Author: Nicky

Review – Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail – The Art of Succession: – Relics of Heritage –

Posted January 24, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail - The Art of Succession: - Relics of Heritage -

by Square Enix

Genres: Game
Pages: 304
Rating: five-stars

Synopsis:
Follow the Warrior of Light and their comrades as they embark on a new adventure in Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail! Commemorating their journey through the faraway lands of Tural, this collector's quality art book offers a wealth of illustrations of characters, environments, equipment, and more.

The tenth volume in the line of Final Fantasy XIV official art books.

The Art of Succession – Relics of Heritage- is one of the artbooks for the Dawntrail expansion, containing the concept art for the new zones, designs of weapons, promo images (like the countdown to the release date), some of the bosses, etc.

There are some brief notes in the back from the artists, which shed some light on the process here and there, but it’s mostly just the images presented without comment. I’d have loved more commentary, but it’s still lovely to go through the images and get a chance to look in more detail.

Plus, the volume comes with the Wind-up Erenville minion! Which I have obviously immediately claimed.

Rating: 5/5 (“loved it”)

Tags: book reviews, books, Final Fantasy XIV, games

Stacking the Shelves & The Sunday Post

Posted January 24, 2026 by Nicky in General / 39 Comments

Okay, hold onto your hats! This one’s a big ‘un, again already — I’ve had a very bookish week!

Books acquired this week

Last weekend I had my annual vision test and OCT scan, after which I always go to the bookshop. To, you know, prove my eyes still work. Look, I swear it makes sense. So I got myself a whole bunch of books, after saying I was only going to look at the non-fiction, because there were a couple of discounts and I had collected 10+ stamps to get money off as well.

Without further ado, let’s start with the manga, manhwa and manhua I’ve got this week (that’s Japanese, Korean and Chinese comics, respectively!).

I read the Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation light novels recently, so it’ll be fun to explore the world more visually in the manhua. There’s a lot more in the series, so I don’t know if I’ll get the rest soon or not — I guess it depends on how much I like it as an adaptation, and maybe whether I can spend my Bookshop.org credit on it. Then there’s the first volume of the Heaven Official’s Blessing manhua, which I’ve read online but wanted to own. I hope they’ll bring more of the series out soon.

Finally, the next volume of the Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint manhwa that I didn’t have yet, since I’ve been going through those apace lately, and the new volume of The Other World’s Books Depend on the Bean Counter, since volume six of the manga just released. These should keep me busy a bit! I do get a lot of manga/comics via Comics Plus/Library Pass, but they don’t seem to partner with these publishers, and anyway I’d probably want copies for my collection, so I couldn’t resist the urge to stock up.

Buuut that’s not all. I also got a few other books, a mix of fiction and non-fiction:

I’d been thinking about requesting Daedalus is Dead, Katabasis and Fate’s Bane as ARCs, so picking those up was an easy choice (especially with Katabasis heavily marked down!). Monsterland and A History of England in 25 Poems were more random choices, but I also love “the history of X in Y objects”-type non-fiction, so I’m very much looking forward to that one.

Since we’re on the topic of poetry, I did get a couple of books from the National Poetry Library this week, as I wrote about yesterday. They’re both debut collections, as I understand it, with one of them being native British and the other Ukrainian. I’m very curious about both, and might spend some time digging in this weekend.

This one’s also from the library, but my local one this time. I’ve seen mixed reviews for this but wanted to give it a shot anyway because the idea amused me:

Finally — yes, just a little more — I got a couple more review copies as well, this time via Netgalley. I’d requested them thanks to seeing people enthuse about them in Top Ten Tuesday posts last week, and was a little surprised to actually get them!

Stay for a Spell sounds like a fun cosy concept, while Princeweaver has me a little wary, since one of the blurbs says it is “a lush reimagining of the English conquest of Wales”. That could be interesting and nuanced, or it could be an absolute mess. I guess we’ll find out!

