Author: Nicky

What are you reading Wednesday

Posted February 23, 2017 by Nicky in General / 4 Comments

It’s only a little late! And hey, now I’m out of assignment hell… for now.

What have you recently finished reading?

Nothing, this week! The last thing I finished was a reread of Mary Stewart’s This Rough Magic, on… Thursday? Yes, I’m suffering withdrawal symptoms. I could probably do with another Mary Stewart reread, for something familiar — This Rough Magic is a total comfort read, like all Stewart’s books for me.

What are you currently reading?

On the Origin of Species is the book I’m reading most actively. So close to finishing it! It amazes me how right Darwin managed to be, given his limited understanding of genetics. I’ve also still got my reread of The Dragonbone Chair and the ARC of The Stars Are Legion on the go.

Oh, and I also newly started After Atlas, by Emma Newman, which I was devouring before my assignment took over everything. And I was also reading Brother’s Ruin, her new novella, which I got as an ARC. I’m enjoying that, too.

What are you planning to read next?

Once I’ve finished with Darwin, I’m going to focus on finishing The Stars Are Legion, After Atlas and Brother’s Ruin. Probably in the reverse of that order. I might also fit in a comfort read like a Mary Stewart book; I’m thinking maybe My Brother Michael, or Nine Coaches Waiting. After that, I’m not sure: the possibilities are endless.

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Review – Murder on the Ballarat Train

Posted February 22, 2017 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Murder on the Ballarat Train by Kerry GreenwoodMurder on the Ballarat Train, Kerry Greenwood

Another enjoyable outing with Phryne, and this one starts to really bring together her found family with the addition of Jane and Ruth. While I’m noticing some inconsistencies in characters that aren’t Phryne (Dot’s surname changes, for example, and apparently the hair colours of Jane and Ruth too), it’s still fun and those are only really noticeable because I’m reading the books all more or less together, in one glorious reread.

(Note: this is still an excellent way to consume them, though I’m now on book seven and taking a bit of a break.)

My main quibble is still with the mentally ill murderer who suddenly loses it and snaps, ruining all his plans and exposing himself badly. The whole mentally ill killer thing is just so stereotypical; so easy a way out. I mean, it happens, but not usually in this premeditated, coldly planned way. That’s more in the line of a psychopath, which is not quite how the character read. And, people so often forget the real fact: people with mental illness are more likely to be victims of crime, not to be perpetrators.

Rating: 4/5

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Review – Adulthood is a Myth

Posted February 21, 2017 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Adulthood is a Myth by Sarah AndersenAdulthood is a Myth, Sarah Andersen

Adulthood is a Myth is a highly entertaining and relatable book of Andersen’s various cartoons featuring all her own awkward adventures, from dating to being an adult. There’s a lot here that’s akin to Hyperbole and a Half in its sillier moments, and book lovers will find plenty in its pages that sounds a bit like someone they might know.

Like this one.

If you follow the webcomic, I don’t know if there’s anything new here, but it is kinda nice to have it one place. For one thing, that means you can point at pages like the one linked and tell family excitedly, “See?! I’m not the only one!”

It’s not profound stuff, but it’s fun.

Rating: 4/5

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Top Ten Tuesday

Posted February 21, 2017 by Nicky in General / 8 Comments

This week’s theme is books you loved less or more than you thought you would. I’ll do five of each!

Books I Liked Less Than I Hoped:

Cover of The Children's Hospital by Chris Adrian Cover of Hard to Be A God by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky  Cover of Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein Cover of The Book of Atrix Wolfe by Patricia McKillip

  1. The Children’s Hospital, by Chris Adrian. A notorious failure in one of my online book clubs. Like, I don’t think any of us liked it, and I’m not sure how many of us actually finished it. For a while it was a byword for terribleness.
  2. Hard to Be A God, by Boris & Arkady Strugatsky. I enjoyed Roadside Picnic a whole lot, and then found Hard to Be a God… completely impenetrable. I’m told it’s a hard one to translate.
  3. Captain Marvel and the Carol Corps, by Kelly Sue DeConnick. It just felt so monumentally pointless. I normally enjoyed DeConnick’s run on Captain Marvel, but nope. Not this one.
  4. Code Name Verity, by Elizabeth Wein. I know, what’s wrong with me, right?
  5. The Book of Atrix Wolfe, by Patricia McKillip. It wasn’t bad, but I just didn’t enjoy it the way I expected to, since I’ve come to appreciate McKillip’s work a lot.

