book

Rated Assassin's Quest 6/10

Wants to read A Lonesome Place for Murder: An Ethan Brand Mystery

Rated Senseless 8/10

Pretty good, different interesting viewpoint characters and I liked the 'resolution' (a couple of threads are left dangling, but it worked for me). Good spooky writing often evoking multiple senses in a scene.

Rated Written on the Dark 10/10

Kay is always excellent, his prose is beautiful and he knows when to focus on the intimate details of a scene between just a few characters and when to pull back and show an overview of a situation, or let the reader know what's happening to someone many years after the main story. This one has the historical connections/influences that he is known for and it's very well done, inspired by several real life events but making its own original story. Lots of family and relationship stuff, some political stuff and a little bit of mortal peril.

Wants to read Stories Are Weapons: Psychological Warfare and the American Mind

Rated Trail of Lightning 10/10

This was a lot of fun. I was late to reading it because it looked a little bit like a somewhat formulaic YA book with the prickly heroine, but it has enough to distance itself from most of the similar books and I liked the combination of future post-apocalypse with indigenous mythology.

Wants to read Little Eve

Rated Uresia Grave of Heaven: d20 system 10/10

Rated Heartwood 6/10

A quick and easy read I picked up for a local mystery book club. I would've liked more writing from the point of view of the woman who was lost in the woods and also feel it took too long to find out how she got lost considering at least some of the chapters were from her POV. I was somewhat underwhelmed by the reason albeit a very terrifying reason which writing that I realize I didn't truly feel??<br/><br/>I also did a lot of skimming of the chapters from the POV of the elderly woman who ultimately figured out what must've happened to the hiker and called it in. Less of her would've been the trade-off for chapters from the hiker. I suppose also less of the interviews/calls with her hiking buddy.<br/><br/>I feel like I'm trashing this book, but I think my dissatisfaction is mainly from too many POVs that also weren't of interest to me. YMMV. I still kept reading to the end and enjoyed the core of the story well enough.

