Review – The Album of Dr. Moreau

Posted August 27, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Review – The Album of Dr. Moreau

The Album of Dr. Moreau

by Daryl Gregory

Genres: Crime, Mystery, Science Fiction
Pages: 176
Rating: four-stars
Synopsis:

Daryl Gregory's The Album of Dr. Moreau combines the science fiction premise of the famous novel by H. G. Wells with the panache of a classic murder mystery and the spectacle of a beloved boy band.

It’s 2001, and the WyldBoyZ are the world’s hottest boy band, and definitely the world’s only genetically engineered human-animal hybrid vocal group. When their producer, Dr. M, is found murdered in his hotel room, the “boyz” become the prime suspects. Was it Bobby the ocelot (“the cute one”), Matt the megabat (“the funny one”), Tim the Pangolin (“the shy one”), Devin the bonobo (“the romantic one”), or Tusk the elephant (“the smart one”)?

Las Vegas Detective Luce Delgado has only twenty-four hours to solve a case that goes all the way back to the secret science barge where the WyldBoyZ’ journey first began—a place they used to call home.

I got surprisingly into Daryl Gregory’s The Album of Dr Moreau; I don’t actually remember where I heard about it or why I picked it up, but I know I added it to my Kobo Plus a while ago, and decided to read it on something of a whim. I expected something… I don’t know, less serious, even given the source material and the fact that it’s a sci-fi murder mystery: given the concept of a boyband of animal-human hybrids, which the story fully leans into, it could have been considerably wackier.

But no, it goes for something sincere, even while there are silly animal puns and cutesy bits with Bobby O, the ocelot band member, and with the detective’s kid. By sincere, I definitely don’t mean that it’s po-faced or anything like that: at times it is silly.

But it also engages with the darkness of the original story of Doctor Moreau’s island, and with the seriousness of a murder mystery (even as it rejects T.S. Eliot’s “rules” for detective fiction, which, good). The band members were abused and have been exploited, and the solution to the story comes out of the darkness of the past, one which looms up behind them slowly even as the detective sometimes seems to be dealing with an entire circus.

I don’t think I should say more about the resolution of the story, but overall, I found it pretty satisfying and well done!

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)

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WWW Wednesday

Posted August 26, 2026 by Nicky in General / 2 Comments

Cover of Servus by Emma SouthonWhat have you recently finished reading?

I didn’t get much reading done yesterday, but on Monday night I finally finished reading Emma Southon’s Servus, which I originally received as an ARC. It’s pretty thorough on the topic of slavery in the Roman Empire, but with Southon’s usual style, which is fairly light and flippant. I mostly enjoyed it, though of course the topic is a heavy one.

Cover of The Villain's White Halo vol 1 by Hao Da Yi Juan Wei Sheng ZhiWhat are you currently reading?

I’ve cleared the decks a bit and now have only one book on my “currently reading” shelf… for now, at least: The Villain’s White Halo vol 1, by Hao Da Yi Juan Wei Sheng Zhi. Irritatingly, no bookshops around here seem to be stocking volumes two and three, so if I want to continue (which so far I think I will), I’ll need to order them when I get home.

So far I’m not totally in love, but I am curious where it’s going and how things work out, now that I’m a bit over halfway through volume one.

What will you be reading next?

Not a clue. I brought all my remaining 20 Books of Summer picks with me, but I think I might be about to let go of that list and just try to encourage myself to read anything, because I’m pretty fidgety and not settling to any given book, and it’s a sad waste of my deliberately chill vacation, designed with plenty of time for reading!

The amount I’m reading doesn’t look like a slump to most people, but it isn’t normal for me, and it makes me feel preeeetty restless, so I really hope I find something that grabs me.

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Top Ten Tuesday: Best Bookshops

Posted August 25, 2026 by Nicky in General / 39 Comments

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday prompt is about bookish places I’ve visited! I think the emphasis is more generally on cool places from books, author residences, etc, but somehow that’s not a thing that really excites me and I can’t think of much right now!

So… time to talk about my favourite bookshops! After each I’m listing their locations that I’ve visited and can personally recommend, not their full list of shops.