Books I Liked More Than I Expected:

Cover of Miss Phryne Fisher Investigates by Kerry Greenwood Cover of The Wolf Hunt by Gillian Bradshaw Cover of Attachments by Rainbow Rowell Cover of The Talisman Ring by Georgette Heyer Cover of DNA: The Secrets of Life by James Watson

  1. Miss Phryne Fisher Investigates, by Kerry Greenwood. Once upon a time, I read this and hated it. Then I read it again and fell in love, and since devoured the whole series. Right time, I guess.
  2. The Wolf Hunt, by Gillian Bradshaw. I expected to be mad at how heteronormative this was set up to be, given I knew the original lai as something rather “homosocial” (as my tutor would’ve said, and did, often). But somehow it charmed me all the same.
  3. Attachments, by Rainbow Rowell. This is the first of Rowell’s books I read, and didn’t expect to be so drawn in by her warm style and her characters.
  4. The Talisman Ring, by Georgette Heyer. I hadn’t yet admitted that I enjoyed some romance stories when I first read this. But Heyer won me over — not a bad person to convert one, I think.
  5. DNA: The Secret of Life, by James Watson. Having read his book on the discovery of DNA, I couldn’t picture getting on with another book of his. But he apparently aged well, and this book was interesting and decidedly less rage inducing.

What about you?

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Review – Passing Strange

Posted February 20, 2017 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Cover of Passing Strange by Ellen KlagesPassing Strange, Ellen Klages

Received to review via Netgalley; released 24th January 2017

Passing Strange is a lovely novella which takes its own sweet time. As it opens, you expect one story, one protagonist… as it continues to unfold, you see that you were wrong. In my case, I didn’t mind that bait-and-switch at all, but I imagine some people will find that shift in POV a little jarring. Though I didn’t mind, I did find myself briefly wrong-footed by it.

The novella is set in San Fransisco, 1940, among a community of queer women whose lives intersect. I’ve seen a review where someone felt that the takeaway from this book was “yeah, yeah, we know gays back then had a hard time”. There’s that, of course, but there’s also that community, and that’s what I really enjoyed. I don’t really want to say too much about it; I think it’s best if the story unfolds itself for the reader in its own time.

I’ve also read a complaint that the speculative aspect isn’t integral. It is, but it’s subtle; the fact that it’s there, quietly but throughout, allows the ending that otherwise couldn’t be mysterious or touching or bittersweet. It’s an ordinary sort of magic, in the way that the women use it — it’s a tool that happens to be to hand.

I enjoyed the story a lot. And it’s another of the Tor.com novellas that feels like it was meant to be exactly this length, no longer, no shorter.

Rating: 4/5

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Review – Dreadnought

Posted February 19, 2017 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of DreadnoughtDreadnought, April Daniels

Received to review via Netgalley; released January 2017

Dreadnought is an #OwnVoices book featuring a trans girl whose dreams come true when she takes on the mantle of a superhero at the moment of his death. Things don’t go easily for Danny, but nonetheless, she navigates being finally seen as a girl (in school, with her parents, with her best friend) and suddenly having superpowers. It’s a whole new world for her in both ways and I love the way the story makes you feel that. At the start, she hides in an alley to paint her toenails; at the end, well… spoilers. But suffice it to say that she’s pretty comfortable in her skin and her identity.

