because, spoilers). Sure, he has a bit of emotional trauma to deal with, but, on the scale of all-out alien invasion, well it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Even the ending felt a bit like a pat on the head. I sort of assume than an epic war-like event involving an alien invasion would make things feel different for the characters, but, while the story sort of sums up the aftermath of the invasion, if felt as though nothing had really changed.
So, what merits does this book have? Well, to be honest, I still think Ernest Cline is great at writing banter between characters well versed in geek culture. I honestly wish I could be a part of these conversations. They are the sort of ultimate argumentative geek out that people in convention lines are too polite to engage in and your real life friends aren't well-versed enough to keep up with. I appreciate Cline's ever present sense of humor, and his creation of screen-names is really a treat. You can feel his enthusiasm bleed through the page, which is really what kept me reading this book, more than anything else. The quality of the writing itself is pretty good, it is just the story itself which is lacking.
I don't really want to compare this book to Ready Player One, because, honestly, they aren't really the same sort of story. However, it is a bit of an interesting exercise to try and figure out why the first novel was so successful, and why this one isn't. Ultimately, I think it comes down to believability. Ready Player One is set in the quasi-not-too-far-ish future, which, theoretically, means that the kids in that novel should be even less interested in 80s and 90s pop culture than the kids in Aramada are. However, the RPO kids have a strong motivating factor that the Armada kids don't - a desire to get out of the utter shit-hole they've been living in. Let's be honest - if the only distraction you had was the internet and an Easter-egg hunt based on 80s trivia with the potential for lots of money as a prize, then you'd be watching the heck out of Family Ties too. The idea that humanity will have wrecked the environment to end up in such a state isn't too hard to imagine either. And from there the rest of RPO is an exciting adventure mixed with a fun romp through 80s nostalgia, which easily pulls the reader through the story. With Armada, the idea of kids playing video games isn't weird. The idea of an alien invasion isn't weird (or, at least, not new). The idea of using kids and their computer game skills to fight an alien invasion also isn't new. And yet I never felt invested in this world. I never loved these characters. I never cared if things got better for them. And I think it really comes down to the fact that I never really believed that these kids were the characters they were written as. The older generation we meet later in the book felt almost indistinguishable from the younger, and I think that was a major problem - everyone felt kind of the same.
So, ultimately, I can't say I really recommend Armada. There are better things in the kid vs. alien genre out there. And, honestly, if you are considering this book stop and go read Ready Player One instead, because it really is fantastic. If I think about what I really get from this book it boils down to about three things: (1) my Comic-Con swag is still pretty cool, (2) “Raid the Arcade” is a pretty kick-ass playlist, and (3) Go Set A Watchman hasn't been getting good reviews either, so at least my hashtag doesn't make me look like too much of an idiot.
Uprooted is the story of Agnieszka, a girl who learns she has magical powers after being chosen by “the Dragon” - a mysterious wizard who protects Agieszka's village from the evil woods. The Dragon chooses a young woman every ten years as payment for his services. While most of the young women he chooses tend to act as his personal servant, Agnieszka's abilities make her life with the Dragon quite different. Agnieszka must learn to use her magical abilities to help the Dragon to fight against the evil woods, while trying not to upset the political issues of the realm.
The novel contains many of the elements of a classic fairytale - a grumpy wizard, a mysterious evil wood, a young person who must learn to use her powers and save the day. Where it differs significantly from a traditional fairytale is in the attitudes of the characters. Agnieszka is no damsel in distress. If anything she is the rough and tumble tomboy getting her hands dirty kinda of a character. The Dragon is a bit like Sherlock Holmes - trying to uncover the mystery of the woods while really just wanting to stay in his bachelor pad, and annoyed by the incompetence of everyone around him. He's kind of an ass, but does just enough cool things that you end up liking him anyway. You've also got the perfect best friend, the ultimate frat boy, and “rival detective” running around keeping things interesting.
Despite how modern the characters feel, they didn't seem out of place in a distinctly fairy tale world. The writing allowed for a perfect blend of traditional tropes and modern ideas to blend and create a rather enjoyable story. It contains a lot of traditional Polish folklore (some of which has been stolen by other fantasy stories over the years), while weaving a lot of modern issues (gender roles, sexual consent, etc.) into the story without being preachy. The book is still about telling the story. The only strong complaint I have is that the pacing of the novel feels a bit inconsistent. I found the start of the novel quite engaging - despite the limited, terse interactions between the Dragon and his apprentice, this portion of the novel felt fairly fast paced. However, as the novel wears on and Agnieszka is tested with ever more challenging foes, the length of the battle scenes seems to stretch on a bit more than necessary. It is one of those things where I can understand the desire to not trivialize death and to give the situation its due, but, on the other hand, when there are a bunch of previously unknown characters fighting a huge battle it is sort of hard to feel an emotional connection to them as a reader. We see the battles from Agnieszka's view - not exactly removed from the action, but not always the center of it either. Which makes sense, but isn't the most engaging thing to read. The battles also felt a bit like an annoying roadblock - can we please let the main characters get on with more important things, like magic-ing some evil trees? - which is possibly another reason that these scenes felt so stretched out. My level of attention wavered from fully engrossed to mildly interested at different portions of the books. The smaller, more intimate scenes involving just a few characters are extremely well done, but I don't know that I cared as much when there were thousands of people on the page.