Rated Changes 8/10

My re-read of this book took me twice or thrice as long as previous Dresden novels have and I'm pretty sure why. With the previous book I also took longer than usual, so part of it is I think I finally was reaching burn-out with the series. However, I also knew where this book was going to end, more clearly than pretty much all other previous books. I was reluctant to get there. I'm not surprised that Butcher only went 3 more books in the series after this. Dresden had reached either a dead end or a peak, depending on how you look at it, and Butcher seemed to be having a hard time figuring out where to go next. As I make my way through these last books to get to the new books he surprise-dropped in the last year, I hope the 5 years he took away from The Dresden Files gave him a fresh outlook on the series.<br/><br/>As for this book, it really is a culmination of a lot of storylines that have been building throughout the whole series. It's not something hidden in the book blurbs, but in case you've not read it and don't know the main plot I'll hide here that immediately dropping on page 1 that <spoiler>Susan had his child (from that scene you know you've not forgotten) and hid the fact from him</spoiler> and that's an immediate motivation to drop everything and run off to blow up villains for doing him wrong (again) really rankled. On one hand, that's typical Harry without it even having to be personal, but on the other it comes off too sudden for my taste. There were even more secrets dropped about Harry's past by the end of the book, so there's that to look forward to. I don't remember if there's one more shoe to drop, but there's one last detail of that background that hasn't come out yet that I hope does.<br/><br/>For once I'd say that there was really only one storyline throughout the novel and almost all of it involved Harry jumping out of the pan and into the fire repeatedly and finally having to make really ugly deals in exchange for help and firepower. I'd say that was almost the most boring part of it all. Some things happened near the front of the book that I'd even already forgotten about by the time they were mentioned in passing near the end. Yikes. That ending, though. Unforgettable and - at the time the book came out - shocking and devastating considering one minute the reader is unexpectedly hopeful and then. And then, indeed.<br/><br/>Finally, here's my bullet points of things that happened that I want to remember and be able to look back, so if you're averse to probably major spoilers, time to skip out.<br/><br/><spoiler>1. The first indicator this book was going to really be about Changes, vampire Arianna had bombs set in Harry's work building all around his floor and has the building blown up.<br/><br/>2. Susan hasn't been around, but she gives Molly the once over like she's a threat? Sure, the dumb teen is lovesick for Harry, but she's like a kid niece to Harry.<br/><br/>3. Finally Harry's literal fairy Godmother makes an appearance! The Leanansidhe appears calmly sitting in his recliner petting Mister after the FBI has turned his apartment upside down trying to find something to pin on him after the building blew up. The last time we actually saw her was 4 books ago in "Proven Guilty" when Queen Mab was busily reprogramming her at Arctis Tor. Things always go interestingly off the rails when Godmother Lea shows up!<br/><br/>4. On the Harry tour of trying to drum up assistance, he gets Marcone's magic bodyguard Gard to take him to her boss in Oslo, "Donar Vadderung." It's a short scene, but obliquely we're lead to the name drop that he's really Father Odin. I didn't realize until just now re-reading this chapter, but one of the stops in the Ways to get to him in Oslo dropped the huge hint that they stopped "before the roots of a vast old tree whose trunk could have contained my apartment with room to spare for a garage." Cute. Also, although never named, his twin receptionists are Hugin and Munin, whom he refers to as "M." He also hints after a good laugh that he's also Santa Claus. Too bad he doesn't offer his help other than telling him Maggie will be in Chichen Itza for sacrifice and about the death curse pointed at Dresden and all his ancestors and descendents.<br/><br/>4b. Why the hell is it Latin America is always only ever discussed about their ritual sacrifice?? Imagine if that was the only thing ever discussed about the Saxons or the Romans or the Brittons? It's tiresome. Native Americans were more than a blood cult.<br/><br/>5. In the middle of all this there were some vampires that even having just finished reading about them keep being totally forgettable to me. Esteban and Esmeralda are lunatics sent by Arianna to try and kill him. In the process, and to add even more Changes to Harry's life, they burn down Harry's apartment house. He manages to get out his elderly landlady and her elderly neighbors, but not without first falling a couple of stories and breaking his back on the landing.<br/><br/>6. In the "hitting everyone up to beg for help" tour, he calls in archangel Uriel asking to fix his paralysis. All that guy did was confirm that it was true Maggie was his daughter and not Susan lying. Next stop: Queen Mab. And there finally was the big deal the book was heading towards. Of course she's been trying to get him to be her Winter Knight since... at least Book 4? Harry is finally desperate enough and he agrees. The price? Kill the broken, tortured remnant of the last still living Winter Knight who dared try to betray Queen Mab, Lloyd Slate, whom she's been torturing all those years since that previous book. Partly out of mercy and mainly to get the power he needs to save Maggie he does it. The deal is then that he gets to be himself and take care of all his business saving his daughter and then he'd completely be hers until he dies. Wow. The deal you knew was coming someday, but there it was.<br/><br/>7. It's always fun for me when Harry suddenly goes on a side trip to buy a stack of pizza because you know what's coming next, an appearance of the great Little Folk lead by Toot-toot! In this case to help Harry find Susan who was taken into custody by the FBI for having been seen at Harry's apartment and a "known associate" who might've been involved with the work building bombing.<br/><br/>8a. Amusing moments:<br/><br/>While Harry is plotting the attack everyone is figuring out who's who from the LOTR Fellowship. When Harry asks who he ended up being Sanya tells him Sam, of course. Which exasperates Harry because Gandalf was RIGHT THERE lol, but to which Sanya says, "Sam was the true hero of the tale... he faced far greater and more terrible foes than he ever should have had to face, and did so with courage... went alone into a black and terrible land, stormed a dark fortress, and resisted the most terrible of temptation of his world for the sake of the friend he loved... in the end, it was his actions and his actions alone that made it possible for light to overcome darkness." How's that for a tearjerker?<br/><br/>8b. On the last run at the temple in Chichen Itza, Lea gets cute and turns everyone into dogs, ones who can't communicate. Who can communicate? Mouse, of course! What does he say when she does this? "That <i>bitch</i>." lol<br/><br/>9a. The three big reveals/events in the end. One was that just as you think Susan is going to take out the crazy Red Court King, Martin kicks her out of hiding making her drop <i>Amoracchius</i> and reveals himself to have been a traitor double-agent for hundreds of years now, slowly getting into place to take out the entire semi-vampires of the Fellowship of St. Giles.<br/><br/>9b. The bigger reveal of the whole thing is that Arianna's goal wasn't just to take out Dresden as revenge for husband Ortega's death, but pull of a whole coup because she knows that more important than Thomas, Harry has another living relative: his grandfather, Ebenezer McCoy, the White Council Blackstaff. Tun-tun-TUN! And not a moment too soon the Blackstaff rides to the rescue with 11 other members of the hooded "Grey Council," one of whom Harry realizes is none other than Father Odin who gives him a respectful tip o' the hat before stepping back out into the Ways after the rescue.<br/><br/>9c. You know someone had to die, right? It turns out that while Martin was on the surface doublecrossing Susan and Harry and St. Giles, he was actually pulling off the long con of the triple-cross and was betting on Susan being turned into a vampire trying to save Maggine. As a newly minted vampire of the Red Court, Harry took advantage of the moment and took out the entire Red Court of vampires by killing Susan. Wow wow. No more Reds!<br/><br/>10. Finally, my favorite bullet point as always: Murphy. She's there for Harry from the beginning, charging the FBI building to get out Susan and to the death at Chichen Itza. Literally, she is his ride or die. She makes the choice to help him even if it costs her beloved job of law enforcement, which it does. Thankfully, it doesn't cost her life. She even starts to contemplate taking up for real the Sword of the Cross, <i>Fidelacchius</i>. What else was she contemplating? Finally taking up with Harry Dresden. YES. Of course, just as Harry starts feeling happiness and hope at the prospect waiting for her to come back and pick him up, Fate steps in and the book ends with Harry alone and shot sinking into Lake Michigan.</spoiler><br/><br/>Wow, that was way more bullet points than I thought I had in me. A lot more of note happened than I'd realized. Onward towards a little detour in the series, a set of "Side Jobs."

