Started: 7/29/20
Finished: 7/31/20
I don’t know exactly how to talk about this book. It’s about black kids with powers, set in the real world, with the backdrop of Rodney King and Watts and police brutality and the prison system, and it’s HARD. And it’s good.
Specifically, I need more SFF book nerd friends. I have Erik (THANK YOU, ERIK, AND WE NEED TO TALK BOOKS MORE), but I need more. This WorldCon thing is hammering it home for me. Tonight, for example, I’m watching a panel about Modern SF Criticism, and Robert Silverberg, who is not a panelist, submitted a question and comment, and GUYS. Robert Silverberg is watching the same panel I’m watching. If this weren’t virtual, we would be in the same room. ROBERT SILVERBERG.
I have no one to squee with.
I mean, the people I would squee with are at this convention (virtually), so I have a goal to find/start a book club. That I don’t have time for.
Started: 7/26/20
Finished: 7/29/20
SO DISAPPOINTING. I mean, it was enjoyable enough, but I was expecting a completely different story since this is supposed to be a sequel to the White Silence AND it picks up right after the other ended. It went in completely different directions (more than once!) and seemed to have nothing to do with the plot of the first book (which had not been resolved), and when it did pick up the plot of the first book (sort of), it resolved unsatisfactorily. Meh. Also, the writing felt more amateurish than the first book and both books felt like that compared to her other books. I don’t understand how that could be, but there it is.
Guys, I am overworked lately and super-tired, but I am still here. WorldCon programming started today, so in addition to taking care of Jack and working, I am MAKING time to join big ol’ SFF nerdfest panels and such. It’s 100% virtual, and THANK ALL THE THINGS they’re recording each session, because they’re running on New Zealand time, which is 16 hours ahead of EDT. For instance, there’s a reading I’d like to see that starts at 10:30 tonight, and there’s another panel I’m interested in that starts at 1am. I’m going to nope right on out of those, but I’m counting on getting the recordings later.
Anyway, I’m done working, I’m done watching the two panels tonight that were on at times only slightly inconvenient for me, and I’m going to bed.
(I am so super excited about this convention. YAAAAAYYYYY!!!!)
Started: 7/23/20
Finished: 7/26/20
This book, or at least parts of it, scared both Corey and Mel, so I went into it gingerly. If it was dark outside and I thought it was going in a scary direction, I put it down until the next day. Maybe that’s why the parts that scared them didn’t scare me. Regardless, I liked it. Weird sinister things kept happening to the character, and I REALLY wanted to know what was going on. Super glad there was a second book.
Started: 7/23/20
Finished: 7/23/20
I LOVED this story. I had just read several heavier stories, some horror, and then I found this, and it’s funny, it’s light, and it’s lovely. Here’s a link:
Started: 7/22/20
Finished: 7/23/20
I don’t think I can say I liked this story (about a whaling ship and its crew), but I keep remembering parts of it randomly. It won’t leave me alone.
Started: 7/22/20
Gave Up: 7/22/20
I tried to read this one, and it had an interesting premise, but the writing style got to me. I stopped reading Fran Wilde’s second book – maybe I finished it, and I don’t care to the third? – and this short story had a similar style.
Started: 7/22/20
Finished: 7/22/20
Weird and disturbing and think-y, like all three pieces I have read by Rivers Solomon now, so at least they have a pattern. 🙂 Available online, link below. Worth reading.
Started: 7/22/20
Finished: 7/22/20
SO GOOD. It’s fantasy, it’s horror (even though I heard on a horror panel that the author doesn’t think of it as horror, so maybe I should just say it has an element that depending on what you’re afraid of, you could absoLUTEly think it’s scary), it’s historical fiction, and it’s emotional (I cried). SO. GOOD.
Started: 7/22/20
Finished: 7/22/20
I read this one on Tor.com a few months ago and just re-read it this morning. It’s so good. And it made me cry, too, more sad horrified tears, but better ones than the last story.
Started: 7/21/20
Finished: 7/22/20
I was not enjoying this story, and then it made me cry (sad horrified tears, not happy tears), so it had clearly gotten to me, but I’m still not sure I liked it.
Started: 7/21/20
Finished: 7/21/20
I like experimental short story formats. This one is fun, but also now I want to read the (fake) source material.
Started: 7/20/20
Finished: 7/21/20
Good story, like a YA werewolf story but without the usual trappings, and I’d really like to find out more.
Started: 7/19/20
Finished: 7/20/20
If you like cats, you will like this story. I do, and I did.
Started: 7/20/20
Finished: 7/20/20
She’s writing in the second person POV again, and it’s SO effective. I love how this played out.
Started: 7/19/20
Finished: 7/19/20
Sarah Pinsker can do no wrong. This story was a roller coaster, speeding downhill, all fun and great, and then BAM we ran into a wall and fell into pieces and then what? And no. No! Oh god no! It’s fantastic and you should read it. Except not you, Mom. Or Margaret.
Started: 7/19/20
Finished: 7/19/20
I don’t think I fully understood this story. I mean, I get the overall plot and everything, I understand what happened and what the characters learned, but the details of the big tech thing and how (or why) things get erased…I spent too much time (for a novelette I finished in less than an hour) puzzling over it. Don’t dazzle me – just tell the story.
Started: 7/19/20
Finished: 7/19/20
I liked the style of this story more than the content, I think. It’s about an archaeologist who reads about an astronomical discovery that upends her views on everything. The setting is an alternate reality where the science really does uphold the beliefs of the young-earth creationists, so that’s the accepted view of the world and physics and everything. The story is told from her perspective as she relates her days and thoughts to God, via prayers that feel like letters or diary entries.
Started: 7/19/20
Finished: 7/19/20
Fascinating near-future story with tech that allows you to communicate with yourself in a parallel universe, which is really cool, but it’s about free will and how people use that tech to make decisions, to justify their actions. The tech is just the next thing (but it’s a very cool next thing to consider).