Category: Reviews

Review – Badgerlands

Posted November 28, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Badgerlands by Patrick BarkhamBadgerlands, Patrick Barkham

A mostly interesting, mostly charming look at the twilight world of one of Britain’s iconic animals. It does a good job of going into the history of badgers and discussing why they’re seen as pests, when they started to be rehabilitated, even a little about one of Britain’s more famous badgers (the one from The Wind in the Willows, of course) and his author. It’s part natural history, part social history, and then veers into the modern problem of badger culling, etc.

Quite interesting, but I skipped some chapters because they didn’t interest me, and there was a slight tinge of superiority in Barkham’s attitude in some places.

Rating: 3/5

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Review – A Kiss Before the Apocalypse

Posted November 27, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 2 Comments

Cover of A Kiss Before the Apocalypse by Thomas SniegoskiA Kiss Before the Apocalypse, Thomas E. Sniegoski
Originally reviewed 10th April, 2011

Eighth book for the readathon in 2011. I was having to force myself to read the seventh book, but this was fun and absorbing, so I had no problems with falling asleep.

As might be predicted for me, I loved the references to Raymond Chandler (the detective is called Remy Chandler; his dog is Marlowe). I also loved the fact that in my head, Remy totally looked like Castiel from Supernatural, as portrayed by Misha Collins.

A Kiss Before the Apocalypse is basically the story of a sort-of-fallen angel who works as a private investigator, and who then finds himself caught up in investigating where the Angel of Death has got to and who wants to start the apocalypse. His closest sidekick is his dog, and not his cop friend, which was not what I expected — I wish supporting characters had been used better, actually. Francis and Lazarus were amazing. He should’ve used ’em and abused ’em.

The thing that I liked most was the relationship between him and his aged wife — given that, being an angel, he can’t age — and the tenderness between them, even when to outsiders she appears old enough to be his mother. I love Remy’s devotion to her.

Nothing amazingly special, but a fun (and quick) read.

Rating: 3/5

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Review – Illumicrate Box #1

Posted November 26, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Illumicrate is a new book box subscription service, mailing out four times a year, priced at £30 per box. The plan is for it to contain new releases, mostly young adult, and the first box went out in early November. It’s always really exciting to get mail, to me anyway, and especially when it’s a surprise. I haven’t signed up to a book subscription service before, though I’ve been tempted; I’m always a little unsure about whether the book is actually going to be something I’m interested in.

Well, with this box, the contents were the following:

The box itself looks gorgeous: the design is great — simple but distinctive. Everything was well packed, too. I was glad to get Wolf by Wolf — it’s a book I’ve been thinking about getting anyway, and now, well, I have it! The matching bookmark is nice, too: the design fits perfectly with the cover art, but it’s also attractive on its own.

The necklace is quite unique, made of wood with an engraved quotation from the Hunger Games series: “If we burn, you burn with us.” It looks a little odd in shape — I wouldn’t have realised what it was without the description — but I kind of like it anyway. Definitely unique. Harry Potter is not my thing, so someone else is going to get the benefit of the poster, but it’s nice enough that a fan should enjoy it. And the little mirror is cute; I don’t have much use for one, but if I did, it’d be one that talks about books.

I’m not 100% sure that Illumicrate is going to be my thing, since I’m not always a fan of popular YA, but I’m going to stay subscribed for now and see what the next box is like. I think it’s always going to be the problem with a subscription box that sometimes it just isn’t going to fit your interests. Illumicrate is beautiful and the first box was near-enough the target that I’m happy to see what’s next.

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Review – Catastrophes and Lesser Calamities

Posted November 26, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Catastrophes and Other Lesser Calamities by Tony HallamCatastrophes and Lesser Calamities, Tony Hallam

Cheerful title, I know. It’s about mass extinctions, in theory: not just the really iconic one at the K-T boundary (that’s the dinosaurs), but the end-Permian, and others that have been defined as extinctions, some in more detail than others. I was hoping it would focus on the causes of mass extinctions and the immediate effects on animals, but actually it included a lot of geology and didn’t spend that much time discussing specific extinctions — more like ways we can find those extinctions in the fossil record, and even to what extent we can call these events mass extinctions. (For example, by the time you reach the K-T boundary in the record, most dinosaurs were already extinct and the diversity of species was tailing off.)