Rated Son of Elsewhere: A Memoir in Pieces 10/10

This is excellent. The prose is nearly transparent and it's almost like a selection of short biographical essays about the author's life and moving to Canada as a child, lots of culture clash and immigrant parents not having the same values as their child, but it is full of heart (and grief) and moments of pop-culture (like nu metal, and wrestling fan fiction) drawn very well.

Rated Galileo's Dream 4/10

At last I've finished this book! I don't remember when I may have gotten it, but it's obvious it was once a library book, so I must've bought it from the local library system's clearance fundraising book cellar. Having read and loved thoroughly Robinson's Mars trilogy in high school, I figured it was way past time I read another of his books. The summary of the plot in the flaps sounded so interesting and completely in my wheel house. A founder of science, time travel, and the future in the balance? Yes, please.<br/><br/>And then it took me three months to struggle with finding the desire to struggle through it to the end. It turned out it did have the components covered in the book flaps. Unfortunately, that write-up was much more exciting sounding than the actual novel. The overwhelming majority of the time is spent in the 1600s and most of it Galileo moaning or complaining about something or the other. Or going on about his various relatives who were all hangers on wholly dependent on him.<br/><br/>If you're really into historical fiction of 1500s/1600s Italy, then you'll enjoy this book a lot more than I did. It's not poorly written, it just really wasn't what I was interested in. I would've loved a lot more time spent in the future and with those aliens on Jupiter and Europa etc. Instead I got a lot more about Galileo and descriptions of his hernia and the truss he used to keep his guts in place, constant drinking, and constant need of money not to mention his impoverished starving daughters he stuck in a convent. By the time the future people change the end of his life, I'd long stopped caring and just wanted to get to the end. The last 30 or so pages of the 527 were the most interesting of the lot. A novel from that final character's POV would've been way more interesting to me.

Wants to read Love, Death and Robots: The Official Anthology: Volume One

Rated Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay 10/10

These are so well done and very powerful, if sometimes kind of distant -- there's history happening just off screen, but we are mostly in the narrator's head. The last hundred pages or so picked up very quickly and it almost ends on a cliffhanger...it takes me a while to read these though so I'll probably give it another few months to marinate in my head before finishing the series.

