Category: General

…And we’re back!

Posted October 20, 2023 by Nicky in General / 2 Comments

Did you miss me?!

Yep, unfortunately enough this blog has been down for almost a month, due to hosting problems. Many many (many many) thanks to Adam Wolf for taking over the hosting, making everything work, and having infinite patience with the fact that I’ve never really learned to manage my WordPress installation on my own. (And many thanks to my old host, of course, for taking me on for so long!)

We should be back in business right now, but some things might not quite work perfectly (like for now I won’t get notifications for your comments in my email). I have an enormous backlog of reviews, so I’m going to start putting those up at a sensible rate of one a day, and be pretty selective about which ones I choose to share.

Hope everyone’s doing great!

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Happy New Year!

Posted January 1, 2023 by Nicky in General / 4 Comments

Greetings, everyone!

I know, it’s been a long time since I showed my face around here, and I’m sorry. Everything got a bit too much, reading including. But I have a bunch of resolutions for the year ahead, and one is doing better by my blog and trying to reconnect with you all.

I don’t think I’ll be posting every review I write (some of them are brief; I’ve given myself permission to do that going forward) but I hope to post a selection of reviews where I have some (hopefully interesting) thoughts to share and books I wanna big up.

Hope to hear from you all, and spend some time visiting you all too!

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Wyrd and Wonder 2022

Posted May 1, 2022 by Nicky in General / 4 Comments

Wyrd & Wonder
Image credit: tree wolf image by chic2view on 123RF.com

Well, here we are again!

I know I’ve been missing from the blog for a while, due to some downtime caused by my host, and burnout on my part. I’m hoping I’m back, with a backlog of reviews to post, and the Wyrd & Wonder event to join in… especially now that I have full weekends off work, and a bit more time for myself. (Same number of hours, actually, but it still feels somehow like more time to myself.)

What will I be reading? Well, I don’t know. As usual, it’ll be “as my whimsy takes me”, but I’m planning on joining in the Fionavar Tapestry reread, and I have a few fantasy books on my BookSpinBingo card for May. I think there are some unposted fantasy reviews in my backlog, so I’ll queue those up to post soon, too.

But otherwise, I’m just here to hang out, and if I read plenty along the way — well, good.

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WWW Wednesday

Posted January 20, 2022 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

And here we are again, it’s Wednesday!

Cover of The Grey King by Susan CooperWhat are you currently reading?

I’ve just finished the only non-fiction book I had on the go, so now it’s The Councillor (E.J. Beaton), my reread of The Grey King (Susan Cooper), and The Absolute Book (Elizabeth Knox). I’ve been meaning to read the latter for quite a while now. It starts off feeling like a thriller, or maybe like Labyrinth (Kate Mosse), which it namechecks… but then it takes a left turn into fairyland, which feels like a significant shift in tone. I’m not sure yet what I think.

What have you recently finished reading?

Material Lives: Women Makers and Consumer Culture in the 18th Century (Serena Dyer), which feels quite academic — it’s talking to an audience that’s very comfortable with phrases like “while the affective resonance of the wedding doll is explicit”, which just reminds me of my English literature days and how really simple points can be obfuscated behind fancy word choices. Just… say what you mean. You mean it’s obvious that the wedding doll refers to an emotional event.

What will you be reading next?

Don’t know! Maybe I’ll take a look at what I’d have to read to get a second bingo line in the Litsy #BookSpinBingo challenge, or maybe I’ll reread Emily Tesh’s novellas, since my wife’s going to read them soon and I could use some bite-size reading.

How about you?

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WWW Wednesday

Posted January 12, 2022 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

Apparently it’s Wednesday again already? Rude. But here we go!

What are you currently reading?

Non-fiction: I’m still reading Chris Gosden’s The History of Magic, which I continue to have the same caveats and concerns about as before. “Ritual purposes” are doing a lot of work with just about every kind of archaeological find.