  1. Portal Bookshop (York).
    From when Lali saved my bacon with a copy of one of Martha Wells’ books at a signing at Worldcon, I’ve been a big supporter of Portal Bookshop, and was so happy when they managed to set up premises in York — which is close enough to be a good day trip. They stock a range of queer books and diverse SF/F works, and I have them to thank for my love of authors like Jordan L. Hawk and much of my collection of KJ Charles’ books in print.
  2. Topping & Company (Bath, Edinburgh, Ely).
    This is a growing chain of indie bookshops, but I first met them in Edinburgh, where the shop is downright magical. I swear there are more rooms than physically make sense with the footprint of the shop, and every time I turned around there was somehow another one. The ladders on wheels and wooden shelving add to that experience a lot. They’ve recently opened a shop in York too, though I just visited their shop in Bath yesterday as part of my birthday trip!
  3. Mr B’s Emporium of Reading Delights (Bath).
    I love the name of this bookshop; the whimsy is definitely part of why I went there. I did find the organisation of the shop a bit bewildering, since all fiction is shelved together without distinction by genre: maybe it sounds weird, given the range of genres I read, but I don’t really like that. It makes my job browsing the shelves harder, when I don’t know if a dragon on the spine means a dragon or just a literary thing. If you’re looking for a bookish conversation or some bookseller recommendations, though, it’s a good one.
  4. Gay’s the Word (London).
    Gay’s the Word is the oldest queer bookshop in the UK, and I visited it recently on my graduation trip to London. The shop feels pretty small, but I carried away a sizeable pile of books anyway. I recently read and cried a little over the history of the shop and persecution against its owners and workers in A.J. West’s How Queer Bookshops Changed the World, which is a book I definitely recommend.
  5. Forbidden Planet (London, Bristol).
    I know, this is somewhat less potentially niche, but the London store is amazing, with a selection of comics, manga, danmei, and SF/F books that really have to be seen to be believed. I can never leave without new books, and the sheer number of books they showcase means I often find temptations that Waterstones don’t seem to stock. I found a few treasures in the Bristol shop, too, though it’s considerably smaller.
  6. Troutmark Books (Cardiff).
    This secondhand bookshop was vital to me in my teens and twenties. Whenever I went home to Wales in my teens, and when I lived there as a student, I loved turning up to look at the SF/F section, poke my nose into the comics, etc. It’s been a long time since I visited, but I imagine it pretty much unchanged, with the high shelves still packed to the ceiling. Maybe I’ll pop my head in today, since I might be in the area…
  7. Paramount Books (Manchester).
    In the same vein, this secondhand bookshop in Manchester impressed me so much that at one point I actually wrote a review of it on this blog. I don’t buy secondhand books much at the moment, but if that changes I’ll definitely make return visits — perhaps not too regularly, as Manchester isn’t super convenient… but when I can!
  8. Criminally Good Books (York).
    On my last trip to Portal Bookshop, I also heard about this shop and had to take a look. I was admittedly more impressed by their non-fiction selection, since I’m a fan of classic crime and there wasn’t a lot of that to be seen (and what they had, I’d read), but I did enjoy the selections of non-fiction and inevitably left with a few books.
  9. The American Book Center (Amsterdam, The Hague).
    When I lived in Belgium, we made semi-regular trips to get me English-language books to keep my engines running. The selection (particularly at the Amsterdam location) was unbelievable, though it was mostly the SF/F that drew me. I haven’t visited since we moved to the UK in 2018, but I’m sure it’s still amazing.
  10. Bookshop.org (online).
    If you want to support indie bookshops, then this is an indispensable resource in the UK, and almost as quick as getting your books off Amazon — just as quick, if you pay a little extra for first class delivery, at least in the UK! You can choose a specific bookshop to support with your purchases, or it’ll be divided up between signed-up bookshops.

There are a few others I would’ve mentioned but found out they’ve closed since — don’t forget that an independent bookshop can be a fragile thing and needs the support of its enthusiastic community!