Irritatingly, I’d forgotten to check before I requested it, and it looks like Stay for a Spell is a PDF, and DRM-locked with Readium, so I can’t get it onto either of my ereaders, or even my e-ink tablet, and will have to read it on my PC. I wish publishers wouldn’t do this; I have no idea how readers are supposed to comfortably read these. Maybe on a tablet or something, I guess? But I don’t have one, so suffering it is.

Just a little note…

Related to my earlier references to my annual vision test/scan, let me just pause a moment to emphasise the importance of eye health, using UV protection, and considering getting eye tests every few years even if you haven’t needed glasses in the past. Conditions like macular degeneration, retinitis pigmentosa and glaucoma aren’t related to whether you have 20/20 vision or not, and while some of the conditions are often associated with aging, they aren’t always. Early diagnosis can really improve your outlook.

Having volunteered for the Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB) for some years, and having a potential genetic risk factor (a parent with early-onset macular degeneration), this one’s incredibly important to me. If you’re not getting your eye health checked, please consider it, and tack on the extra couple of quid for an OCT scan if it isn’t already standard at your optician, assuming you can afford to. And make sure to protect your eyes from UV light, even in winter, with sunglasses, hats, etc: UV light is a major contributor to several eye conditions, including common issues of aging like cataracts.

Okay, off the soapbox now, back to the books.

Posts from this week

There have been posts a-plenty this week, as I went back to working through some of the massive backlog of written reviews that are ready to post, while trying to keep some variety going. First up, the reviews:

Fantasy romance: Swordcrossed, by Freya Marske (3/5 stars, “liked it”)
Classic mystery: Invisible Weapons, by John Rhode (3/5 stars, “liked it”)
Non-fiction: Like: A History of the World’s Most Hated (And Misunderstood) Word, by Megan C. Reynolds (1/5 stars, “didn’t like it”)
Non-fiction: The Wrong Stuff: How the Soviet Space Program Crashed and Burned, by John Strausbaugh (1/5 stars, “didn’t like it”)
Fantasy manhwa: Solo Leveling, vol 12, by Dubu (4/5 stars, “really liked it”)
Fantasy romance light novel: Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, vol 2, by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu (4/5 stars, “really liked it”)
Classic mystery: Death at Breakfast, by John Rhode (2/5 stars, “it was okay”)

There were other posts as well, of course, so here they are:

If you’re interested in poetry and live in the UK, I definitely recommend checking out that last post for more info about how to access the National Poetry Library’s collections! I didn’t know about them and it is a most excellent discovery.

What I’m reading

Given I’ve had the week off, you’d think I’d have managed a lot of reading, but part of the time I really wasn’t in the mood, and part of the time I spent rereading manga — namely, The Other World’s Books Depend on the Bean Counter, since volume six is out and I’d forgotten where the series got up to. Still, I’ve read a few books in the last week, and here’s the usual sneak peek at the ones I finished and intend to review on the blog!

I’m not sure what I’ll be reading this weekend and into the new week (which is also a week off for me), but it’ll probably include reading more of T. Kingfisher’s Snake-eater, which I started this week. I have a lot to do if I want to get a blackout in the BookSpinBingo challenge this month, so maybe more of those books?

But, as always… it’ll be down to my whim in the moment. Nothing’s as important as making sure I do actually enjoy what I’m reading, or at least the process. (I’ll sometimes finish books that I don’t like per se because there’s some interest in doing so, even if it’s just to write a good review to diss ’em.)

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.

Tags: books, Stacking the Shelves, weekly roundup

PSA for UK-dwellers: National Poetry Library

Posted January 23, 2026 by Nicky in General / 2 Comments

Did you know that there’s such thing as the National Poetry Library? And that you can sign up to borrow from their online collection if you live anywhere in the UK? I learned this yesterday on Bluesky, and I figured it was worth sharing on my blog as well because I’ve seen several people talking about wanting to read more poetry!

