Books and comics read in October 2021
Sunday, 7 November 2021 19:14![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
usuallyhatsLifelode - Jo Walton
Winter's Orbit - Everina Maxwell
Ancestors: A History of Britain in Thirteen Burials - Alice Roberts
Descendant of the Crane - Joan He
Redemptor - Jordan Ifueko
Sistersong - Lucy Holland
Iron Widow - Xiran Jay Zhao
The Councillor - EJ Beaton
Parable of the Sower: A Graphic Novel Adaptation
A Master of Djinn - P. Djèlí Clark
Invisible Kingdom: Walking the Path
Invisible Kingdom: Edge of Everything
Monstress: Warchild
Winter's Orbit
I really loved this even though a lot of it was romance? WILD. The central relationship was great, really well developed, and completely sold me on the romance, and the politics and crime IN SPACE were also great. Really excited to read whatever Everina Maxwell does next. Especially if it's IN SPACE.
(spaaaaaace)
Ancestors: A History of Britain in Thirteen Burials
I really enjoyed this interesting, accessible book on pre-Roman Britain, and what we can, and possibly more importantly, can't learn about it through the remains of the people who lived in it. I did feel like the last chapter let it down slightly, though - a bit too much hagiography of Pitt Rivers, a bit too much insistence that the humanist way of approaching death is the most rational and therefore the most correct - but other than that, excellent.
Redemptor
I really loved Raybearer and the second half of the duology did not disappoint. It had the same rich worldbuilding and excellent characters, plus a lot of it is basically about activist burnout and how it's vital to be a person as well as a machine for improving the world. Really great stuff.
Sistersong
I loved a lot about this retelling of the Tale of the Twa Sisters, especially their third sibling's dawning realisation that he was, in fact, a boy, and the way he learns to make the rest of the world accept that fact too. However the sudden swerve into body horror towards the end (from the original story) was pretty jarring, as there hadn't been anything like that in the rest of the book, and I also really did not buy that (skip) Riva would forgive Tristan and leave her family and her magic to be with him after he lied to her for months, seduced her under false pretences, caused the death of her father (and indirectly her sister), tried to kill her brother and, oh yes, led an attack on her people. Yeah, yeah, they're ~*~in love~*~, but COME ON. I think this is a case of a retelling where the further it strayed from the original, the stronger it was, so I wish it had dared to change more.
The Councillor
I thoroughly enjoyed this one, in which the court scholar, Lysande, finds that she's been made responsible for choosing the next ruler after the sudden death of the queen. I really liked that Lysande both wanted to create a better society and liked having power for its own sake, and that though those things were in tension, they weren't mutually exclusive. (Slight content note here: Lysande's enjoyment of power extends to sex, and consent tends to be implicitly rather than explicitly given.) It's also a book that quietly values friendship, which I loved.
(additional content note: more grief stuff than I was expecting)
A Master of Djinn
This was a lot of fun - queer female lead, strong urban fantasy vibe, pre-WWI Cairo with djinn as a part of life, I would read a ton more like this. (I don't think you absolutely have to have read the shorter fiction in the same world to enjoy this, but it's all also a fun time and introduces a lot of the characters/setting/macguffins, so it's worth doing.)
Didn't finish: The Oracle Stone - Talli L. Morgan
This quest fantasy didn't do anything wrong, I just wasn't that excited to be reading it, and I am as ever on a constant quest to only read things I'm excited about. (It suffered somewhat for being read straight after Winter's Orbit, which I absolutely loved, and because a couple of library holds came in just as I was getting going.) I did really like the in media res opening, but the rest didn't quite live up to the strength of the first few chapters.
After the Dragons - Cynthia Zhang
I was enjoying this quiet m/m novella but "character thinks they might be ace but they just hadn't met the right person yet" is a hard pass for me, unless it's clear that they're figuring out that they're grey-ace or demi, which as far as I can tell from googling reviews didn't seem to be the case here. And while I don't want to invalidate that as an experience people have, it's still a trope that I just cannot deal with, especially when it's a throwaway comment rather than an actual exploration of what that might feel like.
Light From Uncommon Stars - Ryka Aoki
I really wanted to like this, but I really struggled with the choppy writing style - it seemed to switch scenes and points of view every five seconds, so I could never really settle into it, alas.
