Started: 11/3/22
Finished: 11/8/22
This started out super interesting (it’s set in LA’s Chinatown and written like a movie script), and it’s a fast read, but I nearly gave it up around 2/3 of the way through. I don’t think there’s any question about the conceit (that I don’t want to spoil for anyone), but I will admit to be confused about what was reality and what was, I don’t know, maybe allegory?, a couple of times.
Started: 10/1/22
Finished: 10/31/22
I read this for the first time last year, and I’m thinking about making it an October tradition. Here goes year 2. The book has one chapter per day, so that’s how I’m reading it. It’s delightful. I think my favorite chapter is October 17.
Definitely doing this again next year.
Started: 10/9/22
Finished: 10/16/22
Finally, a regular book that I really enjoyed. Secret libraries, magic, intrigue. Reminded me of Rachel Caine’s Great Library series, but more adult. The sequel will be published this week, and I am #10 on the waiting list at the library. Can’t wait!
Started: 10/1/22
Gave up: 10/5/22
I tried really hard to keep reading this book. I’ve read a lot about it, and it gets good reviews, and what the book is eventually saying is stuff I would want to say, but it starts out SUPER rape-y, and it sure feels like the victim is going to fall in love with the rapist, and the rapist is going to see the error of his ways, and gross gross gross. My understanding is that this is NOT how it goes, but I couldn’t get past the initial part. Not for me.
Started: 9/6/22
Finished: 9/17/22
I can’t say I liked this book. A lot of the first half was too dryly written, a little too academic. It makes perfect sense why it was that way – I mean, it takes a long time for spiders to evolve to the level of intelligence necessary for a first person point of view to be viable – but it means I didn’t really get drawn in. The problems to be solved and their eventual solutions were interesting and unusual, and maybe I’ll read the sequel, but it’s not jumping to the top of my TBR list.
Also, giant sentient spiders. No, thank you.
Started: 7/10/22
Finished: 7/20/22
I picked this up because the author wrote an article I liked, and wow, I did not know what to expect. And I did not know what was happening, and I finished it and still did not know some of it, and it was so so good. I would like to read more of this, please.
Started: 3/25/22
Finished: 3/29/22
I enjoyed this book – it’s a really cute queer YA love story about a teenager in a bakery. It’s set in Austin, and the Austin-love felt a little much in the beginning, but either it settled down or I let it go – not sure which. Anyway, I will NOT return this book to the library until I have copied out nearly every recipe. They sound really really good, and I want to try them.
Started: 2/13/22
Finished: 2/19/22
First book in a series where many of the aristocracy are trolls, others are human, and lots of people do magic. Loved the romance, enjoyed another character’s ambition, but it felt a little weird when the two plotlines merged.
Started: 2/3/22
Finished: 2/8/22
This book was a LOT. It’s the first in a series (didn’t know that when I started it), and I cannot WAIT for the next one. It was a little hard to follow, not because it didn’t grab my attention (because boy did it), but because there are a lot of characters and a lot of factions, and I wasn’t clear on all of them until the very end. It was only published four months ago, so I have NO idea when book 2 will come out, and I’m sure I will need a refresher by then. I am for sure going to read his debut novel (The Lesson) while I’m waiting.
Started: 12/4/21
Finished: 12/6/21
Nuns in space! Their spaceship is alive, which is kinda weird, kinda gross. I picture it like a giant whale.
Started: 10/28/21
Finished: 11/7/21
First in a series, YA, some of it was predictable, and some of it was very not predictable, and I liked it a lot.
The only thing I wasn’t crazy about it a thing that a lot of YA books do: the characters, teenagers all, never act like teenagers. Or, not never, but even kids faced with a ton of responsibility are still going to act like kids sometimes. I don’t think these kids did. So I was occasionally taken out of the story when I remembered that, hey, this character who said he made a super-serious decision “years ago” is only 18 right now, and then it turns out he made this super-serious decision when he was 12. Uh huh.
That aside, I really liked it, and I LOVED where it took the plot.
Started: 10/13/21
Finished: 10/31/21
I’ve been meaning to read something, anything, by Roger Zelazny, and I just haven’t gotten around to it. An article on Tor.com pointed me to this, which is broken up into one chapter per day of the month of October. The article’s author reads it, one chapter a day, every October, so after playing a little bit of catch-up (since I didn’t start on the 1st), I did, too, and I REALLY enjoyed it. It’s easy, it’s funny, and it’s Halloween-y. I might buy it and do this every year.
Started: 10/20/21
Finished: 10/24/21
Slow start, but that’s based more on the formatting than the story/writing. It’s not .mobi, so the formatting isn’t perfect. Annoying!
SO EASY to get past the formatting after just a bit. Really good story, totally sucked me in, and I’m looking forward to the sequel.
Started: 10/16/21
Finished: 10/20/21
Sarah Gailey LOVED this book, and Tor.com praised it, so I figured I’d try it. It’s a romance that falls into science fiction because there’s a time loop/stuck in time trope involved. The characters are good, the story is good, there’s nothing not to like, and yet I’m a little meh about it. There was a little too much ending.
Started: 9/30/21
Finished: 10/16/21
New fantasy series! It took me a little bit to get into it, then I was hooked, then I wasn’t sure I was going to finish it, and then I got hooked again. I can’t say whether this was just about my frame of mind or about slow parts in the book. Could be either, but the vast majority of it had my full attention, and I’m still thinking about it, and I’m excited about the next book, which – ugh – isn’t out yet.
Started: 8/21/21
Finished: 8/29/21
There are a lot of people out there who raved about this one, about how it’s a superhero novel turned on its head, it’s about the people supporting the villain, and that’s so new and so different! It’s not THAT new, and it’s not THAT different, and I spent a lot of this book feeling like I had read it before, which isn’t really fair. We were deep within this character’s head, and I enjoyed it, and it was good. I suppose I was just (and still am, apparently) annoyed that it felt over-hyped.
Started: 8/14/21
Finished: 8/18/2021
I think this is magical realism, which usually doesn’t do it for me, but it’s also mythology and it’s also a dark book about a kidnapping and it’s also a book about a teenager with problems. I’m not sure if that’s one element too many, but I really enjoyed it.
Started: 8/6/21
Gave up: 8/8/2021
Interesting premise, bad writing. TERRIBLE METAPHORS. I tried, I gave up.
Started: 6/21/21
Finished: 7/3/21
This series comes up whenever anyone is talking about supernatural detectives, and people seem to like it, so I figured I’d give it a try. I liked it, and I’ll probably give it another book or two, but the main character doesn’t have much of an internal life. He gets thrown into this supernatural world, out of nowhere, and he doesn’t seem to have much reaction to it. So maybe that will improve…? Also, he (or the series) has some sexist tendencies, so if that doesn’t get better, I’m out. The mystery and story were interesting, though.
Started: 6/11/21
Gave up: 6/21/21
REALLY really good, except for one interlude that slowed the whole book down, and then the last quarter, which had both too much information and not enough information. I would still recommend it. I liked it.