Sign-up is super easy: you just need to fill out the form on their sign-up page link, giving your name, email, phone number and postcode. They’ll then send you an email telling you where to send your proof of address: you can’t reply directly to that email, but just copy the email address they send there and send to that, attaching a copy of some kind of proof of address like a utility bill, bank statement, council tax bill, etc. You can black out any financial details like your account number, though they will also delete whatever you send after verifying that you really do have a UK address.

I got a reply back from them in less than 24 hours with my login details for their Overdrive collection. I can borrow up to two books at once, for up to 14 days.

I’ve been poking around the collection a bit and it looks very worth the small amount of trouble: the split by subjects isn’t very useful for this particular library, but the collections are handy, highlighting various prize winners, recent poetry collections, and other such themes, if you have no idea where to start. I’ve started by checking out two from Seamus Heaney Centre First Collection Poetry Prize:

There are a small number of books about poetry as well, and a small number of audiobooks. It’s not an exhaustive collection by any means, but it definitely offers a lovely way to explore some new-to-me poetry.

The library also has a physical collection, so if you live in range, you can show up with photo ID to be able to get a library card and access their physical holdings. They run poetry-related events as well! Their physical premises are wheelchair-accessible and you can check their accessibility info here. The info about their collections indicates they have braille and audio resources available for blind and partially sighted users.

All in all, worth checking out if you have a UK address and phone number at your disposal!

Tags: poetry

Review – Death at Breakfast

Posted January 23, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 2 Comments

Death at Breakfast

by John Rhode

Genres: Crime, Mystery
Pages: 288
Rating: two-stars

Synopsis:
Victor Harleston awoke with uncharacteristic optimism. Today he would be rich at last. Half an hour later, he gulped down his breakfast coffee and pitched to the floor, gasping and twitching. When the doctor arrived, he recognised instantly that it was a fatal case of poisoning and called in Scotland Yard.

Despite an almost complete absence of clues, the circumstances were so suspicious that Inspector Hanslet soon referred the evidence to his friend and mentor, Dr Lancelot Priestley, whose deductions revealed a diabolically ingenious murder that would require equally fiendish ingenuity to solve.

John Rhode’s Death at Breakfast has very much the usual feel of a solid, unsurprising classic mystery where the detectives painstakingly follow clues, there’s fairly little emotional engagement, and everything turns out pretty much okay in the end. If that’s what you’re here for, then you’ll be fairly happy.

That said, I did have a quibble with this one, having enjoyed it most of the way, which is a bit of a spoiler (so don’t read on if you don’t want to know, though I’ll try not to give the really important stuff away). The solution of the crime basically requires that someone who was previously really clever, even ingenious, get sloppy and fail to know three things: that the police can tell the difference between human blood and cat blood, that the police can tell when a bullet has actually been fired (vs just mechanically removed from the casing), and that the police can trace bank notes.

It feels like not knowing one of those things — and having that crack open the case — would feel pretty OK. I’d probably plump for “not knowing that the police can tell the difference between human and cat blood”, since as a crime reader I have the impression that it was fairly general knowledge that bank notes could be traced and bullets get unique marks when fired, but honestly any small gap in the culprit’s knowledge could make sense. But it seems weird for him to have such a gaping hole in one side of the plan, after being really clever elsewhere.

I also got a bit annoyed with Hanslet jumping to conclusions (Jimmy is a bit more careful, though sometimes does the same). I know it’s all part of the magic of having Priestley solve everything, but still. More annoying than usual, I’d say; if you’re going to consult your expert, then listen to them and don’t conclude they must be losing their touch until you’ve at least tried to look into it…

So not a favourite, but still a fairly solid classic crime experience for the kind of soothingness I look for when reading classic crime.

Rating: 2/5 (“it was okay”)

Tags: book reviews, books, crime, John Rhode, John Rhode/Miles Burton/Cecil Street, mystery

Review – Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation (light novel), vol 2

Posted January 22, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation

by Mò Xiāng Tóng Xiù

Genres: Fantasy, Light Novels, Romance
Pages: 403
Series: Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation (LN) #2
Rating: four-stars

Synopsis:
HAUNTED BY SIN

Following the trail of a dismembered corpse, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji arrive at the gates of Yi City: an old, abandoned town shrouded in mist and restless spirits. A fiendish foe awaits them in the shadows, heralding a tale of heartbreak and tragedy. When the mysterious corpse’s identity is finally revealed, the hunt for its killer plunges Wei Wuxian back into the depths of the cultivation world's politics, where he must keep his enemies close and Lan Wangji even closer.

