We're a plural system who loves queer & anarchist scifi.
But recently we just read a few randomly picked up mystery books in a row, in German, and we tend to review books in the language we read them in. That or similar may happen again, be warned.
No reading goals, just feelings.
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Picture the scene, if you will – an innocent young couple have just welcomed into the world an adorable, beautiful, …
Picture the scene, if you will – an innocent young couple have just welcomed into …
It's the blurb that caught me, in a "I feel like I relate to this on a deeper level" way, without knowing if I relate to the baby moose or the human parents, one of whom happened to birth it. So I will probably be disappointed because the book is supposed to be fun, not deep!
They killed my mother. They took our magic. They tried to bury us.
Now we …
This one is so intense. It's a very hopeful story, but not an easy one. Don't expect anyone to be rewarded for doing the right thing. Don't expect an almost almighty kingdom to have mercy.
I'll definitely be reading the second book. That was a cruel little cliffhanger.
They killed my mother. They took our magic. They tried to bury us.
Now we rise.
Zélie Adebola remembers when …
Eh, that's not my favourite kind of story. But I still enjoyed reading it, mostly. I just felt like some of the paths it went were a little too much on the "high emotion, low story impact, just so something is happening" side.
Cordelia knows her mother is . . . unusual. Their house doesn’t have any doors …
Ok, I love this one a lot. It's an "escaping abuse" story, but while it does have its tense moments, it didn't set me on edge too much. The whole thing, except for the very beginning, felt stable and grounded and comforting. Obviously, Hester, the almost-old unmarried lady who likes poking people with her cane, used to breed geese and is trying to protect her easy to impress brother, is my favourite, but almost all the characters do their part to make this more cozy than horrifying. Bad things are done, and they're all caught in something hard to grasp and harder to research, but they're caught in it together and that's what matters. Very satisfying.
Cordelia knows her mother is . . . unusual. Their house doesn’t have any doors …
So all she could do was sit and try not to look strange.
— A Sorceress Comes to Call by T. Kingfisher (13%)
Oof, this book hits hard in an unexpected way.
Cordelia knows her mother is . . . unusual. Their house doesn’t have any doors between rooms—there are no secrets …
Yes!! I'm aware that "It's just like Certain Dark Things, only without vampires" doesn't sound like praise, but it is. I loved Certain Dark Things. I liked Mexican Gothic too, but quit halfway through because I wasn't feeling up to an All Abuse All The Time story. So I was uncertain whether this one would be right for me, and yes it is. It feels very soft to me although there's a lot of violence, and I like the unusual energy of the characters and the way everything is connected in a way that's neither too subtle nor too blunt. And how the plot goes on in a pretty steady way, keeping me interested without the exciting events getting overwhelming.
Thirteen years ago, monsters emerged from the shadows and plunged Kierse's world into a cataclysmic …
This was... fun. It's like teenie fantasy with teenie fantasy tropes, and toxic relationships as the norm and consent being discussed in a way that I have my issues with. But everyone is a bit older, so it's not as awkward. I actually enjoyed large parts of the main relationship despite it being quite horrible in a few ways. The erotic tension worked great for me, although I was underwhelmed by The Sex Scene. The world mostly convinced me (with some "ok ok fine") and the friendships are great.
11 June, 1930. On a ship floating near the Atlantic island of Nonsuch, a curious …
I liked this one, it's a mix of diary entries and related people and concepts, not very exciting and I didn't pay constant attention, but, I enjoyed it.
11 June, 1930. On a ship floating near the Atlantic island of Nonsuch, a curious steel ball is lowered 3000 …
On January 28, 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on …
It's not as good as the book about the Erebus & Terror that I just read. I say that because it tries to tell a dramatic story rather than give me an idea of how likely which facts are to be true. But I came to appreciate it for not omitting colonialist racist bullshit, and for writing about it critically.
So my main points of frustration are actually the historical facts (of whichever level of facticity, shrug, ok we can call it the story, I don't care). I find the Erebus/Terror expeditions relatable because, while also being colonialist bullshit, they are about exploring areas unknown to the people doing the expeditions, about drawing maps and uuuuh collecting (cough eating cough) new-to-them species. I get why someone would want to do that. But this? This was some war bullshit, people were literally forced to go, and gosh "capturing the treasures from …
It's not as good as the book about the Erebus & Terror that I just read. I say that because it tries to tell a dramatic story rather than give me an idea of how likely which facts are to be true. But I came to appreciate it for not omitting colonialist racist bullshit, and for writing about it critically.
So my main points of frustration are actually the historical facts (of whichever level of facticity, shrug, ok we can call it the story, I don't care). I find the Erebus/Terror expeditions relatable because, while also being colonialist bullshit, they are about exploring areas unknown to the people doing the expeditions, about drawing maps and uuuuh collecting (cough eating cough) new-to-them species. I get why someone would want to do that. But this? This was some war bullshit, people were literally forced to go, and gosh "capturing the treasures from the Spanish" is such a petty goal.
Also! I'm irritated that this happened before people figured out how to prevent scurvy! Couldn't they just have waited until that was solved? Sounds like such an unnecessary way to suffer and die, and like, a bunch of increasingly sick people forced to keep the ship going sounds like such a nightmare.
That brings me to the island! Cold year round, bad storms, celery? Celery as the only-ish edible plant? When you're on such an island you'd better not scare off the indigenous people who know how to live with this, but also, it's such a bad place to have a shipwreck in in the first place! Who does that!
And then the big conflict is "we have to serve our country to the death" vs "I wanna go home, it's cold and there's no food". It's...... yeah idek. Did this really have to happen?? Could they not just have said "no, we're going to a warmer place with less dangerous storms"?
