In A Day of Fallen Night, Samantha Shannon sweeps readers back to the universe of …
Very Well Done
5 stars
for anyone who loved the Priory of the Orange Tree - wholehearted recommending that you read this right after.
The only problem I had was more to do with me than the book itself. Namely, I had to re-reference characters and events from the original book to truly appreciate this prequel.
The pacing is better in A Day of Fallen Night compared to Priory, which was a surprise treat.
'Vivid, enigmatic, enchanting' M. L. Rio
'Irresistible' Sunday Times
Some people think foxes go around …
Ruthlessly Attention-Grabbing
4 stars
The Fox Wife is a fairly slow-paced book until right at the end. The edges of mystery and vastly different perspectives of the two main characters keep the story fresh and interesting. It's a very good read whether you're in it for the murder mystery aspect or the talented storytelling that goes into the book's minutiae. I loved it for both.
In A Day of Fallen Night, Samantha Shannon sweeps readers back to the universe of …
It feels like this book could benefit from proximity to reading the Priory of the Orange Tree, or at least a character glossary.
tbh there might be a character glossary and flipping around an e reader is miserable so I haven't seen it.
When Rosemary Harper joins the crew of the Wayfarer, she isn't expecting much. The Wayfarer, …
oddly bad from an author I typically enjoy
2 stars
I disliked the level of writing skill present in The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. Upsetting because I really loved A Psalm for the Wild-Built, also by Becky Chambers. I ended up finishing TLWtaSAP waiting for it to get better. It did not. My first 2/5 star completed read in a while.
Dialogue was often awkward and unnatural. Transitions between locations and events were absent. A sense of time in the book is almost completely missing - if you aren't paying attention to dates for each chapter (I often flipped back to the prior chapter to get a sense of time), you will have little to no idea how much time is actually passing. This means that within chapters, it feels like a fever dream where time loses all meaning.
I'm sure this is an enjoyable read for people who enjoy the characters who get a lot of …
I disliked the level of writing skill present in The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. Upsetting because I really loved A Psalm for the Wild-Built, also by Becky Chambers. I ended up finishing TLWtaSAP waiting for it to get better. It did not. My first 2/5 star completed read in a while.
Dialogue was often awkward and unnatural. Transitions between locations and events were absent. A sense of time in the book is almost completely missing - if you aren't paying attention to dates for each chapter (I often flipped back to the prior chapter to get a sense of time), you will have little to no idea how much time is actually passing. This means that within chapters, it feels like a fever dream where time loses all meaning.
I'm sure this is an enjoyable read for people who enjoy the characters who get a lot of page time. I would've enjoyed them more if their reactions to one another and the world around them were more consistent and organic. The dialogue really killed any affection I had for them. It seemed the characters were stereotypical tropes and if you recognized the trope, you'd know everything about the character and what they'd do. But this meant that on the rare occasion where they break out of the trope to monologue - essentially infodumping on the reader and not really communicating with another character - it comes off as really insincere and not true to who they are.
Yume Kitasei's The Deep Sky is an enthralling sci fi thriller debut about a mission …
A Space Colonization Story with AI and VR/AR
4 stars
Content warning
basic plot intro is spoiled to specify genre
Yes. AI, not the bad generative kind used badly, but an intelligent person. And both augmented and virtual reality feature heavily in the story. Somehow avoids being cringy --- for example, most real birds are extinct. People purchase RealBirdsTM for their headsets to view them in trees and in public.
Perspective switches between Asuka as an adult and as a child in training for a worldwide mission to send people into deep space and create an undying diaspora.
Well-written with good pacing, very few sci-fi magic inventions (think quantum quantum quantum everything). Murder mystery aboard a virtually unstoppable and limited-in-resources spaceship.
In a Tokyo suburb a young man named Toru Okada searches for his wife's missing …
Reads like incel fiction
2 stars
there's a strange outlook on every woman so far --- I stopped reading 18% of the way through. This should be viewed as a perspective only on the first story told. The male gaze is personified in the main character. He is somehow never in the wrong despite being incompetent and uncaring much of the time.
Amina al-Sirafi should be content. After a storied and scandalous career as one of the …
Super Fun Pirate Romp
4 stars
A refreshing view on the old pirate story trope. Take us over to a complex area where many cultures and religions mix, engage with myths that don't stop at "there's treasure on a hidden island somewhere." This should be the standard for pirate stories. My aging heart smiles at a much older protagonist, as well: Amina Al-Sirafi has retired from the life of a pirate captain, committing to motherhood and a simple life of virtue. Circumstances drag her back in, and she has to get the crew together for one last adventure.
Murder. Secrets. Sacrifice: Three women seek the truth of the empire's past. And the truth …
Great Storytelling, Pacing Issues
4 stars
At book 2 of this series, I can say this: expect pacing issues for the final book in the Ending Fire trilogy. But that's one of the only real critiques I have with the two books in the series thus far. Full of a complex cast of characters, with real, diverse representation throughout. There are peaks and valleys in how engaged I was throughout both The Final Strife (book 1) and The Battle Drum. However, I was always interested in continuing to read so I could experience more of El-Arifi's characters.
Two time-traveling agents from warring futures, working their way through the past, begin to exchange …
Poetry in Prose
5 stars
Please read this book, if only to experience the writing style. Somewhat encourages you to go along for the ride; if you try to figure out too much of the "lore" or how things work, you'll miss the forest for the trees.
Piranesi's house is no ordinary building; its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls …
A Wonderfully Strange Adventure
5 stars
To describe the book is to spoil the book. This is an Outer Wilds situation where every person of impeccable taste will beg you to experience it and never look it up online beforehand.
This is a book that wants you to read it. It delights in being read. So do that. A perfect little book whose length feels neither wasteful nor lean.
It is Just Right.
The Beauty of the House is immeasureable; its Kindness infinte.