Volume two of Mo Xiang Tong Xiu’s Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation contains the Yi City arc, which takes up most of it and is absolutely heartbreaking. It takes a while for the full story to unfurl, and features a long flashback of seemingly limited relevance to Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji’s current story, but nonetheless it’s completely worth it. Son Lang and Xiao Xingchen’s story is so heartbreaking but lovely.

There is also some development between Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian, of course, including a kiss — though Wei Wuxian seems pretty oblivious to the full weight of his and Lan Wangji’s feelings, sigh. The bit where Lan Wangji gets drunk is, aaahhh, so ridiculous.

I’m still suffering a bit from the barrage of names, clans, sects, and relationships, but I have the character and name guide in the back to help, and of course a wiki. I’m getting there! Slowly. I’m gonna head straight into volume three to keep up the momentum.

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)

Tags: book reviews, books, danmei, light novels, Mò Xiāng Tóng Xiù, romance, SF/F

Review – Solo Leveling, vol 12

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

Solo Leveling

by Dubu, Chugong

Genres: Fantasy, Manga
Pages: 299
Series: Solo Leveling #12
Rating: four-stars

Synopsis:
Jinwoo faces off against the Monarchs for the first time, and while he's undeniably the strongest hunter in the world, three otherworldly beings prove to be too much for him! But as Jinwoo is about to find out, death means little to the Shadow Monarch, King of the Dead. As Jinwoo Sung finally confronts the true source of his newfound powers, in the real world, a person thought to be lost forever steps in to defend his son's defenseless body!

The Solo Leveling manhwa is ramping up toward the end in volume 12, and it’s a heck of a ride. There are some really cute and touching moments (a certain reunion, and Beru’s… well, most things about Beru, somehow; how is an ant soldier so cute?!), a lot of epic fighting, and a bit more explanation of what exactly is going on.

It’s hard to comment a lot without being super spoilery, but this volume did have some veeery satisfying and long-awaited moments, and while the fight scenes just kinda wash over me, I did want to add that I love the art. The whole thing is consistently gorgeous.

I do feel like the pace is accelerating, and that maybe if there’d been fewer monster-of-the-week type episodes early on — which we lingered on — then all of this climactic stuff could have been explored a bit more. The pacing feels a bit uneven. It’s not that I haven’t liked all of it, but… yeah.

Rating: 4/5 (“really liked it”)

Tags: book reviews, books, Chugong, Dubu, manga, SF/F

WWW Wednesday

Posted January 21, 2026 by Nicky in General / 10 Comments

What have you recently finished reading?

I was kinda struggling to finish anything for a bit, but last night I did finish volume five of the Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint manhwa! It’s juuust getting beyond the bit I read in the light novels so far, so things are heating up; I did expect this plot twist somewhat, but it’s fun to see my theories confirmed.

Before that, the last thing I finished was an ARC of Molly Tanzer’s And Side by Side They Wandered, which I found really interesting, albeit very obviously referencing the antics of the British Museum.

What are you currently reading?

Last night I started a bunch of books at once trying to find something that fit, and I think I found some winners! I’m first going to finish up C.L. Clark’s Fate’s Bane, which is a novella; I’m curious where it’s going, and the shortish chapters are really tugging me through it. I also started T. Kingfisher’s Snake-eater, which is likely to be a quick read for me because I find most of Kingfisher’s work pretty compulsive.

I also started volume one of Priest’s Guardian, though I don’t have a good sense for where that’s going yet, so I need a bit more time to get sucked in, and Nicholas Jubber’s Monsterland, which I’m probably going to read a bit at a time, since it’s non-fiction and structured in a way that lends itself to that, with separate chapters for different kinds of monsters/superstitions/etc.