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Review – Wooing the Witch Queen

Posted August 24, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 8 Comments

Review – Wooing the Witch Queen

Wooing the Witch Queen

by Stephanie Burgis

Genres: Fantasy, Romance
Pages: 294
Series: Queens of Villainy #1
Rating: three-stars
Synopsis:

Queen Saskia is the wicked sorceress everyone fears. After successfully wrestling the throne from her evil uncle, she only wants one thing: to keep her people safe from the empire next door. For that, she needs to spend more time in her laboratory experimenting with her spells. She definitely doesn’t have time to bring order to her chaotic library of magic.

When a mysterious dark wizard arrives at her castle, Saskia hires him as her new librarian on the spot. “Fabian” is sweet and a little nerdy, and his requests seem a little strange – what in the name of Divine Elva is a fountain pen? – but he’s getting the job done. And if he writes her flirtatious poetry and his innocent touch makes her skin singe, well…

Little does Saskia know that the "wizard" she’s falling for is actually an Imperial archduke in disguise, with no magical training whatsoever. On the run, with perilous secrets on his trail and a fast growing yearning for the wicked sorceress, he's in danger from her enemies and her newfound allies, too. When his identity is finally revealed, will their love save or doom each other?

I’ve been meaning to try Stephanie Burgis’ Wooing the Witch Queen since forever, seeing other people’s enthusiasm about the series — and there is indeed a lot to love! The introduction is a little heavy, with Felix fleeing his kingdom due to being essentially a puppet ruler, manipulated and outright abused by the man who actually controls the kingdom… and Saskia’s back story is also a tragic one, with betrayal and the murder of her parents by her uncle behind her before she managed to take her own throne. Despite all that setup, the story has a relatively light touch.

The misunderstanding/mistaken identity thing at the beginning didn’t entirely work for me in that I just wanted Felix to come clean already and avoid the horrible third act breakup I could see coming from a mile off… but ultimately, Burgis subverted my expectations there somewhat. She does have to have Saskia wilfully insist on ignorance on more than one occasion in order to play things out the way she wants to, but it mostly works, and I was relieved that the relationship didn’t have the breakup I’d expected.

I did find the insta-attraction a little bit much, but over time the connection between the two did grow on me, as well, particularly when Felix time after time just supported Saskia and her needs, her right to make decisions and make a different world than her First Minister thinks she should, her right to be a queen.

The warmth felt by Saskia for her staff and they for her is lovely, too. The way that the “evil queen”‘s castle is essentially a big family (or at least a well-run and employee-friendly company) is pretty sweet; I do feel that the fact that they insist on Felix eating and sleeping and having company, things a person needs, isn’t played for as much as it’s worth (though that decision does avoid things getting too heavy). Given his trauma, it’s a hell of a gift to be somewhere that his needs are met in that way.

I’m definitely interested enough to read more, even if I didn’t love Lorelei from what I’ve seen so far; I expect she’ll grow on me when we get to understand her backstory more.

Rating: 3/5 (“liked it”)

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Fantasy with Friends: Dark Academia

Posted August 24, 2026 by Nicky in General / 12 Comments

Fantasy With Friends: A Disccusion Meme hosted by Pages Unbound

Monday’s back again, but look, here’s one I made earlier! I’m on a trip right now to celebrate my birthday (today is indie bookshop spree day!) so comments might be slow, but I’ve got a Fantasy with Friends post anyway. All the prompts are hosted at Pages Unbound, if you’d like to join in. This week’s prompt is on dark academia in fantasy:

Do you enjoy dark academia fantasy novels? What are some themes you enjoy seeing discussed in dark academia (ex. ethics in academia, corruption, classism, etc?) Do you think the genre does a good job exploring such themes in general, or are many books focused mainly on the aesthetics?

I don’t think I’ve read a lot of dark academia, not enough to really form an opinion on it as a genre. I’m not opposed to the idea, it’s just not the way my interests have taken me. I think the best of it grows out of and reflects the real dark sides of academia, where people are pitted against each other for limited funding or limited numbers of places, and privilege can get you a long way. Thinking about e.g. R.F. Kuang’s Katabasis, which I’m in the middle of, it feels like a lot of it is a response to those pressures and the sometimes unfair situation gifted people are placed in, struggling against each other for limited opportunities when the opportunities are a bit of a poisoned chalice anyway.

