Arielle
I tried reading this before the HBO series came out, and found it a hard slog. It's incredibly slow to start, and there are so many different characters to keep track of it's hard to bond with any of them. Embarrassingly, I had to watch the series before I tried this one again, but it was much better once I had an idea what the hell was going on - and the rest of the books were so much better! Three stars for getting me into the series and for general competence.
The Fall of the Kings is set in a universe established in Kushner's novel Swordspoint (more on that later), and is about a young man with a streak of madness in him who just might the descendent of royalty, deposed centuries earlier and now anathema to even speak about, and his lover, a historian who might also be a wizard. The romance plot and the magical/political one are interwoven neatly, and frankly, once I started this book I couldn't put it down; the prose was that engaging. Too bad the mood was a little ruined by a totally inconclusive ending. I still loved it, though, well enough to buy the other two novels in the series.
This is known far and wide as one of the best high fantasy novels of all time, and it probably does live up to that claim. It's gorgeously written, lyrical, eloquent, and the author is adept at making her characters real without having the reader dwell in their every waking thought; that said, it didn't catch my interest enough to go pick up the other books in the series. Or maybe it's just not for me right now. Either way, it's seriously well written.
Better than GoT, still picking up the pace. By this point I'd fallen in love with a few characters (hi Sansa, Dany, and Theon!), and was rapidly getting invested in the fate of Westeros. Three stars again because while I liked it, I didn't love it.
These stories are gritty, shocking, and depressing, but hell, are they fantastic. Occasionally they get repetitive, since they're all centered around the same theme (growing up a poor, “white trash” lesbian in the American South), but you honestly don't realize that until after you're done with the book, because her writing is so alive.
Entertaining, but definitely felt like a short story, not a standalone novel. I think it would be better as a movie, and I never say that!
I was so disappointed by this book, and it truly made me sad because I was hoping for another kink-friendly fantasy series to bring into my life. While the writing was decent, I found the character development to be astoundingly mediocre, and while the general concept of the fantasy universe was interesting, it was poorly done IMO. Actually, it kind of felt like a bunch of fanfic tropes thrown into a blender, but instead of resulting in a delicious smoothie, it came out as tasteless syrup with lumps of interesting magic and occasional innovative ideas. But I did read all of it, so I guess I can't complain too much. Oh, who am I kidding? Of course I can.
Murder at a Sherlock Holmes convention, one attendee hunts down the murderer with a beautiful journalist, accompanied by snippets into Conan Doyle's life. Kind of boring, but the history was well researched.
Incredibly valuable and thoughtful analysis that should be required reading for any feminist. I find Dworkin's writing tough to get through—I feel like she's repetitive at times—which is the only reason it doesn't get 5 stars.
Essentially, a scientific exploration of sex research from the point of view of a witty journalist. I didn't much care for it, to be honest. Maybe this would have been a lot more interesting if I hadn't already encountered a lot of the facts presented here online, but there also seemed to be a lack of sex positivity, sort of like the author found some of these crazy and kinky people just so weird! Then again, I read it in a bad mood and may have been projecting. Regardless, probably two stars, because it was funny in parts.
So apparently this guy wins a lot of awards. It's not completely surprising, because the book is full of elegant descriptions and beautifully painted scenes. Unfortunately, his characters are uninteresting, and the plot, while excellent at first, actually ends in the “it was all a dream!” territory, which - no. Not my thing. Probably another reason why I didn't care for it was that it was marketed as a thriller, when it's much more a quiet story about two people and their relationship. Like I said, the writing was beautiful and sparse, and I read it for that reason, but in the end, there wasn't enough meat to the story to make it memorable. I really wish they had half-star reviews, because this is definitely a 2.5 star book.
A brilliant scientist and possible sociopath sells his soul to learn the secrets of necromancy, only to find out that not having a soul is quite inconvenient - his necromancy never quite works right without having one. So he gets himself into another wager with the Devil, this time to collect one hundred souls in exchange for his, using the diabolical means of...a carnival. Johannes is not especially charming, nor is he good at having fun, so he enlists his brother Horst, a vampire, and an army of the dead to help him out. Then, after that book is over, he ends up having to solve a murder on board an aeroship (while on the run from the secret police of a dictatorship), with only one frenemy by his side. So basically: awesome.
It's a James Bond parody novel featuring lesbian lushes and a top-secret group of makeup-selling spies. If that sounds awesome to you, you'll love it. If it sounds stupid, don't pick it up. I liked it; it was a decent parody with cute characters, and good for what it was, but hardly a work of fine literature. But again, lesbian James Bond funny spy novel. What did you expect?