It’s not always the easiest read, because it’s not pure wish fulfilment. Though Danny’s transformation is outwardly perfect, she wouldn’t be able to have children, for example. And the other superheroes around her aren’t the people you’d hope they would be. Scarlet Witch — sorry, I mean, Graywytch is a trans-exclusionary feminist, while Carapace is a douche who can’t get her pronouns right and even a queer member of the team puts his foot in it. Doctor Impossible and Valkyrja are pretty awesome, though, and a young superhero called Calamity who doesn’t fall in line with the Avengers (sorry, the Legion) also befriends her.

All in all, the plot is pretty pacey and fun, and it’s not all about Danny’s transformation. It’s also about responsibility and handling any big life change, about figuring out where you belong in the world. Danny’s family aren’t great at it, and nor is her best friend, and there’s generally plenty of transphobic stuff that might be quite hard to read. But ultimately, I found it more fun than it was upsetting — and anyway, upsetting isn’t necessarily a bad thing, just something the vulnerable might want to know going in.

Rating: 4/5

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Review – The Family Plot

Posted February 18, 2017 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Cover of The Family Plot by Cherie PriestThe Family Plot, Cherie Priest

Received to review via Netgalley; released in September 2016

Cherie Priest has written a whole bunch of different books, and I don’t love them all, but I have found them all to be solid stories. The Family Plot has a fun setting and concept: a salvage crew go in to get what they can from an old house scheduled for demolition. Problem is, the house has a history, and its past occupants aren’t all gone. It makes so much sense: of course old houses are creepy, and of course salvagers are going to be more interested the older it is. And of course, the older it is, the more history it has, tragedy included. The main character, Dahlia, believes in ghosts already; she’s felt them, she knows they’re there, and mostly they leave the living alone.

I won’t discuss too many of the details of the plot, because that mystery is part of the interest. It is worth noting though that every summary I can find doesn’t match with the events as they unfold in the ARC I got.

The problem with me is that I’m a total wuss, so horror isn’t normally my thing — in fact, I only picked this up because it was by Cherie Priest. Even so, I felt that a lot of the elements were pretty traditional and obvious. Doors that slam behind you and won’t open. Burials where there shouldn’t be burials. Ghosts who scratch messages into the floor. It felt like we saw it all a bit too clearly for it to be creepy. The final resolution — the whys and wherefores of the haunting — also didn’t quite satisfy me. There’s so much monstrous build-up, and then the solution is kind of… anti-climatic.

Nonetheless, the setting works really well, and I loved Dahlia. She’s capable, but not a superwoman. She knows what she’s doing, she’s decisive and smart, but she doesn’t always make the right decisions. And she’s not some fresh-faced kid with no history: she has a past which informs the way she acts now and the way she interacts with those around her. The supporting characters weren’t developed as much, but I found myself oddly interested in Bobby in particular, and how he might get his life together. At the very least, he raised a decent kid in Gabe.

Overall, it’s enjoyable, if not ground-breaking, and probably worth a look if you’re into ghost stories.

Rating: 3/5

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Stacking the Shelves

Posted February 18, 2017 by Nicky in General / 18 Comments

Happy Saturday! It’s been a busy week around here, and I should probably be in the digital lab right now, looking at sections of rat tissue. But hey, books!

How’ve you all been?

Received to review:

Cover of Chalk by Paul Cornell Cover of Brother's Ruin by Emma Newman Cover of Agents of Dreamland by Caitlin R. Kiernan

Yay, thank you, Tor!

Finished this week:

Cover of Britain BC by Francis Pryor Cover of Britain AD by Francis Pryor Cover of Wicked Wonders by Ellen Klages Cover of This Rough Magic by Mary Stewart

Sneak peek at ratings:

4 stars to… Britain BC and Wicked Wonders.
3 stars to… This Rough Magic.
2 stars to… Britain AD.