It’s a little dry, but not a bad guide; I only really skimmed parts of it, because I know a lot of this info about geology. It is interesting to see some things that people think they know being examined and the foundations weakened, though.

Rating: 3/5

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Review – Ruddy Gore

Posted November 25, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Ruddy Gore by Kerry GreenwoodRuddy Gore, Kerry Greenwood

I wasn’t as caught up in this one as with some of the others — at least, not the mystery, though I am enjoying Phryne’s latest lover, Lin Chung. But the whole supernatural aspect is just thin to me, and the plot relies on the reader to make the same mistake as the characters, or it becomes rather obvious. I found bits of it contradictory — Phryne notices certain characters, but then doesn’t factor them into her understanding of what’s going on for far too long. And there’s the melodrama with the hints that perhaps there is a real ghost…

Not my favourite so far, but still compulsively readable, of course.

Rating: 3/5

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Review – The Mirror World of Melody Black

Posted November 24, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of The Mirror World of Melody Black by Gavin ExtenceThe Mirror World of Melody Black, Gavin Extence

I was excited to read The Mirror World of Melody Black, given that I found myself enjoying The Universe Versus Alex Woods more than I expected to. Reading the first 100 pages or so, I wasn’t sure if I really wanted to continue. See, the main character is bipolar, and her swings of mania and depression are really well written. I could see what was coming and wasn’t sure if I wanted to be along for the ride.

The thing is, when the main character is in a psychiatric ward, she and another character talk about it being an alternate world, and each person having their own portal to it. Basically, the turn you made that made everything go downhill. The thing that triggered the cycle. Getting better, she talks about seeing those portals and being able to avoid them. That struck a bit close — I have generalised anxiety disorder, and I’m constantly aware of the things I could do which might make me feel a little better, temporarily, but which could start me off on the whole rollercoaster of anxiety (where the only way seems to be down, and down, and down).

And around page 100, with the way Abby was behaving, I was a little worried this book was going to be one of those moments for me. Usually it’s a moment of stress in my life, or confronting a new situation. But really, I think I was just responding to Abby’s foreboding — and Extence’s. See, he finishes the book with a chapter in which he explains his own experience with mania. The chapters that I found uncomfortable were precisely the ones that made him uncomfortable and which embodied his experience the most. So yes, Mr Extence: you wrote something true. It worked.

If you’ve read this and don’t really understand the title, I have to wonder if it’s maybe because you don’t have that experience of those portals. You don’t know that a silly minor thing could constitute a left turn into another reality. The whole book, everything Abby does from the opening pages, it’s not really a story about finding her neighbour dead, being a journalist or dating when bipolar. It’s a story about that moment she takes the wrong turn and enters an alternate world, where logic stops working properly. Melody Black is important not particularly for herself, but because talking to her makes Abby realise these things. The ‘mirror world’ of the title is really Abby’s own head, when her manic phase is triggered, and Melody Black is just a symbol.

At least, that’s how I read it.

Rating: 5/5

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Review – The Seventh Bride

Posted November 23, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 9 Comments

Cover of The Seventh Bride by T. KingfisherThe Seventh Bride, T. Kingfisher
Recieved to review via Netgalley

I actually bought this initially, but the Netgalley page said something about it being an updated version, so I went for it. I originally picked it up for the promise of a heroic little hedgehog, and I was very happy with that aspect — the hedgehog is brave, helpful, clever, and funny. It can’t speak, so it communicates with the protagonist via miming and yes/no answers. It sounded so cute. I want one!

The story itself, aside from the hedgehogs, is a nice reimagining of a Bluebeard fairytale — but darker, really, because instead of death, the antagonist steals things of worth from the women he marries — their voices, their eyes, their ability to die — and leaves them alive. I found the tone somewhat at odds with the perceived historical/mythological time it was set in; the protagonist was too modern in thought and sensibility in some ways, it seemed. But overall, I found it very enjoyable, and I loved the way it treated the other characters. The other wives, for example, are each different, some very strange, and each of them copes with what has happened to them in a different way. As people do.

And, just to reiterate: hedgehog!