It is not my experience of academia, to be clear; I’m an enthusiastic and serial student, with a BA, MA, BSc and MSc now… but having to get into departmental politics is definitely one reason why I haven’t done a higher degree (the other major one being that I prefer to synthesise over doing something new, and synthesis is not rewarded in academia — despite being essential to scientific and medical consensus).

Another aspect of dark academia is the importance of acknowledgement that academia has done some very dark things indeed. I studied at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, a school founded in order to train doctors for colonial service. The whole point was to keep white enslavers healthy for the sake of Empire. It was engaged in “decolonisation” initiatives by the time I enrolled, and continues to be, but that fundamental attitude ripples through the whole course of study. We were taught (in 2020-2025) about the importance of keeping African people healthy so they can study and later earn more… and yes, that is going to benefit them in the sense of helping them get jobs and make informed choices around drug treatments, but there’s also a high degree of “capitalism is the one and only answer, and we must help them do it properly because they won’t if we don’t intervene”.

This blog isn’t a good place to delve into the ethics and complications of all that, but the point is that LSHTM isn’t alone, and many academic institutions are mired in that kind of history, and a history of extracting knowledge without credit and without benefit to the peoples and areas studied. I don’t think I’ve read anything yet that really engages with that, though I think one or two of the books on my TBR do (like Kuang’s Babel).

Anyway, I think what I’m interested in when I do read dark academia is a bit of awareness of the tensions there and how they can particularly impact minorities, and/or of the dark history of many academic institutions. I prefer the “darkness” to mean something rather than rely on vibes to provide a background to an “enemies-to-lovers” story or something. Not that I’m against an enemies-to-lovers story, but I’d like the “dark” part of the academia to make sense and drive the plot, rather than just be an aesthetic.

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Review – A History of Booksellers and the Bookshop

Posted August 23, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Review – A History of Booksellers and the Bookshop

A History of Booksellers and the Bookshop

by Jean-Yves Mollier, George Miller (translator)

Genres: History, Non-fiction
Pages: 320
Rating: three-stars
Synopsis:

A fascinating exploration of the role of the bookseller through the ages.

Across the world and from antiquity to the present day, men and women have enabled authors to disseminate their ideas and knowledge, helping readers to become enriched by their words. Over the centuries, a profession was invented – the bookseller – a role forever renewing to adapt to an ever-changing world.

It is this history of booksellers and bookstores that is traced here. Historian Jean-Yves Mollier guides us through the mysteries of a vital cultural industry that has been at the crossroads between the world of ideas and that of the economy. It is a homage to all booksellers and a book for all book lovers that investigates the twists and turns through time that have led the book into the hands of its reader.

Translated from the French by George Miller.

Jean-Yves Mollier’s A History of Booksellers and the Bookshop is a work in translation from French, and as such it’s not too surprising that it focuses on French bookselling, though I didn’t feel like the blurb on my copy really made that clear. Not that I mind learning more about France and French bookselling, but I’d expected a bit more breadth, rather than just short references to other countries. (Some of which seemed wildly wrong or perhaps mistranslated, like a suggestion that the UK doesn’t really have independent bookshops. Did it just mean in comparison to France, and if so… would it have helped to use some figures here?)

Anyway, it was interesting to read this at the same time as A.J. West’s How Queer Bookshops Changed the World, because they did sometimes mention the same people and events, though it was interesting that Mollier didn’t even allude to the fact that Sylvia Beach and Adrienne Monnier were lesbians and in a relationship, for instance. This was actually important to their work as booksellers!

Overall, I found it a little dry, and the section on modern bookshops felt rushed in comparison to earlier chapters, but it was interesting all the same. If you’re interested in a more general history, well… this one does talk about trends and issues that affected other countries, but almost all from a French perspective, so it probably isn’t what you’re looking for.