First, let me say that I'm not generally a fan of this style of writing. I don't much like Palahniuk and other similarly twisted-for-the-sake-of-twisted authors. That said, the subject matter of this book is fascinating. I've always been drawn to the concept of freak shows, dark circuses, and the like, so I did enjoy that part of the novel. However, the narrator falls into my most-disliked trope: she's a total pushover, completely weak-willed. I'm pretty sure this is supposed to have some sort of significance when interpreted correctly, but I was too annoyed by her to figure it out. A lot of the scenes seemed to be written purely for shock value instead of advancing the plot, as well. I wouldn't recommend it unless you're a fan of this genre.
First off, I really think that people who dismiss this as just erotica or as trashy romance lit are missing out on a lot of the book, because I absolutely adore this series and I'm not really one for smut with no plot. That said, I'm reviewing all six books in the series here, and just giving stars to the others, so read at your own risk.
This is a series of six (really long) books that narrowly rides the line between fantasy and romance novel. Then, midway through the first book, it goes BAM Politics! Court shenanigans! Murder and mayhem! Politics! Travel to distant lands! Torture! Religious experiences! Even more politics! And continues in that vein for pretty much the entire series. The first three books are about Phèdre, while the second trilogy are about a prince named Imriel, and while I prefer the Phèdre books (I'm biased toward female narrators), Imriel's story is just as engrossing. Oh, and everyone is bisexual! There are gay people in my fantasy! Some of them even survive! No wonder I like these books. But what really gets me is the worldbuilding. Short version: it's amazing. It's set in a universe where the half-divine Elua, the apostate grandson of God (yes, that God), and his fallen angel Companions chose to live and love among the mortals. This means that Christianity never became a dominant religion - though there are still those who practice it - and so other cultures kept on worshipping the older gods, which, as you might guess, affects the religious landscape of Europe and nearby countries, which therefore affects the political world, which therefore affects everything. The author does a stupendous job in extrapolating this out realistically and well, and honestly, the universe she created is at least half of why I love these books so much.
Nevill is a skilled writer and can build quite the picture, but ultimately, this book fizzled out at the end.
I hoped this book would be the one that made the like zombies...nope. Probably great in some people's opinions, but I found it horrendously boring.
I'm sitting here trying to think of critiques or compliments to give this book. None are coming to mind. That's how I feel about the entirety of Swamplandia!: I read the whole thing, I was interested enough in the plot, but in the end I can barely remember what happened - except, of course, that I was disappointed in the resolution of Ossie's plot line (I'd hoped it would go in the opposite direction, which would have made the book a lot more interesting to me), and there's a scene toward the end with Ava that came out of nowhere. Since the two things I remember most are both plot points I disliked, I'm not at all inclines to rec the book to anyone.
The premise of this story: a girl undergoes an experimental treatment to give her sight when she's never had it before. It's a successful procedure, for the most part - but in addition to the real world, Caitlin can also see the internet (there are medical explanations for this, I promise). Slowly, due to its uplink with Caitlin's mind, the internet begins to become sentient. What's even cooler: Caitlin purposefully helps it along. This book was incredibly entertaining - I really loved Caitlin's character, and the supporting characters were nicely developed as well - and the philosophical discussions about consciousness and what constitutes life was fresh and interesting. Usually we get androids to help us think about that, but this time it's the entire internet, influencing millions of humans around the world; it's a much bigger scope, and so is a thornier issue to grapple with. The writing was par for the course for a YA novel, a little simplistic, and there were two additional storylines that felt like they were dropped midway through, but I'm intrigued enough to pick up the next book when I find it at my used bookstore.
Love this. Love this, love this. I hadn't read much Sappho before picking this up, knowing her mainly as “that one lesbian Greek poet”, so this was really an educational experience (in a good way!). It starts with analyses of Sappho's poetry, given in the original Greek, then with translations ranging from poets across the centuries (quite literally); it's followed by perceptions of her throughout time, as each generation discovered her and recreated her into something new for their time period. What I found the most interesting was how varied the translations were; some of them forced her verse into the patterns of whatever poetic form was popular at the time; some (most?) erased the bisexual/lesbian/generally queer aspects of her work entirely; some stayed true to the original theme as closely as they could, while taking artistic liberties of their own. It was a fascinating glimpse into Sappho and the psyches of her adherents over time. I kind of loved it, if you couldn't tell.
Congrats to Alissa Nutting for writing this despicable character so well that I, someone who enjoys a lot of dark fiction, couldn't finish it. I think it's probably an excellent book, but man, I just could not deal with the content.
I read this book primarily because it was the only one I had available while camping, and I once went hiking in the rain because it bored me so much. There were almost no redeeming characteristics about it; plot, characters, prose, al were uninteresting to me. It's the sort of book that winks at you a lot, taking pride in its own cleverness, except there is none. In short: I did not like this one bit.