Rated While You Were Out: An Intimate Family Portrait of Mental Illness in an Era of Silence 8/10

I picked this up as a choice by a local book club. It's great to read a book that I'd otherwise not have gone to and picked on my own. I was about 2/3 of the way through it when I decided to glance at some Goodreads reviews and, as often happens, I somewhat regretted that. Negative comments that came up were criticisms of what the reader viewed as tone. Being someone sensitive to and often a target of "the tone police" that always automatically gets my dander up. The "tone" readers picked up on was what I would describe as thinking the writing lacked emotion and elaboration of the writer's personal feelings.<br/><br/>I disagree to an extent. In fact, in the back quarter? or so of the book she clearly explains that she had trouble with that very thing. A struggle between meanderings about her personal thoughts and memories. Maybe a lot of that was lost in the edit, but I can understand an editor wanting to "trim the fat" and build something coherent out of writing like that. I'd think it was emotion that would lead to that type of writing. The other thing Kissinger mentions is that she's spent a lifetime making sense of the mental illnesses in her family through her career, through journalism, and trying to make a difference with it. Classic journalism was very much "just the facts" and I can see that that's how she ended up shaping this story.<br/><br/>There is so much detail. How else is some sort of cohesion going to happen with so many things happening that were explanations of what went on in her family? I appreciated all of the stories about her parents and her siblings. I don't think she was cold about it, but I would think certainly after some 50? 60? years of it, it can be exhausting and at a certain point it would be repetitive. If you can't imagine and have some empathy for the writer losing 2 siblings and dealing with several other close family members all struggling with their mental health without being told over and over her feelings, I don't know what to say.<br/><br/>I definitely also appreciated that in telling their stories and in pointing out this fact, it was clear how much has changed in her lifetime with regards to mental health. Social attitudes and therefore medical treatment has changed so much in the last 50 years. There's still much that needs to change and improve, but sticking relatives in the attic/basement or some horror-show asylum pretending it's not happening are (hopefully) in the past and talking about struggles without fear or shame are huge strides forward.

Rated Hamnet 6/10

I got on a very long wait list for this book after I kept hearing an Oscar-nominated film was based on it. I'm into some historical fiction and I thought it would be an interesting POV from Shakespeare's wife for a change, even though maybe/probably most of it was fiction hung up on a handful of facts.<br/><br/>A relatively slim novel, it took me a while to get through it still. I have to say that I was disappointed. I kept waiting for maybe a little more colorful writing? Maybe more characterization? I can't quite pinpoint my issue, but I didn't feel I got a whole lot out of it.<br/><br/>I like reading books on which a film is based first, so I'm going to try that at some point, but I'm not racing to find it soon.<br/><br/>YMMV on how wrapped up you get in it as I've read in other reviews.

Rated How to Think Like Socrates: Ancient Philosophy as a Way of Life in the Modern World 8/10

Rated The Fox Wife 6/10

I came across this book from a list at my local library and found the premise interesting. I think I did come into it with an expectation of more fable elements than what it turned out to be. I also thought there was going to be more skepticism and more of a hot pursuit of the main character, Snow, by the detective, Bao. Because I was expecting maybe more... blatant writing of Snow as a fox - or not - I read most of the way really wondering if she actually was a fox or if it was something all in her mind. Sure a couple of elderly people may or may not remember or think they knew about foxes, but how much of it was blurry memory from a lifetime ago from when they were small children?<br/><br/>I enjoyed this book well enough, but I felt more time was spent bowing and scraping to the whims of random men than making it more fantastical. Did Snow actually jump fences... as a woman? Somehow it never makes clear whether she's in a fox form or at least I didn't think so. The entire driving motivation of Snow is also rather anticlimactically resolved. I think I would've either preferred the fox aspect removed entirely or detailed more clearly. Middle-roading this detail made it less satisfying for me.