I’m also slowly working my way through Helen Gordon’s The Meteorites, and would like to finish that soon, and I have a volume of the Solo Leveling novels part-read. Clearly I’ve been a bit flighty lately!

What will you read next?

I’m not entirely sure. I’m likely to read more of the Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint manhwa quite soon, and I picked up the Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation manhua as well, which is high on my list. Seamus Sullivan’s Daedalus is Dead is looking tempting too, since it’s a novella and maybe suited to my current attention span.

But as ever, it’ll be wherever my whim takes me in the moment!

Tags: books, WWW Wednesday

Review – The Wrong Stuff

Posted January 20, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 2 Comments

The Wrong Stuff: How The Soviet Space Program Crashed and Burned

by John Strausbaugh

Genres: History, Non-fiction, Science
Pages: 272
Rating:

Synopsis:
A witty, deeply researched history of the surprisingly ramshackle Soviet space program, and how its success was more spin than science.

In the wake of World War II, with America ascendant and the Soviet Union devastated by the conflict, the Space Race should have been over before it started. But the underdog Soviets scored a series of victories--starting with the 1957 launch of Sputnik and continuing in the years following--that seemed to achieve the impossible. It was proof, it seemed, that the USSR had manpower and collective will that went beyond America's material advantages. They had asserted themselves as a world power.

But in The Wrong Stuff, John Strausbaugh tells a different story. These achievements were amazing, yes, but they were also PR victories as much as scientific ones. The world saw a Potemkin spaceport; the internal facts were much sloppier, less impressive, more dysfunctional. The Soviet supply chain was a disaster, and many of its machines barely worked. The cosmonauts aboard its iconic launch of the Vostok 1 rocket had to go on a special diet, and take off their space suits, just to fit inside without causing a failure. Soviet scientists, under intense government pressure, had essentially made their rocket out of spit and band aids, and hurried to hide their work as soon as their worldwide demonstration was complete.

With a witty eye for detail and a gift for storytelling, John Strausbaugh takes us behind the Iron Curtain, and shows just how little there was to find there.

I gave serious thought to simply not finishing John Strausbaugh’s The Wrong Stuff by just 32 pages in. It was already apparent that he was completely incapable of giving the Soviet space programme a single word of praise, even for ingenuity with outdated and clunky tech (and ingenuity they certainly seem to have had).

As far as I can tell — having cautiously read on — he holds all those who worked for the Soviet space programme in contempt. It doesn’t matter if they were compelled or willing, whether they were frightened or fanatic, whether they lived or died. Rarely did I detect any hint of sympathy or admiration.

Now, I’m not saying the Soviet space programme should be above critique. It shouldn’t be (nor should NASA). And there were bodges and mistakes, and a great deal of luck, even behind their successes. That’s not in question. But the bias is so thick, and the sources so completely absent (aside from a “further reading” section, not even divided into chapters, there is absolutely no indication of any sourcing), that it’s impossible to trust.

It doesn’t help that he also snidely (and wrongly) dismisses Wally Funk’s flight, claiming she didn’t get into space. The Kármán line is at 100km; Blue Origin reached 107km in that flight, clearing the bar. Wally Funk went to space at last, and this smug dickhead couldn’t even look that up, claiming incorrectly that the flight peaked at 76km.

He’s also kind of a dick about Tereshkova. Not that she sounds like a delight (and not to excuse her politics), but then she wouldn’t sound like a delight, described like this.

All in all, I did gain an appreciation for the Soviet space programme’s bodgery and luck at some key junctures, wasn’t surprised by the general slipshod nature of the whole endeavour, and found Strausbaugh at best a jerk and poor researcher, and at worst, perhaps a propagandist liar still trying to fight the Cold War.