I’m a bit torn on rating this, because it wasn’t what I’d hoped for, but that doesn’t make it a bad book. I think someone looking for a French history of bookshops would probably rate it higher, but I do always rate on enjoyment (and not on objective measures, even if objective facts play a part), so… here we are.

Rating: 3/5 (“liked it”)

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Review – Obit

Posted August 22, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Review – Obit

Obit: Poems

by Victoria Chang

Genres: Poetry
Pages: 123
Rating: three-stars
Synopsis:

After her mother died, poet Victoria Chang refused to write elegies. Rather, she distilled her grief during a feverish two weeks by writing scores of poetic obituaries for all she lost in the world. In Obit, Chang writes of "the way memory gets up after someone has died and starts walking." These poems reinvent the form of newspaper obituary to both name what has died ("civility," "language," "the future," "Mother's blue dress") and the cultural impact of death on the living. Whereas elegy attempts to immortalize the dead, an obituary expresses loss, and the love for the dead becomes a conduit for self-expression. In this unflinching and lyrical book, Chang meets her grief and creates a powerful testament for the living.

Victoria Chang’s Obit is — unsurprisingly — all about grief and loss, and not just the moment of someone’s death but also the moments of decline before, and the moments going through and sorting their things after, and many in between. It all circles round the loss of her mother and her father’s stroke (which took away his ability to understand and produce orderly language), casting forward and backward in time to try to make sense of it all.

The prose-poem obits are the strongest part, and I really disliked the layout of the poems in… I think it was part two? Unreadable with the spacing provided (at least in the ebook, but that seemed to be image files of the printed book for those sections, so I don’t think it was ebook formatting messing things up). It didn’t all strike a chord with me, but as I lingered with it and watched Chang reckon with the messy nonsense of grief and the living after, there were definitely parts that stood out, like this bit:

 When I told my children, the three of us hugged in a circle, burst into tears. As if the tears were already there crying on their own and we, the newly bereaved, exploded into them.

Overall, not a personal favourite, but an interesting collection and one I enjoyed.

Rating: 3/5 (“liked it”)

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Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted August 22, 2026 by Nicky in General / 32 Comments

Happy weekend! I’ve been off work for two days already, so I’m starting to get into my stride with this relaxation thing… nah, kidding, I’m really bad at it! Even on my birthday on Thursday I was doing chores like a normal day…

Books acquired this week

So far the birthday haul has been very restrained — because Lisa’s waiting until my indie bookshop spree on Monday. So it’s just the one book from my friend Alys, plus a book I got myself because I’ve been wanting it for ages…

Cover of Steeple Chasing by Peter Ross Cover of Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint vol 4 by singNSong

I’ve actually started Steeple Chasing already, since for some reason it just kinda worked with my mood, though I haven’t read much yet! I’m not super interested in churches per se, but more about what they can tell us about people, and so far it does seem to lean that way too!

Posts from this week

Despite my birthday, I’ve kept busy as ever on the blog this week, so here’s the rundown! Reviews first:

As ever, I haven’t read most of these books that recently, since I spread out my reviews to get a range of different books featured. And 3/5 isn’t a bad rating!

Of course, I’ve also participated in various discussions and linkups, as usual…

What I’m reading

First up, a quick round-up of the books I’ve finished in the last week! Which wasn’t a lot, since work was pretty busy prepping for my time off, and I’ve got a couple of other books in progress which are quite dense.

Cover of The Party at No. 5 by Shelley Smith Cover of The Poet Empress by Shen Tao Cover of Apparently, Sir Cameron Needs to Die by Greer Stothers

For this weekend, I probably won’t be reading a ton, since I’m having dinner with my parents and sister for my birthday, and my wife and I are heading off on our week away. But we’ll see! I’d love to finish up a couple more books before we go, so I don’t have to wedge them into my packing somehow…

Thanks all for your birthday wishes last week! And I hope you’re having a great weekend.

Linking up with Reading Reality’s Stacking the Shelves, Caffeinated Reviewer’s The Sunday Post, the Sunday Salon over at Readerbuzz, and It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? at The Book Date.