(also I was reading the short stories from the Hugo shortlist, and it feels weird to DNF a short story, but it turns out I just hate little free libraries, and the idea of asking payment for a book from something that purports to be a library, that much, so here we are)
Winter's Orbit - Everina Maxwell
Ancestors: A History of Britain in Thirteen Burials - Alice Roberts
Descendant of the Crane - Joan He
Redemptor - Jordan Ifueko
Sistersong - Lucy Holland
Iron Widow - Xiran Jay Zhao
The Councillor - EJ Beaton
Parable of the Sower: A Graphic Novel Adaptation
A Master of Djinn - P. Djèlí Clark
Invisible Kingdom: Walking the Path
Invisible Kingdom: Edge of Everything
Monstress: Warchild
Winter's Orbit
I really loved this even though a lot of it was romance? WILD. The central relationship was great, really well developed, and completely sold me on the romance, and the politics and crime IN SPACE were also great. Really excited to read whatever Everina Maxwell does next. Especially if it's IN SPACE.
(spaaaaaace)
Ancestors: A History of Britain in Thirteen Burials
I really enjoyed this interesting, accessible book on pre-Roman Britain, and what we can, and possibly more importantly, can't learn about it through the remains of the people who lived in it. I did feel like the last chapter let it down slightly, though - a bit too much hagiography of Pitt Rivers, a bit too much insistence that the humanist way of approaching death is the most rational and therefore the most correct - but other than that, excellent.
Redemptor
I really loved Raybearer and the second half of the duology did not disappoint. It had the same rich worldbuilding and excellent characters, plus a lot of it is basically about activist burnout and how it's vital to be a person as well as a machine for improving the world. Really great stuff.
Sistersong
I loved a lot about this retelling of the Tale of the Twa Sisters, especially their third sibling's dawning realisation that he was, in fact, a boy, and the way he learns to make the rest of the world accept that fact too. However the sudden swerve into body horror towards the end (from the original story) was pretty jarring, as there hadn't been anything like that in the rest of the book, and I also really did not buy that (skip) Riva would forgive Tristan and leave her family and her magic to be with him after he lied to her for months, seduced her under false pretences, caused the death of her father (and indirectly her sister), tried to kill her brother and, oh yes, led an attack on her people. Yeah, yeah, they're ~*~in love~*~, but COME ON. I think this is a case of a retelling where the further it strayed from the original, the stronger it was, so I wish it had dared to change more.
The Councillor
I thoroughly enjoyed this one, in which the court scholar, Lysande, finds that she's been made responsible for choosing the next ruler after the sudden death of the queen. I really liked that Lysande both wanted to create a better society and liked having power for its own sake, and that though those things were in tension, they weren't mutually exclusive. (Slight content note here: Lysande's enjoyment of power extends to sex, and consent tends to be implicitly rather than explicitly given.) It's also a book that quietly values friendship, which I loved.
(additional content note: more grief stuff than I was expecting)
A Master of Djinn
This was a lot of fun - queer female lead, strong urban fantasy vibe, pre-WWI Cairo with djinn as a part of life, I would read a ton more like this. (I don't think you absolutely have to have read the shorter fiction in the same world to enjoy this, but it's all also a fun time and introduces a lot of the characters/setting/macguffins, so it's worth doing.)
Didn't finish: The Oracle Stone - Talli L. Morgan
This quest fantasy didn't do anything wrong, I just wasn't that excited to be reading it, and I am as ever on a constant quest to only read things I'm excited about. (It suffered somewhat for being read straight after Winter's Orbit, which I absolutely loved, and because a couple of library holds came in just as I was getting going.) I did really like the in media res opening, but the rest didn't quite live up to the strength of the first few chapters.
After the Dragons - Cynthia Zhang
I was enjoying this quiet m/m novella but "character thinks they might be ace but they just hadn't met the right person yet" is a hard pass for me, unless it's clear that they're figuring out that they're grey-ace or demi, which as far as I can tell from googling reviews didn't seem to be the case here. And while I don't want to invalidate that as an experience people have, it's still a trope that I just cannot deal with, especially when it's a throwaway comment rather than an actual exploration of what that might feel like.
Light From Uncommon Stars - Ryka Aoki
I really wanted to like this, but I really struggled with the choppy writing style - it seemed to switch scenes and points of view every five seconds, so I could never really settle into it, alas.
(also I was reading the short stories from the Hugo shortlist, and it feels weird to DNF a short story, but it turns out I just hate little free libraries, and the idea of asking payment for a book from something that purports to be a library, that much, so here we are)
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Date: 7 Nov 2021 21:55 (UTC)no subject
Date: 11 Nov 2021 15:02 (UTC)