Overall I thought this was a really enjoyable book. Definitely well worth a read, especially since it is gathering such a buzz at the moment. It is a fun story with an interesting mix of classic and modern elements. Highly recommended.
Wolf in White Van is the story of Sean Phillips, a severely disfigured man who spends his time as a game designer for a mail-in version of a Dungeons and Dragons meets The Gunslinger type RPG called Trace Italian. The book is a non-chronological look at events in his life, and how Sean exists (or doesn't) in both his real life and fantasy worlds after his disfigurement from a shooting accident.
This book is much more about the use of language, and conceptual ideas than it is about the setting, character, or plot. The main character has many interesting thoughts and observations about the world he lives in, but we never really get a sense of his actual emotions. They can be filled in with the reader's empathy, but they aren't really provided as part of the description. Perhaps an important part of this causes the reader to examine themselves - how would they treat Sean in real life? Sean is constantly confronted with being different - his disfigurement causes him to remain on the outskirts of society, and he hides in his home where he works at sending replies to people who participate in his games. At one point he is confronted by a child who asks point blank, “What happened to your face?” The reader is left wondering if this frank, blunt approach is any less painful than the way that the adults in the novel try to look away from Sean, or the way that his parents try to pretend the he, and his accident, don't really exist. One of the driving forces of the novel is the fact that Sean is sued by parents of gamers whose children attempted to live out the events of their Trace Italian adventure, and ended up dead or dying because of it. This is an interesting nod to the D&D Satanism scare of the 1980s, with the adults in the novel attempting to blame every bad thing that happens on fantasy worlds and games of make-believe, yet still failing to face the reality of their own situations anyway, while Sean manages to find deeper connections to players he never meets than he does to people he interacts with in the real world.
Despite the RPG backdrop and interesting themes, this is a book that I found myself appreciating more than enjoying. On an intellectual level, I admire the use of language, and I appreciate the themes that ran through the book. But I never really found myself loving this book. It is beautiful, in a way, but it is also disturbing and occasionally (slightly) boring. The structure of the book almost makes it seem like the purpose of the story is to figure out why Sean's accident occurred, but, once you get to the end it becomes apparent that that really wasn't the point of the book at all. The story meanders through Sean's life the way some of the players meander through his game - seemingly with purpose, but never really reaching an ultimate goal. I almost feel as though I need to re-read it to fully appreciate the craftsmanship of its construction and use of language, yet I feel no actual desire to revisit this character or this world. Perhaps this is the sort of book that needs a lot of breathing room between reads.
As far as my recommendations go, I think this is the sort of book that will either be loved or hated by a reader. I've seen this recommended as “literature for a genre nerd” because of the RPG backdrop, but I don't know if that connection will be enough to carry a reader through this novel. Genre readers typically enjoy a book with complex world-building, a dynamic plot, and enjoyable characters. Considering that a notable portion of the story consisted of Sean contemplating ceiling tiles, I can't say that Wolf in White Van had any of these things. Though I also don't know that it matters. I think this book accomplishes what it was trying to achieve, and I think it does it very well. I don't think it is going to convert genre-loving folks over to the literary side, but I suppose it might. I think it is just as likely to leave them wishing for weighty text on dragon flights or warp drives. In either case, I think this is the sort of a novel that a reader needs to experience for themselves before deciding how well they like it. Personally, I'm glad I read it, even if it wasn't exactly a fun book to read. I can't say that it will have the same impact on another reader though. I think readers who tend to favor a book for its use of language will rather enjoy Wolf in White Van, while readers who are more interested in character and plot may not. It is the sort of book I would encourage people to try, not because I expect everyone will like it, but because I think it would be a good novel for expanding literary horizons.
Perfect State is the story of Kai, the conquerer of the world. Well, at least of his world. Kai is actually living in a simulated world that is perfectly tailored to making him a hero. Which means he is fantastic at everything. Until he is told by the higher powers that he need to procreate, and is forced to go on a date. With the usual Brandon Sanderson flare, hilarity and awesome adventures ensue.
I've read nearly all of Brandon Sanderson's works, so I've become quite used to his style as an author. I have to say that Perfect State stood out from the rest, in a good way. Sanderson gets a bit edgier than in his other works, and it really worked for this story. The world-building and plot, as always, are fantastic. The setup of the story allows for all the cool things, while still making total sense, which makes my geeky little heart do a happy dance. The characters are fun, and definitely have the typical Sanderson snark that I've come to expect from the non-cosmere crowd. I suppose one could criticize how all of his characters have the same tone when they banter, but it's fun banter, so I really don't mind at all.
I really loved the ending of this story. It is the perfect blend of depressing, thought provoking, and hopeful. There are so many little details that I loved about this story, but I don't want to give away too many spoilers, so I won't list them here. I'm just going to say “I loved it” and leave it at that. The story is fairly short and reads very quickly - I read it while traveling and finished it in one sitting between other books during the trip. This is the sort of story I think everyone will enjoy. It's fun, it's quick, it's inexpensive, and it's good. Highly recommended.