Rating: 1/5 (“didn’t like it”)

Tags: book reviews, books, history, John Strausbaugh, non-fiction, science

Top Ten Tuesday: 2026 Goals

Posted January 20, 2026 by Nicky in General / 44 Comments

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday prompt is about goals for 2026 — bookish or not. I’ll keep things mostly bookish (that’s what you’re all here for, after all, and I have so many bookish goals, always!)… so without further ado, let’s take a look.

Read (or not!) according to my whim. It’s easy to get caught up in reading for a reading challenge, or because I have a review copy, or because a book’s due back at the library. And sometimes that’s fine and fun, but whenever it’s not fun, I stop. Or try to: I can’t say I’m perfect yet at this!
There’s no such thing as a guilty pleasure. It’s kinda sad when I see people talking about “guilty pleasures”, or deriding their reading as “trashy” (though sometimes I think people mean “trashy” in a fun, positive way, I think that’s often still caught up in popular disdain for certain genres or tropes). If it’s fun for me, then it’s worthwhile. It doesn’t need to be any deeper than that.
There’s no such thing as cheating. Reading novellas, reading manga, reading children’s books, rereading a favourite, all of it is valid toward stuff like reading goals, most challenges as long as it meets any prompts, etc.
I won’t do book-buying bans (or book-borrowing bans, or bans on requesting ARCs, etc). I have limits (discussed below) to help ensure that I’m not just stacking up books I don’t plan to read… but if I really want some new books, I’m not going to make that a guilty feeling. It’s a joy to support authors, to have good stuff to read, to get a nice stack of books and devour them. Provided I have the budget, I’ll make it work.
I won’t buy from Amazon if at all possible. In general, but especially books: that’s what indie bookshops and Bookshop.org are for. Sometimes they don’t have something in stock, and there can be relatively few places to turn in that case, but for the majority of what I read there are plentiful options to avoid supporting Amazon.
I want to have no more than 20 books at a time bought in 2026 that I haven’t started. This sometimes results in me having a few books on the go at once that I turn out not to be in the mood for, but broadly speaking it’s been really great at helping me read review books on time, start books when I feel like it instead of waiting for “the right time”, etc. I worried I would find it overly restrictive, but I did this last year and really liked the nudge to read books while they’re relevant/exciting/exactly what I’m interested in, because I just got them.
I want to start all the books I bought in 2025. As mentioned above, I had the same rule last year (a limit of 20 books not started), but at Christmas the total rocketed up, ahaha. So I currently have 32 books from 2025 that I haven’t started yet. I’m hoping to get them all started (at least) by June, always provided that’s the way my whim takes me.
I want to read at least 100 books from my backlog (counting 2025’s books). I did great last year at weeding out my backlog — sometimes by just recognising I didn’t want to read something after all, but also by reading 100 books that had been on my backlog since the end of 2024 or longer. I’d built up quite a backlog for a bunch of reasons, and it was great to explore my shelves more and push myself to poke around in the depths of my Kobo, get to books I meant to review when they came out, etc. I’d like to keep going!
I want to read 400 books again this year… or even more? I managed to read 400 books last year and the year before, while still studying on top of full-time work. I don’t have any new course or class lined up, so maybe I have more time for reading? Maybe not, if other priorities crop up, but I still figure that 400 books is a reasonable goal to start with.
Any goal can be changed if it’s doing more harm than good. I set reading goals as a way to remind myself that I want reading to be a priority, because reading makes me happy, because talking about books on my blog makes me happy, etc, but if it’s not making me happy then it needs to change. There was a point last year when I dropped my goal to 300, gradually increased it back to 350… and then I eventually ended on 400 exactly. Flexibility is important.

And that’s it! The main goal, of course, is to keep on having fun with it. If I’m not, then for me there’s no point.

How about you?

Tags: books, Top Ten Tuesday

Review – Like: A History of the World’s Most Hated (And Misunderstood) Word

Posted January 19, 2026 by Nicky in Reviews / 4 Comments

Like: A History of the World's Most Hated (and Misunderstood) Word

by Megan C. Reynolds

Genres: Linguistics, Non-fiction
Pages: 256
Rating:

Synopsis:
A comprehensive and thought-provoking investigation into one of the most polarizing words in the English language.