Rated The Sparrow 6/10

Normally, books written out of choronological order isn't an issue for me. This novel switches mainly between 2 disparate time periods and that's not an issue. More on that in a bit.<br/><br/>On one hand, I really enjoyed the development of the 8+ characters, albeit a couple of them from the later time period weren't as clear for me. The world building was pretty great. I was really impressed by the development of alien species descriptions and their entire cultures. I could really imagine them in my mind's eye.<br/><br/>On the other hand, my primary issue related to the time switches is it took too long to get to the big denouement and I felt it was at the expense of all of those fully developed characters. In addition, the entire time these humans decided to up and go to a whole other world, I was tearing out my hair because so many things just... never occurred to them?? Like, humanity, especially some of these particular humans, never learned their history from the Era of Colonization??<br/><br/>I'll caveat that the entire reason for being of the main character at the end is lunacy to me, so those final chapters caused eyerolling more than anything else. At least it wasn't stereotypically one of the other main characters?<br/><br/>The entire premise of that main character at the end isn't something for me, so I'll probably pass on the sequel.

Rated American Demon 6/10

Here's another author I used to read who seemed to have quit writing their long-running urban fantasy series and then came back to it after nearly 6 years of hiatus. By the end before that, I was kind of meh on the series, but kept reading it out of habit. I'm a little sketchy on whether or not I read one or two books before that intermission, though. The plots sounded familiar, so I decided to plow ahead and read this new adventure. Although a hefty 501 pages, it's super-light easy reading, but I kept waiting for something more... remarkable to happen, something extra exciting. Unfortunately, that never happened for me. The ending mostly fell flat. I'm just not that invested in these characters and thinking back I can't say I ever really was. I honestly hate-read some parts of previous books just because I spent so much of it rolling my eyes, mainly at the vampire character Ivy. Not quite as strongly tired as I was when reading Laurell K. Hamilton books once upon a time before giving them up, but still. I think getting through this book just proved to me that it's time to quit reading this series too and spend it reading something I appreciate a lot more.

Rated The Perks of Being a Wallflower 6/10

A nice book and a really easy read. At first the diary style was fun, but after a while it got annoying. I started wishing it had just been writen as a standard novel. The writing of the main character was kind of bad at first, too, but then suddenly miraculously improved and for that I was thankful. As for the story itself, I'd initially started getting impatient because it seemed like it was going to be another one of those cliche "coming of age" stories. In a way it was, but I think what really made this book was the way the author approached some serious topics that suddenly come out of the blue.<br/><br/>I actually put the book down for a while because it got depressing and serious really fast at one point. Not to worry, though, because it didn't delve TOO deeply into the situations and it soon picked up again. I suppose that for a YA book that's the way it's supposed to be. It WAS also only 213 pages long, so there was no time to really get into it. But it has some of everything in it: drugs, physical abuse, mental illness, homosexuality, family death, you name it. The guilt the main character carries over his Aunt is sad, but I either missed something or the author really leaves you hanging on the why of what happened with his old friend, Michael. I guess I'll never know? I can't decide if the girl with whom he's in love, Sam, is a MPDG. If she's not, then she really leans towards one.<br/><br/>I think I would've given this more stars if this had been a longer, more in-depth novel than this, but considering it's seemingly for teens, I suppose it does its job. I'm interested how the movie treats this book. I realize it was done by the author himself, which is infinitely rare. There were two things I just can't see making it to the screen. One I won't mention because it would be a book spoiler involving Sam near the end of the book, but the other was one thing I found really exasperating about Charlie: he kept bursting into tears at the drop of a hat. Constantly! Just no, I can't see some studio exec or whoever letting a nearly mentally-handicapped seeming teenaged boy constantly being weepy.

Rated El viento conoce mi nombre 8/10

I picked up this book to read as a choice for a local library book club. I'd read a few months ago another Allende novel, "Violeta," and enjoyed it very much. Since I'm fairly fluent in Spanish I chose to read the original Spanish version rather than the English translation. A couple of times I made a comparison and found the English transation pretty faithful.<br/><br/>While reading this novel, I noted a few Goodreads reviews were a little down on this book and I have suspicions as to why, but I don't agree. I enjoyed the story and appreciated the converging stories comparing two different instances of refugees from human horrors of which one is a very common go-to for the Western world, the Holocaust. I find it telling when someone refuses to make that connection, that they're one and the same, and refusing to lend the same humanity and empathy to Latin American refugees.<br/><br/>About the only thing I would say I would make a minor criticism is the length it took to converge the 2 stories. It wasn't until approximately 3/4 of the way through that how they related was explained. Maybe it might've occurred to someone else and I usually consider myself fairly quick in those types of instances, but it didn't with this story. Regardless, the story is fairly true to real life in the horrible aspects and it would serve many people to read this book and fix their hearts to make that same connection themselves.