Rating: 4/5

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Review – Blood and Circuses

Posted November 22, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Blood and Circuses by Kerry GreenwoodBlood and Circuses, Kerry Greenwood

This is a nice change of pace for Phryne, taking her out of her element and putting her in the circus, where she isn’t automatically great at everything and people don’t automatically like her — some of her privilege of being a rich person gets stripped away, leaving the tough kid who grew up in poverty to deal with things. There’s a good bit of drama towards the end, which got a bit too much for my tastes in a cosy mystery (attempted rape, protagonist is left naked in a cage with large predator animals). I did like Jack’s involvement and trust in Phryne’s work, though, and the way he corrected the other policeman who was calling an intersex person “it”.

Also, Phryne’s men made me laugh this time when they both got in bed with her to cuddle her after her shock. They really didn’t protest very much!

The series remains easy to read and solidly entertaining; I’m getting through it at speed.

Rating: 4/5

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Review – Freaks of Nature

Posted November 21, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of Freaks of Nature by Mark BlumbergFreaks of Nature, Mark S. Blumberg

The title put me off this right away, the opening chapter helped somewhat because it promised to be more than a parade of curiosities, showing some sympathy and understanding, but ultimately I didn’t feel it did really manage to rise above that. There was a lot of reiteration about ‘circus freaks’, etc, and I don’t think it got past the novelty factor of such cases. There were some rather odd assertions — that the figure of Atlas could’ve been inspired by people with a developmental issue who ended up with a globe of brain matter sticking out from their shoulders, for example; it seems a rather ridiculous idea to me, and I couldn’t find anyone else saying the same thing. And saying Janus could’ve been inspired by cases where faces appear on both sides of the skull — maybe, but I think it more likely it’s a metaphorical depiction arising from what the god was said to do.

The science wasn’t particularly in depth or surprising. I don’t think anyone denies that developmental factors can be as important as genetics during gestation.

Rating: 1/5

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Review – War of the Flowers

Posted November 20, 2015 by Nicky in Reviews / 0 Comments

Cover of War of the Flowers by Tad WilliamsWar of the Flowers, Tad Williams
Originally reviewed 1st June, 2009

I read this book a long time ago — it was the first book by Tad Williams that I read — but never wrote a proper review for it. Both times I’ve read it I ate it up in about two days. The writing was pretty good — or it tasted good, anyway, from a synaesthete’s point of view — and the plot was interesting enough to draw me on and make me read it in great big chunks. There was something unmemorable about it, though. I have a pretty good memory, like my dad, and my dad is one of those guys who can tell you what happened in an obscure episode of the old series of Doctor Who that hardly anyone even remembers seeing. But I just didn’t really remember what happened in this book, so reading it again was actually mostly discovering things all over again.

One of the things I like a lot about the book is that it isn’t some great multi-volume epic with hundreds of characters. You stay focused on one main character throughout and don’t go off on too many tangents. Speculative fiction seems to, by default, come in trilogies, which drives me a little mad when I want a relatively simple/quick read. Unfortunately, this can be a bit of a pitfall, too. The War of the Flowers is pretty dense, and the main character, Theo Vilmos, is a bit slow and a bit of a jerk. He seems to sort of mean well, but he keeps saying and doing the wrong things.

There are some pretty awesome supporting characters — particularly Applecore, who is a little sprite with a foul mouth and a temper and, despite an odd soft spot for Theo, she calls him on his behaviour a lot. There’s a lot of other interesting characters, both good and bad, although some of them are more concepts than fully realised characters — for example, the Terrible Child.

There is also a lot of world-building packed into the book. Because parts of it rely on political machinations, there’s a lot of social/historical background packed in. It’s also complicated by the fact that Williams uses the old stories about Faerie, but his Faerie society is what we would consider to be more advanced: out of the medieval era into the world of “electricity”, etc. I liked the world he built quite a lot, although the obvious parallels with our modern world were somewhat intrusive. I don’t know how much it was intended to be a commentary on our world, but some parts felt rather pointed.

Overall, I think it could have been a shorter, slicker read, but I kind of liked the slow build. I’d say it’s just good summer holiday reading, but I know the first time I read it I read in the gaps between classes and so on, so it’s not something you can only stand if you settle down with it in the evenings or whatever. Depends how you read, I guess.

Rating: 4/5

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