Fiction: I’m now reading E.J. Beaton’s The Councillor, and finding it very absorbing. People mentioned it being slow, so I was prepared for that, but it doesn’t feel unduly so to me. I found some of the phrasing awkward at first, the substitutions telling us we’re in a fantasy world felt a biiit too prevalent, but I’m finding that now I’m used to it, it all works. I can just sink in for pages and pages and not notice how time is passing.

Cover of Strange Beasts of China by Yan GeWhat have you recently finished reading?

The last thing I finished was Strange Beasts of China, by Yan Ge, which didn’t quite work for me — partly because it wasn’t what I expected, and partly because I had problems with what was explained and what wasn’t. Probably that’s partly my fault for being slow on the update, but I felt like I needed to make diagrams to understand bits of it…

I also just finished a reread of Susan Cooper’s Greenwitch, which I always like because it gives some space for Jane Drew to shine. Also the gorgeous descriptions in the chapter where Will and Merriman visit Tethys.

What will you be reading next?

I don’t really know for sure, but for #BookSpinBingo on Litsy I know I need to pick up The Absolute Book (Elizabeth Knox) and Money: The True Story of a Made-up Thing (Jacob Goldstein)! So they’ll be my next fiction and non-fiction reads respectively, most likely.

What about you, dear reader?

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WWW Wednesday

Posted January 5, 2022 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

Hey everyone! It’s been a while since I did this… but I missed it, I was just too tired out by life to pop in and say hi. So, how’s the reading going? Here’re my answers:

The Dark is Rising by Susan CooperWhat are you currently reading?

Fiction: a reread of The Dark is Rising, which just missed being perfectly seasonal, and which I’m almost done with, and Eliot Schrefer’s The Darkness Outside Us. The latter’s a little predictable, but I’m curious exactly how they’ll work it all out, and also about the romance.

Non-fiction: I’m reading Chris Gosden’s A History of Magic, but I’m constantly full of objections about the assumptions made about things we can’t possibly know. Like, people don’t need to be exploring a deep spiritual bond with animals to draw them: I do not have a deep spiritual bond with cats. I don’t even particularly like cats, I just have a particular stylised cat doodle I like to do and then label “Jorts”. And people don’t need to be trying to borrow the magic of animals to tattoo said animal onto their skin: few people are actually trying to do a magical spell when they tattoo Belle from Beauty and the Beast on their arm (though if it works to summon that library, I’ll do it). I find the descriptions of the archaeology fascinating, though.

What have you recently finished reading?

Nothing yet in 2022! But I did read quite a bit between Christmas and the New Year, including Murder After Christmas by Rupert Lattimer. It went on slightly too long and tried too hard to be quirky, but it was fun in its way.

Cover of Strange Beasts of China by Yan GeWhat will you read next?

I don’t know. Possibly Serena Dyer’s Material Lives, which is about (as per the subtitle) “Women Makers and Consumer Culture in the 18th Century”, which I’m quite curious about. Also, I should read Yan Ge’s Strange Beasts of China, since it’s a book club read.

How about you?

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SciFiMonth 2021

Posted October 24, 2021 by Nicky in General / 6 Comments

SciFiMonth 2021 (1-30 November): Words full of hope and threat, like the stars

ARTWORK by Liu Zishan from 123RF.com
QUOTE from Babylon’s Ashes by James S A Corey

Yep, it’s soon going to be SciFiMonth!

I’ve been doing crap at making time for reading, lately, and I don’t know if I’ll have time once November gets started — honestly, the Magic 8 ball of precedent tells me that signs point to no. But! I would like to participate a little, so here’s hoping I can maybe do some rereading of old favourites and novellas.

My main plan is to reread the Murderbot books by Martha Wells, and then read the latest, which is new to me. If I get that done, I’ll be happy.

Joining the crew?

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WWW Wednesday

Posted August 26, 2021 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

Cover of Magic Bleeds by Ilona AndrewsWhat are you currently reading?