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Review – Moon-Flash

Posted August 21, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Review – Moon-Flash

Moon-Flash

by Patricia A. McKillip

Genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction
Pages: 150
Series: Kyreol Duology #1
Rating: three-stars
Synopsis:

Kyreol's small world begins at the Face, a high rock cliff, and ends at Fourteen Falls, a series of rapids. Each year, her people celebrate Moon-Flash-a spark of light that seems to come from and go into the moon, a symbol of life and joy. When a mysterious stranger arrives, Kyreol wants to know more about him, as well as the Moon-Flash, and soon she and her childhood friend Terje leave their home to look for answers. Those answers will pluck Kyreol from Riverworld and transform her life forever-by fast-forwarding her into a future she can barely comprehend.

Patricia McKillip’s Moon-Flash begins feeling like a fantasy novel, and it’s difficult to talk about how the story actually goes without spoilers. The initial chapters follow Kyreol, a girl who doesn’t quite seem to fit within the small world of her very much pre-industrial society, shaped by ritual and custom… a girl who asks questions and tells stories about the world around her, and ultimately notices too much, finding herself driven to understand what’s really going on.

Into her quest she draws her best friend, a young man that she wishes she could have married (though she has been betrothed since very young to someone else): I rather liked Terje and his practical responses to everything that’s going on, while at the same time he enjoys Kyreol’s curious mind and the stories she comes up with about things.

The reveal, when it comes, is pretty much as I’d expected in many respects, but it works out quite neatly, I’d say. The only thing for me is that sometimes I find McKillip’s prose rather opaque — beautifully written, but I realise that I don’t really feel like I understand Kyreol, even when I’m told what she’s thinking (and you definitely don’t get to understand Terje’s thoughts well). Sometimes she makes a leap, and I’m like… what? How’d you get there? Why are you feeling that way?

But that might be me; it’s a problem I’ve often had with McKillip’s prose, and I do think her writing is lovely anyway, in general, though this isn’t one of my favourites.

I did also discover that I had read this book before, just now, from the fact that I have apparently previously posted a review of it. I have no memory of the previous occasion at all, though I can excuse myself somewhat due to that being a decade ago.

Rating: 3/5 (“liked it”)

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Book Blogger Hop: Trends

Posted August 21, 2026 by Nicky in General / 12 Comments

A banner for a "Book Blogger Hop", with a photo of a bunny wearing glasses and its paws on a book

It’s Friday, so it’s time for the Book Blogger Hop again, hosted by Billy @ Coffee Addicted Writer. I’ve made my own image from a stock photo (credit: Anna Shvets) to avoid adding images created via generative AI to my blog. Feel free to use it too if you would like!

This week’s prompt is about whether you follow trends or not:

Do you follow book trends and bestsellers, or do you prefer hunting down lesser-known titles?

I don’t specifically try to follow what’s trending; I don’t pick up a book because it’s a hit on BookTok or Bookstagram (I probably wouldn’t even know that it is!), or read something just because it’s a bestseller… but I don’t refuse to read such books, either. A lot of the time they aren’t the sort of book I’m interested in, but e.g. the trend for cosy fantasy and romantasy has been a fun one, and I have read some of those, and sometimes popular books have worked well for me even if they aren’t a genre I normally read. Sometimes then I’ll seek out other similar books (as with romantasy, cosy fantasy, my deep-dive into danmei, etc)… so I guess in that sense I follow trends, since that can be a good way to find other similar books.

Because I don’t actually use stuff like TikTok or Instagram, I mostly come across books through blogging or through just exploring in bookshops, or occasionally via The London Review of Books or The New York Review of Books, so I’m usually well behind on the trends either way. I don’t think that’s a particular virtue, though; there’s value in popular fiction, even if it’s just people enjoying it. Some of what I read is lesser-known just because it’s old, but it was popular fiction of its day even if it’s sometimes treated as “classic” now: my addiction to golden age crime novels is no secret.

All in all, I guess my answer is a bit of a shrug. I don’t particularly do either, I just pick up whatever pings my interest, which may or may not be a bestseller or a less-known book, and might sometimes mean picking up books because they fit the same description as something else I liked, which might happen to be “trendy” (do people still use that word?).

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