Few words in the English language are as misunderstood as “like.” Indeed, excessive use of this word is a surefire way to make those who pride themselves on propriety, both grammatical and otherwise, feel compelled to issue correctives.

But what the detractors of this word fail to understand is its true function and versatility—as an exclamation, a filler of space, a means of subtle emphasis, and more. “Like” may have started out as slang, but it is now an intrinsic component of fun, serious, and altogether nurturing communication. And like any colloquialism, the word endears the speaker to its audience; a conversation full of likes feels more casual, despite its content.

In this book, culture writer and editor for Dwell magazine Megan C. Reynolds takes us through the unique etymology and usage of this oft-reviled word, highlighting how it is often used to undermine people who are traditionally seen as having less status in society—women, younger people, people from specific subcultures—and how, if thought about differently, it might open up a new way of communication and validation. Written in a breezy yet informative and engaging style, this is a must-read for anyone who considers themselves a grammarian, a lover of language, and an advocate for the marginalized in discussions of cultural capital, power, and progress.

I’m not entirely sure where I originally heard about Megan C. Reynolds’ Like: A History of the World’s Most Hated (And Misunderstood) Word; I thought it was on Litsy, but the review I’d have been most likely to see there was fairly ambivalent. Maybe it was Litsy and I was just curious despite the reservations. In any case, I’m glad I gave it a shot, even though I agree that I wasn’t bowled over by it.

First: I agree with Reynolds’ points that the word “like” serves a useful purpose in casual and spoken communications, for sure, and that those who really hate it often do so out of sexism and ageism because it’s associated with young women in particular (despite actually being fairly widespread).

However, I did find that Reynolds’ introduction rambled and went on a personal tangent several times, while the various chapters wandered around, visited anecdotes, went off into blind alleys, etc. This book is as much about Reynolds’ feelings about communicating as anything, and she admits she isn’t a linguist. So that’s worth knowing going in for a start: it’s rambly, with lots of personal stuff squeezed in so you know that she has a cousin who she doesn’t speak to anymore who said she talks too much in a rude way, etc, etc. You get to know way too much about her fear of being vulnerable and her interest in stuff like “radical candour”. This is a matter of personal taste — maybe you like this in your books, but I don’t. Or at least, I didn’t in this case, not least because I don’t think I’d get on with the author.

It’s also worth knowing that despite stating her fear about robotics and AI, Reynolds is all-in on AI. This bit was honestly just bizarre to read:

Despite the obvious and alarming implications AI software and machine learning carry, ChatGPT is a tool that can occasionally be useful. Embarrasingly, ChatGPT is a useful starting point for guidance in interpersonal situations that you’ve already talked through to death with every single one of your friends and anyone who will listen, so much so that by now the opinions of others have merged with your own. When a situation calls for true impartiality, AI is a neutral party with no skin in the game. If you ever find yourself in a position where you desperately and immediately need a list of suggestions on how to set and uphold boundaries, ChatGPT will deliver, providing useful information that answers the prompt in an objective manner. The results are serviceable and delivered in a tone devoid of personality or opinion.

It goes on, but I got tired of typing it out. That’s all the lead-in to her explaining that she tried to get ChatGPT to sound a bit more human, and when she prompted it to talk in a “valley girl” style, that’s when it did sound kinda human to her.That was apparently worth boiling the planet for, laying aside any other thoughts about how she completely doesn’t understand LLMs, which are explicitly programmed to be sycophantic, and which cannot offer you any kind of opinion on anything because they do not think, they are just glorified auto-complete — a glorification which she’s enthusiastically contributing to, apparently.

Just, overall, really weak — and weaker the more I think about it, since the main points would be more impactfully stated in a much, much shorter essay, with a lot of extra padding cut out. I should probably have DNFed it when I hit the LLM part, but… sunk cost fallacy, I guess?!

Rating: 1/5 (“disliked it”)

Tags: book reviews, books, linguistics, Megan C. Reynolds, non-fiction