I’ve gone back to my usual habits and I’m reading a couple of books at once: Pen Vogler’s Scoff, for a start, which is slower than I’d maybe expected. It’s all about food and class in Britain, and ye gods, I’d thought my family were snobs but my eyes are getting opened. Then there’s my reread of The Fellowship of the Ring, which feels very slow right now since I only just cleared the Council of Elrond.

Finally, I’m rereading the Kate Daniels series, and I’m now embarked upon book four, Magic Bleeds. I love how Kate and Curran are total idiots and need to communicate properly, yet it doesn’t frustrate me because it doesn’t feel contrived — they’re just that stupid, and carry such a boatload of issues each, that it makes sense things won’t just work between them.

Cover of The Jasmine Throne by Tasha SuriWhat have you recently finished reading?

The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri! I really need to sit down and write my review; I’m still sort of digesting it, I think. It felt so chunky and daunting, on the shelf, but it melted away when I sat down for my focused reading sessions each day. Very enjoyable, even though I tooootally called the big secret about Rao’s name.

Cover of Elatsoe by Darcie Little BadgerWhat will you be reading next?

Ooof, no idea. I recently reread The Goblin Emperor so I could start The Witness for the Dead while the details of the world were clear in my mind, so maybe that. Or Elatsoe, which is my next book club read. Or maybe one of the books I got for my birthday — The Chianti Flask looks like a good palate-cleanser in the way most of the British Library Crime Classics are.

How about you?

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Weekly Roundup

Posted August 21, 2021 by Nicky in General / 2 Comments

Yay, it was my birthday! I mean, um, hi! Look, I have books!

Books acquired:

Cover of The Sirens of Mars by Sarah Stewart Johnson Cover of Perfect Wives in Ideal Homes by Virginia Nicholson Cover of Curry by Lizzie Collingham

Cover of The Chianti Flask by Marie Belloc Lowndes Cover of Dead Dead Girls by Nekesa Afia Cover of Murder by the Book ed. Martin Edwards Cover of The Black Coast by Mike Brooks

All from my wife. 💙 I am a spoilt creature.

Read this week:

Cover of The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien Cover of Velvet Was The Night by Silvia Moreno Garcia

Reviews posted this week:

So how’s everyone doing? Any good books come your way lately?

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WWW Wednesday

Posted August 18, 2021 by Nicky in General / 0 Comments

What, me, doing my weekly update in a timely fashion?! Surely you jest.

Cover of The Jasmine Throne by Tasha SuriWhat are you currently reading?

Just two books! I know, it’s a shock — I didn’t intentionally cut down, really, I was just feeling pretty stressed and it happened by itself. So I’m halfway through Tasha Suri’s The Jasmine Throne, for a book club read. It’s a bit chunky-looking on the shelf, but I’ve been speeding through it when I sit myself down and focus.

I’m also now rereading The Fellowship of the Ring. I had a bit of an urge to read it, and I decided to just go with it — whims are good!

Cover of The Bone Wars by Erin EvanWhat have you recently finished reading?

The Hobbit, which is for me always the right place to start a Tolkien reread. It’s as cosy as ever (despite going some very un-cosy places), and I still love the narrative voice.

Before that, I DNF’ed The Bone Wars (Erin S. Evan) too soon to even review it (which I normally would) for being a bit too young-feeling and infodumpy.

Cover of Slippery Creatures by K.J. CharlesWhat will you be reading next?

That’s a bit of a mystery, as usual, but maybe not quite so much as usual. I’m really really hoping to get started on Scoff: a History of Food and Class in Britain by Pen Vogler, from my non-fiction pile, and Slippery Creatures by K.J. Charles from the fiction pile. However, I also want to reread the fourth Kate Daniels book soon, and the next Whyborne and Griffin book, and I’ve so far had 10 new books for my birthday, and(!) I want to work on reading more of the ARCs I’ve neglected.

So, um, probably still plenty of mystery.

Okay, now it’s your turn. What’re you reading?

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