Rated Absence 8/10

I don't remember how I learned about this book, but I thought the premise was intriguing and immediately put it on my TBR list.<br/><br/>There's sometimes/often? a split between people who like to refer to stories as scifi and those who like to call the genre speculative fiction. I think to the general public sci-fi always brings to mind flashy technology and, for lack of a better term, a lot of "pew pew!" Sometimes what the plot may be speculating about our current condition, wrapped among all the pew!pew!, can be lost because of the flash. At some point while reading this book, Rod Serling-type "The Twilight Zone" came to mind. It's definitely sci-fi, but without all the flash of, let's say, 1970s+ sci-fi.<br/><br/>If you pick up this book looking for aliens and pat answers, you're going to be disappointed. It's definitely a more philosophical look at American culture and society under alienating circumstances with the remove of some sci-fi unknown cause which creates the hypothetical circumstances through which it can be viewed. I can't say I care for the final conclusion the main character closes the novel, but that's entirely the point. I easily see how the author extrapolated recent behavior into this novel. In a way, that's both tragic and sad.<br/><br/>Read this book for the what-if of what our society is like and where it's going riding on the idea of what Life Comes Next.

Rated The High Lord 8/10

What a huge difference in writing from beginning to end of this trilogy. I started book 1 a little disappointed at the level of writing while blowing through book 3, not because the writing continued to be so YA easy, but because it had become so rich in characters. Yeah, it was still fairly predictable, but I was happy to read that the nugget dropped in book 1 was used to help save the day in book 3. I would've been pretty mad, actually, if it had been just left there. Each book was progressively longer, but not to their detriment. It gave Canavan more time for world detail and character development which was definitely a bit lacking in book 1. Thankfully, there wasn't another weird aha! twist in the middle like there were in both previous books, so that was a relief. It really had come off as amateur, to be honest. The one question I asked in my book 2 review, did anyone really believe Akkarin was evil?, really fell to the wayside starting with book 3's back cover summary. I guess Canavan decided she wasn't fooling anyone, so she just let it go from the start. The ending though, I didn't expect. It even got a "WHAT?!" out of me, so good job. I felt it was rather sad and not what I would've liked necessarily for several of the characters nor how the New World Order, if you will, turns out, but that doesn't make it a bad ending. Like I always say, not all endings have to be perfect happily ever afters nor neatly tied off in a bow. There's a sequel trilogy of which I already have book 1, but I think I'm going to rest a bit from this universe and pick it up later when I'm ready to read more of the Guild's black magicians.

Rated Triple Chocolate Cheesecake Murder 2/10

I picked up this book in anticipation of checking out a local book club. This is their January read. However, the meet is scheduled for one of the days next week where it's supposed to be extremely cold and also, honestly, I did not enjoy this book.<br/><br/>I can't believe the amount of coffee and pastries these people drank and ate. And the amount of time spent describing and asking about pouring and making coffee and baking. Good grief! I wasn't interested in a cookbook, so I skipped through the many many pages of baking instructions for whatever baked good was just exhaustively discussed in the previous chapter.<br/><br/>Speaking of skipping, I didn't quite skip, but did do a lot of skimming not long after I started the book of alllll that coffee making, drinking, pouring, and baked good describing. It didn't help that after only a few chapters I noticed and then couldn't not notice how stilted everyone spoke. And how... staccato? all the writing was. It reminded me of the lessons drilled into me by English teachers to throw in some variety in your writing with sentence structure and vocabulary to keep your writing interesting.<br/><br/>I even checked the reading level of the book thinking maybe I'd not noticed the book club was for teens or something. Sad and horrifying this is supposed to be adult reading level. It's a slim recipe book with an attempt at a mystery on the side. When it finally got around to that, it was painfully obvious who was the murderer. And who would let them walk like that?? Yikes.<br/><br/>Not recommended above middle schoolers. And probably not even that considering all that recipe padding.