Reviews posted this week:

–Miss Phryne Fisher Investigates, by Kerry Greenwood. A reread, again already? Yep. And it remains a lot of fun — I don’t know why I didn’t enjoy it the first time. 4/5 stars
–The Prince of the Moon, by Megan Derr. A sweet queer fairytale, though a little rushed for my taste. 3/5 stars
–The Celtic Revolution, by Simon Young. Interesting history, but where it touched on Arthuriana it rather annoyed me, alas. 3/5 stars
–Monstress, by Marjorie M. Liu and Sana Takeda. Beautiful artwork, but I kept losing track of the story. 3/5 stars
–Flying Too High, by Kerry Greenwood. Gotta love all the references to other detectives which, for some reason, I’m only just picking up now. Hurrah Phryne! 4/5 stars
–Miranda and Caliban, by Jacqueline Carey. As beautiful as you would expect coming from Carey, and as heartbreaking. 4/5 stars

Other posts:

–Why haven’t you read ____ yet? The short answer is: I’m terrible. Sorry.
–Top Ten Tuesday: Couples That Weren’t. Literary couples I was really rooting for, or who I didn’t get enough of.
–What are you reading Wednesday. The usual status update.

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Review – Miranda and Caliban

Posted February 17, 2017 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Cover of Miranda and Caliban by Jacqueline CareyMiranda and Caliban, Jacqueline Carey

Received to review via Netgalley; release date 14th February 2017

I’ll probably give anything by Jacqueline Carey a chance. I’m not a huge Shakespeare fan, and I wasn’t really sure if I’d like something retelling The Tempest. But it’s Jacqueline Carey’s work, so I requested it anyway. And… I loved it quite a bit. I wasn’t sure about the narration: honestly, Miranda sounded rather like Phèdre in many ways, and far too mature considering the narration is present tense, even when she’s a small child. I wasn’t sure about Caliban’s narration either, because I’m not a fan of broken English portrayed in fiction — it quite often comes out sounding like mockery.

But all the same, the writing has grace to it, and it’s certainly easy to read and absorb, despite the tendency to thee and thou. (I wish Ariel didn’t say “Oh, la!” like he was from Pride and Prejudice or something, though. It always sounds far too comical for me.)

The relationship between Miranda and Caliban, their tenderness for each other as each helps the other, is well done. The portrayal of Prospero as a somewhat abusive father who sometimes nonetheless shows tenderness for his daughter makes perfect sense, and so does the way his behaviour pushes the two together. Ariel’s capriciousness and ambivalence works, too.

The only problem, really, is that you know how it’s going to end. I found myself hoping all the same that it would end differently — it’s a retelling, after all. But at the same time, there’s always that sense of inevitability: you know what’s going to happen. I don’t think there’s anything revolutionary about this telling, but it humanises Caliban and makes of him much less of a monster, and more of a lover. The ending gave me a lump in my throat: his hope, despite Ariel’s warnings, despite Miranda’s doubts. It’s so tender and naive.

Rating: 4/5

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Review – Flying Too High

Posted February 16, 2017 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Flying Too High by Kerry GreenwoodFlying Too High, Kerry Greenwood

I can’t believe I didn’t notice, first time round, that Phryne manages to move into house number 221… and then adds a B. I love the little references to other detectives — like the Megatherium Trust, for example (a reference to Sayers). Phryne, I love your wit. Or is that Greenwood?

Anyway. Flying Too High is another fun instalment, which I enjoyed rereading. I love that Phryne can fly a plane and that it’s a part of several later stories, and I love the women that come into her story being awesome in their own ways. Dr MacMillan, in the first book, and in this book, Bunji Ross. One’s a female doctor, the other’s one of the most daring fliers in the area. Just gotta love it.

Not all of Phryne’s found family has joined her yet, by this book, and so it’s missing a few of the domestic comforts I love. But it does have Mr and Mrs Butler, who are just perfect. And I adore the loving way Phryne’s clothes and food are all described. She’s so unashamedly feminine, and so unashamed of enjoying the good things in life.

Rating: 4/5

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